I have my own win-lose thoughts for the rest of the Jets schedule and the "Home Game" against the Giants is one that I can't get a feeling for. The way I have the season playing out, Giants game is huge for Jets, that's all.
I think Buffalo, Oakland, Tennessee and Pittsburgh are all threats to win 10+ games. Only two of them have to do it to make the Jets road to the playoffs very dicey. We got lucky in 2002 and 2009. We're probably going to have to get lucky again in 2011 and Lady Luck doesn't all dance with the same partners. This year is going to be strange because of all the teams trying to lose out at the end. If the NFL is ever going to have a year where an 11-5 team misses the playoffs this is it.
The problem with comparing this to 02 or 09 is even though we were lucky in both instances, we had teams that were playing significantly better football. The 09 team had a great running attack and the No. 1 D in the league and backed in. The 02 team was going nowhere until we put a healthy Pennington in. Pennington before his injuries in 02 was miles better than Sanchez. The guy had a great 3/4 of a year and we still backed into the division that year.
I've never had any concerns about the AFC in general, im only worried about the bills, we gotta win those two games man
The only thing we need to worry about is getting to 10 wins. Only 4 teams in the AFC with 10-6 or better record have missed the playoffs in the past 10 years. 10 wins gets you to the playoffs much more often then not. People incorrectly analyze this stat all the time. As an example, last year the Jets were the 6 seed at 11-5. That DOES NOT mean that a 10-6 team would not make the playoffs. Quite the contrary, the Jets and Ravens could have both made the playoffs at 9-7 or even 8-8 last year. To say a 10-6 team would not have made it last year is injecting a fictitious team into the standings, which you can not do, because for every win for one team is a loss for another, and in turn further alters the standings. The fact of the matter is that out of 21 wide card spots (2001 had three wild cards) in the last 10 years only four teams missed out at 10-6 or better. 10 Wins? Well we have 3, so we only need 7 more. Out of 4 Division games remaining, 3 Vs. AFCW, and 3 Vs. NFCE we can only have 3 losses. This makes no game "a do or die" until we are at 6 losses. Does beating SD make our chances better? Hell yeah, but to write off the season with a loss is silly. Just get to 10 wins and we in all likelihood will make the playoffs. After that, we know what to do.
Refer to my above post about historically getting into the playoffs at 10-6 in the AFC. Furthermore the only time in the past ten years a 11-5 AFC team missed the playoffs the AFC was 34-29-1 against the NFC. The NFC has a lot of good teams this year and is currently up on the series (AFC)7-(NFC)9. I have a distinct feeling this trend will continue. Wins in intra-conference games by the NFC take wins out of the AFC playoff picture. Basically for there to be a 10-6 or even 11-5 team not making the playoffs you have to have an overall edge in the intra-conference games, and a few other conditions. These conditions include a very bad division winner winning the division with 8 or 9 games. (Last time 11-5 didn't make it, SD won the division at 8-8) I do not see that at all this year as each division winner should have 10+ winning games. The other condition is a large amount of teams who end up substantially under .500 within the conference. Considering that 12 out of the 16 teams are at, or one game within .500 that also does not look likely. The more "contenders" there are the more likely 9-7 gets you in the playoffs (because everyone is beating each other). In conclusion, 10-6 will very likely get you in the playoffs, plain and simple. All we have to do is focus on getting to 10 wins.
This is not a normal year. Miami and Indy are both real threats to go 0-16 since they don't play each other. Miami plays Buffalo twice, Oakland and New England. Indy plays Tennessee twice, Baltimore, Houston and New England. That's 9 games against our competitors that are pretty likely to go 9-0 in their favor. Then you have the Andrew Luck Wanna-gets who don't really have a shot at him but will probably tank anyway trying. Right now that's Jacksonville. Jacksonville plays Houston twice, Baltimore, San Diego and Tennessee. That's another 5 games against our competitors for the wildcard or 14 total so far from teams trying to lose the season. I think 11 wins is what you need to get to the playoffs this year if you're the Jets given that we've already lost to Baltimore, Oakland and New England. The one thing in our favor is that partly due to the plethora of really bad records so far in the AFC all of the divisions look pretty competitive at this point. That means for the time being we don't have to worry about Baltimore laying down for Cincinnati in week 17 to avoid injuries or Tennessee resting people against Houston (or vice-versa) or San Diego against Oakland. If any of those divisions is won by a 12-3 team going into week 17 we've got problems though because team #2 is going to catch a massive break as they try to get their 10th or 11th win.
Refer to my above posts. A lot of what you are stating is not mathematically feasible. More "competitors" = more likely a 9-7 record gets in. 11-5 only doesn't get in when you have a lot of very bad teams (record wise), a lot of very good teams (record wise) in same conference, have that conference win more intra-conference games then the other, and usually have a poor record wise division winner, shifting a playoff spot to someone with a worse record then potential wild cards. NFC is up on the AFC, there are actually a lot of teams "in the middle" (atleast at this point in the season) and no division looks to be won by a 9-7 or 8-8 team. Wins and losses are a Zero Sum Game, for every win, there is a loss. This is to say a lot of what people are saying is just statistically not very likely.
Definitely a toss up, but if you made me pick.. I would probably say the Jets, I think they are going to surprise a lot of fans in the coming weeks.
