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The Detroit Lions pulled their proposal on Wednesday
NFL Network’s Judy Battista reported on Wednesday that the Detroit Lions pulled their proposal for changes to playoff seeding less than an hour before owners were set to meet and discuss the potential change. As it stands right now, the top four seeds in each conference come from a pool of the division winners in each conference. The Lions’ proposal would have allowed for “wild card” teams to earn those seeds, if they had a better record than a division winner, and allowed teams in that situation to host a home playoff game in the first round.
Battista’s co-worker, Ian Rapoport, stated that the rule change may be implemented whenever the NFL moves to an 18-game schedule, which is expected in the near future.
So for now, divisional games still hold a special rank in the league...sort of. It’s still possible for a team to win a division while going winless (0-6 record) against their divisional opponents. Ultimately, what matters is just winning games, not winning divisional games. Divisional winners aren’t decided by teams’ records against those opponents, in contrast to how college football decides its conference and/or division champions.
It’s hard to claim that divisional games are particularly important when a team can win a division without beating a single one of their division mates, but at least one team from each division will host a home playoff game for the 2025 season.
