The 2025 NFL regular season is now complete. Even with nearly all the playoff teams already established in some order, the Week 18 slate still managed to bring some captivating developments.

$.01--Congratulations to the Seattle Seahawks, the NFC’s No. 1 seed. The Seahawks earned the top spot and the sole conference postseason bye with an impressive 13-3 defensive beatdown of the 49ers in San Francisco on Saturday night. 

Seattle’s 14-3 season was largely on the back of a fantastic, well-disciplined defense. Only the Houston Texans allowed fewer points, and coach Mike MacDonald’s defense finished in the top-five in yards allowed, first downs, interceptions and yards per attempt in the passing game. Playing almost exclusively zone coverage in base nickel no matter what the opposing offense showed, the Seahawks' speed, strong tackling and excellent coordination between the levels allowed them to thrive. That was certainly the case in the suffocating win over the rival 49ers in a game that decided the NFC West championship as well as the top spot in the conference. 

The Seahawks allowed just nine first downs and 173 total yards all night to a Niners' offense that had not scored less than 37 points in a game in a month. San Francisco’s own defense, despite missing some key injured players, held tough in its own right. The NFL doesn’t get a lot of defensive struggles anymore, but Saturday night was indeed a defensive fight. 

Down to their last gasp, the 49ers saw all hope extinguished when Seahawks DEs Derrick Hall and Leonard Williams met at Brock Purdy, blasting the Niners’ QB just as he released an incomplete fourth-down pass. That was a very fitting end to a game that Seattle’s defense completely dominated from the opening drive to the final kneeldowns. 

The Seahawks happen to have a great offense, too. Offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak figures to get some head coaching buzz after generating the No. 3 scoring offense in the league with Sam Darnold at the controls. 

While schematically different, these Seahawks are constructed similarly to the dynamic Detroit Lions of the last few seasons: smart, accurate veteran QB behind a strong line, a pair of effective RBs in Kenneth Walker and Zach Charbonnet, and a fantastic alpha dog wideout with a hyphenated name in Jaxson Smith-Njigba. Detroit faltered as the No. 1 seed last year because its injury-ravaged defense couldn’t stand up anymore. Seattle doesn’t figure to have that problem, which makes them a very difficult out in the NFC.

$.02--The NFC South title might very well have been decided by some truly inconceivable officiating decisions in the Tampa Bay Buccaneers' victory over the Carolina Panthers on Saturday. The Buccaneers prevailed 16-14 with a heavy hand from referee Brad Allen and his crew. 

It’s patently unfair to blame the officiating for an outcome, but this game is a great example of how egregious, easily-corrected officiating mistakes can significantly impact the final score. Of many flat-out wrong calls made in this game, nicely chronicled here by Anthony Rizzuti, one stands out. 

The scene: Just after the Panthers had converted a 4th down and then extended into Bucs territory on their opening drive of the third quarter while down 13-7, QB Bryce Young flips a backward screen pass that sails over the head of RB Rico Dowdle and hits the turf. Dowdle quickly scooped the ball up, but the play was blown dead by an official. 

Anyone who has watched football for more than 15 minutes in life understands that a backward pass is a live football, a fumble. And this was very obviously a backward throw; Young was just ahead of the TB 41-yard line when he swung the pass at Dowdle, whose feet were behind the 42 when he reached up to try and catch it.

The explanation from Allen, both on the field and then in the postgame pool report, is where the NFL looks incredibly bad. The play was blown dead because the official who blew the whistle mistakenly thought it was an incomplete forward pass. Okay. That’s a terrible call, but at least it’s a plausible mistake. But that’s not what Allen says happened. Not even a little. 

Allen claimed it was a backward pass and that the ball went out of bounds, and that’s why it was spotted for a 7-yard loss. Except Dowdle recovered the ball and neither he nor the football ever went out of bounds. Allen’s call, which he later claimed was not influenced by the league’s review protocol, is technically impossible. If it’s an incomplete pass, it’s 2nd-and-10, period. There is no other possible outcome, except in the NFL’s dubiously obscured officiating world. 

The game itself was far less interesting than the officiating gaffes that predominated it. Tampa Bay’s run defense suffocated the Carolina offense (19 yards on 14 carries) and dominated on third down. A Baker Mayfield-to-Cade Otten TD strike on the opening drive of the game was Tampa’s only touchdown. Each team missed a field goal in a steady downpour that persisted throughout the afternoon. 

The officiating debacle ultimately didn’t matter, as the Atlanta Falcons edged the New Orleans Saints on Sunday. That Falcons win created a 3-way tie between Atlanta, Tampa Bay and Carolina, and the three-way tie-breaker belongs to the Panthers. 

$.03--Myles Garrett is the NFL’s new single-season sack champion. Garrett bagged the record-breaking 23rd sack late in Cleveland’s 20-18 win in Cincinnati. 

As is often the case with Garrett, the historic takedown of Joe Burrow showcased some superhuman athletic ability. From the NFL’s press release, 

Per Next Gen Stats, on the record-breaking sack, Garrett crossed the line of scrimmage 0.23 seconds after the snap, the fastest on any sack this season. Garrett's 0.70-second average get-off time ranked as the fastest among all pass rushers with at least 200 pass rushes this season.

