The NFL schedule creation process is so complicated that there’s always a few quirks each year. Some teams end up with an unfair slate of road games — sometimes in a row — or an extremely challenging opening set of games. Sometimes a team seems destined to nosedive before the playoffs, with a devilishly challenging bunch of contests.
There’s nothing the NFL can do about it. Someone’s going to end up in a bad situation. That’s just the reality of schedule-making, especially this year when the NFL was dealing with a schedule which is designed specifically to help the league prepare for the possibility of postponed or cancelled games due to the coronavirus pandemic.
1. San Francisco 49ers
The NFC West is like the Group of Death for a World Cup: the 49ers (the defending AFC champions), the Los Angeles Rams (last year’s defending AFC champions), the Seattle Seahawks (Russell Wilson is still good) and the Arizona Cardinals (Kliff Kingsbury — so hot right now).
Not only do the 49ers have to battle that, but they’ll be battling the hangover of losing the Super Bowl, which is never a good feeling. Meanwhile, they’ll have a target on their back, because while their final season ended with a loss, they ended a lot of seasons. And then there’s the Week 7 – Week 10 stretch.
#49ers' hell stretch:
* Week 7 at NE (longest trip in US they can make)
* Week 8 at SEA
* Week 9 vs. GB (Thurs game/short week)
* Week 10 at NO
All four opponents made playoffs in 2019.— Matt Barrows (@mattbarrows) May 7, 2020
The 49ers are headed to New England and Seattle and back east again on a short week.
2. Houston Texans
They may well start the season 0-4, with the following slate: at Chiefs, vs. Ravens, at Steelers and vs. Vikings. That should be enough to get Teapot’s blood boiling. It’s a horrific way to get the season going.
3. Los Angeles Rams
The Rams may well start 0-3. Let’s give their schedule a look: vs. Cowboys, at Eagles and at Bills. The relief comes in Week 4 against the New York Giants, who should be bad for another year. (But who knows? Maybe Daniel Jones will be good in 2020.) The calm doesn’t last long. Again, the Rams are in the NFC West, which should follow the plot of “Captain America: Civil War,” with The Avengers duking it out constantly.
4. New York Jets
5. Buffalo Bills
They play each other back-to-back, something that hasn’t happened since 1991. It’s really not a big deal. It’s just kind of boring.
6. New Orleans Saints
They open the season against Tom Brady’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers, which feels like a game that Brady and Rob Gronkowski are desperately going to try to win. There’s so much riding on it for them — it’s a chance to silence the critics, to get the new era off to the right start and to begin to write a new chapter in their legacies. The Saints will also see the Buccaneers again during a brutal stretch.
Make-or-break stretch for the Saints has to be Weeks 10-16:
• 49ERS (13-3)
• FALCONS (archrival)
• At Broncos (1-5 all-time in DEN)
• At Falcons (archrival)
• At Eagles (4-9 all-time in PHI)
• CHIEFS (12-4, SB champs)
• VIKINGS (10-6)— Jeff Duncan (@JeffDuncan_) May 8, 2020
That’s not a fun bunch of games for New Orleans.
7. New England Patriots
They’ve got a full slate of games against the AFC West, which will probably feature two of the NFL’s best teams. And then the Patriots have games against the Kansas City Chiefs and the Baltimore Ravens, two more of the NFL’s best teams. To make things worse, the Patriots are in Houston, in New England, in L.A. for two consecutive games over five days (including Thursday Night Football) before heading to Miami.
Oh yeah, and they’ll be starting a quarterback not named Tom Brady.
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