Inside The Bills

When coaches on playoff teams can interview

With seven head coach openings in the NFL now, interviews with prospective replacements will begin in earnest across the league. Here is the timeline allowable by league rules for head coaching candidates currently coaching on playoff clubs.

Beginning now until Sunday January 6th, assistant coaches under contract to playoff teams that have byes in the Wild Card weekend may be interviewed for head coaching positions. The interview window lasts until the conclusion of the Wild Card games Sunday, which will be about 8 pm when the NFC Wild Card game between Seattle and Washington wraps up.

The next window of opportunity for clubs seeking to interview a head coaching candidate that is an assistant under contract to a playoff team that’s still alive (won Wild Card playoff game) would be the week of the Divisional playoff round (January 7th until January 13th), the Sunday of Divisional Playoff Games.

Andre Reed talks NFL playoffs

Bills all-time leading receiver and Wall of Famer Andre Reed gave his take on the upcoming playoff games this weekend and provided his final four for the AFC and NFC Championship games next week.

Reed did an interview with the NFL Players site this week where he made his choices for the winners of this week’s Divisional playoff games.

He picked Green Bay, New England, New Orleans and Baltimore.

Broncos help Bills

Denver’s 17-13 win over the Jets last night could prove to be a big help for the Bills.

The win lifted Denver to 5-5 and dropped the Jets to 5-5. New York is now a half game back of the Bills.

Should the Jets and Bills be battling each other for a Wild Card spot (perhaps premature with teams ahead of them right now in the AFC for the Wild Cards) the tiebreakers go as follows to break a tie within a division.

Head-to-head
Division record
Record vs. common opponents
Conference record
Strength of victory
Strength of schedule
Etc.

Buffalo’s game next week at New York is going to be huge should there be a need for a tiebreaker between the two clubs because if the Bills can get a split then it would go to division record. Right now the Bills are 1-1 in the division and the Jets are 2-2. We’re dealing with a lot of ‘ifs’ here but if Buffalo wins Sunday in Miami and then gets a win in New York (a big if for some) the Bills would not only put more distance between themselves and the Jets in the playoff race, but in division record as well.

First things first in Miami. At this point if the season ended today both the Jets and Bills would be out of the playoffs. Here’s a look at the current AFC standings.