That is a fantastic explanation of why common opponents logically trumps conference record as a tiebreaker. Thanks much.
Now, I'd like to hear your opinion on a related issue. Every year I read dozens of arguments in favor of taking away first-round home playoff games from weak division champions and granting them to wildcard teams with superior records. For example, fifth-seeded Indianapolis will visit a fourth-seeded division champion now guaranteed to have a worse record than the Colts. This apparently offends some people's deepest sensibilities; it's unfair, they say. But doesn't your tiebreaker explanation make a very compelling case for leaving the playoff seeding process exactly the way it is?
Rewarding the four division champions with the top four seeds and their corresponding home playoff games strikes me as the most logical way to do things for the very reason you mentioned: division rivals play fourteen of their sixteen games in common. Therefore, we can judge their performances on the closest thing we have to a level playing field. For example, let's say Denver wins the AFC West at 9-7, while Indianapolis closes out the season on a nine-game winning streak to finish 12-4. Some people will work themselves into a frenzy over the injustice of the Broncos actually hosting the Colts on wildcard weekend. I will be the first to admit that the Colts seem a much more dangerous playoff team at the moment. But what do we really know about the type of seasons these teams have had relative to one another? Outside of their divisions, the Colts have played the AFC North and NFC North, while the Broncos have played the AFC East and NFC South. As a result, they have just four common opponents: San Diego, New England, Cleveland and Jacksonville (Colts would win common opp. tiebreaker, by the way). It's as if they've played two completely different seasons. What we do know definitively, however, is that under this scenario the Broncos will have had a better season than the Chargers, Raiders and Chiefs, who actually did play almost identical schedules. This, to me at least, is the material point.
In any case, I would be interested to hear your opinion on the connection between the common opponents tiebreaker, as you explained it, and the rationale behind awarding the top four playoff seeds to division champions, as I've outlined here.
Thanks much for your time and continued willingness to share your expertise.
If the chart below comes out correctly when it's posted, the 1st team listed in each game is the team that Baltimore or New England needs to win. Any combination of wins for Baltimore and losses for New England that adds up to 4 will clinch the strength of victory tie-breaker for Baltimore. Games in bold are the games that are in both Baltimore's column and New England's column, the outcomes of which are doubly important.
Since only 3 of these games are this week, Baltimore cannot clinch just yet. If Miami wins, Oakland loses, and Buffalo loses, then New England can still win the strength of victory tie-breaker in the last week (by half a game). All 8 of the week 17 games would have to swing in their favor. New England can afford one tie amongst these 8 games and still squeeze out the strength of victory tie-breaker by percentage points. This is because Baltimore has 3 ties in their strength of victory record (Cincinnati twice and Philadelphia once), and New England currently has 0. So either Baltimore would have 4 ties and New England 0, or Baltimore would have 3 ties and New England 1. In either case they could end up tied in games, but New England would have the better winning percentage. (I only threw this stuff in about ties since I know PiGuy likes to consider ties).
Remember it only comes down to strength of victory between New England and Baltimore at 10-6 each, if New England beats Buffalo and Baltimore loses to Jacksonville to give them each 7-5 conference records. Otherwise Baltimore would have a better conference record and strength of victory would not be needed.
Baltimore needs the outcome of 4 games to go in their favor. Games in bold count twice.
Week 16 for Bal Week 16 for N.E.
Miami at KC Oak vs. Hou
Buf at Den
Week 17 for Bal Week 17 for N.E.
Cin vs. KC Den at SD
Cle at Pitt KC at Cin
Mia at NYJ Sea at Ari
Hou vs. Chi SF vs. Wash Was at SF StL at Atl
If Indy and Tennessee finish tied, Tennesse wins the common games tie-breaker (11-3 to 10-4). Teams in the same division always have 14 games against common opponnents. Teams from different divisions that do not play head-to-head, always have 4 common opponents but 5 total games against them. Teams from different divisions that do play head-to-head have 6 or 8 common opponents but 9 or 11 total games against them. However, teams from different divisions that play head-to-head will always use the head-to-head tie-breaker to break the tie before it gets to record against common opponents.
One quibble, bretteis: Ties count as 1/2 win, 1/2 loss, so if there was one tie among those games (and not WSH-SF or CIN-KC) it would go to SOS. The easy way to figure SOS is to look at "strength of losses" since the victories have to be tied for it to matter. The relevant teams there (throwing out common losses to PIT and IND) would be:
BAL: PIT (11), TEN (12), NYG (11), JAX (5) - current total 39
NE: MIA (9), NYJ (9), SD (6), ARI (8) - current total 32
PIT-TEN play each other, so BAL has to pick up two games (including their loss to JAX) and NE can pick up no more than 7 (MIA-NYJ can't both win in week 17). BAL wins SOS if SOV is tied.
Baltimore might actually be better off with a MIA win, NYJ loss, NE loss this week than all three losing, as it helps them in SOV. In that scenario, only NE can possibly get a wild-card from the East - MIA wins the division with a win or tie but loses the division to NYJ and head-to-head tiebreaker to BAL if they lose, and NYJ would win the division with a win but finish behind BAL with a loss or tie - so the boost to SOV would be more helpful than knocking MIA down.
I just read Joe Ferreira's posts. He is correct. Games against each other cannot count as games against common opponents. This makes sense. Because, for example: Indy did not play itself, therefore Indy cannot be a common opponent of Indy and Tennessee (Even though Tennessee played Indy twice, Indy never played against itself.).
