MTZehvor said:
The Jags, Lions, Titans, and Steelers also beat the Patriots. The Panthers and Titans beat the Cowboys. The Bills pulled off the largest upset in the history of the league by point spread this season on the road in Minnesota. Upsets happen in the league. The point is that they don't happen at any higher of a rate inside of the division than outside. As a Dallas fan this year, you should be aware of this; the Cowboys were 5-1 inside of their division this year, but just 5-5 outside of it. New England was 5-1 in the AFC East this season and 6-4 outside of it. The Rams were 6-0 inside their division and 7-3 outside of it. The Bears were 5-1 in the NFC North and 7-3 outside of it. Of the eight division winners this year, only one had a division record that was worse than their out of division record (New Orleans). Besides, most of your examples are extremely cherry picked. Miami needed a last second lateral craze to win, which hardly suggests some kind of deep personnel knowledge. The Browns are by no means a bad team, and the Ravens were still starting Joe Flacco when Cleveland beat them. Washington beat Dallas when the latter was terrible and didn't yet have Amari Cooper. The Bucs beat the Saints in Week 1, which means next to nothing as both teams are still figuring out how good they are. The only one that stands is the Colts losing to the Jags, and even then, upsets happen. It's the NFL. Someone's going to lose to a team they're better than eventually. |
It isn't cherry picking, green bay beat the bears as well. The Panther and Titans are good teams and missed the playoffs by a few games. Cleveland won despite having a historically horrible Coach. Also, Cowboys won their division but each division game was pretty close imo.
