Who Goes To The Playoffs In The NFL?
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It’s that time of year again! The NFL season is coming to a close and teams are fighting for their spot in the playoffs. Who will come out on top?
Introduction
In the National Football League (NFL), the playoffs are a single-elimination tournament held after the regular season to determine the NFL champion. Seven teams from each of the league’s two conferences qualify for the playoffs. A tie-breaking procedure exists if required.
How the NFL Playoffs Work
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league. It is made up of 32 teams, divided equally between the National Football Conference (NFC) and the American Football Conference (AFC). At the end of the regular season, six teams from each conference (four divisional winners and two wild card teams) advance to the playoffs.
The playoff format
In the NFL, the playoff format is a single-elimination tournament held after the end of the regular season to determine the league champion. The tournament consists of six rounds, culminating in the Super Bowl.
The first round, known as the Wild Card round, features two games matching up the two wild card teams in each conference. The winners advance to the Divisional round, where they face the top seed in their respective conferences. The Divisional round winners then move on to face each other in the Conference Championships, with the winners of those games advancing to the Super Bowl.
The Super Bowl is played between the champions of the NFC and AFC and is one of America’s biggest annual sporting events.
How teams qualify for the playoffs
In the NFL, the team that wins each division automatically qualifies for the playoffs. There are also 2 wildcard spots available for teams to qualify. The four division winners are seeded 1-4 based on their record, with the 1 seed being given to the team with the best record. The 2 seed goes to the team with the second-best record, and so on. The two wildcard teams are seeded 5 and 6, regardless of their records.
Once the playoffs start, each round is a single elimination game. The divisional round pairs up the 1 seed against the 6 seed and the 2 seed against the 5 seed. The winners of those games then face off in the conference championships. The winners of each conference championship game then advance to the Super Bowl, where they will compete to be crowned NFL champions.
Who’s In?
The NFL playoffs are upon us and there are 12 teams vying for a chance to win the Lombardi Trophy. Who will be crowned champion? Who are the favorites? Who are the underdogs? Let’s take a look.
AFC
In the American Football Conference (AFC), the New England Patriots, Pittsburgh Steelers, Jacksonville Jaguars, and Kansas City Chiefs have clinched playoff spots. The Tennessee Titans and Baltimore Ravens are fighting for the final spot.
NFC
In the National Football Conference (NFC), the playoffs are made up of the four divisional champions, who are seeded 1-4 based on their regular season records, and two Wild Card teams, who are seeded 5-6. The top seed in each conference hosts the bottom seed Wild Card team, while the other two divisional champions host the other Wild Card team and the #2 seed.
Who’s Out?
As the NFL Regular season comes to a close, there are a few teams that have been eliminated from the playoff race. The Buffalo Bills, Cincinnati Bengals, Denver Broncos, and Miami Dolphins have all been mathematically eliminated from the playoffs. Let’s take a look at why these teams won’t be playing in January.
AFC
The American Football Conference (AFC) is one of the two conferences of the National Football League (NFL), the highest professional level of American football in the world. This conference and its counterpart, the National Football Conference (NFC), currently contain 16 teams each, making up a total of 32 franchises in the NFL. Both conferences were created as a result of the AFL–NFL merger in 1970.
As of 2020, there are 16 AFC teams:
-Buffalo Bills
-Miami Dolphins
-New England Patriots
-New York Jets
-Baltimore Ravens
-Cincinnati Bengals
-Cleveland Browns
-Pittsburgh Steelers
-Houston Texans
-Indianapolis Colts
-Jacksonville Jaguars
-Tennessee Titans
-Denver Broncos
-Kansas City Chiefs (defending Super Bowl champions)
-Los Angeles Chargers
Las Vegas Raiders
NFC
The NFC (National Football Conference) is made up of 16 teams, divided into 4 divisions: East, West, North, and South. The team with the best record in each division automatically goes to the playoffs, as do the 2 teams with the next best records (based on overall win-loss records, regardless of division).
So, in total, 6 teams from the NFC make it to the playoffs. The NFC playoff bracket is then reseeded so that the team with the best record plays the team with the worst record of all the playoff teams, and so on. The 4 division winners always get home-field advantage in this reseeding process.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the NFL playoffs are a single-elimination tournament held each year to determine the league champion. The tournament consists of four rounds: the Wild Card round, the divisional round, the conference championships, and the Super Bowl. The Wild Card and divisional rounds are played at home stadiums of the higher-seeded teams, while the conference championships and Super Bowl are played at neutral sites.
