Nota Bene

This post, which draws its data from the results of Mike Beuoy's Monte Carlo simulation presented at fivethirtyeight.com, is somewhat out of date, as Mike's OP has not been updated (as of this writing) since Thursday. While Thursday's game had no impact on the playoff picture, Saturday's two upsets did, in opposite ways: the Chargers' defeat of the 49ers increased the uncertainty around the 6th seed in the AFC, while the Eagles' loss to the Redskins increased the certainty around which teams will make the playoffs in the NFC. Additionally, the betting lines that these posts are based on have moved in some cases since Thursday, sometimes significantly. I will update the numbers of this post when and if I am able to.

Nonetheless, for the most part, the rankings given here are still accurate (per the assumptions that they depend on, of course, such as the accuracy of the betting market in ranking teams). In particular, the Game of the Week continues to be so by an enormous margin.

Edit: From the OP:

Because of a programming error, this analysis miscalculated the outcomes of “head-to-head sweep” tiebreakers involving multiple teams. This miscalculation had a large effect on the race for the top two NFC seeds and a smaller effect on the AFC wild card race. The tables and text have been updated.

I will update this post accordingly as I find the time. edit: Updated for all of the most important games (through BAL/HOU).

Notable Games This Week:

Games of Week 16, Ranked by Influence on Super Bowl Picture¹

Points of Interest

The detailed write-up on the important games of the week and what makes them important can be found here.

Previous Posts

See http://www.onlinesportsbetting.com/category/nfl/.