Playoff Solutions Assuming they don’t replay the Bengals game.

[What a Tuel]

13 minutes ago, Warriorspikes51 said:

 

If KC remains the 1 seed....they get 2 weeks off

 

The 2 & 3 seed Bills & Bengals have to face  6 and 7 seeds coming off a bye week to prepare for them.....

 

This is a massive amount of upheaval because of 1 game.  Not a fan 

 

As opposed to eliminating teams from the playoffs or ceding the Chiefs the #1 seed by default? Who cares. Sometimes too much time off is a disadvantage.

 

It is the least bad solution. I don't know why people are getting pissy about bye weeks but ceding the bye week to the Chiefs...

[zow2]

24 minutes ago, HappyDays said:

The thing I don't like about this is the Bills and/or Bengals would have to play against a team coming off a bye on wildcard weekend.

 

Agreed. You just can’t have the Bills/Bengals playing a week 19 game while one of them maybe both have to play week 20, while the opponent is sitting with their feet up chillin, studying film and healing up.

 

I’d rather the Bills be awarded the 3 seed now and be able to play the New England game as they see fit.

 

 

 

[T.E.]

3 minutes ago, What a Tuel said:

 

As opposed to eliminating teams from the playoffs or ceding the Chiefs the #1 seed by default? Who cares. Sometimes too much time off is a disadvantage.

 

It is the least bad solution. I don't know why people are getting pissy about bye weeks but ceding the bye week to the Chiefs...

Do you honestly think it's fair for the Bills to play the Bengals in a Week 19 scenario, lose, then play a rested and healthy Ravens or Chargers team coming off a bye, even though we'd be the higher seed? This is a much worse scenario for the team than being forced to forfeit the Cincinnati game, to be honest.

[BigDingus]

28 minutes ago, HappyDays said:

The thing I don't like about this is the Bills and/or Bengals would have to play against a team coming off a bye on wildcard weekend.

 

That's still a better option than most. If the Bills win, they end up getting 2 weeks heading into the Divisional round anyway.

 

Sure, it's an inconvenience if they lose, but let's be real, the Bengals & the Bills are the only teams that reasonably should be inconvenienced by it. The minute the game was cancelled, the only teams that would ever have to makeup a game would be these 2. 

[billsfan5121]

Just now, Patrick Fitzryan said:

Do you honestly think it's fair for the Bills to play the Bengals in a Week 19 scenario, lose, then play a rested and healthy Ravens or Chargers team coming off a bye, even though we'd be the higher seed? This is a much worse scenario for the team than being forced to forfeit the Cincinnati game, to be honest.

I think what’s being overlooked is if KC, Buffalo, and Bengals win this weekend, bengals have no reason to play week 19, so they could rest and have their bye. Buffalo would seemingly win against backups and get their bye week 20. KC would now have their bye with the rest of the AFC, so essentially, the entire conference gets a bye but we get home field 

[What a Tuel]

3 minutes ago, Patrick Fitzryan said:

Do you honestly think it's fair for the Bills to play the Bengals in a Week 19 scenario, lose, then play a rested and healthy Ravens or Chargers team coming off a bye, even though we'd be the higher seed? This is a much worse scenario for the team than being forced to forfeit the Cincinnati game, to be honest.

 

Yes, its fair. The Ravens have to play a rested Bengals team this week for their division? If the most harm done is an extra bye week for some teams, then this is a good solution. 

 

The only other solution that doesn't have a "it's not fair" caveat is making Buffalo and Cinci play 2 games in the next 6 days which wait for it....isn't fair.

 

Affecting bye weeks is the least problematic option.

Edited January 4, 2023 by What a Tuel

[T.E.]

1 minute ago, billsfan5121 said:

I think what’s being overlooked is if KC, Buffalo, and Bengals win this weekend, bengals have no reason to play week 19, so they could rest and have their bye. Buffalo would seemingly win against backups and get their bye week 20. KC would now have their bye with the rest of the AFC, so essentially, the entire conference gets a bye but we get home field 

If Cincinnati beat us in this hypothetical game, they would get the #2 seed and avoid a possible trip to Buffalo in the playoffs. They'd definitely be playing to win there.

