Stat of the Jay: How Many Teams Have Started 0-4 at Home and Reached the Playoffs?

Jay Morrison | Oct 28, 2024

Bengals fans shout at the Eagles offense in the third quarter of the NFL Week 8 game between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Philadelphia Eagles at Paycor Stadium in downtown Cincinnati on Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024. The Bengals fell to 3-5 on the season with a 37-17 loss to the Eagles at home. / Sam Greene/The Enquirer / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

CINCINNATI – Little about what the Cincinnati Bengals showed in Sunday’s 37-17 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles suggests they have a chance to rally from an ugly first half of the season to make the playoffs.

But as long as Joe Burrow is healthy and playing the way he is, the possibility exists.

Let’s remove Burrow from the equation and simply look at the mathematic component of it.

The Bengals are 3-5, which, as Burrow pointed out in his postgame press conference, means they need to win seven of their final nine games to get into the postseason conversation.

A 7-2 finish would get Cincinnati to 10-7, and at least one team has made the playoffs with 10 or fewer wins since the NFL expanded the playoffs to seven teams per conference in 2021.

Three did it last year.

But the question isn’t whether 10-7 gets a team in, but whether a 3-5 team with four home losses in four tries can actually get to 10-7.

Since 1990, when the league expanded the playoffs to six teams per conference, there have been 199 teams that started 3-5.

Twenty-one of them rallied to reach the playoffs. That’s 10.3 percent.

Since the 2021 expansion, 22 teams have started 3-5. Six rebounded to make the playoffs. That’s 27.3 percent.

Here’s a look at those six teams, all of which were in the NFC:

2023 Packers: They actually won to get to 3-5 then lost to fall to 3-6 before going 6-2 down the stretch to get to 9-8. They beat Dallas in the Wild-Card Round before falling to San Francisco 24-21 in the Divisional Round.

2023 Buccaneers: They were 4-7 through 11 games before going 5-1 to finish 9-8 and win the NFC South. They beat Philadelphia in the Wild-Card Round before falling to 23-21 to Detroit in the Divisional Round.

2023 Rams: Another team that began 3-6, the Rams went 6-1 down the stretch with the lone loss coming in overtime at Baltimore. Los Angeles earned a wild-card berth at 10-7 before losing their first playoff game at Detroit, 24-23.

2022 Buccaneers: The outlier of outliers, Tampa Bay started 3-5 and only went 5-4 down the stretch but won an abysmal NFC South at 8-9. The Buccaneers fell to Dallas 31-14 in the Wild-Card Round.

2021 49ers: They went 7-2 after the 3-5 start to earn a wild-card berth at 10-7. The 49ers won at Dallas 23-17 and at Green Bay 13-10 to reach the NFL Championship Game before falling to the Rams.

2021 Eagles: Another squad that went 3-6, Philadelphia went 6-2 down the stretch to get to 9-7. The Eagles lost at Tampa Bay 31-15 in the Wild-Card Round.

But if you’re encouraged by the 23.7-percent chance, not all 3-5 starts are created equal.

The troubling aspect of this year’s 3-5 start for the Bengals is the fact that they are 0-4 in four home games.

In the Super Bowl era, 121 teams lost their first four home games.

Only four made the playoffs. That’s 3.2 percent.

On the plus side, three of the four who accomplished it did so since the 2021 expansion – the 2021 49ers, 2021 Patriots and 2021 Eagles.

The 2013 Eagles also did it.

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