Playoff Solutions Assuming they don’t replay the Bengals game.

[Billsfan1972]

1 minute ago, flmike said:

OK, I thought that was the first year for that. Yeah there were other reasons. 3rd and 13 was devastating. 

Not to get get off track but more important things, but if you do any deep dive into that week, the Bills were completely ill prepared for the week, too much distractions, commitments & parties and were not focused.  You could see it played out on the field. 

[LeGOATski]

4 minutes ago, UKBillFan said:

Speaking with all emotion removed, I’m not sure why Goodall is obsessed with finishing the game within two days, if that tweet is correct.

 

Let week 18 play out as normal. Bills-Bengals then finish their game on 12th January. The wildcard weekend is pushed back to weekend of 21st January and the week’s gap between the Conference Championships and the Super Bowl is removed.

 

Of course, whether the Bills will be ready to play Sunday is another question altogether at the moment.

I don't think he's "obsessed" with completing the game in two days, but that's just the standard procedure. The NFL has acknowledged that nothing about this is standard.

[BillyBilliams]

7 hours ago, NUT said:

If the Bills players and coaches are the ones who decide they are not playing, they have to be the ones taking the L.

 

The Bills players and coaches didn't decide that.  Once they announced the 5 minute warm up, it was Zac Taylor coming across the field to talk to McD.  It was a mutual decision.

[Warriorspikes51]

2 minutes ago, SinatraSinger said:

I just keep trying to think what Damar would want.  He worked his whole life to get to where he is at.  He worked hard the whole week to prepare for this game.  He wanted to play this game.  We are talking about competitors, hard core.  This is obviously my opinion but if I am Damar I want this game to be played.  I believe the other players on the Bills need to ask themselves the same question.  If they believe the answer is that Damar would want them to play and they want to show respect for their fallen comrade, then they need to play the game.  WHAT WOULD DAMAR WANT?  For the Bills players that is all that should matter.

 

So if the answer is we play, then play tomorrow or Thursday and move next weeks games for these two teams accordingly.

 

If the team goes in with the attitude that they are playing for Damar they will then go in focused.

 

A refreshing post! Thank you 

[Generic_Bills_Fan]

10 minutes ago, flmike said:

The difference is that we would be facing Burrows w/o Hamlin and possibly Taron. Was looking to be a long night in any case. Bills could still win if Josh had an MVP night in a tough environment. That's all beside the point now, though. The game was suspended. Best possible outcome is that Hamlin improves and they push everything back a week and kill one of the "prep" weeks for the Super Bowl. The Packers didn't need that in '66. 

On the flip side we were winning in the offensive trenches quite handedly and had already piled up quite a bit of rushing yards.  Bills are pretty tough to stop when they can run the football and get good pass protection

 

i would expect the bills to come up with a key sack or two with the bengals playing an absolutely horrible RT.  I have no idea who was gonna win this one.  Maybe if the bills got first possession and went down 14-3 I’d be closer to seeing where you were coming from but neither of those things happened 

 

Even if we go down 14-3 there’s a pretty good shot we would’ve come up with the td to make it 14-10 

Edited January 3, 2023 by Generic_Bills_Fan

[John from Riverside]

4 minutes ago, UKBillFan said:

How do you know Burrow wasn’t going to have a bad night and start throwing interceptions? Or their players begin to fumble the ball? Or their offense make hay and we win a shootout?

if Beasley catches a ball, they hit them right in the hands than the game is probably tied at the time of the accident

 

[flmike]

3 minutes ago, UKBillFan said:

Oh well, we shouldn’t have bothered turning up then. And we should have gifted the Chiefs a win at Arrowhead earlier in the season too rather than playing the game.

That's a pretty big leap of logic there. 

[flmike]

2 minutes ago, Generic_Bills_Fan said:

On the flip side we were winning in the offensive trenches quite handedly and had already piled up quite a bit of rushing yards.  Bills are pretty tough to stop when they can run the football and get good pass protection

 

i would expect the bills to come up with a key sack or two with the bengals playing an absolutely horrible RT.  I have no idea who was gonna win this one.  Maybe if the bills got first possession and went down 14-3 I’d be closer to seeing where you were coming from but neither of those things happened 

I would hope for the same. Don't get me wrong. I've seen them pull things out (for example, the last few weeks...). It just wasn't looking good with the Bengals poised to make it 14-3 in the next minute or so. The Bills D did not have really good answers the entire quarter to that point. Just making a point but still holding out hope. 

