Faced with
the prospect of a 7-9 team getting into the playoffs -- and then possibly
winning the Super Bowl -- I expected sports writers, etc., would have troubles justifying their opposition to the BCS while championing a system (playoffs) that would let a 7-9 team win a championship.
What I
didn't expect was that they'd go the NFL route of suggesting modifications of the rules for playoff contests only -- modifications designed to achieve the desired result rather than a
fair outcome. Modifications such as the one proposed today by Tuesday Morning Quarterback's Gregg Easterbrook.
Easterbrook in the past has argued that the BCS, which annually pairs no-loss or one-loss teams in a championship game,
doesn't actually choose the best team, an argument which seemingly facetiously championed the BCS as a system which:
spreads the razzle-dazzle around to a large number of teams, and allows large numbers to say their seasons yielded a final triumph. That's the college spirit! Along these lines, football-factory schools may not necessarily mind that no true champion is crowned. Under the BCS and the previous dueling-polls system, two or three colleges may assert a plausible claim to the crown. It's easy to imagine a scenario in which this season ends with four teams (the winners of the BCS, Orange, Rose and Fiesta bowls) all claiming to be the national champion. The more the merrier! With a playoff format, only one college team can end the year calling itself the best.
So it's no surprise that Easterbrook secretly likes playoffs -- but dislikes them when the playoff system results in an outcome that he doesn't like -- such as a 7-9 team making it into the postseason and having a chance to contend for the championship. Easterbrook's solution? Have one set of rules for regular season, another for postseason:
That the league is entering its final regular-season weekend with a plausible scenario of a 7-9 team hosting a playoff game while a 12-4 team goes on the road is yet another argument that the NFL needs a seeded postseason format.
Easterbrook goes on to argue that divisions and conferences could be used to set up schedules, but abandoned for the postseason so that Easterbrook's desired outcome -- no 7-9 teams -- gets achieved. His rationale for that is implicit: Easterbrook, like everyone else, feels that there's
no way a 7-9 team could be the best team in the NFL.But isn't that
what playoffs are supposed to determine? Aren't playoffs supposed to say
who the best team is? Not quite 2 years ago, the Giants finished 10-6 and in second place in their division -- a six-seed team that had to play 3 road games to get to the Super Bowl, where they faced only the second team ever to make it to the big game undefeated... and won. Along the way, the Giants beat the razzle-dazzle media darling Cowboys and outplayed Green Bay
in Lambeau Field. And the Giants had lost 2 of their last 4 games in December that year.
Easterbrook's solution is to seed teams regardless of division or conference. For the 2007 regular season that would mean the Giants would not be a 6-seed NFC wildcard. The seeding would be:
1. Patriots* (16-0)
2. Cowboys (13-3)
3. Packers (13-3)
4. Colts (13-3)
5. Jaguars (11-5)
6. Chargers (11-5)
7. Browns (10-6)
8. Giants (10-6)
9. Steelers (10-6)
10. Seahawks (10-6)
11. Titans (9-7)
12. Buccaneers (9-7)
That seems superficially pleasing, as it lets in the 10-6 Browns (who missed the playoffs that year) while keeping out the 9-7 Redskins (who made the playoffs that year) and all but one team with a winning record would have made the playoffs.
But after the 2008 season, things break down again;
looking at the NFL site, a 9-6-1 Eagles team gets into the playoffs while four 9-7 teams miss out, with only one team (an 11-5 Falcons team) gets in that missed in real life. In 2006, the Easterbrook Seeding rule would have ousted the 8-8 Jets in favor of the 9-7 Broncos; is that really worth jettisoning (pun intended) the divisions for the postseason?
In 2005, Easterbrook's system would let in the 10-6 Chiefs, but keep
out the 10-6 Redskins. That's an improvement worth doing away with the divisions and conferences?
In 2004, Easterbrook's seeding would let in the Ravens, Bills, and Jaguars -- all at 9-7 -- while keeping out the Seahawks, division winners that year at 9-7.
