Next week's game - Playoff implications (Merged Threads)

**akashicrecorder** · 12-23-2012, 09:59 PM

As I understand it, if we win next week and New England loses, we can still be the third seed, below Houston and Denver?

Do the Bengals have anything to play for? Can their wildcard seeding be improved or worsened?

**bmorecareful** · 12-23-2012, 10:02 PM

Meaningless game for the Bengals. They're locked into the #6 seed even if they win and Indy loses because of losing the common opponents tiebreaker.

And yeah, it's not impossible for us to win the #3 seed. If we win and New England loses, we get the #3 seed and have to play Cincy at home.

**Dirt1** · 12-23-2012, 10:03 PM

I think the Ravens are better off as the 4th seed. I'd rather play Indy than Cincy in Round 1.

**MD Boy** · 12-23-2012, 10:05 PM

Originally Posted by Dirt1

I think the Ravens are better off as the 4th seed. I'd rather play Indy than Cincy in Round 1.

Agreed. And the Texans in the 2nd Rd instead of Denver at Milehigh.

**akashicrecorder** · 12-23-2012, 10:06 PM

Originally Posted by bmorecareful

Meaningless game for the Bengals. They're locked into the #6 seed even if they win and Indy loses because of losing the common opponents tiebreaker.

And yeah, it's not impossible for us to win the #3 seed. If we win and New England loses, we get the #3 seed and have to play Cincy at home.

Thank you for clarifying this.

It'll be VERY interesting to see how Marvin Lewis treats that game. On the one hand, he'd love to beat us. On the other hand, he'd be excoriated if he caused an injury to an important player in a meaningless game.

**Boulderraven** · 12-23-2012, 10:07 PM

Originally Posted by Dirt1

I think the Ravens are better off as the 4th seed. I'd rather play Indy than Cincy in Round 1.

Thinking beyond that though. Rather be 3 seed and face probable 2 seed Denver in Denver after a week off. Then if NE beats Houston @ Houston very possible then you HOST AFFCG. Either way you are going to have to likley play @ Denver sooner or later. Being a 3 seed gives you a much better advantage at getting 2 home games.

**LukeDaniel** · 12-23-2012, 10:09 PM

Originally Posted by Boulderraven

Thinking beyond that though. Rather be 3 seed and face probable 2 seed Denver in Denver after a week off. Then if NE beats Houston @ Houston very possible then you HOST AFFCG. Either way you are going to have to likley play @ Denver sooner or later. Being a 3 seed gives you a much better advantage at getting 2 home games.

Ya know...that's an excellent point. I was in the prefer-the-4-seed camp, but you've given me reason to reconsider that.

**Rosdaman** · 12-23-2012, 10:09 PM

But if the Ravens and Pats advance to the AFC Championship game ... the 3d seed will matter.

Ravens should not treat Week #17 as a post-season match if the 3d seed is within reach ... i.e., they should be score-board watching as Pats host Miami at same time as Ravens - Bengals kick off.

Originally Posted by Dirt1

I think the Ravens are better off as the 4th seed. I'd rather play Indy than Cincy in Round 1.

**Dirt1** · 12-23-2012, 10:12 PM

Originally Posted by Boulderraven

Thinking beyond that though. Rather be 3 seed and face probable 2 seed Denver in Denver after a week off. Then if NE beats Houston @ Houston very possible then you HOST AFFCG. Either way you are going to have to likley play @ Denver sooner or later. Being a 3 seed gives you a much better advantage at getting 2 home games.

The best way for the Ravens to advance in the playoffs is to get as many players as healthy as they can. For them to do that, they need to rest any injured players next week. If they win that game with back-ups then fine, but they should rest a bunch of players against Cincy.

**akashicrecorder** · 12-23-2012, 10:25 PM

And herein lies the great debate. Do we rest starters for a more significant playoff push? Or do we play the damn game like it's any other Sunday and try to win? (Despite the fact it's unlikely Miami can beat NE in NE?)

**pslholder96** · 12-23-2012, 10:26 PM

Originally Posted by Rosdaman

But if the Ravens and Pats advance to the AFC Championship game ... the 3d seed will matter.

Ravens should not treat Week #17 as a post-season match if the 3d seed is within reach ... i.e., they should be score-board watching as Pats host Miami at same time as Ravens - Bengals kick off.

