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Here’s a stat to jolt you before the start of these NFL playoffs — at least one wild-card team has won in the opening round of the NFL playoffs in each of the last six postseasons. In two of the three years since the league expanded to seven playoff teams, a wild-card team has gone all the way to its respective conference title game. The Buccaneers won Super Bowl LV in February 2021 as the No. 5 seed in the NFC.
A season ago, I picked the Chargers and Giants in this piece. While neither made a journey “deep” into the playoffs, New York snuck past the higher-seeded Vikings in Round 1, and Los Angeles had first-half leads of 24-0 and 27-7 on the road in Jacksonville before a very Chargerian collapse ended in a wild 31-30 Jaguars victory.
In January 2022, I made a video for the Pick Six Podcast TikTok labeling the 49ers as the true dark-horse team to make another Super Bowl run. San Francisco didn’t get to the Super Bowl that season but did upset the Cowboys in Dallas in the wild-card round and shocked the No. 1-seeded Packers in Lambeau the following week. And heck, they had a fourth-quarter lead on the eventual Super Bowl champion Rams on the road in the NFC Championship.
Which wild-card teams in this season’s playoff bracket are most scary? Below are my picks. One per conference.
AFC
Browns
I nearly picked the Dolphins here, I just don’t love their wild-card setup, in Arrowhead, in potentially sub-zero weather. I’m a firm believer the main fuel source for a wild-card club making a deep playoff run is a large collection of star power. The 2021 49ers certainly had that.
Cleveland does too, even after the team’s extraordinarily bad luck on the injury front, but it’s a collection that looks a bit different than most. Myles Garrett is a perennial Defensive Player of the Year candidate, a perpetual game-wrecker who registered 14 sacks and 85 total pressures on just over 500…
Source link : https://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/2024-nfl-playoffs-sleeper-wild-card-teams-with-the-best-chance-to-make-a-deep-postseason-run/
Author : Chris Trapasso
Publish date : 2024-01-11 16:47:16
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