AFC Playoff Picture after week 14
 

After struggling to even get 6 teams with a winning record the last couple years... the AFC has 12 teams with a winning record with three games to go. Houston has now thrown themselves into the mix too.

1) New England 10-3
2) Denver 10-3

3) Indianapolis 9-4
6) San Diego 8-5

4) Cincinnati 8-4-1
5) Pittsburgh 8-5

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7) Baltimore 8-5
8) Houston 7-6
9) Miami 7-6
10) Kansas City 7-6
11) Buffalo 7-6
12) Cleveland 7-6

There are a million different things that could happen from this point forward. This entire chart could look completely different by next week, let alone three weeks from now.

Chiefs control their own destiny. Win 3 and they are in.

Yeah, at this point no one has even clinched a spot yet. Sometimes teams have clinched homefield by this point.

It's still possible, although unlikely, New England and Denver miss the playoffs. Denver's gotta play @SD and @CIN the next two weeks, and Manning's been in a slump. The AFC North is going to beat up on each other too.

That would be absolutely hillarious.

Gosh, it'll be so exciting to see a playoff series featuring new teams like New England and Denver and Indianapolis and Pittsburgh. That's not boring and repetitious at all.

Teams that have real qbs. Odd how that works in the modern NFL.

The best result for the Chiefs at this point would be for them to go 7-9 with one of the most pathetic meltdowns of all time, ending the season with a 6 game losing streak. That at least might make Reid and Dorsey take a look at dumping Alex before his 2015-2016 salary becomes guaranteed in March.

I know we all assume Smith is here to stay, but the fact that an escape was even written in to his contract means that there has to be at least a small piece of rationality of Dorsey's brain. He must know deep down what a piece of shit Smith is. Maybe, just maybe, if we play bad enough he will start to think long and hard about whether he wants to pay Alex $26 million over the next two years.

The first Super Bowl that I really remember watching as a knowledgeable football fan was Super Bowl 6 - Dallas over Miami.

Since then, I've been witness to 43 Super Bowls featuring 86 teams. Those teams (and appearances) are as follows:

Pittsburgh 8
Dallas 7
Denver 7 (2 involved cheating on the salary cap)
New England 7
San Francisco 6
Miami 5
NY Giants 5
Washington 5
Buffalo 4
Oakland 4
Green Bay 3
Minnesota 3
St. Louis Rams 3
Baltimore 2
Chicago 2
Cincinnati 2
Indianapolis 2
Philadelphia 2
Seattle 2
Arizona 1
Atlanta 1
Carolina 1
New Orleans 1
San Diego 1
Tampa Bay 1
Tennessee 1

So if you set aside things like the LA Rams versus St. Louis Rams, I've seen 26 franchises in the Super Bowl. But the downside is that there are only 5 teams that comprise 35 of the 86 spots, which means that one of those five teams is pretty much in the Super Bowl every year (if you discount the fact that Denver was caught cheating).

In my entire life, the AFC Super Bowl team has been Pittsburgh, New England, or Denver (caught cheating twice) every second year. The NFC isn't much better since it's been either Dallas, San Francisco, the Giants, or the Redskins every other year.

No wonder I'm bored with football these days. I've pretty much seen already seen every Super Bowl.

Big games in week 15:

Steelers @ Falcons -- spotty Steelers team, should win though, move to 9-5
Jags @ Ravens --- Ravens win, move to 9-5
Texans @ Colts --- they were 'in it' for a week or so, Colts win huge
Packers @ Bills --- Bills get stomped
Dolphins @ NE -- MIA loss seals their fate
OAK @ KC -- scrappy team playing for nothing, huge for KC
Bengals @ Browns --- who knows, but CIN should win
Broncos @ Chargers --- Broncos should win, anything can happen on the road in the AFC. Everyone wants to say Manning is slumping - ok.

The games in blue are 'up for grabs'...

Its called elite franchises. They are always in, because they know what the **** they are doing and got good quarterbacks.

Smith isnt going anywhere, he's going to get bullshit excuses that the ONline was terrible and he has no wide receivers. Chiefs fans are yet again, ****ED>

We aren't assuming anything. He's here until at least 2017. Alex got 30 million guaranteed when he signed the extension.

Broncos are going to win out, congrats.

I agree, but SD is a wildcard - they can look all word and then fall flat, esp at home. Bengals @ their house - that's just a weird team.

Denver's hopes of getting that #1 seed died last night in SD, so it's all about staying healthy at this point... #2 seed is ideal because it drags a bye week with it.

Three games remaining - Denver is 2 up on CIN (with a H2H to play) and they are 1 up on IND (Den won the H2H), so they can lock up that #2 seed (I believe) before the final game.

Pros and cons to resting if that's the case or keeping your foot to the pedal, I think you play your studs, but limit the workload. Feed Anderson and Thompson a ton over the next 3 weeks, set the tone now. We know what Manning and company can do when needed - let's win some ugly ground games with defense and rushing.

W-L-L as the Chiefs sputter to an 8-8 season.