Home field was no advantage in NFL this season. Will it be for Chiefs in playoffs?
The best record in the conference has always come with a major perk: a guarantee of playing exclusively home games in the NFL playoffs.
This year, there was an additional incentive.
For the first time since the NFL went its current division and scheduling formats in 2002, the postseason field is expanded by one team in both the AFC and NFC brackets. Seven qualified this year, with only the top seed in each conference receiving a bye in the Wild Card Round — not the top two seeds, as has usually been the case.
The Chiefs and Green Bay Packers are the first beneficiaries of the new structure, earning the top seeds in their respective conferences. KC and Green Bay begin postseason play this coming weekend, Jan. 16-17. They’re the only teams that can reach the Super Bowl simply by winning two home games.
Playing on a home field in the postseason has typically been a launching pad for playoff success. Since 2013, the No. 1 seed is a combined 22-4 in the playoffs, and no seed lower than No. 2 has reached the Super Bowl in that time.
Taking it a step further, in the last seven years, the 12 of the 14 teams that reached the Super Bowl didn’t have to leave home in the playoffs (until the Super Bowl). The only two teams to win on the road en route to the final game came in the same season: 2019, when the New England Patriots won the AFC Championship Game at Arrowhead Stadium and the L.A. Rams won the NFC Championship Game by beating the Saints in New Orleans.
Last season, the Chiefs were the No. 2 seed but didn’t have to hit the road because the top-seeded Baltimore Ravens lost their Divisional Round game. In 2016, the second-seeded Atlanta Falcons reached the Super Bowl after the top-seeded Dallas Cowboys were bounced in their first game.
But hold on. The 2020 regular season was unlike any other when it came to home fields. For the first time since the AFL-NFL merger in 1970, home teams finished with a collective losing record: 127-128-1.
The most obvious reason was greatly reduced or no attendance due to COVID-19 pandemic restrictions. The Chiefs went 8-0 on the road, 6-2 at home. In their first year in Las Vegas, the Raiders went 2-6 at home, 6-2 on the road.
The reasons are quantifiable. With few or no fans in attendance, there’s no disrupting a visiting quarterback’s calls on third down on the road, no packed stadium lifting the spirits of the hometown team. Think of the Chiefs in last year’s playoffs, trailing by double digits in their first two playoff games and leading by halftime.
Although the Chiefs never played before more than 16,000 fans at home this season — and played three games in front of no fans on the road — Chiefs players and coaches late in the season spoke often about the importance of gaining the Arrowhead advantage.
Kicker Harrison Butker thought of the weather as much as the thundering noise from a full house of Chiefs fans.
“There’s really no way to prepare in the offseason for kicking in late December or early January on a grass field,” Butker said. “That’s only developed through experience.”
Teams like the Packers and Buffalo Bills, the second seed in the AFC, generally count winter weather as an edge when playing at home (though the weather was decent Saturday as the Bills beat the visiting Indianapolis Colts in the Wild Card Round).
The regular season before this one was an anomaly for road teams. Home teams’ combined record for the 2019 regular season was 132-123-1, their worst since 1972, but the change was abrupt.
In 2018, home teams went 153-101-2, their best record in 15 years.