Game Thread -- Texans @ Patriots (Keeping an Eye on the Playoff Competition)

[Haloti92]

The truly unnerving thing is that Indianapolis is now in control of its own destiny, with both its games vs Houston remaining (sandwiching a trip to KC). Win out & they take the AFC South--& the mighty Texans fall to the #5 seed & in all probability come to M&T on Wild Card Weekend.

Then again, if Flacco and the Ravens step up the game after their main excuse has been removed and beat Denver, I don't think us winning out is all that unlikely.

And if the Colts win out and we win out, we get the #2 seed at worst, and the #1 seed with one more Patriots loss. All of it is longish odds, us winning out, the Colts winning out and the Pats losing again. But that is the optimum, and as long as it is still possible, I'll be rooting for it.

The funny thing about that scenario you are worried about, where the Colts get the #3 seed, we get the #4 seed, is that if we assume Pittsburgh beats Cincy and gets the last WC spot, then the WC round is Houston at Baltimore rematch of last year's Divisional round playoff, and interim-HC Bruce Arians and the Colts vs the team that canned him, the Steelers.

Then if the Colts win and we win, then we get a rematch of last year's AFCCG at Foxborough while Luck and the Colts play their HoF former QB now-playing at Denver.

Depending on those results (admittedly, the two least likely, near-impossible results) we could then travel to Indy to play our former D-coordinator's team with him recovering from cancer in the skybox (or on the sideline) while their former HC is our OC.

Every game would have a storyline from last year. Every game.