PRO FOOTBALL : Maybe It’s Time Playoff Tiebreakers Were Settled on the Field

More than ever this year, the National Football League appears to be on the wrong postseason track.

After turning up a record number of playoff contenders, the league is still using its old tiebreaker formula to decide among them.

It seems obvious that, in the interests of justice for all, the pros should play off ties--particularly division-leading ties--whenever possible. And it’s usually possible.

This season, for instance, Green Bay and Minnesota both will finish 10-6 in the NFC Central if they win their final games this weekend against Dallas and Cincinnati, respectively.

But under NFL rules, Minnesota will be the division champion, and, unless it gets a lot of help elsewhere, Green Bay will be out of the playoffs.

If it happens that way, it won’t be fair to the Packers, who have had a fine season. And it won’t be necessary.

For if Green Bay and Minnesota are still tied on wild-card Sunday--which falls on New Year’s Eve this year--there could well be, and ought to be, a Packer-Viking playoff in place of any artificial wild-card meeting.

Most 1989 races are so close that, if the NFL were using games instead of a formula to break ties, there might be as many as three other division playoffs that day.

Eight teams are still alive for first places in the AFC East, AFC Central and NFC East: Buffalo, Miami and Indianapolis (all 8-7); Houston (9-6), Cleveland (8-6-1) and Cincinnati (8-7), and the New York Giants (11-4) and Philadelphia (10-5).

A different procedure is recommended:

--All two-team ties should be played off on the Sunday after the regular season.

--With a three-team tie, the present tiebreaking formula eliminates one of the three.

--The formula otherwise applies--if necessary--to shape a playoff structure with eight teams replacing the present 10.

Taking one possible example, there would be more interest--and, potentially, more money--in a Cincinnati-Houston rematch New Year’s Eve than in any conceivable wild-card matchup.

The feuding coaches, Sam Wyche of Cincinnati and Jerry Glanville of Houston, might even be persuaded to settle that one on the sideline.

If the favorites all win this weekend, the league’s 1989-90 playoffs would begin with these 10 teams:

--NFC champions: San Francisco, Minnesota and New York Giants. Wild cards: Rams and Philadelphia.

--AFC champions: Denver, Houston and Buffalo. Wild cards: Miami and Cleveland.

In such a field, the playoffs would start with these wild-card games Dec. 31: Rams at Philadelphia, 9:30 a.m.; Cleveland at Miami, 1 p.m.

Coming up:

Jan. 6-7--The NFC’s two travelers--the wild-card winner and Minnesota or Green Bay--would play either at San Francisco or at the New York Giants. Assuming all AFC favorites continue to win, the AFC wild card would be at Denver, with Buffalo at Houston.

Jan. 14--San Francisco and Denver would be favored to play host to the conference championship games.

Jan. 28--The 49ers would remain the Super Bowl favorite in New Orleans.

The NFL has never had a season to match this one. On the one hand, the league has come up with the dominating team that its critics have demanded for years, San Francisco.

On the other hand, NFL parity is even more widespread.

In the decades when former commissioner Pete Rozelle helped tailor the rules to make every team a potential Super Bowl winner, the largest number of contenders the league ever had in the season’s final week was 16--and it had that many only once.

Today it has 17. After all this time, only 11 of the 28 ballclubs have been eliminated.

The top 20 or 21 are so evenly matched that it didn’t help last week to have a significant playoff incentive. Six teams that thought they had taken charge of their own destiny all lost--Minnesota, Houston, Buffalo, Philadelphia, Kansas City and the Raiders.

Among those who needed only to keep winning to reach the playoffs, there was one winner over the weekend, the Giants. And the Giants had only Dallas to beat.

So the favorites in this week’s final regular-season games aren’t necessarily safe.

Any of five underdogs--Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, the Raiders or Kansas City--could still bump Cleveland or somebody out of the playoffs.

The results of a crazy season suggest that at the Meadowlands Sunday, the Giants have the edge, but the Raiders have a shot.

Indianapolis replaced Kansas City this week as the AFC entry with the most momentum. Last Sunday, when the team that Steve Ortmayer built, the San Diego Chargers, upset the Chiefs at Kansas City, the Colts routed the co-leader of the AFC East, Miami, 42-13.

And suddenly, after what seemed to be a down season for the Colts, they are in position to make the playoffs, if they can overcome a giant-killer Sunday in New Orleans, where the Saints upset Philadelphia Monday night.

In a best-case scenario, the Colts could even win the division if Buffalo loses to the New York Jets.

“Eric Dickerson getting healthy and coming back was the key,” Coach Ron Meyer said after the former Ram gained 107 yards against Miami, catching Jim Brown in 100-yard games with 58.

Another key has been the work of backup quarterback Jack Trudeau after Meyer shifted gears and went for short passes as the Colt staple, replacing his cherished running game.

Nobody has been expecting much of the Colts since September, when they were clubbed by the 49ers and the Rams in their first two starts, then lost quarterback Chris Chandler for the season with a knee injury in the third week.

Next, a hamstring injury slowed Dickerson, who hasn’t been himself since October. And at various times, Trudeau has been knocked out with a broken finger, two split fingers, a shoulder injury and a concussion.

Through all their misery, the Colts kept fighting back, leaving one final question for 1989: This time, can they handle a good NFC team--the New Orleans defensive unit that just brushed off Philadelphia?

The rise of the Detroit Lions under Coach Wayne Fontes has some of them feeling giddy.

“I think at this point we’re playing the best ball in the league,” nose tackle Jerry Ball told Detroit reporters the other day.

Looking ahead to the Lions’ final game, tackle Lomas Brown said: “We want to blow Atlanta out.”

They didn’t have much trouble with Tampa Bay last week, in any case, winning, 33-7, to tie Chicago for third in the NFC Central. Both have 6-9 records.

But while 6-9 depresses Chicago Coach Mike Ditka, it greatly cheers Fontes and his offensive coordinator, Mouse Davis, the run-and-shoot expert who has established his favorite offense in Detroit.

“People were talking about wanting Mouse Davis’ head,” linebacker Chris Spielman said, referring to the Lions’ 0-5 start when they were neck and neck with Dallas. “Now we’re getting used to winning.”

Fontes is the Lions’ ninth coach since their last championship in 1957, and for a while this season it looked as if somebody would shortly make it 10. But after opening 1-8, the Lions have won five of their last six, defeating, among others, the Bears.

So doing, Fontes and Davis may have proved two things:

--The run and shoot is a viable NFL offense.

--It is as much an offense for runners as it is for passers. A Detroit rookie, Barry Sanders, running primarily draw plays out of the run and shoot, has become the NFC’s leading ground-gainer.