Week 12 Root-For Guide

Happy Thanksgiving week, Lions fans. It’s time to fill our bellies, drink some Kool-Aid, and watch some old school football. And it’s time to concoct the Week 12 Root-For Guide. Previous editions can be seen here (Week 6) and here (Week 9). Strap in, this one is long.

The Root-For Guide is a comprehensive list of all Wk12 games and the results that most strongly benefit the Lions on their quest to achieve a first-round bye in the playoffs. These results, in one way or another, positively impact the Lions’ NFC standing and potential tiebreak scenarios.

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TL;DR:

Lions (8-2) def. Packers (4-6)
Commanders (4-7) def. Cowboys (7-3)
Seahawks (6-4) def. Niners (7-3)
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Jets (4-6) def. Dolphins (7-3)
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Falcons (4-6) def. Saints (5-5)
Bengals (5-5) def. Steelers (6-4)
Texans (6-4) def. Jaguars (7-3)
Buccaneers (4-6) def. Colts (5-5)
Patriots (2-8) def. Giants (3-8)
Panthers (1-9) def Titans (3-7)
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Rams (4-6) def. Cardinals (2-9)
Broncos (5-5) def. Browns (7-3)
Raiders (5-6) def. Chiefs (7-3)
Bills (5-5) def. Eagles (9-1)
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Chargers (4-6) def. Ravens (8-3)
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Bears (3-8) def. Vikings (6-5)

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Now for the nitty-gritty.

The most obvious results are the ones where we win and NFC contenders lose. But many games are further removed from the NFC playoff picture.

This is where some of the more obscure tiebreaks come in, and where the Lions can still gain an edge if ever a tie with another NFC contender comes down to these.

This is the principle upon which the Root-For Guide is based. Football is a game of inches, so why not root for every inch we can get?

Let’s review the official cross-division tie-breaking procedures (source).

Head-to-head, if applicable.
Conference win percentage.
Win percentage in common games, minimum of four.
Strength of victory.
Strength of schedule.

Here’s how each NFC contender stacks up in each of the tiebreak procedures.
In case it’s not clear, we want to have high marks in the SoV and SoS categories (and, of course, we want to have positive records in Ovr / H2H / Conf / Common categories).

Team	Overall Record	H2H	Conference Record	Common Games Record*	Strength of Victory	Strength of Schedule
Eagles	9-1	N/A	6-0 (1st)	4-0 (SEA tbd)	0.484 (1st)	0.476 (2nd)
Lions	8-2	0-1 vs SEA // tbd vs DAL	5-1 (T-2nd)	PHI: 2-1 // SF: 1-2 (MIN, DAL tbd)	0.402 (3rd)	0.447 (3rd)
49ers	7-3	N/A	5-1 (T-2nd)	2-1 (SEA, BAL tbd)	0.458 (2nd)	0.495 (1st)
Cowboys	7-3	tbd vs DET	4-3 (5th)	N/A (min. 4 games not met)	0.292 (5th)	0.379 (5th)
Seahawks	6-4	1-0 vs DET	5-2 (4th)	N/A (min. 4 games not met)	0.397 (4th)	0.442 (4th)

*Note:
For the Lions, “Common Games” refers to DET’s games in common with PHI or SF separately. DAL and SEA are excluded because we do not meet the minimum four games in common with either of them.
For the Eagles and Niners, “Common Games Record” refers to their record in games in common with DET alone.

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All of this means that our root-for criteria are the following:

Root for the Lions, always.
Root against opposing NFC contenders, always.
Root for teams that we’ve already beaten. This improves our SoV.
Root for teams that we play in the future. This improves our SoS and - if we beat them - our SoV.
Root against teams whose losses would worsen the SoV / SoS of any opposing NFC contenders.

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With that in mind, let’s review the slate of games.

Criteria 1:

Lions def. Packers. FTP.

Criteria 2:

Commanders def. Cowboys
Seahawks def. Niners
- This one is tricky, because the Seahawks would take first place in the NFCW, and they have the H2H tiebreak over us.
- However, they would still be a game behind us anyways (or two, assuming we beat GB).
Bills def. Eagles
Bears def. Vikings
- I guess this belongs here too. The Vikings need to just get off our asses.

Criteria 3:

Falcons def. Saints
Buccaneers def. Colts
- Lions, Eagles, & Niners have all defeated Tampa, so regardless of the outcome here, SoV for DET, PHI, and SF all move in the same direction.
- Therefore, it’s better for our SoV to improve in case we end up in a SoV tiebreak with Dallas, whose SoV is unaffected by this game.
Panthers def. Titans
Raiders def. Chiefs
- Also Criteria 5. We’ve beaten both of these teams; the Eagles beat the Chiefs and don’t play the Raiders. Therefore, a Chiefs loss weakens PHI’s SoV without weakening our own.
Chargers def. Ravens

Criteria 4:

Broncos def. Browns
- Also Criteria 5. Seahawks defeated the Browns, so we want their SoV weakened.
- Niners lost to the Browns, so only their SoS can be weakened with a CLE loss here.

Criteria 5 (bear with me, this is the messy part):

Jets def. Dolphins
- Eagles & Cowboys have both these teams on their schedule. Eagles lost to the Jets, beat the Dolphins. Cowboys beat the Jets.
- The only one not yet played is Cowboys @ Dolphins. We want this Jets/Fins game to have the strongest possible negative SoV effect for PHI & DAL.
- Assuming DAL defeats MIA, there would be two wins over the Dolphins, which means we want Miami to lose this game and subsequently weaken the SoV of both PHI & DAL.
Bengals def. Steelers
- Niners & Seahawks both lost to Cincinnati; San Fran defeated Pittsburgh and Seattle has a chance to beat Pittsburgh in Wk17.
- Therefore, a Steelers loss weakens the SoV of SF and potentially SEA.
Texans def. Jaguars
- The Niners defeated the Jags. No NFC contender plays the Texans.
- A Jags loss weakens the SoV of San Fran.
Patriots def. Giants
- New England is 0-2 against NFC contenders (Dallas, Philly).
- New York is 0-4 against NFC contenders, with two future dates against Philly.
- Therefore, a Giants loss weakens far more SoVs of opposing NFC contenders.
Rams def. Cardinals
- This one is tricky because of how many times both teams play NFC contenders.
- Arizona has more games remaining against NFC contenders (3) than LA (1), so if we assume said NFC contenders defeat Arizona in those games, we want ARI’s record to be as low as possible to weaken said NFC contenders’ SoVs.

If you read this entire post, I’m incredibly thankful for you. I hope you all have a safe, restful, and enjoyable holiday. Go Lions.