[CSBill]

20 minutes ago, Giuseppe Tognarelli said:

That's not fair when not all teams have played an equal number of games and when it's totally obvious that KC, of all teams, is the one and only beneficiary.

 

I hear you GT and appreciate your perspective--and on the KC point, I totally agree.

 

But with any solutions that involves resuming the game, there are so many logistical gymnastics that would need to be considered and done. If they do end up playing it, I suspect they do it after week 18 and then push the start of play-offs back (and maybe that would be good for every team considering the circumstances) and eliminate the two week window between the Conference Finals and the SB.

 

But think about this, if they do end up coning up with a way to finish this games, at least one of these teams, and probably both, would be further stressed with all the negatives of having to play another game: the logistics, the prep work, not to mention the physical tool, the emotional burden, etc. If the game is resumed--no matter one--It seems to me you are putting both teams at a serious competitive disadvantage over every other team that qualified for the play-offs. I doubt they will do that.

 

Well neither of us will have a say, so we'll see. In the meantime, be well TBD friend.

[dakrider]

So I think they will most likely just not count the game as played.  The NFL should have a protocol for this since we just went thru Covid last couple years.  
That gives KC the #1 seed and everything else falls in place after that.  The only other thing they could possibly do is decide the game with a coin toss, simply because there would be no other way.  If this were early in the year the teams could make it up but just not feasible to do so now. 

Really the best scenario would be if Bills win on Sunday and KC loses.  Regardless I don't think the Bills org. is going to make a fuss over what happens at this point. 

[DapperCam]

I think the NFL will do everything in its power to have this game played Wed night. Then they would push Bills-Pats and Ravens-Bengals to Monday. I guess it will depend on if the players/coaches feel able to play by then. We won’t know about Hamlin’s status by then I don’t think.

[quinnearlysghost88]

6 minutes ago, UKBillFan said:

How do you know Burrow wasn’t going to have a bad night and start throwing interceptions? Or their players begin to fumble the ball? Or their offense make hay and we win a shootout?

Come on. We saw the Taron injury. And burrow throwing dimes (he’s 4-4) directly at our best corner.
 

And us coming up short on throws. You could see the direction clearly. Our secondary can’t hang. Which was made clear on the opening PI call for 30 yards. 
 

oh by the way, it’s currently 7-3 and the Bengals are on our 48 with a 1st down. 

[Generic_Bills_Fan]

10 minutes ago, flmike said:

The odds of that were pretty small in their home stadium. 

Mahomes threw a game losing interception against us when we were missing a bunch of defensive starters in their home stadium.

 

baltimore was up 20-3 on us in their home stadium when we were missing a bunch of defensive starters and Lamar threw a game losing interception.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 3, 2023 by Generic_Bills_Fan

[LeGOATski]

I bet they either play tomorrow or the Bills forfeit. I doubt Hamlin would want them to forfeit.

 

This reminds me of when Bengals WR Chris Henry died in an off-field accident. The Bengals played 2 days later and Ochocinco wore Henry's number.

[beebe]

One scenario I was thinking of for the Bills in the event of this being a 16-game season -- combined with a Chiefs win on Saturday -- is that the Bills could tank the Pats game to help get their mind right; become the 2-seed; and guarantee themselves a home game vs the Patriots (likely their desired Rd 1 opponent).

 

However, I don't think they would win the tiebreaker vs Cincy for 2 seed if they finished with the same record.

 

If Bills lost vs Pats and Bengals beat Ravens, both would have 12-4 records. 

 

Conference record tiebreaker would be identical: Bills 8-3, Bengals 8-3

 

Record vs common opponents tiebreaker would be identical: Bills 8-3, Bengals 8-3

 

Next tiebreaker I believe is strength of victory. Bills opponents have 92 wins, Bengals opponents would have 95 wins. The Bills couldn't overtake the Bengals in the final week due to the schedule being so identical. 

 

So best I can tell, the Bills would need a win or Bengals loss to secure the 2 seed if neither team plays all 17 games. 