[The Frankish Reich]

2 minutes ago, billsfan5121 said:

I think what’s being overlooked is if KC, Buffalo, and Bengals win this weekend, bengals have no reason to play week 19, so they could rest and have their bye. Buffalo would seemingly win against backups and get their bye week 20. KC would now have their bye with the rest of the AFC, so essentially, the entire conference gets a bye but we get home field 

IF it played out that way, it would be a good result - as fair as can be hoped for under the circumstances. (Visions of losing to the Steelers backups in my head and all that)

[Dick_Cheney]

37 minutes ago, HappyDays said:

The thing I don't like about this is the Bills and/or Bengals would have to play against a team coming off a bye on wildcard weekend.

The possibility of the Chiefs getting 2 weeks off strikes me as.....disgusting lol.

[May Day 10]

1 minute ago, Patrick Fitzryan said:

If Cincinnati beat us in this hypothetical game, they would get the #2 seed and avoid a possible trip to Buffalo in the playoffs. They'd definitely be playing to win there.

 

Im not sure how much teams value the difference between #2 and #3 when it compares to rest and preservation of health.  Didnt the Bills rest starters a few years ago in this situation?  (My memory is hazy)

[What a Tuel]

8 minutes ago, billsfan5121 said:

I think what’s being overlooked is if KC, Buffalo, and Bengals win this weekend, bengals have no reason to play week 19, so they could rest and have their bye. Buffalo would seemingly win against backups and get their bye week 20. KC would now have their bye with the rest of the AFC, so essentially, the entire conference gets a bye but we get home field 

 

Last year the Bengals rested their starters to get 4th seed instead of 3rd seed and effectively avoided the Chiefs until the AFCCG. 

 

No such luck for them this year unless they get #1 seed, so they will look to get homefield advantage.

4 minutes ago, May Day 10 said:

 

Im not sure how much teams value the difference between #2 and #3 when it compares to rest and preservation of health.  Didnt the Bills rest starters a few years ago in this situation?  (My memory is hazy)

 

I looked at this a little while ago and 2020 we played the Dolphins with our starters and obliterated them for the 1st half. We were contesting with the Steelers for 2nd/3rd seed.

 

Last year we played our starters against the Jets because the Chiefs played Denver and if they lost and we won we'd have had the 2nd seed. Denver almost beat them if it wasn't for a Melvin Gordon fumble if i remember correctly.

Edited January 4, 2023 by What a Tuel

[May Day 10]

I thought that Miami game was supposed to have 2nd stringers and it was a question of when the starters would be pulled.... and they pulled a lot of players at half time?  I think Pittsburgh also rested starters 

 

Looking at the box score, Antonio Williams had more rushes than the rest of the RBs combined.  Diggs did have 7 catches though.

 

It was 28-6 at half time....   And the Dolphins were favored by 3.5?

Edited January 4, 2023 by May Day 10

[The Frankish Reich]

Q. What have we learned in 57 pages of discussion here?

A. No solution is perfect. In fact there are big problems with every proposal. 
 

In hindsight, the NFL should have had a rule for dealing with game cancellations that can’t be made up (based on league determination). No, we fortunately haven’t seen this particular situation before. But let’s say 9/11 had happened on 1/1 and the Jets/Giants couldn’t play and the game couldn’t be moved before the playoffs. Or that some Storm of the Century shut down Week 18 from Chicago to Boston. Or that 90% of some team tested positive for COVID ahead of Week 18. People don’t react well to after-the-fact fixes. They don’t mind if the plan was in place and known to all teams ahead of the event. 

 

I say no contest/coin flip if two teams are tied in the loss column after Week 18 concludes. We can create all kinds of fancy fixes that won’t satisfy people anyway. The Bills didn’t “forfeit”; the league canceled the game. For all I know  the “atmospheric river” crossing California may inundate Las Vegas on Sunday and cause the Chiefs game to be canceled. The fix for a random occurrence altering an expected scenario is usually a random method for assigning a winner. Coin flip and be done with it. 

