While the Pittsburgh Steelers have a near-100-percent chance of making the playoffs, what seed they capture is far less certain. Come Wild Card weekend, they could be enjoying a first-week bye and home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. Or they could turn into a plucky seven-seed going on the road against some AFC favorite.
As KDKA’s Bob Pompeani laid out via NFL Research, the Steelers could finish with any of the seven playoff seeds. Their most likely outcome is where they currently stand at the No. 3 seed but the other six remain in play.
The next most-likely seed is the five spot. That will be their most likely finish should the Baltimore Ravens storm back and win the AFC North. Just trailing is a 16-percent chance to become the No. 2 seed which could be achieved if the 10-3 Buffalo Bills have a worse finish than Pittsburgh. But with the Bills having an easier end to the year, facing the New England Patriots twice and the New York Jets once over their final three weeks, the odds aren’t strong.
Grabbing the six-seed comes in next with an 11-percent chance. A Wild Card contender like the Los Angeles Chargers or Denver Broncos, two teams who’ve lost to Pittsburgh, would have to get hot late as the Steelers fade at the same time. Unlikely but not impossible.
The other seed possibilities have single-digit percent chances. An eight-percent chance at the four seed, five-percent for the top seed (which would essentially require running the table), and a two-percent to fall all the way down to the seven-seed.
Without crunching the numbers for the other playoff teams, Pittsburgh probably isn’t alone in their seed possibilities. There’s still four weeks left and any team who gets hot or cold could climb the ladder of fall down the chute. But it’s an interesting exercise in knowing how wide open the Steelers’ playoff fate is.
Of course, they haven’t technically clinched the playoffs yet though there’s scenarios in play beginning tomorrow. Working out the path for them missing the postseason isn’t even worthwhile. If I’m wrong and Pittsburgh is on the couch come then, you’ll have angrily thrown your computer out the window and won’t be able to tell me how incorrect I was, anyway.
