Early look at Playoffs if the season ended today

[Doomsday101]

Granted this is way too pre-mature but ran across this at MSNBC and thought I would share it with the board.

Wild-card round, Jan. 7-8

No. 5 Giants (6-3) at No. 4 Cowboys (6-3, NFC East leaders)


No. 6 Falcons (6-3) at No. 3 Bears (6-3, NFC North leaders)

Second round, Jan. 14-15

Lower-ranked team at No. 1 Seahawks (7-2, NFC West leaders)

Higher-ranked team at No. 2 Panthers (7-2, NFC South leaders)
Explaining the seedings:


Seahawks seeded ahead of Panthers by better record against NFC (Seattle 6-1, Carolina 5-1)

Bears seeded ahead of Cowboys by better record against NFC (Chicago 5-1, Dallas 5-2)

Giants seeded ahead of Falcons by better record against NFC (N.Y. 5-2, Atlanta 3-2)

Falcons seeded ahead of Bucs by better record against division (Atlanta 1-0, Tampa 0-1)


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3700009/?pg=24#anc_NFL_playoffs_05

 

[Hoov]

Seattle looks to have the easier schedule of the teams in contention and they are 7-2. Likely the NFC championship game will be played in Seattle.

I think the gianst are going to fall off a little in the second half and be fighting for wc spot.

Chicago has it rough and i think they could go 3-4 the rest of the season, but will still probably win their division unless GB or Minn makes a great run, still that division will post the division leader with the worst record, IMO.

Then you have Atlanta, Carolina, TB all having to play each other 2 times, that is the division that's up for grabs.

So the question in my mind is what do the cowboys have to do to get a first round bye, they have to make a good run here, loose no more than 2 games to end at 11-5 and hope that TB, Atlanta and Carolina all split, and i think they will have to beat Carolina.

I think if cowboys end up 12-4 they get a bye, im not really confident they can do this, but they will probably need 12-4 or 11-5 with a win in carolina.