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Why 2016 has been the worst NFL playoffs ever

William Glasheen / Appleton Post Crescent

So that wasn't very fun.

After a fairly underwhelming season of football, the 2016 playoffs have somehow been worse. Through the first 10 games of the postseason winning teams have outscored losing teams 323 to 166 with two games being decided by one score or less.

The Green Bay Packers and Dallas Cowboys put on a game-of-the-year candidate in the NFC divisional round (props to Aaron Rodgers and Jared Cook) and then the Pittsburgh Steelers and Kansas City Chiefs demonstrated what the slowest version of a close playoff game looks like.

There have been games that everyone thought would be close and games that we all knew wouldn't - yet somehow they pretty much all disappointed.

The playoffs opened with one of the least enticing quarterback matchups of the year, Brock Osweiler off the bench against Connor Cook in his first-ever pro start. It certainly didn't get the fire started, but at least the expected terribleness would provide a close game, right? Wrong. Osweiler took advantage of a depleted Raiders team and won 27-14.

Detroit being dismantled 26-6 by the Seahawks and Ben Roethlisberger passing for negative 1 yard in the second half of a 30-12 win over a Ryan Tannehill-less Miami Dolphins team filled in the middle part of calm a Wild-Card Weekend. Even the matchup of former Super Bowl winners was a mess as the Packers blew out the Giants, whose boat trip became a more exciting story than their play.

The rematch of a controversially-ended regular-season contest between the Falcons and Seahawks promised to be a classic, but injuries throughout the Seattle secondary were too much to keep the talent level up. No one gave much chance for the Texans to top the Patriots, including the Patriots apparently as Tom Brady had a rare sub-50 completion percentage in the win.

An ice storm in Kansas City pushed the Chiefs-Steelers game to prime time, which only shone a brighter light onto the fact that a lopsided score alone isn't what makes a game boring. Pittsburgh's six field-goal drives were enjoyable for kickers and that's it.

The Packers' last-second win over the Cowboys was awesome (possibly because we were deprived of entertaining football for a few weeks at that point), but also disadvantageous. Rodgers' "anything is possible" aura gave fans certainty that the NFC Championship was at least going to be a high-scoring competition, which was a very wrong assumption. The Falcons jumped out to 31-0 lead and that was that.

So with one game remaining before the Super Bowl, fans held their breath, hoping Pittsburgh's "Killer B's" could keep it close with Brady and the Pats. But sadly, the most exciting Killer B - Le'Veon Bell - left the game early with a groin injury, killing his team's chances and allowing Brady to reign victorious.

Now there are two teams and one game remaining. Over the past decade, only one Super Bowl has been a blowout, so the odds are against the 2016 playoff's trend. But in all honesty, it will take much more than just a good, close game to erase the memories of the 40 hours or so we just spent watching some of the most boring football we've ever come across.

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