The Way It Stands Now, NFL’s Bowl Isn’t Super

College football needs an NFL-style playoff system, or so we have heard, even though USC seems to have taken care of the who’s-No. 1 debate for a while.

But is the NFL’s much-lauded Super Bowl tournament really all it’s cracked up to be?

Have you checked out this weekend’s first-round pairings?

Does the world really need a third Ram-Seahawk matchup? A third Viking-Packer meeting? A Colt-Bronco rematch? (Last season’s first-round result: Colts 41, Broncos 10.)

Give the colleges their playoff brackets. What the NFL needs this season is the BCS.

Let’s face it: The only game that matters in the NFL playoffs is Pittsburgh-New England. That’s the real national championship game. But in the NFL postseason format, it’s only a potential semifinal.

In the NFL-BCS, Pittsburgh-New England would be the title game. It would be the NFL’s Orange Bowl.

The NFL-BCS would still need to fill out the three other major bowls, so it would do it college BCS style, by mixing up the champions of six designated “power divisions” with two “at-large” teams:

The power divisions:

AFC East: Won two of the last three national championships.

AFC West: Four trips to the national championship game in the last 10 years.

AFC North: Baltimore won 2000 national title, Pittsburgh top-ranked today.

AFC South: Manning, McNair, Leftwich, Carr. They know how to throw the ball here. The Pac-10 of the NFL.

NFC South: Has gone 1-1 in last two national title games.

NFC East: Not much recently, living off decades-old legacies of Cowboys, Redskins, Giants.

That means two divisions, the NFC North and West, would lose their automatic bids. That might cause some grousing in Green Bay, but have you taken a look at the Vikings, Lions, Bears, Rams, Seahawks, Cardinals and 49ers lately?

The Rams and the Seahawks would go where they belong: the Liberty Bowl.

The at-large berths would go to the New York Jets, who started very fast, and the Buffalo Bills, who closed 6-1 and probably belong in the tournament somewhere, but lost their must-win finale to the No. 1 Steelers, thus falling just short.

The NFL playoff format penalized the Bills harshly for that one defeat. The NFL-BCS would cut them a break. Besides, everyone knows how well Bill fans travel. The Bills fill seats. Some bowl is going to want them.

That leaves us with six AFC teams and two NFC teams -- not a perfect ratio, but a considerable improvement over the current 50-50 split -- and the following NFL-BCS matchups:

* Orange Bowl: New England versus Pittsburgh. The game everyone wants to see. The marquee billing no possible AFC-NFC match can match.

Added bonus: Takes the NFL title game out of Jacksonville and moves it to Miami.

* Sugar Bowl: Atlanta versus Philadelphia. The other bowls will demand their “anchor” divisional tie-ins. The Sugar gets the NFC South and Atlanta. It also gets Philadelphia, because the Eagles have an outstanding regular-season record and no realistic chance of winning the national championship. Just like Auburn.

Added bonus: Would ensure a Falcon-Eagle matchup, pleasing traditionalists who still care about such quaint anachronisms as “NFC bragging rights.” Current NFL playoff format provides no such guarantee, not with Atlanta and Philadelphia a combined 0-4 the last two weeks.

* Fiesta Bowl: Indianapolis versus Buffalo. Indianapolis because of the Fiesta’s AFC South tie-in, Buffalo because the Bills will bring a lot of teeth-chattering fans eager to defrost in Arizona. Great old-school AFC East rivalry.

Added bonus: Fiesta gets Peyton Manning, Willis McGahee and all those Bill fans. Any way you look at it, it beats Utah versus Pitt.

* Rose Bowl: San Diego versus New York Jets. San Diego because the AFC West is a Rose Bowl “anchor,” the Jets because of Chad Pennington’s well-publicized media campaign, begging for more support. Wait ... what’s that? You say this is the same setup as tonight’s actual AFC wild-card matchup?

Hmm, so it is. Evidently, the NFL-BCS has some deep and serious institutional flaws. That means it is perfect. We’re striving for realism here.

As it stands now, this is the NFL first round we’re stuck with:

TODAY

* St. Louis Rams at Seattle Seahawks

(Channel 7, 1:30 p.m.)

Old NFL playoff chestnut: It’s tough to beat a good team three times in a row. Then there’s this, Round 3 between the Rams and the Seahawks, with St. Louis having swept the first two.

New question for the Rams, then: Is it tough to beat a mediocre team three times in a row?

* New York Jets at San Diego Chargers

(Channel 7, 5 p.m.)

A landmark moment in the history of Charger football? Or just one more rematch? The Jets defeated the Chargers, in San Diego, on Sept. 19, 34-28. But that was back in Week 2, before Pennington hurt his shoulder and Drew Brees found his Pro Bowl stride. Since that game, the Jets are 1-4 against playoff teams. On the other hand, Charger Coach Marty Schottenheimer is 5-11 in playoff games. Overtime, anyone?

SUNDAY

* Denver Broncos at Indianapolis Colts

(Channel 2, 10 a.m.)

According to an ESPN.com poll, this is a matchup between the best quarterback in the playoffs, Manning, and the worst, Jake Plummer. And Plummer just broke John Elway’s single-season club record for passing yardage. So, yes, depressing news for Bronco fans all around.

* Minnesota Vikings at Green Bay Packers

(Channel 11, 1:30 p.m.)

A few days after abandoning his team in the final seconds of a loss to Washington, Viking wide receiver Randy Moss went on ESPN to say, “I don’t know if Coach [Mike] Tice is the [right] coach for this team, and I don’t know if he isn’t. All I know is, Coach Tice says, ‘Who has my back?’ or ‘Who’s ready to play?’ All I know is that I’ve got his back.” Imagine what it’d mean for Tice if he didn’t.