With No Mahomes, Burrow In The Playoffs, It's Now Or Never For Josh Allen

With the AFC playoff picture becoming more and more clear after yesterday's games, a few familiar faces will be absent from this year's postseason.

Though the Cincinnati Bengals had been all but eliminated the moment Joe Burrow went down earlier in the season, it would have been unwise to count them out as long as they still had a mathematical chance after his return.

The Chiefs, on the other hand, were finally locked out of the playoffs with a loss to the Chargers and lost star quarterback Patrick Mahomes to an unfortunate ACL tear in the process.

With all due respect to the other great teams in the AFC like the Patriots, Broncos, and Jaguars, this is now Buffalo's conference to lose.

More specifically, it's do-or-die time for Josh Allen.

If there was ever a more perfect scenario for Allen and the Bills to, at the very least, win the AFC and represent the conference in the Super Bowl, it's this year.

Allen has a 7-6 record in the playoffs, with five of those six losses coming at the hands of the Kansas City Chiefs.

The lone loss against someone other than KC? The Bengals in 2023.

The road is wide open for last year's league MVP to finally capture the one thing that has eluded him in his young but illustrious career in the NFL.

Yesterday, Allen and the Bills proved that they are still the team to beat in their division despite the Patriots' one-game lead in the standings, coming back from a 21-point deficit to shock New England at home.

Now, they need to ride that wave of momentum into the playoffs and not fumble this golden opportunity that has been given to them.

Bills fans are aware that the stars may be aligning as well.

No Mahomes or Burrow in the playoffs means that all of Allen's postseason demons have been exercised, and he is now free to bring a Lombardi Trophy home to Orchard Park.

Yes, the Baltimore Ravens are still lurking in the playoff picture, and Lamar Jackson can make magic happen when he is 100% healthy. But the Bills are 2-0 against the Ravens in the playoffs during the Jackson-Allen era, so they might not be the stumbling block that the other two kings of the AFC represent right now.

Will he see it this way? Or will he feel the pressure of needing to capitalize and end up playing too tight.

That's up to him, but I know he at least recognizes the proverbial clear skies that lie in front of him.