The Seattle Seahawks beat the Carolina Panthers 27-10 on Sunday, improving their record to 13-3 with a huge game against the San Francisco 49ers on deck in Week 18. The Los Angeles Rams have no power in the division and playoff standings except to do one thing, which is to win their last two games against the Atlanta Falcons and Arizona Cardinals while praying that everything else goes right.
But because of Seattle’s win over Carolina, the options for the Rams to do better than the 5-seed shrink just that much more.
In order for the Rams to win the NFC West:
- Beat the Falcons and the Cardinals (13-4)
- Bears beat the 49ers
- 49ers beat the Seahawks
That’s L.A.‘s path to the division title, not considering ties.
In order for the Rams to get the 1-seed:
- Beat Falcons, Cardinals
- Bears beat 49ers
- 49ers beat Seahawks
- Lions beat Bears in Week 18
The Rams are left hoping that not only do they win their last two games — the Falcons should be much harder than the Cardinals, but both games are games that L.A. should win — but also the 49ers and Seahawks lose the right games. If the Bears beat the 49ers but the Seahawks beat the 49ers, then Seattle gets the number one seed.
If the 49ers beat the Bears and the 49ers beat the Seahawks, then the 49ers get the number one seed.
In both of those situations, L.A. would be going to the winner of next week’s Bucs-Panthers game in the wild card round. That is probably going to happen.
The Rams will probably play the winner of Bucs-Panthers.
Carolina lost to Seattle and had one of the worst passing games of the century. The Bucs lost to Quinn Ewers’ Dolphins. These are BAD teams.
But if the Rams somehow win the division and the Bears win their last two games, then L.A. is the two-seed and ends up hosting the Green Bay Packers. In the scenario where everything goes right, then the Rams are getting a bye week.
In all likelihood, the Rams will be on the road in the playoffs. They did that in 2021 and still won the Super Bowl. Not all is lost just because of the playoff standings, although the Rams wish they had more control than what’s left after losing to the Seahawks in Week 16. Now it’s up to other NFC teams to decide the order.
