Chargers should be sounding alarms following The Athletic's latest playoff projections

Chargers should be sounding alarms following The Athletic's latest playoff projections originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

The Los Angeles Chargers returned from their bye to get their fourth win in their last five games in Week 13. That brought them up to 8-4 on the year and placed them as the No. 5 seed and top AFC Wild Card team.

Seemingly a pretty nice, comfortable, safe spot to be in with just five weeks remaining. Or is it?

The Chargers might be in a more precarious spot than they or their fans might think. 8-4 is a good record, but it’s also the same record as the Indianapolis Colts at No. 6 and the Buffalo Bills at No. 7. They’re only ahead on conference win percentage. And with all three of these teams playing at least three more AFC teams before the regular season is up, that could fluctuate wildly over the next month.

And based on those remaining games, The Athletic’s playoff simulator—which projects probabilities for teams to make the playoffs, win their division, and win the Super Bowl—projects the Chargers to not only fall off their perch at No. 5, but right out of the playoff picture altogether.

According to these probabilities, the Chargers have a 61 percent chance to make the playoffs. That’s below Buffalo (91 percent) and Indy (68), and basically on par with the surging 7-5 Houston Texans (60 percent).

In the publication’s final projections, however, it’s the Colts, Texans, Kansas City Chiefs, and Chargers all tied at 10-7, with the two AFC South teams making it in on some sort of tie-breaker, most likely conference win percentage again.

Should the Chargers and their 12 fans actually be worried about falling out of the playoff picture? Or is this just a scare tactic from the New York Times?

The Chargers have the 3rd-toughest remaining schedule

The sledding gets a lot tougher for these California boys come snowy December. They have the third-toughest remaining schedule, with their opponents combining for a scary .625 winning percentage so far this year.

In Week 14, they will almost certainly lose to the Philadelphia Eagles, who are coming in having lost two straight. In Week 15, the Chargers take on the division rival Chiefs, who will be struggling through their own playoff push. And considering the Chargers already beat the Chiefs but have not swept them since 2013, this is likely another loss.

L.A. then heads to Dallas to take on the surging Cowboys and their high-powered offense, hosts the Texans (with whom they are jostling for Wild Card position here) in Week 17, and wraps up on the road against the Denver Broncos, who may or may not have something to play for.

Throw in season-ending injuries to your starting offensive tackles and left hand surgery for Justin Herbert that is being downplayed to a suspicious degree, and you’ve got the recipe for one heck of a slide.