My app doesn't have it marked but it lookss like the Panthers have clinched a playoff. No I see where a Falcon loss would eliminate them. I just didn't want the Saints to have to play Carolina a 3rd time.
Oh wait so the Rams have the same record. If they lose next week and the Saints win Saints get the 3. If Carolina wins next week and the Saints win, and the Cowboys win today and next week the Cowboys will eliminate the Falcons from the playoffs. So ideally, you would want Saints to win next week obviously, then Carolina to win and the Cowboys to win 2 in a row to eliminate the Falcons.
Saints have clinched the playoffs but not the division. Falcons can be beaten out by either the Cowboys or the Seahawks and possibly the Lions dependon on what happens the rest of today and next week. I haven't gone through all the possible permutations.
There are a bunch of scenarios still left. I would think the best possible scenario is obviously a Saints win, then a Rams loss, a Carolina win, and then a beat up Seattle to get the 8. Plus it would be nice for the Saints to get a little revenge on Seattle for those playoff losses earlier in this decade; no Earl Thomas, no Cam Chancellor, they are banged up.
How does it feel Atlanta? When NONE of the calls go your way? Sucks huh?! I don't know if anybody is as big a Saints fan as me, but even I can admit we got a lot of calls today. In my humble opinion Atlanta got screwed today worse than we got screwed in Atlanta. That being said we were still clearly the better team. Who Dat! We going to the playoffs!!!!
It's so hilarious on their boards. They're screaming conspiracy just like we were 2 weeks ago. Only they don't acknowledge the screw job that happened to us in week 14. Their 'win' was all them. Their loss today was because of officiating. I acknowledge that we got the calls today. So what? We've been on the opposite end of that too many times for me to give a shit. I will say this though, they had a lot of other things tilted in their favor besides officiating in that Thurs night game and we still had a chance to win. They never really threatened us at all today.
Two weeks ago, penalties gave the Failcans 9 1st downs and took 3 points off the board. A no-call also denied us a 1st and goal at the 2. And we still had a chance to win the game at the end. Looking at today's drive chart, the Falcons had 2 offensive penalties on the 2nd series of the game that I said right away were questionable. That killed one drive around midfield. They were called for offensive penalties on 3 straight plays on their next drive, but there didn't seem to be any question that they were good calls. That accounted for half the Failcan's penalties in the game, and its still 1st quarter. The no-call on Lattimore that Charles Davis had a fit about was not a bad call. I said at the time, refs go no-call on close coverage like that all the time. The picked up flag on the interference later was a little questionable, I thought. About the same as the one they let stand against Atl after the goal line stand. Was the officiating in our favor today....no question. Was it as aggregiously bad in our favor as it was in Atl's 2 weeks ago? No way.
The refs didn't make the Falcons fail to score twice from inside our 2 yard line today. That was Who Dat defense at work.
