The NFL has officially decided the Buffalo Bills and Cincinnati Bengals won’t resume their postponed Week 17 game, electing to designate it as a no-contest.
Meaning, the game officially goes on the record books as having not occurred, so the Bills and Bengals will finish the season with 16 games played compared to 17 for all other teams.
With the decision, the Bengals automatically win the AFC North regardless of Week 18 results.
The NFL also announced that the AFC championship game could end up being played at a neutral site, pending owners voting to approve the measures on Friday.
This was the cleanest way to move forward and the one that does the least harm to both teams and others that didn’t even take the field that night. The only other viable options were rescheduling the game on a short turnaround or pushing the entirety of the playoffs back by at least a week.
The news comes on the heels of an amazing update on the status of Bills defender Damar Hamlin, who suffered cardiac arrest during Monday night’s game and has remained in critical condition at a Cincinnati hospital.
From a sheer football perspective, the Bengals still have much to play for in terms of AFC playoff seeding, with those possibilities outlined here:
A neutral AFC Championship Game site now is possible, per the NFL: pic.twitter.com/5gmd0drq7q
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) January 6, 2023
