Final Regular Season Football Outsiders Rankings
Find this week's rankings here. Incredibly, Buffalo ended the year at number 5, and just a hair from #4, and are on the outside looking in at the playoffs. I think the Colts are breathing a huge sigh of relief to be facing Denver rather than the Bills in the first round - a fate which they interestingly controlled by tanking the last game of the season, despite their coaches assurances to the contrary.
For the Super Bowl, I am sticking with the Patriots in the AFC. Its tough not to pick Pittsburgh, who were impressive with even their scrubs beating a surging Buffalo team in the last week. However, I will go with experience. The NFC is a total mess. No one has ever lost much money betting against the Eagles to reach the Super Bowl, but everyone else really, really sucks. Everyone else is an 8-8 team, even the Falcons who should be 8-8 but got away with a few. I'll go with NE and Philly in the Superbowl, with the AFC winner, whoever they are, taking the title.
By the way, the Cards finished 27th in the rankings, which is actually (pathetically enough) one of their best finishes. However, don't get cocky. You can see from this post that the Cardinals are still the standard for mediocrity against which all teams are compared.
David:
Of course if Indy hadn't rolled over and played dead against Denver they'd be facing Jacksonville who already beat them at home this year.
January 7, 2005, 10:15 pm