The 2025 NFL regular season is over. Mercifully, that means we’ve been freed from spending our weekends with most of the league’s bad teams.

The 14-team playoff field has been set in a league that’s achieved commissioner Roger Goodell’s dream of parity. Two of last year’s conference championship game participants were eliminated from the postseason race well before Week 18. The bracket that remains is loaded with teams capable of glorious highs and baffling lows.

No one is infallible. Everyone has a fatal flaw. No one’s quite sure what the Super Bowl will look like in a way that feels different in 2026 than it has in years past.

That makes our playoff power rankings tough to divine and easy to get mad about. Let’s try to unpack the fortunate 14 to have their fire for Super Bowl 60 stoked and burning. But first, we’ll sift through the embers of the 18 whose offseason began Sunday evening.

Blurbs for non-playoff teams are mercifully short. Blurbs for the 14 teams still vying for a Super Bowl are more in-depth. Let’s see how the league shook out after 18 weeks and 272 games.

32. New York Jets

Last Week: 31

17 games. Zero interceptions. Aaron Glenn should not be employed.

31. Las Vegas Raiders

Last Week: 32

A win over the Chiefs AND the first overall pick? What a baffling win/win in Vegas.

30. Arizona Cardinals

Last Week: 30

The season is over, and that’s the best thing you can say about it.

29. Tennessee Titans

Last Week: 29

Please get Cam Ward help.

28. Kansas City Chiefs

Last Week: 25

If you’re gonna fail, fail hard enough to get a top 10 draft pick.

27. New York Giants

Last Week: 28

Joe Milton is two-for-two in ruining Week 18 tanking plans.

26. Cleveland Browns

Last Week: 27

Shedeur Sanders can stay, but if he’s Cleveland’s no-doubt QB1 this offseason, hoooo buddy, that’s trouble.

25. Washington Commanders

Last Week: 26

They gave us a chance to appreciate Josh Johnson, so at least there’s that.

24. Cincinnati Bengals

Last Week: 22

Every season we get another step closer to breaking Joe Burrow’s spirit.

23. Minnesota Vikings

Last Week: 23

J.J. McCarthy managed to hurt himself in a meaningless game, which feels like an omen.

22. Miami Dolphins

Last Week: 17

Mike McDaniel is gonna be awesome calling plays for the Eagles next fall.

21. Dallas Cowboys

Last Week: 19

(loud scream into the void, which does not scream back)

20. Atlanta Falcons

Last Week: 24

13-4 after being eliminated from the playoffs since 2018. The perfect Falcons stat.

19. Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Last Week: 21

The Buccaneers didn’t deserve to be in the playoffs (see No. 16).

18. New Orleans Saints

Last Week: 18

Tyler Shough’s ability to come through in the fourth quarter means he’s earned a full season as Kellen Moore’s QB1.

17. Indianapolis Colts

Last Week: 15

Chris Ballard and Shane Steichen are coming back, which means Daniel Jones is almost certainly gonna try to reclaim his early 2025 magic in Indiana next fall.

16. Carolina Panthers

Last Week: 16

(See No. 19) Neither did the Panthers. Bryce Young doesn’t crack the top 25 in most quarterback metrics. The defense ranks 22nd in expected points added (EPA) per opponent play. Now this group has to stop the 49ers. Godspeed.

15. Detroit Lions

Last Week: 20

The clock is officially ticking for Dan Campbell to prove he wasn’t just buoyed by Ben Johnson and Aaron Glenn through the Lions’ rise.

14. Baltimore Ravens

Last Week: 13

Lamar Jackson is a wizard. After a season full of the two-time MVP not looking like himself, he stepped up with a playoff spot on the line and did this.

Of course, we didn’t get to see that because kicking a football on the frozen, windy, shredded turf of not-Heinz Field is a nightmare (and possibly an affront to god). But hey, 2026 is looking brighter!

13. Pittsburgh Steelers

Last Week: 14

The Steelers did the rest of the AFC a favor and kept an ascending Lamar Jackson out of the playoffs. Now the DK Metcalf revenge tour begins for an offense in dire need of playmakers. That still might not be enough for the franchise’s first playoff win since January 2018, but it should keep Mike Tomlin on the sideline for at least one more season of upset wins, baffling losses and entirely whelming Wild Card games.

12. Green Bay Packers

Last Week: 12

Green Bay’s ability to allow opponents to hang around has cleared the runway for a truly devastating playoff loss. The Packers get some deja vu in the Wild Card round, where they’ll head to the same Soldier Field where they gave up a 10-point lead in the final two minutes — albeit in a game Jordan Love left due to a head injury.

He’ll be healthy for the postseason and well rested after his team sat most of its starters in Week 18, but Green Bay is entirely untrustworthy in a way that makes their games extremely fun to watch (as long as you don’t care about the outcome).

