Sunday Wild Cards Featured the Good and the Bad Ugly

Thankfully, the New Orleans Saints and Carolina Panthers game followed whatever it was the Buffalo Bills and Jacksonville Jaguars were doing for three hours.

The best guess is providing a rationalization for Bills fans to have playoff parties for the first time since dinosaurs walked the earth.

Whatever, Buffalo wound up getting what teams who depend on an Andy Dalton miracle pass to make the post-season deserve.

Frankly, all that was missing in this one were leather helmets and the single wing.

• Jags QB Blake Bortles' poverty-stricken passing total of 87 yards was eclipsed by his 10-88 rushing stats, and
• Bills slinger Tyrod Taylor struggled to manage a 44.2 passer rating.

In the end, try as these teams might, someone had to not lose:

It'd be easy to call this 10-3 Jax victory a valiant defensive struggle, but give a hard look to those highlights again.

Did you see anything on that side of the line that was anything other than vanilla? And if you were the defensive coordinator for either team, would you have varied from it if it was working as well as it was?

Exactly.

After viewing this game ...

The Pittsburgh Steelers immediately ordered game film to prepare for next week's clash with Jax:

Meanwhile, just as Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time was getting to the hot parts, an NFL playoff game started.

There was much at stake when the Saints and Panthers tangled. For example:

• Would New Orleans complete a rare three-game sweep of the same opponent in the same season?
• Who would be moving on to play the Minnesota Vikings next week?
• Will P Diddy be ready to go with his purchase offer the moment Carolina's eliminated?

Well, now we know:

• Check,
• Check it out, and
• Check, please.

For the record, Cam Newton said he was poked in the eye at the end and did not suffer a concussion.

OK, but in that case, it looked more like dude got poked in the face:

At least he'll now have an off-season to recover, as opposed to a week.

With the pairings now set for the Divisional round, here's what Bovada thinks of them:

If there's a surprise in those numbers, it's the Saints being a road dog.

The Wild Card weekend confirmed the value of an experienced slinger in the playoffs, and while QBs don't square off personally, they obviously have a huge say in a team's performance.

The Drew Brees vs Case Keenum factor seems a hella lot more influential than -1, keeping in mind the home-field bookie bias of -3.

All the more reason to tune in.

And being thankful that's what the Bills -- and by then, the Jags -- will be doing, too.