Should NFL teams even have seat no. 1?

THE KANSAS CITY The Chiefs’ recent Super Bowl run began in earnest from the meeting room of a Denver hotel. It was hours after a Week 18 loss to the Broncos — a loss that was almost expected after the Chiefs mostly played backups in an attempt to rest starters — and the team was stuck in town overnight because of heavy snow in Kansas City area.

Chiefs coach Andy Reid determined the no. 1 seed’s bye week schedule, which came with a twist: The team would be off Monday through Wednesday and practice later in the week, a departure from the Chiefs’ normal in-season bye week procedure.

Reid later said the schedule reflected their 2022-23 postseason, when the Chiefs last held the No. 1 seed, “almost to a T.”

But a team source sensed surprise in the room, perhaps because the ability to rest was so timely.

“I loved what he did,” the source said. “It’s a learned experience or unique to our situation every year — every year has different needs.”

The Chiefs had good reason to push back their 2022 schedule — they’re the only team to parlay a No. 1 seed into a Super Bowl title under the league’s new playoff format. They beat the Philadelphia Eagles, the NFC’s 1 seed, in Super Bowl LVII in Arizona.

This season marks the fifth year since the NFL playoffs expanded to 14 teams in the 2020 season, isolating the 1 seeds as the only ones to receive postseason bye weeks. Previously, two teams in each conference received a bye.

When the Chiefs met at their hotel in Denver, the Vikings and Lions were playing for the right to claim the 1 seed in the NFC. Minnesota lost, falling to the 5-seed and a first-round road game on wild-card week.

To ensure no. The 1 seed was a year-long goal for Lions head coach Dan Campbell.

“You come out of that game feeling like it gives you the best odds to get to where the ultimate goal is, which is everybody knows what the prize is and that’s the Super Bowl,” Campbell said.

But the bye week has hardly proven to be a clear path to a championship.

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NO. 1 SEED has an 11-7 (61.1 winning percentage) playoff record since 2020, when the 2023 Ravens, 2021 Packers, 2021 Titans and 2020 Packers all failed to reach the Super Bowl from the top. Super Bowl LVI following the 2021 season featured two 4-seeds, the Los Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals. The previous season, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers rallied from the 5 seed in 2020 to win it all.

Super Bowl LVII following the 2022 season is the only game under the new format that featured two 1-seeds, the Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles. The NFC’s four no. 1 seeds since the format was changed (Packers in 2020 and 2021, Eagles in 2022 and 49ers in 2023) all lost to a lower seed in the playoffs.

From 2002 to 2019, no. 1 seeds a 51-29 record (63.8 winning percentage) in the playoffs. Seven of them won the Super Bowl.

While the Chiefs are used to the process, the recent No. 1 seeds admit that guarding against coming out flat due to too much rest is a real concern.

The Tennessee Titans were in an unknown place at the end of the 2021 season — with the No. 1 seed thanks to a 12-5 record. The Titans had failed to win 10 or more games in 11 straight seasons before coach Mike Vrabel led Tennessee to a combined 23 wins from 2020 to 2021 and earned the top seed after being the No. 4 seed the previous year.

Tennessee started the bye week with a few technique-driven practices, a senior official from that team recalled, followed by a heavier workload through Thursday and a few days off on the back end.

Not only did Tennessee try to maintain intensity while keeping a relatively depleted roster healthy, but it also complied with the league’s COVID-19 protocols. One of the team’s coordinators was confined to a hotel room for three-plus days to start the week due to testing positive for COVID.

Those challenges aside, a team that started games slowly for most of the year was motivated to get off to a fast start in the divisional round. But this weekend’s setup made some in the building uneasy.

“You have a weekend where you don’t do anything,” the Titans official recalled. “It takes you out of your normal rhythm a little bit. And even if you had a game that week, you can still rest your veterans during the week.”

Although the Titans’ defense wasn’t flat in the divisional round against Cincinnati, sacking Joe Burrow nine times, the offense hardly resembled that of a No. 1 seed. Ryan Tannehill threw three interceptions and Derrick Henry, who had just returned to the lineup after missing nine games with a broken foot, averaged 3.1 yards per carry. carry.

“We were just offensive,” the official said. “Maybe it would have happened anyway, but it came at the worst time.”

Added a coach from that staff: “I’d rather keep playing (than have a bye). It keeps you on the same schedule and you don’t go overboard. You can have too much time to game plan.”