11. Los Angeles Chargers

Last Week: 11

If the Chargers can keep Justin Herbert upright, they’ll have the cantilever to a top 10 defense and capability to make a deep playoff run. Unfortunately, that’s not what Los Angeles has done this season. With Joe Alt and Rashawn Slater out, Herbert has faced pressure on 43.3 percent of his dropbacks — by far the highest mark in the NFL.

LA is, amazingly, 5-2 when he’s sacked at least four times. That’s not a record that can last.

10. Buffalo Bills

Last Week: 10

Mitch Trubisky carving up the Jets doesn’t mean anything, but it sure is fun. As expected, these Bills will go as far as Josh Allen can take them. Who’ll step up downfield for him?

Will we get some big Dalton Kincaid reps? A Gabe Davis revival? A shocking Keon Coleman turnaround? It’s gotta be someone to help the reigning MVP shoulder the load for a good-not-great roster.

9. Philadelphia Eagles

Last Week: 7

Tanner McKee probably won’t be the tradable asset Philadelphia had hoped after losing to Washington in Week 18. Any hope offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo had figured things out has likely evaporated as well. But the Eagles can rely on a swarming, athletic defense and a cache of offensive stars to run through a flawed NFC. Or they could lose in the Wild Card round and be forced to sacrifice Patullo outside a WaWa to sate a distraught fan base.

8. Houston Texans

Last Week: 9

Houston avoided disaster to finish the season with nine straight wins, becoming the first playoff team to overcome an 0-3 start since… the 2018 Houston Texans. Defense wins championships, and the Texans have to hope that’s true. They rank first in defensive EPA and 24th on the offensive side of the ball.

7. San Francisco 49ers

Last Week: 8

Injuries have sapped the San Francisco defense. For four weeks before Saturday’s loss to the Seahawks, Brock Purdy was able to plaster over that. Instead, Seattle swarmed Purdy and some bad bounced further doomed the Niners to three points in the battle for the NFC’s top seed.

The dream of three straight home games and a Lombardi Trophy is over. But a home Super Bowl in Santa Clara persists if Purdy can reclaim his late-season form.

6. Chicago Bears

Last Week: 2

Chicago’s early-game disappearing act cost it in Week 18 but still managed to put Caleb Williams’ ability to level up on full display. The Bears may be the league’s scariest team trailing by a touchdown in the final quarter.

Getting Rome Odunze healthy again will only up the terrifier factor. But this team also fields a bottom-four fourth quarter defense, allowing opponents the chance to punch back late. The Lions did it Sunday; will the Packers and a healthy Jordan Love do it in the Wild Card round?

5. Los Angeles Rams

Last Week: 3

The Rams occasionally feel like the best team in the NFL and occasionally feel like a collection of cursed artifacts. No one fits the “no one in the NFL is actually good in 2025” vibe quite like Los Angeles, who is a freight train occasionally derailed by pennies on the track in the form of the Panthers or Falcons. But Matthew Stafford and a healthy compliment of skill players are capable of dropping 40-plus points on a given playoff night. Can anyone in the NFC keep up with LA’s best?

4. New England Patriots

Last Week: 5

Drake Maye certainly looks like an MVP, even if he wrapped his season by beating up on the overmatched defenses of the Dolphins and Jets. Soft schedule or not, an improvement from 4-13 to 14-3 is one of the most stunning turnarounds in NFL history. It doesn’t happen without Maye — or without new head coach Mike Vrabel or pricy free agent additions like Milton Williams, Harold Landry or Stefon Diggs, who was charged with felony strangulation in December.

3. Denver Broncos

Last Week: 4

The Broncos are capable of stinkers, but as a whole this is a team that rises up when it needs big plays the most. Bo Nix’s seven game-winning drives are the most in the NFL. Denver’s defense ranks 12th in EPA allowed over the first three quarters of the game in 2025. In the fourth quarter and overtime they jump to fifth.

Doubt the Broncos at your own risk, but prepare for drama either way.

2. Seattle Seahawks

Last Week: 6

Sam Darnold has quietly backslid late the last two seasons.

Last year, that led to a one-and-done playoff appearance after a 14-win season with the Vikings. Can the Seahawks’ defense rally once more to ensure he avoids a similar fate this winter? Holding the Niners to three points in Week 18 suggests yes.

1. Jacksonville Jaguars

Last Week: 1

Jakobi Meyers’ arrival brought order to the offense. With a precise route runner in tow who can work over the middle, the rest of the Jaguars’ passing offense fell into line. The result? The best football of Trevor Lawrence’s career.

The former first overall pick has finally seized his potential and is playing at an MVP level with 15 passing touchdowns and one interception his last six games. Add in a swarming pass rush and Jacksonville is capital-d Dangerous.

This article originally appeared on For The Win: NFL playoff power ranks: Everyone kinda stinks, the playoffs will be great