The LA Rams At 10-6, they won the NFC West division regardless of the result in Week 18. That means the Rams’ roster now has a unique opportunity to rest some key starters in Week 18 while the team takes on the Seattle Seahawks in a game , which now only offers the opportunity to seed teams in the NFC Wild Card round of the 2025 NFL Playoffs. If the Rams lose and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers win in Week 18, the Rams will likely host the Minnesota Vikings.

If the Rams win in Week 18, regardless of what the Buccaneers do, they will retain third place in the upcoming playoffs and will likely face the Green Bay Packers. But that is all still to be decided. Let’s focus on the Rams’ strategy in Week 18.

The Seattle Seahawks (9:7) staved off direct elimination with a 6:3 victory over the Chicago Bears. But an equally impressive defensive performance from the LA Rams (10-6) over the Arizona Cardinals (7-9) from a Result: 13-9 placed Elimination back on the menu.

All the Rams have to do is sit back and wait for the final results of six specific games to be played on Sunday, December 29, 2024. If four of the games resulted in wins by teams favoring the Rams, that would result in the Rams winning the NFC West Division via the Strength of Victory (SOV) tiebreaker.

Which teams donated to the LA Rams?

The tiebreaker is based on the premise that a team defeats teams with a total win-loss record that is more favorable than the teams with a total win-loss record of the other team. And so the crazy statisticians worked feverishly to work out the details ahead of Week 17 to determine exactly which teams the Rams needed to win to ensure they would ultimately reach the SOV tiebreaker.

Here is a version of the NFL playoff scenarios for Week 17:

Well, that was all as clear as mud.