Maybe this season ends the same way as last season, as so many other recent seasons have: With the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl. It’s certainly probable, if not likely. But if the 2017 NFL season has taught us anything, it’s that this sport can be weeeeeird.
OK, so the Patriots are back in the playoffs. No surprise there, must be a year that starts with 2-0. The Steelers are in too, as NFL law decrees. The Chiefs made it back in for a third straight year and the Falcons overcame all those memes to elbow their way through.
After that? No Packers, no Seahawks, no Cowboys, just eight teams that weren’t playing January last year. And nearly half of those teams, we still kinda can’t believe they’re in. The Rams? The Jaguars? The Buffalo-freakin’-Bills?!?!
When the season started, we never could have predicted this is version of the playoffs we’d get. And that’s GLORIOUS.
These are some of the stories of how we ended up with this particular playoff picture, either how teams found their way in or how they found themselves clearing out their lockers on New Year’s.
The Patriots snatched the top AFC seed from the Steelers (with a little help from the refs).
This wasn’t the only reason the Steelers lost that Week 15 game to the Patriots, but it was the most crucial call. This Jesse James play was initially ruled a touchdown catch, but it was overturned on review.
That’s awfully close, and we’re not sure it’s indisputable. If the catch had stood, the Steelers would have taken a 31-24 lead with less than 30 seconds to play. Then Ben Roethlisberger threw an ill-advised slant two plays after the non-touchdown that was intercepted by the Patriots in the end zone. That essentially locked up the top seed in the AFC and home-field advantage throughout the playoffs for New England.
The Saints drafted their way into the postseason.
The Saints bounced back after an 0-2 start to show that this wouldn’t be another mediocre 7-9 season, and a big reason for that was how they cleaned up in the draft.
Alvin Kamara has proven to be one of the best picks of anyone from the 2017 NFL draft. Along with Mark Ingram, Kamara has turned the Saints’ backfield into one of the most fearsome in the NFL.
One first-round pick, tackle Ryan Ramczyk, has played in every game as a rookie. The other, No. 11 pick Marcus Lattimore, could be the Defensive Rookie of the Year. With Lattimore at cornerback and second-rounder Marcus Williams at safety, the secondary has transformed from the worst in the NFL to No. 11 in yards allowed.
These players, along with others from recent drafts like Michael Thomas, Sheldon Rankins, and Cam Jordan, have helped breathe new life into the Sean Payton-Drew Brees era in New Orleans.
Colin Kaepernick didn’t get signed, but what if he did?
It was evident early on that Kaepernick wasn’t going to get another shot in the NFL. But there were teams out there that certainly could have used his help. The Ravens missed out on the playoffs, by one game, in a year where Joe Flacco struggled early.
The Broncos were worse off than the Ravens, and never had even a glimmer of hope at quarterback all season. Despite having the NFL’s third-best defense, Trevor Siemian, Paxton Lynch, and Brock Osweiler couldn’t produce offensively, leading to a 5-11 season.
Houston looked like a contender with Deshaun Watson at quarterback, until he tore his ACL in practice on Nov. 2. The team wasn’t even a speed bump for the rest of the season Tom Savage at quarterback, surprise.
Without Carson Wentz, the Eagles are staring at a Divisional round exit. A lot of pages in the playbook that are off limits with Nick Foles would still be fair game if they had brought in Kaepernick as a backup early in the season.
Aaron Rodgers’ broken collarbone played a big impact.
Aaron Rodgers was off to his best start in years, 13 touchdowns and just three picks in five games. The Packers were 4-1, leading the Vikings by one game in the NFC North ahead of their Week 6 showdown. He managed four passing attempts in that game before a big hit from Anthony Barr broke his collarbone.
Minnesota won the game, grabbed the division lead and never looked back. Rodgers ended up on injured reserve. The Packers brought him the shelf in Week 15 to salvage what was left of their Wild Card hopes, but the Panthers put a stop to that.
It’s just the second time in his career that Rodgers will miss the playoffs. Meanwhile, in Minnesota, the Vikings have an air of destiny about them. They’re arguably the best team in the NFC, led by career backup QB Case Keenum who’s playing like Rodgers, and they have a real shot at playing a home game for the Super Bowl.
Case Keenum emerged as an unlikely MVP candidate.
Keenum needs to sign an endorsement deal with AllState; no one in the NFL proved the value of insurance more than the Viking quarterback. The fifth-year passer came to Minnesota as the team’s third option at quarterback less than a year removed from a 4-5 season as Jared Goff’s placeholder with the Rams. Ongoing knee issues for both Sam Bradford and Teddy Bridgewater pushed Keenum into the starting lineup, and he delivered with an exceptionally efficient 2017.
The Vikings went 11-3 in his 14 starts, as he posted career highs in touchdown passes, passing yards, and quarterback rating. A powerful defense helped push the team to its second NFC North title in three years.
