Broncos would return to familiar place if the NFL playoffs began today

The Denver Broncos currently occupy the 5th seed in the NFL Playoff Picture. If the season ended today, who would Denver face in the Wild Card Round? Right now, NFL Next Gen Stats gives the team a 57% chance to make the playoffs at the moment. A win in Week 9 raises their chances to 77%, and a loss bumps them down to 51%.

So while a win against the Baltimore Ravens would be huge, they'd still be in decent shape even with a loss. Anyway, the team sits in the 5th seed, which is the first of the three Wild Card seeds. As of right now, here is the entire playoff picture in the AFC and the Wild Card matchups:

1. Kansas City Chiefs - Bye

2. Houston Texans vs 7. Los Angeles Chargers
3. Pittsburgh Steelers vs 6. Baltimore Ravens
4. Buffalo Bills vs 5. Denver Broncos

Yep, if the playoffs began today, the Denver Broncos would travel to Buffalo to face the Bills, a team they beat in 2023 in the same place. That ended up being one of the more fun and dramatic games for the Broncos in quite some time, and it ended on a Wil Lutz game-winning field goal as time expired:

The Broncos are surging...

That gave Denver their third win in a row, and they would go on to win two more games in a row to make it five straight. Anyway, facing the Bills in the Wild Card Round may be the worst possible matchup for the Denver Broncos if they managed to get into the postseason this year. It'd be hard to say what team would be the "easiest" to face, but the Houston Texans haven't been overly dominant on either side of the ball thus far, so they may be the matchup that Denver would want.

The Broncos still have to face the Ravens, Chiefs twice, Falcons, and Bengals among a few other games. They don't have a guaranteed path to the postseason at all, but their chances are currently better than 50% for them to squeeze in. Currently, the only team in the NFL who has a longer playoff-drought streak would be the New York Jets, and the Jets are among the worst teams in football in 2024, so that streak is probably going to stay alive.

A long way to go remains, but the Denver Broncos are currently in a playoff spot and would face the Buffalo Bills in the first round.