The Reason Every N.F.L. Playoff Team Will Lose
The New York Times
Only one of these teams will prove us wrong.
There are no nigh-unbeatable 1972 Miami Dolphins or 2007 New England Patriots in this year’s N.F.L. playoff field. Each team has at least one critical flaw. Opposing coaches have spent countless hours scouring game film and statistical breakdowns searching for those flaws. All you have to do is read the following capsules.
The Cardinals fumbled (“aborted,” in N.F.L. parlance) 17 center-quarterback snaps this season. Per Football Outsiders research, that’s the highest figure in at least the last 12 years.
Football players master the snap early in their Pop Warner careers, so learning that a playoff team botches an average of one per game is almost as stunning as discovering that they also occasionally get lost on the way to the stadium.