The Rams and Eagles made it a point to get Jared Goff and Carson Wentz weapons this offseason, and it worked.
The Rams’ 2016 season was a disaster for many reasons, but if we focus on the field, there was clearly a lack of talent. They signed Andrew Whitworth, who was considered the best offensive lineman in free agency to help protect Goff, and it worked. They brought in Sammy Watkins, and drafting Cooper Kupp provided Goff with a couple of reliable targets that pushed him to a 3,804-yard season through the air with 28 touchdowns.
For Wentz, the Eagles picked up Alshon Jeffery and Torrey Smith. Little did they know, Nelson Agholor would have a resurgent season after having a nightmare rookie campaign, and played a big part in the offense. They also signed LeGarrette Blount, and would later trade for Jay Ajayi giving the Eagles a backfield so powerful it would finish the regular season third in rushing yards per game. Wentz of course, would get hurt, but the Eagles are as stacked as can be in hopes that Nick Foles can keep the train going.
The Jaguars fired Gus Bradley and brought Tom Coughlin back to Jacksonville.
The Jaguars were pegged as a sleeper team in each of the last few offseasons by eager analysts who wanted to be the first on the hype train. But with Gus Bradley coaching the team for close to four seasons, the team was 14-48.
Bradley finally got fired after Week 15 in the 2016 season and voila, the Jaguars looked good under interim coach Doug Marrone for two games. It was enough to get Marrone the gig for real and when Jacksonville brought back former coach Tom Coughlin to be executive vice president, they were really cooking with gas.
Instead of Bradley’s focus on “just getting better,” Coughlin made it clear that winning was the only priority for the Jaguars.
When asked if winning is the goal- Tom Coughlin gave an answer that only Tom Coughlin could give.#Jaguars #lunch pic.twitter.com/xsaZoqTyvZ
— Alyssa Lang (@AlyssaLang) January 12, 2017
With Calais Campbell, A.J. Bouye, and Leonard Fournette, among others, added to the fold in the 2017 offseason, the Jaguars finally turned the corner and became the bullies of the AFC South to earn a division title for the first time since 1999.
The Chargers cut kicker Josh Lambo right before the season started.
In their inaugural season in L.A., the Chargers bounced back from an 0-4 start to finish 9-7, the same record as the AFC’s two wild card teams. With just one more win, the Chargers could have overtaken the Titans or Bills and made it to the playoffs. But one kicker decision potentially cost them three wins.
During final roster cuts in September, the Chargers released Josh Lambo, who had been their kicker for the past two seasons. He hit 81.3 percent of his field goals both seasons, an OK number, but nothing that great. Still, Lambo was the incumbent and favorite to win the job again, until a late preseason push from rookie Younghoe Koo meant Lambo had to find a new team.
In the Chargers’ first game, Koo missed a kick against the Broncos that would have sent the game to overtime. In the Chargers’ second game, it got even more cringeworthy when Koo missed a game-winning field goal against the Dolphins with five seconds.
Then in November, well after Koo was released, the Chargers faced the Jaguars and guess who their 95 percent-making field goal kicker is this season? Lambo, who ended up making the game-winning kick in overtime.
The Chargers cycled through four kickers and ended up with, by far, the worst field goal percentage in the league. So unsurprisingly, one of their big tasks this offseason is finding a kicker. And hopefully not cutting him.
The Falcons changed the NFC race with Adrian Clayborn’s six-sack game.
Muddling along at 4-4, it looked like the Atlanta Falcons had a nasty Super Bowl hangover, and no amount of Alka-Seltzer was going to get them back to the postseason. And then the Cowboys came to town for a Week 10 showdown (a game colored by the Jerry Jones vs. Arthur Blank spat over Roger Goodell’s contract).
Dallas was 5-3 before that game, but they didn’t have left tackle Tyron Smith that week. Adrian Clayborn pounced on Smith’s hapless replacements with an inspired Hoss the Week-winning, six-sack performance.
The Cowboys point to that game as the moment their season changed. It was the first of three straight losses that, in the end, kept them from a Wild Card. The Falcons’ Wild Card came down to their Week 17 game, but it wouldn’t have gotten to that point had they not beat the Cowboys in Week 10.
Andy Dalton throws the most-clutch touchdown of his life.
In the NFL, sometimes one game, one play can send ripples throughout the entire league. Facing fourth down with less than a minute to play in the Bengals’ season finale against the Ravens, Andy Dalton — one of the the most “oh yeah, him” quarterback in the NFL — cemented himself Bills lore by throwing beauty of a pass to Tyler Boyd, who found an angle and headed all the way home for the game-winning score.
With that one play, Dalton sent the Bills to the playoffs, breaking the longest active postseason drought in North American sports. He eliminated the Ravens from the playoffs. He raised six figures for his foundation, courtesy of grateful Bills fans.
Heck, he might be the reason Marvin Lewis is still the head coach of the Bengals.