The NFL announced today that the playoff field will be expanded from 12 teams to 14 teams by adding the No. 7 seed in each conference to be the final team to qualify for January, according to NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport. With the official vote from the owners now set in stone, we’ll see the new playoff format in the final season before a 17th game is added in 2021 and beyond.
On Tuesday, the owners held a conference call to make the announcement due to the NFL’s Annual League Meeting canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The new rule was passed with at least three-quarters of owners in favor of changing this season’s playoff format.
How The New Playoff Format Works
Under the old playoff seeding, the No. 1 and No. 2 seed would receive a first-round bye while seeds No. 3 and No. 4 would host the two Wild Card teams during the first week of the playoffs. With the new rule in effect, only the No. 1 seed would earn a first-round bye, thus making everyone else play during Wild Card Weekend.
The No. 2 seed would now face that conference’s No. 7 seed while the other two matchups stay the same. Once the seeding from Wild Card Weekend is concluded, then the No. 1 seed would know who they’re playing in the Divisional Round.
Going off records from last season, if the new rule had been in effect for the 2019 season, then the Pittsburgh Steelers and Los Angeles Rams (A 8-8 and 9-7 team, respectively) would have been the final two teams to earn the No. 7 seed.
Which would’ve then made Wild Card Weekend even zanier with the Kansas City Chiefs playing Pittsburgh and Green Bay Packers playing Los Angeles instead of automatically advancing to the next round.
Adding More Playoff Games to Wild Card Weekend
The NFL is no stranger to having their stars play in primetime games throughout the season and would’ve had the likes of Aaron Rodgers and Patrick Mahomes amongst the many big names in the opening weekend. With the addition to the extra game, the NFL is preparing to have three games on Saturday and Sunday to kick off the playoffs.
With so many possible matchups, the NFL is figured to gain a significant rating boost with the extra game. For teams, it now provides an extra incentive to stay in contention until the final week.
This will be the final season that we’ll have 8-8 teams finishing the season. In year’s past, it was good enough to qualify and sometimes not good enough. The last time the league tinkered with adding more teams came back in 1990, which gave us the current format we know today.
The Fight Until the End
According to NFL Data, since 1990, a staggering 44 of the 60 teams would have qualified for the seventh seed — which includes “10 different 10-win teams.” With only one losing team (1990 Dallas Cowboys, 7-9) still eligible for the seventh seed.
Teams with a first-round bye as the No. 1 seed have gone on to the Super Bowl at least 51.7 percent of the time while No. 2 seeds make it 27.6 percent, according to CBS Sports’ Jeff Kerr.
The all-important No. 1 seed increases your chances exponentially due to having the road to the Super Bowl go through them — which usually boasts a team with a dominant home record. While upsets to the No. 1 seed have happened before, it’s more often than not, they are representing their conference in the Super Bowl.
For retrospect, a little under 50 percent of NFL teams have a realistic shot to make the playoffs — and once a team gets in, we’ve seen that anything can happen.
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