In the highly anticipated matchup of Bengals-Bills in the Divisional Round, Cincinnati earned the resounding 27-10 victory by being the more physical team up front and crafting gameplans on both sides of the ball that were more effective at attacking the weaknesses of their opponents. Let’s break down what exactly they did from a schematic perspective!
NFL All-Rookie Team 2022/23:
Since I managed to predict five or six Wildcard games correctly and therefore already broke down all but one of the Divisional Round matchups in my preview of the full 2023 playoffs, I decided to once again put together my all-rookie team at this point, where I fill out a full starting lineup of 11 offensive and defensive players each, along with a group of four specialists. I listed seven key backups on each side of the ball, plus three more honorable mentions, who largely didn’t get a chance to put together a full body of work, along with a couple of names who I thought deserved to be mentioned.
For the purposes of this list, I only considered regular season performance. If I felt compelled to do so, I may have mentioned what a couple of these players did in the Wildcard Round, but it’s not taken into account in terms of the players I chose.
Here’s my squad:
Predicting the full 2023 NFL playoffs:
With Super Wildcard Weekend upon us, it was time for me to give you my full predictions, leading all the way up to Super Bowl LVII. I analyze all 14 teams, break down each matchups schematically and give my reasoning for who I think advances.
Of course the very first thing I saw once I finished recording were the news on Dolphins QB Tua Tagovailoa already being ruled out for this weekend. So a couple of my thoughts on him are irrelevant for now, but it doesn’t really change anything.
Most dominant elements of the 2022/23 NFL Playoffs:
I struggled to just let this write-up flow as I was typing it up, once I had collected all the information, due to the remaining uncertainty about the health of Bills safety Damar Hamlin. This is a major challenge for all parties involved and what actually happens on the field seems secondary right now, but NFL life goes on and maybe just talking some ball will be welcome change for people, who don’t quite know how to deal with all of this. Plus, we’re continuing to get positive news about the young man, thankfully. I actually couldn’t state some things definitely, as it pertains to the effect of remaining regular season games on the final playoff picture.
There’s one more week left in the 2022 regular season, to finalize the playoff picture and upcoming matchups, along with whatever the NFL does with the Bills-Bengals matchup. Before we get into those and the specific X’s and O’s, I wanted to look at all the teams in the running and talk about the ten biggest strengths or most dangerous elements across them. All but one of these groups associated with them have already clinched a playoff spot, along with the Dolphins, who will host the Jets in basically a pick’em this Sunday and need a win in combination with the Bills beating the Patriots – a matchup that still brings some questions with how relevant it will be for playoff seeding. Still, therefore Miami actually has a slightly higher chance at a Wildcard spot than their division rivals.
So without any further proclamations, here are the ten elements that stood out most to me from this pool:
The Panthers run all over the Lions (Week 16):
Breaking down how the Panthers gashed the Lions defense for a franchise-record 320 rushing yards, along with some of the wrinkles they installed off that!
The five biggest questions (and answers) for the 2022/23 NFL playoff race:
We’re just three weeks away from the regular season being wrapped up and as I went through the remaining schedule, there’s literally just one game left with zero playoff implications and two others that by all likelihood will have no impact at all. Therefore, I decided to break down a bunch of these different scenarios, by formulating five questions that are most prevalent as it pertains to the ultimate playoff picture, and handing out my predictions for how I believe things will play out.
Once again, I want to thank playoffpredictors.com, for helping me not go completely insane as I went through this exercise, working through all the different possibilities and having to go down the steps of tie-breaking procedures, depending on two or three teams having the same record, etc.
I decided to not make a separate point for “who will earn the final Wildcard berth in the AFC”, since the Chargers have a playoff probability of about 80+ percent and the Ravens sit above 98% right now. So really it should be a three-headed race between the AFC East teams not named Buffalo, and since I don’t have much belief in the Patriots, this will most likely come down the season finale between the Dolphins and Jets, as the atter would hold the head-to-head tiebreaker with a win and same record ultimately. A paragraph was enough to cover this and maybe I’ll do a full preview of that contest anyway, if things break the right way.
Now let’s get to my five actual questions:
Who should be in the 2023 Pro Bowl?
Join me in filling out my final Pro Bowl ballot, as I run through every position & explain my choices!
Where do you agree/disagree? Let me know in the comments! ⬇️
NFL Power Rankings heading into the fourth quarter of 2022:
We’ve now played 13 of 18 regular season games, which puts us exactly at the three-quarter mark of the season at this moment in the middle of the week. And just like I did after the first month of the season, I thought it was time for me to rank and tier all 32 NFL teams yet again.
As I always say – these are power rankings, based on what I perceive teams to be right now, rather than listing them by record and basically creating a standings table. Some squads may have started off slowly but are starting to hit their groove, while others have fallen off, as the season has progressed. Funnily enough, numbers one and 32 are still the same today as they were for me back on October 5th, but there’s been plenty of shake-up between those two.
Here’s my list:
Burrow vs. Mahomes: Part III
After winning a late-season thriller & then overcoming a 21-3 deficit in the AFC title game, the Bengals are now set to play the Chiefs for the third time in less than a calendar year.
How are both sides different schematically compared to when they last met, who has the upper hand in certain matchups & what can we expect on Sunday?
You can check out the full video at youtube.com/@halilsrealfootballtalk
Halil's Real Footballtalk 