To be totally honest it is going to take a miracle of some sorts. Several teams have already clinched playoff berths throughout the NFC. The Panthers and Cardinals have locked up the top spots, while the Packers, Seahawks, and the eventual NFC East champion all have guaranteed spots in the playoffs. As of now, the Falcons can still cling on to the fact that they have a “shot” at getting the 6th seed, but it certainly is a long one.
According to the website sportsclubstats.com, the Falcons only have about a .4% chance of making the playoffs. So what if the Falcons win out, how high are the odds? Well not much higher, even if Atlanta wins their final two games they are still only given a 2.4% chance of making the postseason.
So what else has to happen for the Falcons to make the playoffs? The simple answer is a lot. The only team the Falcons can move past for the finals playoff spot is the Minnesota Vikings, which is sort of puzzling considering the Falcons can only finish at best tied with the Vikings and Minnesota owns the head-to-head tiebreaker. However, it can only happen if there is a three-way tie for the two wild card spots. In this scenario the first tiebreaker would actually be conference win percentage. So first thing is first, the Falcons would have to win out, and the Vikings and Seahawks would have to both lose their final two games. The Seahawks would get the 5th seed, and the Falcons and Vikings would begin going down the tie breaking list.
Both the Falcons and Vikings would have 6-6 records at the end of the season versus the NFC. The next tie breaker win/loss percentage in common games (minimum of four games). This would not come into play because the teams do not have four common opponents. So it comes down to strength of victory. This is determined by the amount of wins each team has that the qualifying teams have defeated. As you can imagine a lot of that is bound to change in two weeks of the season. But if you really want to cling onto the Falcons slim playoff chances, continue to root for every team the Falcons have defeated this season, because those games are just as important as the Falcons’ own games at this point of the season.