It will not be easy to conjure any degree of sympathy for the current iteration of the Cleveland Browns. It was their choice, remember, to trade multiple draft picks and half the food and beverage sales in The Flats for the indefensible Deshaun Watson, and then sign him to a contract guaranteeing him a quarter of Lake Erie.
The people watching from the stands and on television, though, the people unironically wearing the team’s unappealing brown-and-orange color combination on jerseys, caps, sweatshirts and scarves – they have been waiting for a truly successful team since the 80s. There only have been periodic flirtations with success, a mere four playoff appearances in the past 33 years.
Now, they have something, and Watson is only tangentially involved. He’s been out with an injury since early November and only completed five games all season. Instead, the ghost of Joe Flacco rescued these Browns and elevated them toward an 11-5 record that is the second-best in the AFC and third-best in the league.
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Such an achievement ought to grant the city the opportunity to celebrate this team with an NFL Playoff game next weekend at Cleveland Browns Stadium. Instead, the Browns will be forced to travel on the road to open the postseason. As it stands today, they’d have to visit Jacksonville to play the Jaguars, who’ve won two fewer games. The disparity would be worse. In the NFC, the Eagles are three games superior to their projected current first-round opponent, the Buccaneers, yet the game would be in Tampa.
This is life as a Wild Card team in the modern NFL.
Even as the standings almost annually make a mockery of its postseason system, the NFL continues to adhere to this rule: Division winners are guaranteed a top-4 seed and, therefore, a home game. Wild Card teams must go on the road.
If the Browns are able to win their final regular-season game Sunday against the Bengals, they will finish the season with 12 wins. Even with the schedule expanded to 17 games in the past three years, only 15 of a possible 96 teams – including Division winners – reached a dozen victories. Because the Ravens achieved 13 wins and clinched the AFC North, however, the Browns have little at stake in their game this week. They’re going to be traveling somewhere in the postseason, and pretty much the only decision they’ll be permitted is what to eat for their pregame meal. In a scenario in which record was the decisive element of NFL playoff seeding, they would have the potential to earn the No. 2 seed in their final game. Shouldn't the NFL want more competitive games?
The current system is counter to competitive logic. It was in 2021, when the 11-5 Bucs were forced to make a visit to Washington even though its team couldn’t even finish .500. The Bucs had to play every playoff game on the road until, curiously enough, they got to play the Super Bowl in their home stadium. It was ridiculous the year before, when the 11-5 Seahawks traveled across the country to Philadelphia to play a 9-7 Eagles team.
Is anyone else in major American team sports doing this? In the NBA, they’ve gone to the other extreme and eliminated any advantage for division winners, including qualification for the postseason. They seed their conference quarterfinal round based entirely on record, with the four most accomplished teams gaining homecourt advantage. The NHL playoff format is far from ideal, but neither does it put less successful teams in an advantageous position. In Major League Soccer, home field for the MLS Cup final is granted to the team that accumulated the best regular-season record; it doesn’t matter if one finished first in its conference while the other finished third in its. Which had a better regular season is all that matters.
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There is some segment of NFL fandom, and obviously a majority of its leadership, that will proclaim a team should just go out and win its division if it wants to play at home in the playoffs, but it really is OK to use some critical thinking on this subject.
There ought to be some value to the regular season division championship, which is why the winner ought to be granted automatic entry into the playoffs. But if one division comprises teams with a .640 winning percentage (the 2023 AFC North) while another is only at .500 (AFC South), what makes anyone believe the challenge of the season was greater for the Jags than the Browns?
It happens the two divisions were matched each other during the regular season, and the AFC North went 10-6 in those games. So that’s one more piece of evidence the Browns have earned more than they’ll get.