The officials stopped the game to recognize Garrett’s incredible achievement, something that didn’t sit well with Bengals coach Zac Taylor after the game. 

There has been a nasty battle between Browns and Steelers fan bases for years about who is better, Garrett or Watt? Steelers faithful love to point out that Watt accomplished his previous record-tying (with Michael Strahan) 22.5 sacks in just 15 games back in 2021. However, Garrett eclipsed that mark in more than 100 fewer pass-rush snaps, 437 to 616 (per PFF). 

Garrett has long been a favorite player of mine. I was privileged to cover Garrett’s first six NFL seasons with the Browns, and his No. 95 is the only active player jersey I own--and I’m a Lions fan. Aside from his pass-rushing prowess, Garrett is a unique individual off the field. He chose to stay on a bad Cleveland team for a considerable amount of money, and that rubs many fans the wrong way. Not me. His loyalty should have a price, and the ineptly run Browns having to pay it is some sort of karmic justice. 

Cleveland won its final two games to finish 5-12, even with Garrett’s record-setting contributions. There are very strong rumors that the Kevin Stefanski era is over as head coach, and probably needs to be so. GM Andrew Berry’s seat should have some flames on it as well, though a fantastic draft class in 2025--outside of the QB position--might spare him. If it does play out that way, the Browns should strongly consider promoting defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz to head coach. 

$.04--In the first year of the College Football Playoff expansion to 12 teams a year ago, all four teams that earned bye weeks lost their opening game. That trend of the bye week being completely fatal for the 1-4 seeds very nearly carried over intact into 2025.

It started ominously on New Year’s Eve, when second-seeded Ohio State stumbled out of the bye and got humbled by Miami. Oregon embarrassed No. 4 seed Texas Tech, 23-0, in the Orange Bowl. Ole Miss came back and upset No. 3 Georgia in a great Cotton Bowl. The only team with a bye to emerge victorious in the first two years of the expanded field is Indiana. And the Hoosiers made sure there was not any drama about it, either. 

Indiana flat-out humiliated Alabama 38-3 in a soggy Rose Bowl that flipped college football royalty on its head. Alabama was completely outclassed in every facet of the competition. 

I want to let that sink in for a minute. Alabama, the bluest of blueblood college football programs, had no prayer against Indiana, a program that hadn’t won a bowl game since the 1991 Copper Bowl. Give yourself a high five if you know where that game was played…

Back to the byes. It’s a tricky subject for the CFP committee, because the top teams do deserve some form of reward or advantage. But waiting an extra week to play a team that just won a playoff game is not a reward. It’s proven to be a pretty significant disadvantage. It sure felt that way in the Ohio State and Georgia losses; the lower-ranked victors carried real momentum from winning a week (or so) earlier, while the lethargic rust of not playing for over a month really showed for the Bulldogs and (especially) Buckeyes. Momentum and confidence are a bigger deal at the college level than the pros, where most--but not all--teams with byes do prevail. 

The most obvious solution is to either shrink the field to eight or expand it to 16. Since cutting teams means cutting money, that’s not going to happen. Watch for the elimination of the troublesome bye weeks become a rallying cry from the CFP decision-makers to expand the field quickly. 

$.05--NFL Quickies

--The New York Jets did not intercept a single pass all season, becoming the first team since 1933 to fail to pick off even one in a regular season. The bitter irony is that the Jets are coached by longtime NFL DB Aaron Glenn, who picked off 41 passes in his career. 

--The Las Vegas Raiders earned the No. 1 pick even though they beat the Chiefs, 14-12. Had the Giants lost to the Cowboys, New York would have earned the top pick with the Raiders’ unexpected win. Now, the 4-13 Giants will pick 5th, after the Raiders, Jets, Cardinals and Titans--all of whom finished 3-14. 

--The Detroit Lions beat the Chicago Bears on a last-second field goal to finish 9-8. Even with the winning record, the Lions are the last-place team in the NFC North and miss the playoffs. Bad loss for the Bears, though Chicago held onto the No. 2 seed in the NFC when Washington upset Philadelphia. 

--About those Eagles: the defending champs were 8-2 at one point, but since then, Philly is 3-4 and sports an offense that has looked somewhere between disinterested and uncoordinated much of the time. It’s hard to stay at the top. 

--The Atlanta Falcons fired GM Terry Fontenot and head coach Raheem Morris after their win over New Orleans. The Falcons were 8-9 each of the last two seasons, which isn’t terrible at all but also isn’t convincing enough to keep the band together anymore. 

--On the other hand, the Colts are keeping head coach Shane Steichen and GM Chris Ballard after back-to-back 8-9 campaigns. Steichen might’ve deserved another shot after making the best of the latest Indy QB fiasco. The retention of Ballard is likely to be a very tough sell for Colts fans tired of years of being slightly below average and uninteresting, with Ballard proudly hitting singles off the outfield wall with his draft classes for most of his nine years in charge. 

--Three weeks ago, I’d have placed the Los Angeles Rams as the best team in the league. While they did trounce the hapless Cardinals in Week 18, the Rams are still limping into the postseason not playing their best football. Beating an Arizona team that went from 2-0 to 3-14 shouldn’t impress anyone. 

--Early playoff predictions:

• AFC Championship - Broncos over Texans

• NFC Championship - Seahawks over 49ers

Ask me again on Friday and those could all change…