Does Easterbrook have an east-coast media bias? His system in 2003 would have let in the 10-6 Dolphins... while keeping out the 10-6 Seahawks. Maybe there is no bias, as in 2002, the Easterbrook Make-Up-Special-Rules-As-We-Go system would let in the 9-7 Broncos while keeping out the 9-7 Dolphins, Patriots, Saints, and Jets -- while as far back as 2001, the 9-7 Seahawks would've gotten in, instead the team that
actually made the playoffs, the 9-7 Buccaneers.
All of those results are easily available on NFL.com, which'll sort by year and record. Easterbrook could have checked whether his proposed system would represent an actual improvement or simply a quick fix to avoid a once-in-a-blue-moon problem he doesn't like, but, then,
providing opinions without bothering to see if they're correct is a TMQ hallmark.
Easterbrook also says that
The current system rewards luck-of-the-draw in division affiliations. The only possible effect of a seeded format would be ensuring the best teams reach the playoffs!
But as I showed through
checking the facts, that's not the case; in six of the last 9 years, the Easterbrook Arbitrary System would let in one team with an identical record to a team that was kept out -- and teams would get those records by playing in "
luck-of-the-draw" divisions -- with 9-7 teams sometimes getting that record because they play in tough divisions.
Then Easterbrook says -- without
any evidence to back it up -- that
Most important, a seeded format would ensure better playoff matchups.
But consider: Easterbrook doesn't say how his playoffs would work; presumably the top 4 would still get a first round bye, while the rest would play high-low contests with the better record playing at home. So the 2008 playoffs, in which the Giants faced Tampa Bay, the Cowboys, and then the Packers -- the latter a thrilling, hard-fought overtime contest -- would instead of have featured a Giants-Steelers matchup, which, if the Giants won, would see them then take on the Patriots*, Cowboys, Packers, or Colts. Considering that the Giants played three of those teams in the
actual playoffs that year -- a run that included two close games that made for great theater -- what would be gained by having the Giants face the Steelers instead of the Bucs in the first round? A Giants-Colts game is not
guaranteed to have been more entertaining than Giants-Packers or Giants-Patriots* were.
Easterbrook also ignores 2008, and last year, when he says:
A seeded tournament would in most cases eliminate those awkward late-season games in which teams have locked their best playoff positions and start practice-squad members. If the playoffs were a seeded tournament, even the top teams usually would have incentive to win their final regular-season games.
In 2008, one of the best regular season games was the meaningless, or almost-meaningless, Giants-Patriots* final game battle, when New England opted not to rest its players while going for 16-0, and the Giants opted to play the game as though it mattered to them. (It didn't.) In 2009, the Colts rested their players at the end of the year and looked rusty in the playoffs. The Packers treated the season-ending meaningless game against the Cardinals as though it mattered -- and were ready to play for real a week later, taking the home team to overtime. Regardless of the playoff system, some teams will continue to play late games as though they matter, and some will not.
Last year, Brett Favre's Minnesota Vikings lost in the NFC Championship, in overtime, an Brett Favre never got to take the field in the extra period. Based on that, the NFL decreed a playoffs-only change in overtime rules that I refer to as the "Let Brett Play Rule," a rule that seemingly was designed to address the rare situation where a legendary player doesn't get a chance for a heroic outcome -- and expressing not just a preference for Brett over Drew Brees, but for offense over defense, as in the NFC Championship Game, Minnesota
had gotten to take the field -- but only their defense.
In passing their rule, the NFL ignored the fact that the Packers, just two weeks earlier, had lost in overtime, too -- despite getting their offense on the field first, and without ever getting Kurt Warner a chance to take the field in the sudden-death period, as the Cardinals' maligned defense took on the Packers' hyped offense and
won the game. And the NFL ignored the Giants-Packers overtime NFC Championship in Lambeau, when both offenses got onto the field even though the Packers won the toss -- both the Giants' and Cardinals' playoff OT victories proving that defenses and special teams are
part of the team, a fact the NFL quietly ignored in passing the Let Brett Play Rule.
This year, in an effort to avoid a once-in-a-blue-moon outcome of seeing a 7-9 team host a playoff game, the NFL will likely propose more quick fixes without bothering to think whether this is a problem or just a fluke -- and with "thinkers" like Gregg Easterbrook urging them on, expect more half-cocked solutions to help mess up the game.
