A Look Ahead to the NFL Divisional Round

When handicapping games, we are always looking for a connection between the past and the present. We call them trends. Here are a few examples:

Official Shawn Hochuli loves the Kansas City Chiefs and hates the Buffalo Bills. Hochuli has been a lead official for six seasons, and the Bills are 1-3 in those games, calling 64% more penalties against the Bills. Meanwhile, the Chiefs are 8-2 in games Hochuli has officiated. 

 

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Can Jordan Love can beat the Cowboys and 49ers in back-to-back weeks in the playoffs? No team has defeated both the Cowboys and 49ers in a single playoff campaign.

The Packers just became the first #7 seed to win a playoff game. The previous #7 seeds were 0-7 SU.

The #6 and #7 seeds are 16-14-1 ATS in the Divisional Round or later since 2004. 

And there are a ton more. Some related to weather, some related to the betting line, how teams have played in the past going back twenty years when the players playing in the game weren’t even born. Some are useful, some are meaningless, and some are not connected, allowing bias to enter our decisions. 

When we make a connection using random trends or past patterns of outcomes, we are prone to fall into a bias known as Apophenia—the propensity to mistakenly detect patterns or connections between unrelated events, objects, or occurrences.

Does Hochuli really hate the Bills and love the Chiefs? I’m not buying that one. Is it impossible to beat the Cowboys and 49ers back-to-back? Difficult, not impossible.  What must occur as we prepare for handicapping the Divisional Round is to follow the old Joe Friday rule from the television show Dragnet, “Just the facts.”  I’m not interested in making a connection from the past to the present. I only handicap what I know. 

Facts about the games…starting with…

Houston at Baltimore

Houston has been a big-play offense all season. Their ability to strike quickly, with a one-play drive for a score or under four plays, has been the strength of their offense. Can they create big plays against a team that doesn’t allow big plays? Without the big play, can the Texans score more than the 19 points they average on the road? I don’t think so. 

The Texans cannot run the ball effectively, gaining only 809 yards on the ground in their eight road games. When they get to the red zone without a run game, they tend to settle for field goals, as they rank 19th overall in red zone percentage of touchdowns, which is why the Under has been falling all week. 

Laying the 9.5 seems like a good play, considering the Texans are playing better than they did in the opener when they lost 25-9. I’m not sure that is a good connection. For the Texans to cover, they must make explosive plays. They cannot fall behind, and they need to avoid a drop-back pass game—all of which will be a huge hurdle for them to climb. 

Green Bay at San Francisco

There is a prevailing belief the 49ers defense is on par with the 1985 Bears, the 2000 Ravens, and the 2002 Tampa Bay Bucs. In part, that is true, especially when they face bad teams with no quarterbacks. The numbers become a little different when they face good offensive coaches and good quarterbacks. The Vikings threw for 378 yards, the Bengals threw for 266, the Cardinals ran for 234, the Rams threw for 297 and Baltimore threw for 241.

They are not invincible when they face a well-coached offense who understands their scheme and attacks their adjustments. What makes them a good defense is when they play from in front and make the other team drop back to pass, which allows their defensive line to take over the game. 

Green Bay is one of the best pass-blocking offensive lines. They have young, athletic wide receivers and a quarterback who can make every throw. The fact is simple: both teams can score points and move the ball, and what has to be removed from our thinking is how Green Bay played versus the Bucs and Giants earlier this season. Those games are meaningless. Green Bay is playing more like a #4 seed than a #7, so the connection between #7 seeds and winning is not real. 

Another fact, and perhaps the difference in the outcome, is the 49ers will run the ball on the Packers. Kyle Shanahan will use different formations to challenge the Packers’ run fits, causing them to be displaced. The 49ers will have balance and operate with a CFL mindset of getting first downs in two downs. Shanahan knows he needs to keep the Packers offense off the field and slow the game down, which will be hard.  I expect points and for the Packers to run out of gas in the fourth quarter. 

Tampa Bay at Detroit

The Bucs scored nine points vs. the Panthers in a must-win game. They got dominated at home by the Saints. Then they destroyed a bad Eagle team, which makes everyone forget how the Lions manhandled them in Tampa in Week 6. 

The Bucs are not a good run team no matter how many metrics you examine. Yes, they ran the ball well on Philadelphia, but at that point of their season, the Birds wouldn’t have been able to slow down the Michigan Wolverines. This game will become a one-dimensional game, all pass, and do you trust Baker Mayfield in a 40 plus pass game? I don’t. 

The Lions will be prepared for the blitz, unlike the Eagles. Placing Goff under pressure in the past was the formula, but not anymore. He has become better at speeding up his game, getting the ball out, and making big plays. Bucs head coach Todd Bowles will mix and match the pressure, not relying on one method. Brian Flores of the Vikings attempted to blitz Goff, which didn’t work, and Bowles will use his pressure package in a timely fashion.

The Bucs will need to play their best game of the season to win. Don’t allow the Eagles game to fool you. Teams on short rest in the playoffs facing teams who are not in the same position are 5-12 SU and 7-10 ATS over the last 20 years. The outcome has nothing to do with who is rested and everything to do with trusting Mayfield to throw it 40 times on the road.

Kansas City at Buffalo

Can we ignore all the nonsense about Patrick Mahomes playing his first road playoff game? It’s a stupid narrative. Winning two Super Bowls offsets everything and anything.  

The Chiefs moved the ball in the first game. The only problem was they never had the ball. The Chiefs had 62 plays averaged 6.2 per play, and outgained the Bills. They main problem was what has been their main problem all season—no big plays.

In their last game, the Chiefs had three plays over 20 yards: one for 23, one for 22, and another for 20. Kansas City can win the game if they can make 2 explosive plays over 30 yards as the beat-up Bills defense will struggle to stop the underdog Mahomes, who, over the last few weeks, has been more willing to take what the defense gives him and operate within the framework of the offense. 

The connection everyone makes with Joe Brady taking over the offense for the Bills isn’t a fact. They have run the ball more effectively than when Ken Dorsey called plays, in part because since they were 5-5 and their season was on the brink, they had to infuse Josh Allen into the offensive run game, especially near the goal line where he has 15 touchdown runs. His 57 first downs running are the most of his career, and his successful runs at 65.8 are also a career-best.

Allen is hard to control in the run game and even hard to tackle. The officials have a hard time officiating his game, much like Shaq in basketball, as they give him a long whistle in the pocket, and every close hit becomes a personal foul. He has been the difference in the Bills offense since Week 10. 

It’s hard for me to back a wounded Bills team in a game that features Mahomes as an underdog when he is 8-1-1 in that role.

Focus on the facts, don’t assume a connection, and enjoy the games. 

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