Detroit Lions wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown (14). Jeffrey Becker-Imagn Images

Lions star calls for change to NFL playoff seeding format

By Adam Gretz | Last updated Jan 3, 2025 11:00 PM ET

The Minnesota Vikings and Detroit Lions enter their Week 18 game with matching 14-2 records and will be playing for the top seed in the NFC.

The stakes could not be any clearer.

The winner not only wins the NFC North, it also gets the No. 1 seed, a bye week and home-field advantage throughout the NFC playoffs. It is an absolutely massive reward for winning the game.

The loser does not get anything close to that. Despite having a record that will still be one of the top-five records in the league, the loser will not only get the bye week or home-field advantage; it will end up having to go on the road for its first playoff game at the No. 5 seed and play the No. 4 seed (either the Los Angeles Rams, Tampa Bay Buccaneers or Atlanta Falcons).

The NFL's playoff format is nothing new. Everybody knows the four division winners in each conference get the top-four seeds and at least one home game. It sometimes presents a situation where a team with a better record has to go on the road, depending on the strength of each division.

Some people do not like that.

You can count Lions wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown as one of those people.

He argued on his podcast this week that the NFL needs to change the playoff seeding format so that division winners get automatic playoff berths, but that overall record still determines the seeding.

Amon-Ra St. Brown believes the NFL needs to change the current NFL Playoff rules to where the division winners make the playoffs but overall seeding is decided on overall record.

Do you agree or disagree? pic.twitter.com/fvnJbwbBaJ
— St. Brown Podcast (@StBrownPodcast) January 3, 2025

He is not the first person to share that thought, and we generally hear it every couple of years when one of these situations presents itself. It is also a player on the team that loses the division and has to go on the road that is making the complaint.

While it might seem unfair, as long as the NFL separates its teams into divisions, there needs to be a reward and an incentive for winning it.

Getting the home game is the incentive. The automatic playoff berth is not enough because, generally speaking, any team that finishes at the top of its division would almost certainly be at least a wild card team if it played in any other division. The home game is the added reward.

The Lions still have a chance to secure the home game (and potentially more than one) if they can beat the Vikings on Sunday night. If not, they will be hitting the road for the playoffs.

Adam Gretz

Adam Gretz is a freelance writer based in Pittsburgh. He covers the NHL, NFL, MLB and NBA. Baseball is his favorite sport -- he is nearly halfway through his goal of seeing a game in every MLB ballpark. Catch him on Twitter @AGretz

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