Wanted to make sure I got my picks locked in for this year's bracket before the Seahawks/Niners game begins here in about ten minutes or so. Winners also cover the spread unless otherwise specified.
Wild Card Games
49ers beat Seahawks
Chargers beat Jaguars
Bills beat Dolphins, but don't cover the spread
Vikings beat Giants
Bengals beat Ravens
Cowboys beat Buccaneers
Divisional Round Games
Bills beat Bengals
49ers beat Vikings
Chiefs beat Chargers, but don't cover the spread
Cowboys upset Eagles
Conference Championship Games
Chiefs beat Bills (again), spread winner TBD
49ers beat Cowboys
Super Bowl LVII (57)
Chiefs beat 49ers, upset potential depends on how the spread turns out
When I made this, it looks like I had my seeds wrong on who actually played who, assuming these games went the way they did. The main one I had messed up was the Cowboys in the divisional round, as for whatever reason I thought they would have been playing against the Eagles instead of the 49ers. I still actually stand with that selection, albeit with a rock/paper/scissors pattern of "Eagles beat 49ers, 49ers beat Cowboys, Cowboys beat Eagles".
This is only part of why I'm posting tonight, though. It's come to my attention that several, and I mean several fans think both of the conference championship games were rigged this year, even by referee standards. I wasn't following both of the games in full, but I think I can say one thing with utmost certainty.
There's a lot more that goes into football officiating than you might think. There's only so many ways I can say this without a bunch of 49ers and especially Bengals fans trying to cancel me or something, but I don't think the referees were ever the biggest problem in the sport. Are they a problem sometimes? Yes, but not every time. Something that cannot be refuted, however, is that football teams that lose big games primarily have themselves to blame for letting the game get to a situation where the referees might have an impact on the outcome of any given matchup. Professional sports remind me of bipartisan voting politics: your fans either celebrate the win or think you got cheated in the process.
Referees have it rough. I'd argue it's one of the hardest jobs out there in any profession. Going in front of tens of thousands of people, to say nothing of the far greater number that may be watching a sports game in a different way, and being required to make split-second judgment decisions that, under most circumstances, will leave at least one of the two team's group of fans upset isn't something I would wish on my worst enemy. These guys have to go into every game knowing pretty much every rule in the book by memory, and just to make it even worse they're required to point out which player and/or group of players committed any given penalty.
At the very least, even if push comes to shove and there are sketchy things going on behind the scenes, I get that people are upset when their favorite team loses in a big prime-time matchup. I get it. From what I can tell our community seems to be relatively clean as far as sports toxicity is concerned, but just in case, I want this post to be a reminder to always treat both the officals and the fans of the other team with nothing but respect. Being upset is okay, but no one likes having to put up with that.