[HappyDays]

18 minutes ago, Warriorspikes51 said:

No, but it does screw over the Dolphins, Steelers and Jaguars.  They are automatically eliminated from Wild Card seed

 

Oh well. None of those teams control their own destiny regardless so they can't complain. A young man's heart stopped on the football field. There is no perfect 100% fair solution. Logistically there is one reasonable situation and not a single player or coach or fan would be callous enough to reject it.

 

Edited January 3, 2023 by HappyDays

[LeGOATski]

1 minute ago, quinnearlysghost88 said:

Come on. We saw the Taron injury. And burrow throwing dimes (he’s 4-4) directly at our best corner.
 

And us coming up short on throws. You could see the direction clearly. Our secondary can’t hang. Which was made clear on the opening PI call for 30 yards. 
 

oh by the way, it’s currently 7-3 and the Bengals are on our 48 with a 1st down. 

Loser mentality

[Generic_Bills_Fan]

9 minutes ago, flmike said:

I would hope for the same. Don't get me wrong. I've seen them pull things out (for example, the last few weeks...). It just wasn't looking good with the Bengals poised to make it 14-3 in the next minute or so. The Bills D did not have really good answers the entire quarter to that point. Just making a point but still holding out hope. 

As far as we know neither did the bengals though.  Even if they went up 14-3 it was with an extra possession.  The bills really had no problem driving down the field. I was a bit surprised to not see the bills go for that 4th and 3…that implies there was some level of confidence in the defense

Edited January 3, 2023 by Generic_Bills_Fan

[ALLEN1QB]

8 hours ago, transplantbillsfan said:

Get rid of the bye week before the Super Bowl and Buffalo and Cincy have their game in 2 weeks. Only playoff games are pushed back a week and who cares about the Pro Bowl.

 

Seems about the most competitively fair thing they can do at this point 

Exactly what I was thinking probably the most plausible scenario

[quinnearlysghost88]

Just now, LeGOATski said:

Loser mentality

🤷‍♂️ sorry. I’ve watched this team for decades. They are missing an extra gear this year and deep down we all know it. 

[dave mcbride]

1 hour ago, GunnerBill said:

 

I don't think they need to take a forfeit. They just don't count the game. Bills and Bengals play a 16 game schedule and you use win % for seeding.

There is no way that the Bills will be forced to take a forfeit because one of their players nearly died on the field (and we still have no idea of ultimate outcome yet).

[clayboy54]

10 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

I don't see that there is another option.

 

I'd guess that some way, somehow New England will get comp picks out of this.

[Boatdrinks]

1 minute ago, LeGOATski said:

Loser mentality

Especially with the game still in the first quarter. A lot of football to be played to reach any conclusion 

[Ed_Formerly_of_Roch]

6 hours ago, Bad Things said:

A guy was crushed to death where you work, and they didn't close shop for the day?

WTF?  Sounds like a great place to work.

 

He is a Barbarian!

[Ta111]

1 minute ago, quinnearlysghost88 said:

🤷‍♂️ sorry. I’ve watched this team for decades. They are missing an extra gear this year and deep down we all know it. 

BS. You haven’t been watching them very closely. Down 20-3 at Balt and won, down last week at half and won 35-13. You have no idea how this would have turned out.

[What a Tuel]

3 minutes ago, quinnearlysghost88 said:

Come on. We saw the Taron injury. And burrow throwing dimes (he’s 4-4) directly at our best corner.
 

And us coming up short on throws. You could see the direction clearly. Our secondary can’t hang. Which was made clear on the opening PI call for 30 yards. 
 

oh by the way, it’s currently 7-3 and the Bengals are on our 48 with a 1st down. 

 

I mean this is game day thread level prognostication and losing mentality. You have 0 idea if the team wins or loses last night. None.

[Boatdrinks]

3 minutes ago, Generic_Bills_Fan said:

As far as we know neither did the bengals though.  Even if they went up 14-3 it was with an extra possession.  The bills really had no problem driving down the field.

You simply cannot underestimate Josh Allen

[Royale with Cheese]

6 minutes ago, quinnearlysghost88 said:

Come on. We saw the Taron injury. And burrow throwing dimes (he’s 4-4) directly at our best corner.
 

And us coming up short on throws. You could see the direction clearly. Our secondary can’t hang. Which was made clear on the opening PI call for 30 yards. 
 

oh by the way, it’s currently 7-3 and the Bengals are on our 48 with a 1st down. 

