An Early Look at the AFC West’s
Non-Division Opponents
by Paul Pulley
The NFL schedule is set up in a rather clever manner. Every team plays each team in their own division twice, once at home and once away. In addition, each division plays another division from their own conference and a division from the other conference on a rotating schedule. This allows each team in the NFL to play every other team at least once every four years and it makes it so each division has 14 out of 16 common opponents every season. The final two games consist of conference opponents from the two non-scheduled divisions based on the previous year’s ranking.
For the AFC West, this years scheduled AFC division opponent is the AFC North. The North consist of the Baltimore Ravens, the Cincinnati Bengals, the Cleveland Browns and the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Many people believe that the primary goal of the season is to win your own division. Winning your division is not only an automatic berth in the playoffs but a guaranteed home playoff game. In addition, a bye week and/or home field advantage throughout the playoffs is impossible without first winning your own division.
I read any number of articles about how a team will do by looking at their schedule and picking wins or possible losses, but I wanted to stretch this a bit and see how these common opponents will affect the entire AFC West, not just our own Kansas City Chiefs.
The Pittsburgh Steelers
Let’s first take a look at the Steelers. The Chiefs visit Pittsburgh on September 16, week 2 of the NFL season. With so many changes on both the offense and especially the defense of the Chiefs, most are expecting the Steelers to win this game. One caveat to this is the continued contract dispute with Steelers RB, Le’Veon Bell. If Bell and the Steelers cannot agree to a long-term contract within the next month or so, Bell will likely skip most or all of the Steelers training camp. With Bell coming in late and not knowing how the Chiefs revamped run D will look and if the Chiefs new offense is able to gel quickly, this could shift the advantage to Kansas City. It sure would be nice to take one against the Steelers in their house.
In an interesting schedule, the Steelers face the rest of the AFC West in back to back to back games later in the season. First visiting the Denver Broncos November 25th, week 12, followed by a game in Pittsburgh versus the Los Angeles Chargers on December 2nd, week 13, finishing with a trip to Oakland to face the Raiders on December 9th, week 14.
The week 12 game in Denver might be Pittsburgh’s toughest test of the three, as the Steelers will be playing consecutive road games, having visited Jacksonville on Sunday night in week 11. If Case Keenum is what Elway expects, this could give the Steelers some problems.
The Steelers then return home to host the Chargers, which should be advantage Steelers. The following week Pittsburgh travels to Oakland for a Sunday night game. This will be Oakland’s second consecutive home game, having played the Chiefs on December 2nd. Two very tough back to back games for the Raiders in which I think they will end up with two marks in the loss column. The Steelers bye week is week 7, which won’t have any bearing on their play against the AFC West. Hopefully the Chiefs can take one in Pittsburgh, but I would not be surprised to see the Steelers sweep the AFC West this year.
The Cincinnati Bengals
The next AFC North opponent for the Chiefs will be the Cincinnati Bengals. Cincinnati comes to Arrowhead in week 7, October 21st. This will be an interesting matchup as the Bengals will have played their division rival Pittsburgh the prior week but the Chiefs will be returning home after a Sunday night game versus the Patriots in Foxborough. I still believe the Chiefs will win this one, especially if the run defense has improved at all.
In an eerily similar schedule to Pittsburgh’s, the Bengals play the rest of the AFC West in back to back to back games.
Cincinnati will host the Denver Broncos on December 2nd, week 13, after having played a home game against the Cleveland Browns, while Denver will be traveling to Cincinnati following a home game against the Pittsburgh Steelers. I will give the Bengals the advantage in this one.
On December 9th, week 14, the Bengals will travel to Los Angeles to face the Chargers. The Chargers will not only be returning home from a road trip to Pittsburgh, but will be facing a very short week having to travel to Kansas City to face the Chiefs on Thursday night following the Bengals game. This is a very rough stretch for LAC. I think the Chargers will win this game if they aren’t looking ahead to Thursday night.
In week 15, December 16th, the Bengals go back home to Cincinnati to host the Oakland Raiders. The Raiders will be coming off of two consecutive home games, first hosting the Chiefs on December 2nd and then facing the Steelers on Sunday night, December 9th. I think the Bengals will have the advantage in this game.
With the Bengals bye week coming in week 9, it won’t have an impact on their play against the AFC West. Because of scheduling, it’s possible the Bengals win the final three games against the West but I think they will split, winning their two homes games and losing the two away.
The Cleveland Browns
The third AFC North team the Chiefs will face will be on November 4th, week 9, when Kansas City travels to Cleveland to play he Browns. The Chiefs will be coming off a home game against the Broncos the previous week while the Browns will be returning home from Pittsburgh, having played their division rival Steelers on October 28th. I believe the advantage here will belong to Kansas City.
The first AFC West team the Browns will play will be the Raiders in Oakland on September 30th, week 4. The Browns will be coming off a 10-day rest having hosted the New York Jets on Thursday night, September 20th. In the meantime, the Raiders will be returning from the east coast having played the Miami Dolphins on September 23rd. I’m not expecting the Browns to win this game but the schedule does help them a little.
The second team from the AFC West to play the Browns will be the Chargers on October 14th, week 6. The Browns will have consecutive home games, having hosted their division rival Baltimore Ravens on October 7th. The Chargers will be traveling to Cleveland after hosting their division rival Raiders the prior week. I can’t really imagine the Browns winning this game but we can hope.
The final AFC West opponent for the Browns will be when they travel to Denver in week 15, Saturday December 15th. This will be a short week as the Browns will have hosted the Carolina Panthers on December 9th. Meanwhile the Broncos will be returning home having played the 49ers in San Francisco the prior Sunday. This could be an interesting game as both teams will probably be in the running for an early draft selection in 2019.
The Browns week 11 bye won’t influence their games against the AFC West. It’s hard to imagine the Browns winning any of these games versus the West but it would be hilarious if they took that week 4 game in Oakland.
The Baltimore Ravens
The final AFC North opponent for the Chiefs will be when we host the Baltimore Ravens on December 9th, week 14. The Ravens will be playing consecutive road games having traveled to Atlanta to face the Falcons on December 2nd. The Chiefs will be returning from Oakland, having played the Raiders on December 2nd and will be playing another game at Arrowhead against the Chargers on Thursday night the 13th. This will be the second game after the Chiefs bye week, so let’s hope this years post bye week games turn out a lot better than they did last year.
The Baltimore Ravens first AFC West opponent will be on September 23rd, week 3, when they host the Denver Broncos. The Ravens will be coming off a mini bye, returning home from playing their division rival Bengals on Thursday night, September 13th. Denver will be traveling to Baltimore after playing the Raiders on September 16th. This should be an advantage for the Ravens.
The second AFC West opponent for the Ravens will be the Oakland Raiders on November 25th, week 12. In a little scheduling quirk, the Ravens have a home game versus the Steelers in week 9, their bye in week 10, a home game against the Bengals in week 11, followed by this home game versus the Raiders week 12. The Raiders will be playing consecutive road games having traveled to Arizona to face the Cardinals on November 18th. I think Baltimore has a good chance to beat the Raiders at home in Baltimore.
The final game for the Ravens against the AFC West will be on December 23rd, week 16, when Baltimore travels to Los Angeles to play the Chargers. Baltimore will be coming off a home game versus the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on December 16th. The Chargers will be coming off a 10-day rest as this game is following the Thursday night game in Kansas City. The Chargers should win this one.
Similar to the Bengals, I think the Ravens will split their four games versus the West, winning their two at home and losing the away games at Kansas City and Los Angeles.
This is my way too early take on how the AFC West versus the AFC North will play out.
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