Tennessee Titans fans far and wide will all be biting their nails as the final two weeks of the 2019 regular season winds down.

Increased levels of stress for Titans fans in the month of December is nothing new. For the third consecutive season, the Titans will enter Week 17 with a shot to make their playoff dreams come true.

Route to an AFC South division title:

Winning the division is the least complex situation for the Titans. With the Texans holding a one game advantage over Tennessee, along with a tie-breaker in their back pocket, Houston controls its own destiny.

That being said, there is still a slight possibility the Titans could walk away with their first division crown since the 2008 season where Tennessee finished 13-3.

ESPN's Football Power Index gives the Texans a 90% probability to wrap up the AFC South. They could do so as early as Saturday when they hit the road to face the red hot Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who have won five of their last six. The Texans currently sit as one-point road favorites in that matchup.

For Houston, one win in their final two games locks up the AFC South and a home playoff game in the first round of the playoffs. However, if the Titans can find a way to knock off a Saints team who will be on short rest AND Tampa Bay lends a helping hand by knocking off the Texans, then the Titans will go on the road to Houston and play for the division title in the final week of the season.

To simplify: Houston must lose out and the Titans must win out in order for the Titans to walk away with the AFC South, setting up a rematch in Nashville with the Buffalo Bills in the AFC Wild Card Round.

If Houston wins on Saturday, the Titans' matchup with New Orleans the following day is virtually meaningless. I will circle back to this shortly.

Road to a wild card berth:

After the Bills topped the Steelers by a score of 17-10 on Sunday night, Buffalo secured a playoff berth. With the win, Buffalo is a shoe-in for the five seed leaving just one wild card position remaining to be filled.

The Tennessee Titans and Pittsburgh Steelers will be jockeying for that coveted wild card berth in the final two games of the regular season.

First, here are the four important tiebreakers considered at the end of the regular season:

1. Head to head record
2. Conference record
3. Record versus common opponents
4. Strength of victory

Since the Titans and Steelers never faced each other this season, the tiebreaker moves to conference record.

As things stand at the moment the Steelers have the slightest of advantages with a 6-4 record in the AFC compared to the Titans 6-5 record in conference.

However, this tiebreaker has the potential to swing in favor of Tennessee over the course of the next two weeks.

Pittsburgh’s last two games are each on the road. They head to New York to square off against the Jets on Sunday before finishing the year on the road at Baltimore.

If the Steelers lose one of their final two games AND the Titans can finish with a win on the road at Houston, the two teams would share a 7-5 record in the AFC.

If the Steelers win out, they would retain ownership of the conference record tiebreaker finishing with an 8-4 record in conference. The Titans (6-5) can not possibly reach that mark in the AFC due to only having one more AFC foe (Houston) on their schedule.

If both teams drop their final two games and finish at 8-8 they would share a 6-6 record in the AFC advancing the tiebreaker to record versus common opponents.

The Titans and Steelers also share a 3-2 record against common opponents (Browns, Colts, Chargers and Bills). This moves the tiebreaker to strength of victory.

In the strength of victory tiebreaker, the win-loss-tie percentage of each team that lost to the Titans and Steelers is respectively combined to determine who advances.

The good news here is that the Titans hold the advantage in strength of victory as the teams Tennessee knocked off during the season currently combine for 50 wins while Pittsburgh’s victims add up to just 34 wins and one tie on the season.

This would ultimately send the Tennessee Titans to the playoffs as the final wild card team and set up a road matchup with the #3 seed in the AFC, likely the Kansas City Chiefs.

Circling back

If the Texans win the AFC South on Saturday that would make Tennessee’s game on Sunday at home nearly meaningless. This is because the only way the Titans would be able to crack the playoffs would be through the wild card avenue.

A win against a New Orleans team would not enhance any of the aforementioned tiebreakers outside of strength of victory, which the Titans already control.

Since the Titans are already relying on Pittsburgh to lose AT LEAST one more game to move into a possible 9-7 tie at season’s end, then a loss at home to the Saints would mean nothing.

Remember that the only situation in which the Saints game would be of any importance at all to Tennessee would be if the Texans lose to Tampa Bay, opening up a battle for the AFC South in the Week 17 finale.

Obviously a win does not hurt, but it really would not matter if Houston beats Tampa Bay since Pittsburgh still needs to finish 9-7 or 8-8 in order for the Titans to fill the wild card vacancy.

This could present an opportunity to rest Derrick Henry, who has a nagging hamstring injury that clearly slowed him down Sunday versus the Texans, as well as the other Titans players who are currently battling injuries.

It will certainly make Mike Vrabel’s decision an interesting one in regards to which 53 Titans make the active roster for Sunday afternoon’s date with the Saints.

In conclusion

None of this matters if either Pittsburgh wins out or Houston beats the Titans. A win against New Orleans and a loss against the Texans eliminates Tennessee from the wild card on the conference record tie breaker. The Titans’ only avenues to get into the playoffs are if one of the following occurs:

• The Steelers lose out
• The Texans lose out
• The Steelers lose once and Tennessee beats Houston

That was a lot. If you made it to this point in the story reward yourself with an adult beverage or several.