Sounds like a good idea but unfortunately the league just moved the Pats game to 4pm to keep the Broncos game meaningful because they play at the same time and as you know the Pats and Broncos are battling for the 2 seed

**Haloti92** · 12-23-2012, 10:27 PM

Originally Posted by Boulderraven

Thinking beyond that though. Rather be 3 seed and face probable 2 seed Denver in Denver after a week off. Then if NE beats Houston @ Houston very possible then you HOST AFFCG. Either way you are going to have to likley play @ Denver sooner or later. Being a 3 seed gives you a much better advantage at getting 2 home games.

Except you wouldn't have to play Denver at all if you go to Houston and beat a semi-foundering Houston team (no easy task obviously) and let NE beat Denver in Denver. Sure the AFCCG would be in Foxboro but we still could avoid Denver.

I would rather have the AFCCG at home, but I think at this point in the season Houston looks to be an easier win than Denver, assuming we win at home in WC weekend. I also think the Colts at home would be easier than Cincy at home in the WC weekend, but maybe not; that is a bit harder to gauge.

**pslholder96** · 12-23-2012, 10:32 PM

I'm on the fence but nevertheless our game now becomes a little more meaningful because the Pats game just got moved to 4pm. If we win and the pats lose we get the 3 seed and play the bengals again. Would be extremely difficult to beat any team 3 times in one season.
Furthermore I would like to see the starters play most of this game to keep the momentum from today going. Jim Caldwell called a good game today and threw in a few wrinkles but you have to be careful showing too much because we may see this team again the following week.

**bmore finest** · 12-23-2012, 10:58 PM

Rest who u can, let Flacco and Rice play til half, and hope they put up 21 points. If we can win anyway with more backups,lol, Fine.

But would like Joe Cool to play some. More momentum would feel nice no matter where we seed.

Finally, imo, the Ravens just played their best game of this crazy season!!

**Shambla** · 12-23-2012, 11:08 PM

Brady's good at taking down Manning. Us? Not so much...

I think I'd prefer to play Houston over Denver/NE. They've come down to earth quite a bit since we got pounded.

As for what to do next week - I'd say rest Suggs, Ngata, and possibly Reed on defense. The offense I think could still benefit from another half to gel with our new OC (haven't tried it on the road yet). Either at halftime or if we put up a couple TD's I would yank Joe, Ray, Pitta, Q, and Torrey. The Bengals can't change positioning at all so I'd imagine they'd have the JV team in.

**StingerNLG** · 12-23-2012, 11:23 PM

I think you play all your non-injured starters, especially on offense. Especially with a new offensive coordinator, they will need all the reps they can get before the playoffs. And this will be Caldwell's first road game calling plays.
I think you have to play this game to win on the offense, or at least score and keep fine tuning the playcalling. But obviously anyone who's too banged up on defense to go at least a half should sit. Maybe you sit Suggs out of this one just to give that arm a little more healing time. Ngata looks like he's almost 100%, Ellerbe played today and looked good. So we may be able to rest some defensive folks.

**bacchys** · 12-23-2012, 11:31 PM

The most important thing is to win, especially coming off that three game slide. Win, win, win.

That doesn't mean keep the starters in the whole game regardless of the score, or don't rest injured guys who could really benefit from a week off. But don't rest somebody who isn't going to get better or isn't hurt just to rest them or avoid injury. We've had one good game in all three phases in the last month. This is no time to start thinking about anything but winning.

**leachisabeast** · 12-24-2012, 03:45 AM

Would you rather go to Houston than Denver in the divisional game? Yeah, I would.

Denver are the hottest team in football, and Milehigh is an extremely tough place to go and beat a team that has not lost for a long time with Peyton Manning at QB. Houston are kind of reeling right now, and I think this team goes into the Reliant pissed off from what happened earlier in the year. We are also much more familiar with the Texans than we are with this Denver team as we've played Houston four times in the last two years. NE will likely beat Cincy in the WC round, which would send them to Denver.

So yeah there really is very little to play for next week. These AFC Play offs are going to be the most exciting ones for a while.

**Dade** · 12-24-2012, 04:11 AM

It really doesn't matter to me. If the Ravens play like they did yesterday, they can beat anyone in the NFL.

Regardless Houston and Denver are tough outs.

**leachisabeast** · 12-24-2012, 04:17 AM

I guess the benefit with the 3rd seed is that you hope NE or a long shot Colts team can beat Houston the divisional game, while we try to take care of business in Denver, which would set up a home AFCCG.