The Los Angeles Rams have the easiest remaining schedule of any team in the NFC West, setting Matthew Stafford and Sean McVay up to potentially run away with the division if they can beat the Seahawks
again in Week 16. According to data collected by the website tankathon , the Rams’ remaining opponents have a combined winning percentage of .479, tied for the 11th-easiest remaining strength of schedule in the league.
Of course not all teams are what their record are, so “strength of schedule” is up for interpretation and open to a LOT of debate. However, the other NFC West teams are not that close to L.A.’s .479:
- 49ers SOS: .508
- Seahawks SOS: .514
- Cardinals SOS: .563
It is not as though the Rams can celebrate like “ooh la la, this is going to be so easy!” but relatively speaking maybe it does help L.A. get that one extra win needed to secure the division and the NFC’s number one seed.
Both the Seahawks and 49ers have yet to play the 8-2 Colts, a team that the Rams already beat, which is one of the reasons they have a tougher remaining schedule than L.A. does.
Rams remaining schedule:
Week 12 – 6-4 Buccaneers
Week 13 – at 6-5 Panthers
Week 14 – at 3-7 Cardinals
Week 15 – 6-4 Lions
Week 16 – at 7-3 Seahawks
Week 17 – at 3-7 Falcons
Week 18 – vs 3-7 Cardinals
One of the most important factors that works against “strength of schedule” is that teams change so much during the season, both for reasons that make them better or worse than their current record.
The Cardinals have made the switch at quarterback from Kyler Murray to Jacoby Brissett, probably for the better. The Falcons have placed Michael Penix on season-ending IR, giving Kirk Cousins one more shot to prove he’s worthy of being an NFL starter. The Lions are putting Sam LaPorta on season-ending IR, according to Dan Campbell.
We could even get to Week 17 and 18 and find out that the Falcons and Cardinals have interim head coaches.
Meanwhile, do the 49ers seem likely to lose many of their remaining games just as they get back Brock Purdy and start to look a little bit more like the team we expected after beating Arizona 41-22 last week? The 49ers have upcoming games agains the Panthers, Browns, and Titans, making it seem fairly likely that San Francisco could be 10-4 when they face the Colts. That would put San Francisco just one win away from being 11-4 with games left against the Bears and Seahawks.
Are Chicago and Seattle going to look as good at the end of the season as they’ve looked recently? Maybe not. Maybe they’ll be better. Or worse. But the concept of the 49ers winning out to finish the season 13-4 with a schedule like theirs is not impossible to imagine.
Given that they split the series, the Rams would need to be better than the 49ers to guarantee that they won’t need to go to a tiebreaker. And a tie almost certainly goes to San Francisco because of their NFC West record (4-1, but 5-1 if they win out).
If the 49ers do win out, then the Rams can only afford to lose one game over the rest of the season. So “easier” schedule may sound ideal, but there’s nothing easy about winning 6 of 7 games in the NFL. That thin margin of error will get a little bit wider if L.A. can beat the Bucs this week.