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THE CURSE OF “too much time” doesn’t offset two important advantages that 1-seeds serve: injury prevention and the accelerated path to a title that comes with one game less.

Just ask the Chiefs, who have all but mastered the bye week. Kansas City won Super Bowls after holding the No. 1 seeds in 2019 and 2022. In 2020, the Chiefs reached the Super Bowl as the No. 1 seed, but lost to the Bucs.

“It’s basically like winning a playoff game,” a Chiefs source said. “It’s rest, recovery and not getting anybody injured for the next game. If you have a veteran group and the management to handle it well, it should work in your favor.”

A key component of this advantage is Reid, known as an excellent planner. For example, even though the Chiefs had played all four possible opponents in the divisional round leading into last weekend, Reid said “you can’t be satisfied” with what you’ve already seen and need to dig back into the game tape of many, if not all. of their game.

The Chiefs also rely heavily on self-scouting tendencies, delving into plays or concepts that are evergreen and effective against any opponent.

“We’ve been trying to knock them out, keep doing that until we find out what the results are on Sunday night,” Reid said. “We (should) try to be ready for all (the potential opponents) since we have this time.”

Despite their longtime role as a heavy favorite, the Chiefs say they try to maintain the mentality of a 7-seed in weeks like this one, clinging to core principles that combat complacency. They remind themselves that players should never assume they will be back in the playoffs next year. Kansas City is telling its young players that relative unknowns can enjoy a star turn in the playoffs, such as Green Bay wide receiver Romeo Doubs, who finished with 151 receiving yards against Dallas in last year’s wild-card round. And they tell the players that momentum can be thrown away once the playoffs begin.

“Home field advantage doesn’t mean much once you get it going,” said one member of the Chiefs staff.

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OTHER SPORTS OFFER anecdotal data questioning the impact of first-round byes. The four teams with byes in this season’s College Football Playoff went 0-4 in the quarterfinals. The 2023 MLB playoffs saw the teams with first-round byes go 1–3 in the divisional round, including the two 1-seeds (Atlanta Braves and Baltimore Orioles) being swept in the first round against opponents who had to play in the wild-card round. Conversely, the 2024 MLB playoffs produced a World Series meeting with the 1-seeds, the Los Angeles Dodgers and the New York Yankees.

A 1 seed in the NFL has never been more exclusive than in the last five years. Longtime fans of this season’s second-seeded Eagles (14-3) and Buffalo Bills (13-4) can think back to the days when such seasons would have warranted a bye.

The Eagles basically treated Week 18 as a bye week in 2024, which was not an easy decision. With Saquon Barkley within reach of Eric Dickerson’s single-season rushing record, playing the starters on offense would have been good for the fans’ emotions and entertainment.

The Eagles’ staff talked at length about the pros and cons. A predominant theme emerged. “We got beat up,” a team source said. “We needed the rest. Everyone knew it was the right thing (to sit).”

The decision paid off in the short term. The Eagles beat the Giants with mostly backups in Week 18, still completed a normal week of practice, then watched their fresh starters beat Green Bay 22-10 in the wild-card round on Sunday.

With no. With the No. 2 seed already locked up, the Eagles say they maintained the momentum of a 14-3 season while getting the kind of rest reserved for No. 1 seeds.

“It was a nice bridge for us,” the source said.

Most interviewed for this story said they preferred the former two-byes-per-conference format, but returning to that setup doesn’t appear to be viable for the league. Seam CBS Sports reported that recentlycould the next playoff tweak focus on rewarding better records during wildcard weekend. Currently, division winners occupy the top four seeds in each conference, despite the fact that the wild-card teams have a better record in three of last weekend’s matchups. The league could reportedly reverse that setup to reward the best record.

Perhaps an 18-game schedule that feels like an inevitability could reopen conversations about the number of byes.

“But it would be a bloodbath,” said an executive from a team that once had a No. 1 seed about an 18-game schedule.

That’s not Campbell’s problem. His now famous comment to Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell that he will “‘see you in two weeks” was offered from the comfort of Ford Field, which he won’t leave for the remainder of the NFC playoffs.

“You try to set yourself up the best you can, and that’s why you put those goals out there,” Campbell said. “So, yeah, it’s been there for a while, so it’s definitely something we want to do and we’ve had in mind — division and No. 1 seed and all that, and it’s right here in our hands .”