NFL in 2025: Parity rules (except for Jets and Giants)
Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson runs the ball in the first half of an NFL football game against the Browns in Cleveland on Nov. 16. Credit: AP/Sue Ogrocki
New York football will be treated to a rare potential Super Bowl preview on Sunday.
No, definitely not from the Jets nor the Giants. Their chances of playing barely meaningful games in December already have evaporated, never mind an opportunity to actually make the playoffs and get to the big game at the end.
It is their opponents on this particular afternoon who could be representing the AFC and NFC come February. The Jets will play the Ravens in Baltimore and the Giants will face the Lions in Detroit. If you squint your eyes and flick between the two channels very quickly, you may be able to see an approximation of those two playing each other.
The Ravens and Lions are what the Jets and Giants want to be, teams that in recent years have found a way to be sustainably competitive and perennially interesting. This season, despite some tumult in each of their schedules, each has returned to the conversation regarding contenders as we near the Thanksgiving holiday that starts the “real” season for those squads lucky enough to still be in the thick of things. Lions head coach Dan Campbell, left, talks with quarterback Jared Goff during a game against the Washington Commanders on Nov. 9 in Landover, Md. Credit: AP/Stephanie Scarbrough
Even so, if the regular season had ended after this past Week 11, neither the Lions nor the Ravens would be in the playoffs. Nor would Kansas City. The Patriots and Colts and Jaguars would be. The Panthers and Texans, meanwhile, are knocking on the door to get in.
Things have gone predictably poorly for the Jets and Giants — although each sometimes has reached a depth worse than anyone could have expected — but for the rest of the league, this season has become a wide-open mad dash. Traditional powers are struggling, new ones are emerging, there is no clear-cut leader for the MVP award, and even though the defending champion Eagles are tied for the best record in the NFC, their squabbling casts doubt on how long they can sustain it.
It’s hard to remember the last time we carved our turkeys without a clear-cut idea of who the top two seeds in each conference would be. If you look at those spots coming into this weekend, they belonged to the Broncos and Patriots, the Eagles and Rams, but those definitely are written in pencil. Very light pencil.
And those power rankings that just about everyone puts forth each week? You might as well pull teams’ names from a bingo cylinder on any given day to come up with the top half of the list.
We should have seen this coming when not a single team made it through the first five weeks of the season without at least one loss. It was the fourth time in the Super Bowl era in which there were no undefeated teams entering Week 6, according to NFL Research. The champagne for the 1973 Dolphins this season wasn’t even cool yet when it had to be uncorked. Only in 1970 did every team register at least one loss earlier than this year, and that happened in Week 5 back then.
So how did this happen? How did we go from a league of dynasties — in which during the last nine Super Bowls, only eight of a possible 18 franchises reached the game — to this year, with a very real opportunity to see some much-needed fresh faces battle for the championship?
The obvious first reason is the play of quarterbacks. There used to be only four or five really elite ones in the league, but now there is a new generation of them creating a more egalitarian system.
Of the 14 teams that would be in the playoffs if the season had ended last week, six are led by quarterbacks who either are new on the roster this season or in their second year in the league. The top four seeds in the AFC — the Broncos, Patriots, Colts and Steelers, all division leaders — all fall into that category. The Bears and the Seahawks are the other two.
Another element is the aging of the Big Red Machine in Kansas City. Quarterback Patrick Mahomes remains in what should be his prime productive age bracket, but the rest of his squad is in transition. The result is a team usually at or near the top of the standings at this point in the season ceding that spot to others.
Then there are the bumps that other more traditional regular-season powers — albeit ones that haven’t always fared well in the playoffs — have endured. At various points, the Bills, Lions, Ravens and Packers have looked lost. The Ravens and Bengals have had to deal with injuries to their quarterbacks. Both Lamar Jackson (sorry, Jets) and Joe Burrow look as if they are ready to regain their health and form down the stretch, but it might be too late and their teams might be in too big a hole for them to dig out.
So here we are, heading down the stretch with seven weeks remaining, fewer than 50 days left until the playoffs begin on Jan. 10, and according to SportsBetting.ag 16 teams have at least a 50% chance of making the postseason. Four more have at least a 10% chance. Twenty-seven of the NFL’s 32 teams have some chance of making it.
The Giants and Jets, you ask? They are among the five who are at zero, joining the Saints, Browns and Titans.
There isn’t much we can do about that now. There is a parity party in the NFL, and the Jets and Giants clearly have not been invited.
Oh, well. At least we get to watch them play some of the teams that are.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
