NFL First Round Games This Weekend

Yesterday the National Football League playoffs began with the wild card round.  For much of the end of the regular season, several teams struggled week-by-week to make the postseason playoffs and the few who squeaked in at the end I'm sure feel successful.  But then reality hits and they have to play much better teams once the playoffs begin.  Yesterday I saw two good opening round games in the American Conference: the Los Angeles Chargers at the Houston Texans and the Pittsburgh Steelers at the Baltimore Ravens.  Being from the Miami area, I tend to root for whichever...if any...Florida teams make the playoffs: this year only Tampa Bay qualified.  Beyond them, I have others I tend to support.  With Saturday's contests my traditional favorite has been Baltimore, and I was glad to see them prevail.  As for the other game, I've come to like Houston for their head coach DeMeco Ryans and their excellent young quarterback C.J. Stroud...the Texans unexpectedly turned some big plays into a decisive win as well.  Today it's Denver at Buffalo, Green Bay at Philadelphia, and Washington at "my" Tampa Bay.  Monday night has Minnesota "at" the Los Angeles Rams, that game moved to Glendale, Arizona because of the LA-area wildfires.  Detroit and Kansas City received byes this week due to them having the best regular season records in their respective conferences.  At this juncture I like to think about possible intriguing Super Bowl matchups.  Let's see, of the 12 remaining teams, we have Detroit, Minnesota, Houston and Buffalo never having won a Super Bowl, and among them Detroit and Houston have yet to even get to play in one.  So any games involving the assurance of a "first" Super Bowl win is very interesting...I see the most likely scenario here being Buffalo vs. Detroit or Minnesota.  Then we have old title game rematch possibilities: Green Bay vs. Denver, Tampa Bay vs. Kansas City, Philadelphia vs. Kansas City, Buffalo vs. Washington, Minnesota vs. Kansas City, Green Bay vs. Kansas City...quite a few.  Let's see, where do the remaining teams rank according to my liking and to their likelihood of winning it all (two very different lists)?

MY LIKING:

1 Tampa Bay

2 Kansas City

3 Houston

4 Baltimore

5 Philadelphia

6 Los Angeles Rams 

7 Minnesota

8 Green Bay

9 Washington

10 Detroit

11 Denver

12 Buffalo

THEIR LIKELIHOOD

1 Buffalo

2 Detroit

3 Kansas City

4 Minnesota

5 Baltimore

6 Philadelphia

7 Houston

8 Green Bay

9 Los Angeles Rams

10 Tampa Bay

11 Washington

12 Denver