Every 1989 NFL playoff game, three ways: the season race carried on into the postseason, who beat their seeding, and the bracket.
Loading playoff data…
The same race these clubs ran all season, carried on through the postseason on one scale and on real dates.
Where each club finished the season against how far it went, ranked on record rather than seed.
Who played whom, round by round, which no line chart can say.
San Francisco 49ers won the 1989 title from a regular season record of 14-2. 10 teams reached the playoffs and the bracket ran 4 rounds. Every game below is taken from FiveThirtyEight's openly licensed NFL data and the devstopfix results set; nothing on this page is estimated.
| Round | Won by | Result | Opponent | Played |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wild Card Round | Los Angeles Rams | 21-7 | Philadelphia Eagles | December 31, 1989 |
| Wild Card Round | Pittsburgh Steelers | 26-23 | Houston Oilers | December 31, 1989 |
| Divisional Round | San Francisco 49ers | 41-13 | Minnesota Vikings | January 6, 1990 |
| Divisional Round | Los Angeles Rams | 19-13 | New York Giants | January 7, 1990 |
| Divisional Round | Denver Broncos | 24-23 | Pittsburgh Steelers | January 7, 1990 |
| Divisional Round | Cleveland Browns | 34-30 | Buffalo Bills | January 6, 1990 |
| Conference Championship | San Francisco 49ers | 30-3 | Los Angeles Rams | January 14, 1990 |
| Conference Championship | Denver Broncos | 37-21 | Cleveland Browns | January 14, 1990 |
| Super Bowl | San Francisco 49ers | 55-10 | Denver Broncos | January 28, 1990 |
The left column ranks this field by regular season record, not by seed number: seeding rules differ by era, so this site uses records everywhere instead. The right column groups clubs by the round they went out in, which is not the same as the number of rounds they won, because a bye carries a club further without it winning anything. The figure beside a name is places moved between the two columns, and part of it is only where a club sat inside its band. Nothing here is a prediction. The data notes carry the whole method.
The races that filled this bracket: AFC Wild Card NFC Wild Card