The competition committee has narrowly passed a proposal (5-3) to change the current playoff seeding format.
Under the current setup, the four divisional winners get the first four seeds, followed by the two wild card teams. Under the proposed change, the wild card team(s) would be seeded higher if their records are better than any of the divisional winners.
In 2007, the Giants had a 10-6 record but were seeded lower than the 9-7 Buccaneers, who won the NFC South. The Giants wound up playing the Bucs on the road in the wild card round, beating Tampa Bay on its way to the Super Bowl championship.
It is uncertain whether this rule will pass, since any rules change requires 24 of the team’s 32 owners to approve it. The fact that the competition committee was split on it means it’s likely other teams will take issue with the change.