NFL Playoffs Review 2014

This review of the NFL playoffs was done 'only' about 8 months after they occurred, so the games were not exactly fresh in my mind or anything.

Wild Card Weekend

AFC
#4 Colts vs #5 Chiefs

The Chiefs played as the better team and posted a comfortable 28 point lead, but they ended up blowing that and giving away the victory to the Colts.  If the Chiefs had run the ball more, then that probably would have been a decent idea, but the injuries that they suffered did hurt their running game a bit.

#3 Bengals vs #6 Chargers

Despite what most people thought, the Chargers did indeed pull out the victory, and it wasn't even a close game.  

NFC

#3 Eagles vs #6 Saints

The better neutral field team won, the Saints, but since this happened to be in Philly I think that the wrong team ended up winning.  Either way though it was a close, entertaining game.  

#4 Packers #5 49ers

The Packers put up a tough fight, but in the end they fell to the '9ers.  

Divisional Round

AFC
#1 Broncos vs #6 Chargers

This time around the Chargers were unable to get Manning's number and fell to the Broncos. 

#2 Patriots vs #4 Colts

I would have had the same sort of reasoning for the Patriots vs the Chiefs as the Patriots vs the Colts.  Overall, this game went almost exactly as it should have.  The Patriots were the better team in about all facets of the game.  

NFC

#1 Seahawks vs #5 Saints

The Saints played an extremely tough game on the road, it was a somewhat impressive performance by them.. However, the Seahawks still came away with the nice victory.  

#2 Panthers vs #5 49ers

The 49ers were the more physical team, the team with a better QB, and the team with the better HC, all of which added up to a convincing victory.

Conference Championship Round
AFC
#1 Broncos vs #2 Patriots

In the end the Patriots' smoke and mirrors offense finally faded and was unable to keep up with Manning and the Broncos.

NFC
#1 Seahawks  vs #5 49ers

The Seahawks struggled a bit in their victory against the 49ers (it's not like the 49ers are a good team or anything) and as such the media started thinking that the Broncos actually had a decent chance against the Seahawks.

Super Bowl XLVIII

#1 Seahawks vs #1 Broncos

While picking favorites generally happens to be a bad route to go in the NFL, for once it actually ended up proving to be the right path to take.  I pegged the Broncos at having a 45% chance of reaching the SB and the Seahawks at a 40% chance of reaching the SB.  I also said that one of the two teams had a 60% likelihood of winning the SB, the Seahawks at a 35% chance and the Broncos at 25%.  I also thought that all of my game by game predictions for %chance happened to be fairly accurate.  While I originally thought that the SB game would be a decent one in my preview and predicted the Seahawks to win by 10, 30-20 to be precise; in the weeks leading up to the SB I could see that the media was giving way too much praise to the Broncos and not realizing just how good the Seahawks happen to be.  As such, if I would have made a new pick, I probably would have gone something like 37-23, but I figured that I should just stick with my original pick anyways.  

Somehow I doubt that the Broncos brought
their A game to the Super Bowl.

However, the 43-8 score is in no way all that indicative of the actual overall strength of each team.  I would put the line at about Seattle -4, with the typical game results being: Seattle winning by 14+ (10% of the time), Seattle winning by 7-14 (25%), Seattle winning by 1-6 (25%), while the Broncos would win by 14+ (5%), by 7-14 (10%), and win by 1-6 (25%).  

The Broncos simply had almost every possible wrong thing that could happen for them happen. As a result, the Broncos looked like they shouldn't have even been on the same field as the Seahawks.  I am uncertain if it was because of the boat press conference thing, or what caused the Broncos to have such a lackluster overall performance, but the Broncos starting their offensive series by having a ridiculously high snap was just a tad out of character for them.  I also thought that Manning tried to do too much reading of the defense rather than just running what the Broncos normally run.  However, I also thought that he did not use audibles quite enough either.  In some ways though it was nice that the SB ended in a blowout, since that way there could be no conspiracy talk (at least so I would think...) and also just because some football games should indeed end as blowouts, even at the highest level of the playoffs.