 

Edited January 4, 2023 by The Frankish Reich

[CorkScrewHill]

A little bit of a different concept

 

week 18 plays out . If all 3 win, chiefs top seed, Bengals2, Bills 3 - but the Bills get the bye in the wild card round. Gives the Bills a chance to recover and gives the Bengals and Chiefs homefield for the divisional round. Nothing will be totally fair but this makes it as fair as can be without replaying the Bengals game

[Rochesterfan]

2 minutes ago, The Frankish Reich said:

Q. What have we learned in 57 pages of discussion here?

A. No solution is perfect. In fact there are big problems with every proposal. 
 

In hindsight, the NFL should have had a rule for dealing with game cancellations that can’t be made up (based on league determination). No, we fortunately haven’t seen this particular situation before. But let’s say 9/11 had happened on 1/1 and the Jets/Giants couldn’t play and the game couldn’t be moved before the playoffs. Or that some Storm of the Century shut down Week 18 from Chicago to Boston. Or that 90% of some team tested positive for COVID ahead of Week 18. People don’t react well to after-the-fact fixes. They don’t mind if the plan was in place and known to all teams ahead of the event. 

 

I say no contest/coin flip if two teams are tied in the loss column after Week 18 concludes. We can create all kinds of fancy fixes that won’t satisfy people anyway. The Bills didn’t “forfeit”; the league canceled the game. For all I know  the “atmospheric river” crossing California may inundate Las Vegas on Sunday and cause the Chiefs game to be canceled. The fix for a random occurrence altering an expected scenario is usually a random method for assigning a winner. Coin flip and be done with it. 

 

 

They do have rules that have been posted in this thread.

 

The issue is the rules state they need to do everything to play the game if possible if it could provide an advantage to other teams.  Hence why the NFL is looking at various options.

 

They must explore options before working with everyone on a solution that per Vincent may not be equitable.

 

Additionally - they adopted Covid rules to deal with unequal number of games played - switching from record to winning percentage to determine seeding.

 

None of these have been used, but they are part of the discussion on figuring this out.

 

Ideally for the NFL is to get the game in, but they will get a huge amount of pushback from the NFLPA and the 2 teams trying to shoehorn in a Bills Bengals game.

 

 

[The Frankish Reich]

9 minutes ago, Rochesterfan said:

Additionally - they adopted Covid rules to deal with unequal number of games played - switching from record to winning percentage to determine seeding.

Thanks for pointing out the existing rules. But as you note, there isn’t one for “game cannot be played at all.”

 

Unthinking adherence to “try to act as if everything is back to normal” usually brings the worst results. I remember the Broncos having their entire QB room barred based on 2020 COVID protocols. Yes, kind of their fault. But it resulted in a joke of a game with WR Kendall Hinton playing QB and completing 1 pass for 13 yards in a New Orleans blowout. This made a mockery of the product on the field. If they’d just forfeited tickets would’ve been refunded; the Saints wouldn’t have gotten one tainted win. Acting like “we’ll play the games as scheduled or the closest we can” was the worst solution. 
 

Likewise the 1987 strike season played (for 3 games) by “replacement players” in games the NFL insisted would count. Trying to maintain the status quo resulted in a farce. 
 

Compare the 1981 MLB season, divided in rough halves by a strike. The league decided there’d be a first half winner in each division and a second half winner. Those teams went to the playoffs. An after-the-fact solution, but nobody harps on the Dodgers WS win as illegitimate today. (The Reds fans do a little, since overall they had the best record in the NL West but didn’t make the playoffs at all under the new rule. Nobody cares except them)

 

And the NBA COVID “bubble” season was fantastic. Every season should be as short and intense. The NHL version was kinda ok if I remember correctly. 
 

The point: try to maintain general fairness and strive toward putting the best product on the field even if that

means deviating from the standard more  than some of the alternatives. 

[stlbills13]

There are no solutions that will be completely fair but that suggestion is horrendous 

[Motor26]

Honestly the easiest solution is to just call Bills Bengals a no-contest. Sucks cuz it pretty much hands the Chiefs the 1 seed but eventually they need to just move on from this game. 

[Airseven]

The easiest solution isn't the proper solution. The game should be finished for the sake of competitive integrity. The season still matters. At this point, several reasonable scenarios have been offered to get it played in the next two weeks.

[The Frankish Reich]

1 minute ago, Motor26 said:

Sucks cuz it pretty much hands the Chiefs the 1 seed

Only if the Bills/Chiefs both win this weekend, and only if win percentage is the deciding factor. I say it should be a tie if they’re tied in the loss column and a coin flip should decide who gets the #1 seed. It’s actually good that all 3 teams involved are clear playoff teams already. The only thing at issue is seeding, and given that the NFL canceled one game, there’s no clear rationale for going by win percentage. You might as well say “when teams are tied in the loss column, the tiebreaker is head-to-head record.” Coin flip!