Why the Bengals vs. Bills Are in Buffalo: Explaining the NFL’s Home Field Advantage Rule for the 2023 Playoffs

The NFL’s playoff format had to make a few adjustments for the 2023 edition in response to the cancellation of the Bills vs. Bengals Week 17 game.

Buffalo and Cincinnati were scheduled to meet in “Monday Night Football,” and the game went off without a hitch. But Bills safety Dumar Hamlin suffered a cardiac arrest during the first quarter and had to be resuscitated on the field as players watched in horror.

The game was suspended and eventually canceled because there was too little time left in the season for the team to make up the contest.

The Bengals and Bills were both in the middle of the AFC playoff race, competing for the number one seed. As a result, the NFL has had to enact several contingencies for the postseason, including the possibility of an AFC Championship Game on a neutral site, among other resolutions. increase.

However, there was no move to play the Bills vs. Bengals game at a neutral location. High-seeded teams (Buffalo in this case) will be able to host competitions as normal, albeit with some changes to the playoff structure.

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Why did the NFL make that decision? Here’s what you need to know about the Bills vs. Bengals game and why there’s only one neutral-site playoff game to play before Super Bowl 57.

Why is Bills vs. Bengals in Buffalo?

Bills vs. Bengals is taking place in Buffalo as the Bills finished the season better than the Bengals. They finished the year with a 13-3 record while the Bengals finished 12-4.

Clearly, both teams failed to play a single game, complicating the situation in the AFC playoffs. In particular, these were how the league compared the Chiefs’ record to the Bills’ and Bengals’ records.

But as the NFL’s vice president of broadcast planning, Michael North, explained, it was much easier to compare Cincinnati and Buffalo records.

“The fact that Buffalo and Cynthie were never played is going to play a different number of games compared to Kansas City,” North told USA TODAY Sports ahead of Super Wild Card Weekend. .

But when it comes to Buffalo and Cincinnati potentially facing each other in the divisional round of the playoffs, they Have We played the same number of games — we both played 16 games. So there really wasn’t any conversation about coin flips related to the host site. I’ll let it play on the field this weekend.

That ruling makes sense. Still, it drew the ire of Bengals fans who knew the team would have had a home field advantage over the Bills had they won their Week 17 game against Buffalo.

Alas, the NFL believed it would be fairest to allow the Bills to host the game, but NFL Competition Commission Chairman Rich McKay said he was considering neutral site games in Buffalo and Cincinnati. rice field.

“It was discussed in detail among the owners on today’s conference call,” McKay said.

Ultimately, however, the NFL determined that given the special circumstances this year, only the AFC Championship Game may require a Neutral Site Game. Still, that only applies to some teams within a conference.

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What are the matchups for the AFC Championship Game on Neutral Sites?

Only one of the AFC Championship Game’s possible matchups will be played on a neutral site. This happens when the Bills and Chiefs are the last two teams in the AFC bracket.

Why is this the only game played on a neutral site? If the Bills’ (13-3) game against the Chiefs (14-3) for the AFC No. 1 seed is cancelled, it could result in a tie. Because. The Bills possessed the tiebreaker against the Chiefs thanks to their direct victory over them, so it’s entirely possible they could have taken the number one seed in the conference.

As such, the NFL felt it was inherently unfair to penalize the Bills for having a win-loss disparity based solely on canceled games. Proposals were reviewed and Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium, roughly equidistant from Buffalo and Kansas City, was selected as a potential host for the matchup.

Read more: How Bills and Chiefs fans can get tickets to potential matches in the AFC Championship Game

That said, matches in other AFC Championship Games are played at the homes of higher-seeded teams. For example, if the Chiefs play the Bengals, the game will be played at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City. Or, if the Bills face the Jaguars, that game will be played at Highmark Stadium in his Park in Orchard, New York.

So it’s quite possible that the Neutral Site Championship Game will be unnecessary.