The good thing is that whether you are figuring out record in common games out of 14 or out of 12, your analysis is always correct. To get from 14 games to 12 games, just subtract the head-to-head win and head-to-head loss from each teams' record, and the outcome does not change.
The same easy correction can be made with 3 tied teams in the same division. Ttheir combined record in head-to-head games must be 2-2 each, so just subtract 2-2 from the 14 game record and the order of thier ranking is not affected. For example,
Miami 10-4 Miami 8-2
New England 10-4 becomes New England 8-2
NY Jets 8-6 NY Jets 6-4
This is exactly the tie-breaker that would be used to eliminate the Jets in a scenario where the three teams finish10-6. Miami would have to beat the Jets and New England would have to beat Buffalo so that all of their conferences records are tied at 4-2. Then it would come down to their record in 10 common games.
After the Jets are eliminated, It would come down to strength of victory between Miami and New England.
Interestingly, they will have beaten 8 of the same teams. One difference is their head-to-head wins but that balances out since each team is 10-6. The other difference is Miami beat San Diego, while New England beat Kansas City. Since San Diego has clinched a better record than Kansas City, Miami has clinched a better strength of victory record over New England.
Miami wins the division. New England would need either Baltimore to lose twice, or New England would need Baltimore to lose their remaining conference game to Jacksonville and then overtake Baltimore in strength of victory record.
indy if they beat tennessee will be 12-4 and if tenn loses out they will be 12-4.
since indy would beat Titans last week that puts the head to head at a tie.
the division records would be the same at 4-2 but indy would have a 10-2 afc record opposed to 8-4 that the titans would have so how did the titans clinch the division????????
To sum things up in the AFC, with IND locking up the # 5 seed last night, the # 6 seed will come down to Baltimore and whoever finishes 2nd in the AFC East.
To help determine how the NYJ, MIA, and NE can win the AFC East and how each can finish 2nd, please refer to the following post "AFC East Scenarios" (back on page 41 of this board), which details the 32 possible scenarios (assuming no ties) based on the remaining games for the three clubs:
Here are the possible ties between BAL and the AFC East 2nd place team (again, assuming there are no ties):
At 11-5:
NE/BAL:
No H2H; BAL wins #6 seed based on better conference record, 8-4 to NE's 7-5. (Note: Even if there is a 3-way tie between IND/NE/BAL at 11-5, IND earns the #5 seed based on H2H sweep over NE and BAL; NE and BAL revert back to two team format above for the #6 seed).
At 10-6:
NYJ/BAL:
a) If BAL beats DAL and loses to JAX AND NYJ beat SEA and lose to MIA:
No H2H; conference record tied 7-5; BAL wins #6 seed based on better record in common games, 4-1 to NYJ's 3-2.
b) If BAL beats DAL and loses to JAX AND NYJ lose to SEA and beats MIA:
No H2H; NYJ win #6 seed based on better conference record, 8-4 to BAL's 7-5.
c) If BAL loses to DAL and beats JAX AND NYJ beat SEA and lose to MIA:
No H2H; BAL wins #6 seed based on better conference record, 8-4 to NYJ's 7-5.
d) If BAL loses to DAL and beats JAX AND NYJ lose to SEA and beats MIA:
No H2H; conference record tied 8-4; common games tied 4-1; NYJ wins #6 seed based on better SOV over BAL.
NE/BAL:
a) If BAL beats DAL and loses to JAX AND NE beats ARZ and loses to BUF:
No H2H; BAL wins #6 seed based on better conference record, 7-5 to NE's 6-6.
b) If BAL beats DAL and loses to JAX AND NE loses to ARZ and beats BUF:
No H2H; conference record tied 7-5; common games tied 2-3; #6 seed to be determined by better SOV between NE and BAL which is still undecided.
c) If BAL loses to DAL and beats JAX AND NE beats ARZ and loses to BUF:
No H2H; BAL wins #6 seed based on better conference record, 8-4 to NE's 6-6.
d) If BAL loses to DAL and beats JAX AND NE loses to ARZ and beats BUF:
No H2H; BAL wins #6 seed based on better conference record, 8-4 to NE's 7-5.
MIA/BAL:
BAL wins #6 seed based on head-to-head win over MIA.
At 9-7:
NYJ/BAL:
No H2H; conference record tied 7-5; BAL wins #6 seed based on better record in common games, 4-1 to NYJ's 3-2.
MIA-NE SOV winner at 9-7/BAL:
In either case, BAL wins #6 seed based on head-to-head win over MIA (if MIA wins SOV over NE), or over NE based on conference record, 7-5 to 6-6.
As Joe pointed out, the AFC Wildcard matchups will be:
5-IND at 4-DEN/SD (AFC West winner) and 6-BAL/AFC East 2nd at 3-AFC East champion, unless the NYJ win the East at 10-6 and DEN also finishes 10-6. In that case then it would be 5-IND at 4-NYJ and 6-BAL/AFC East 2nd at 3-DEN.
indy if they beat tennessee will be 12-4 and if tenn loses out they will be 12-4.
since indy would beat Titans last week that puts the head to head at a tie.
the division records would be the same at 4-2 but indy would have a 10-2 afc record opposed to 8-4 that the titans would have so how did the titans clinch the division????????
As has been explained ad nauseam, common games comes before conference record in division tiebreakers. TEN would be 10-2, IND 9-3.
