Friday, March 5, 2021

Playoff stats...

 

Hello again everyone.

Plenty of things on my mind tonight, but I wanted to speak briefly on something I looked up today. I was wondering when the last time every NFL team had not only a playoff game, but their last home playoff game and win, as well as their last road playoff game and win, not counting Super Bowls. Here is what I found.

Every team now has made the playoffs at least once since 2015, in fact the Cincinnati Bengals (not surprisingly) and the Denver Broncos have the longest playoff drought in the league, both last reaching in 2015. As far as the longest victory drought in the playoffs, that of course belongs to the Cincinnati Bengals, who haven't won a playoff game since 1990; when I was a sophomore in high school in Hoke County, NC. Remarkably, six teams have failed to win a playoff game in the last decade; Chicago and the Jets, which last won in 2010, Washington in 2005, the Raiders in 2002, the Dolphins in 2000, and the Detroit Lions, who haven't won a playoff game since 1991, when they played in the Silverdome.

As for road victory droughts, the Lions' streak is even more remarkable; dating back to 1957, a conference playoff win at San Francisco. Other long road playoff droughts include both Dallas and Buffalo, who haven't won away from home in the playoff since 1992, Chicago (1994), Miami (1999), Washington and Carolina (2005), and the Jets in 2010. Interestingly the Jets haven't hosted a playoff  game since 2002

Some other tidbits I took out from this "research": Cincinnati and Houston have never won a road playoff game. On the other hand, the Cardinals (believe it or not) are the ONLY franchise to have never LOST a home playoff game. One caveat to that last sentence, while the St. Louis Cardinals never had a home game, the St. Louis Rams did in fact lose a home playoff game; that 2003 2OT thriller against Carolina in what would be the last playoff game for the Rams before moving to back to Los Angeles.

If you want to check out what I did, click on the Playoff Spreadsheet linked here.

Have a safe weekend

Bony