Battle for Seeding or Rest Battered Starters?

[CJD]

They have not locked up the division or the #2 seed yet. The #2 seed is guaranteed a home game in the divisonal round if they win in the wild card round, since the #1 seed will play the lowest of the advancing seeds, which cannot be the #2 seed.

Since the #2 seed is fully within our control to achieve (since we play the Bills and Ravens), I see no reason to rest starters until that seed is no longer within our control. Especially since the likely #3 seed in that scenario is the Buffalo Bills.

You mentioned that you believe there's little benefit to the #2 seed vs the #3 seed and I disagree. I have absolutely no interest in the Bengals traveling to Buffalo in the middle of January when they could easily be playing in several inches of snow or some other kind of adverse weather that Buffalo often gets this time of year. The #2 seed is still extremely important even though it no longer has a bye week.

And then, obviously, if KC loses 1 game, which they have almost done two weeks in a row now, we would be in control of the #1 seed.

We cannot lock up the division title before week 18 unless we win our next two games and Baltimore loses their next 2 games, which means we would have beaten the Bills which then means we'd be battling for the #2 seed. If we win our next 2 games, Buffalo could still get the #2 seed back if they beat New England in week 18, assuming they don't lose to the Bears this weekend.

So, basically, the only scenario where I see us resting our starters is in week 18 if the Ravens lose the next 2 games, the Bengals win their next two games, Buffalo loses their next 2 games and KC wins out. And we won't even know about that last item until, basically, kickoff week 18 if our game is a 4pm or 8pm game and KC's game is 1pm.

If we play in the same time slot as KC in week 18, I don't think there is any situation where we rest our starters at any point this season.