 

What a stupid post.

[LeGOATski]

1 minute ago, quinnearlysghost88 said:

🤷‍♂️ sorry. I’ve watched this team for decades. They are missing an extra gear this year and deep down we all know it. 

No we don't. They've won a bunch of close games this year.

 

Don't be sorry for your loser mentality and project it onto the rest of us.

[BillsFanSD]

8 minutes ago, ScottLaw said:

The playoffs are pushed back so one game is played between Bills and Bengals after week 18? 

This is too complicated and heavy-handed.  Far simpler to cancel and figure out a solution.

[No_Matter_What]

Just now, Generic_Bills_Fan said:

To be fair I don’t think that’s the ‘only’ thing they’re thinking about.  If the nfl discusses continuing the game I would certainly want it left up to the players whether they actually want to continue or not.  You can care about Hamlins health and think the situation is a bit unfair…it’s not an either/or  

 

that’s my guess as to how it’s going to go down…nfl will offer a reschedule and leave it up to both teams and if both teams agree they don’t want to play the game it won’t be counted.  

Yeah you're right I went too far judging people. I apologise. It isn't either/or. But the point is that I don't get why people are so adamant on playing the game just to make sure it's "fair" when it is more than clear that there are no good solutions available (and to me, cancelling the game is clearly the best / most simple one).

[Sammy Watkins' Rib]

The problem with pushing the playoffs back a week and removing the extra week before the Super Bowl is that we are all just assuming the Bills are even ready to play next week. I'm sure the NFL would like them to play the Patriots this Sunday, as not playing them would create even more chaos in the fight for the last wild card spot. But I think for the Bills to be ready to play this Sunday they will need to get some really positive news on their teammate first. 

 

The Bills are in a position that they can easily skip these last two games before the playoffs start. 

[LeGOATski]

1 minute ago, BillsFanSD said:

This is too complicated and heavy-handed.  Far simpler to cancel and figure out a solution.

The league isn't going to cancel. It's going to be played or forfeited so that it counts towards the record.

[teef]

4 minutes ago, Boatdrinks said:

Especially with the game still in the first quarter. A lot of football to be played to reach any conclusion 

it was on the 3rd series for god's sake.

[LeGOATski]

1 minute ago, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

The problem with pushing the playoffs back a week and removing the extra week before the Super Bowl is that we are all just assuming the Bills are even ready to play next week. I'm sure the NFL would like them to play the Patriots this Sunday, as not playing them would create even more chaos in the fight for the last wild card spot. But I think for the Bills to be ready to play this Sunday they will need to get some really positive news on their teammate first. 

 

The Bills are in a position that they can easily skip these last two games before the playoffs start. 

Yep. I can see the Bills forfeiting this game and resting the starters against the Pats.

[D. L. Hot-Flamethrower]

1 minute ago, LeGOATski said:

The league isn't going to cancel. It's going to be played or forfeited so that it counts towards the record.

Don't be so sure

[BillsFanSD]

1 minute ago, LeGOATski said:

The league isn't going to cancel. It's going to be played or forfeited so that it counts towards the record.

"Forfeit" is one type of cancellation though.

[ArtVandalay]

8 hours ago, transplantbillsfan said:

 

Yet both teams and particularly the Bills are given a competitive disadvantage by not even being allowed the opportunity to have home field advantage throughout the playoffs barring a KC loss to the Raiders 

We had all year, all we needed to do was not fumble a snap for a TD.

 

This is a tragic event, nothing is fair in life or this situation. As long as Hamlin lives that's all that matters. 

Edited January 3, 2023 by ArtVandalay

[Locomark]

8 hours ago, transplantbillsfan said:

Get rid of the bye week before the Super Bowl and Buffalo and Cincy have their game in 2 weeks. Only playoff games are pushed back a week and who cares about the Pro Bowl.

 

Seems about the most competitively fair thing they can do at this point 

I thought about this and that they move the pro bowl to the day before the Super Bowl. 

[Warriorspikes51]

Just now, Locomark said:

I thought about this and that they move the pro bowl to the day before the Super Bowl. 

I'd be surprised if they do something that will affect the quality of preparation and rest players have before the Super Bowl