NFC Contenders .... AT A GLANCE (**NEWLY UPDATED - Week 10)

[KB_fan]

Here's the week 9 playoff leverage chart. Yikes the Panthers fell FAR last week with the combo of our loss + every team ahead of us winning.

 

[KB_fan]

Teams to root for:

I later realized I confused PHI and DAL.

Root FOR DALLAS (I know that's tough)

Root against Philly to minimize Wild Card contenders.

[CRA]

On 10/28/2019 at 9:23 AM, bull123 said:

Yes...but after yesterday we may lose to tenn

and now the book is out on us, Payton and Pete will coach circles around Rivera...and Rivera can’t beat the falcons

im just totally disgusted 

the book is generally out on most teams.  Doesn't really matter if you know the book...if don't have the pieces to execute it. 

the Titans are the 20th ranked rush offense.  They can watch tape all day long.  They aren't going to show up Sunday and do what one of the top 2 rush offenses does.  If it was that easy, the Dolphins could just watch what the Patriots do and boom....win a ton of games copying them. 

Teams can watch the Bucs shut down CMC and all the other RBs.  I'm sure SF did.  Didn't mean they could stop CMC. 

[KB_fan]

Busy morning... Here's are current NFC playoff standings following week 9 games (pending MNF Dallas - NYG)

Will do the new week 10 contenders table tomorrow.

[KB_fan]

Ok, here's the updated table for week 10.

I've dropped out several teams (Detroit, Bears, Cardinals), who with their losses last week are now pretty much out of contention.  Panthers remain in 8th place.  Philly is right on our heels, and could pose a threat to jump ahead of us as they have an easy remaining schedule.

This week in the section for upcoming games, I've highlighted the games remaining against other playoff contenders (both NFC and AFC - NFC is blue, AFC is green).  You can see that Seattle has a brutal schedule ahead, playing 6 contenders, while the Packers, not so much, they only play 3 other contenders.

I've also attempted to calculate projected total wins, using these assumptions:

1) Each team will win all the games they play versus non-contenders. (For Panthers that's Washington and both Atlanta games) 2) Each team will split their remaining games with other playoff contenders.

That leaves Panthers at 10.5 wins.  Even if we get to 11 wins, it might not be good enough to make the playoffs.  Rams are projected to have 11 wins and they have a head-to-head vs. Panthers.  Vikings are also projected to have 11 wins, and they currently have a 5-2 conference record.

Basically things look very very challenging for the Panthers.... We need to hope for a meltdown of a team above us and/or win at least 6 if not 7 of our remaining 9 games.

[stirs]

7-9  -  9-7

Thinking Atlanta might win one of theirs

Puts us at 7-9

But, if we take both from Atl and win Indy, (QB is out), then 9-7.

Not sure who has tie breaker between NO and SF, but wait till their game to see if our last NO game is meaningful.  We know that Ron likes to go for broke on that 16th game

[ickmule]

Sorry, this team won’t make the playoffs.  You could save yourself so much time if you just watch the games and forget playoffs.  There are easily 3 more loses ahead of us and that’s not gonna be good enough.   

[Pantha-kun]

You can pretty much throw all this out of the window if we lose to Green Bay on Sunday. We already have a crappy NFC W-L record and losing yet another contest against an NFC foe will dig us into a hole we can't get out of unless we win out from there on. And that's too much to ask your backup essentially rookie QB to sweep the Saints. 

[KB_fan]

43 minutes ago, ickmule said:

Sorry, this team won’t make the playoffs.  You could save yourself so much time if you just watch the games and forget playoffs.  There are easily 3 more loses ahead of us and that’s not gonna be good enough.   

I do watch the games and I fully recognize the extreme improbability that Panthers will make the playoffs unless something dramatic changes either for us or to one of the teams ahead of us.  

I did this for my own reference and thought I'd share it.  The NFC is ultra-competitive this year and I'm expecting to enjoy watching the playoff race shake out as the season enters the home stretch.  I hated having to constantly look up the schedules of upcoming opponents.  I like seeing the different schedules all in one place.

[stirs]

I am a numbers person too, so I love seeing it on paper.

I am also a realist and figure we will be picking around 13th in the next draft

[ickmule]

1 hour ago, KB_fan said:

I do watch the games and I fully recognize the extreme improbability that Panthers will make the playoffs unless something dramatic changes either for us or to one of the teams ahead of us.  

I did this for my own reference and thought I'd share it.  The NFC is ultra-competitive this year and I'm expecting to enjoy watching the playoff race shake out as the season enters the home stretch.  I hated having to constantly look up the schedules of upcoming opponents.  I like seeing the different schedules all in one place.

Props to you for taking the time to do it.  I was just getting to the reality of the entire playoff thing and being somewhat sarcastic. I hope they do make the playoffs, I just don’t see it with the remaining schedule and I’m not overly confident in Allen to best the better teams.  Hopefully I’m wrong.  

[thefuzz]

As my Grandfather used to say....son it's gonna be a tough row to hoe.

I just don't see a path to the playoffs that don't involve us playing much better going forward, and a couple teams really falling off....that said, I doubt many could see us losing 7 straight last season sitting at 6-2, so obviously is possible.

[stirs]

We have problems on the Oline and Dline.  Until that is solved, we are not playoff caliber.  We cannot even rate our skill players at this point, no matter how many people want to claim every WR to hit the waiver wire

[Untouchable]

 

 

We are a passing offense away from being a serious Super Bowl contender.  The construction of this season's roster in the offseason was very solid and it's showing as the team is fighting through some key loses (albeit against lesser competition).

The competition is going to start heating up but there is still reasons for hope.  Norv has been very good since coming to Carolina so I don't expect coaching improvements to help much on that side of the ball, so to look for improvement its going to have to be talent.  The return of a healthy Newton would be the biggest help to Super Bowl run (who knows how likely that is at this point).  The next biggest chance at improvement I can see would be the return of Little as his pass blocking is superior to the rest of the LTs on the roster.  Allen's increased game experience leading to his continued improvement and the potential improvement to the receiving corp with recent signings (Dortch and Moncreif), Hogan's potential return from IR and additional experience for Samuel and Moore can also help improve the team's glaring weakness.  Ian Thomas' athleticism over the middle could be a help to the passing game as well.