NFL Playoffs 2025: Previewing Rams vs. Eagles Divisional round matchup

The NFL divisional round is fascinating, because sometimes you get a matchup between two distinctly good teams who are stylistically different, but sometimes you get one that's just plain weird.

This Rams-Eagles matchup is firmly the latter of these two types. You have a flawed, but fun Eagles team who is incredibly good at what they do well, and very not good at what they don't do well facing off against a Rams team who remains one of the toughest teams to get a handle on in the entire NFL.

Will the Eagles continue to steamroll opponents here, or will the Rams' mystifying season continue with another impressive win? Let's break it down.

Tale of the Tape: These two teams met in Week 12, and it...was not close. At all. The Eagles stomped the Rams 37-20, while rushing for 343 yards and two touchdowns. 255 of those yards came from Saquon Barkley alone, as he ripped LA's defense apart to the tune of 9.8 yards per carry in the game.

Eagles' Offense: This team wants to do one thing, and only one thing most of the time. Run the ball. And they do that better than basically any other team in the NFL, save the Baltimore Ravens. Philly ranks second in the NFL in rushing yards and rushing touchdowns. Barkley and quarterback Jalen Hurts are a phenomenal duo out of the backfield, incredibly good at getting downhill and picking up yards.

Barkley in particular has been utterly unstoppable this season. He's rushed for 2,005 yards and 13 touchdowns, and averaged an astonishing 5.8 yards per carry on the year. Hurts has been no slouch either, racking up 630 yards and 14 touchdowns while averaging 4.2 yards per attempt. This team will run the ball, and then they'll run it some more.

When it comes to passing the ball, the Eagles should be great. Receivers A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith are both All-Pro-caliber players, while tight end Dallas Goedert has looked like a reliable safety valve in the passing game as well. By all accounts, this team should be lethal throwing the ball, especially with that vaunted run game keeping defenses honest.

And yet... they haven't been all year. They've struggled to find any kind of consistency, with two games in which they failed to break 100 yards passing (both wins), and 10 games (counting last week's win over the Packers in which they failed to crack 200 yards passing ( and went 7-3 in those games). Will the passing game show up? Who can say?

Eagles' Defense: The offense makes the headlines, but the defense is the key to Philly's success this season. They rank second in points allowed, and first in total yards allowed, while allowing the fewest yards per play and total plays of any team in the NFL. They've given up the fewest passing yards of any team in football, have allowed the lowest net yards per pass attempt, and rank in the top 10 in passing touchdowns allowed (seventh), rushing yards allowed (10th), and rushing touchdowns allowed (second).

They haven't been all that good at getting to the quarterback, racking up 41 sacks (15th in the league), but they're also not really trying to get there all that often. They rank 27th in blitz percentage, and 28th in pressure percentage. They dont really rush the quarterback, but given how good they've been, they don't particularly need to. They allow the third-fewest air yards and fourth fewest yards after the catch, meaning they're not getting burned on big plays, and if you make the catch, you're not getting much after it.

Losing linebacker Nakobe Dean for the season hurts, but make no mistake, this is still one of the league's absolute best defenses.

Path to Victory: Get up early and run the ball. Control this game, let your defense choke the life out of the Rams' offense, and get done quick. With any luck, A.J. Brown will be able to read his book on the sideline again by the end of this one.

Rams' Offense: If I were going to use a word to describe the Rams offense, it would be mid. They rank 20th in scoring, 15th in yards, and sit no better than 10th in any statistical measure. Matthew Stafford hasn't been bad, but he hasn't exactly been good either this season.

Puka Nacua and Cooper Kupp have both been solid when they've been on the field, while Tutu Atwell and Demarcus Robinson have each had their moments to shine as well, but no one has been all that consistently great. Nacua and Kupp combined for just one multi-touchdown game this season.

The run game, powered by Kyren Williams, can best be described as workmanlike, but not particularly effective. They rank second-worst in the NFL in yards per carry, 24th in yards, and 18th in rushing touchdowns. Williams has averaged just 4.1 yards per carry, while backup Blake Corum has averaged just 3.9.

Rams' Defense: The fact of the matter is, this isn't a particularly good defense, either. They rank 16th in points allowed, 26th in total yards allowed and yards per play, 20th in passing yards, 27th in passing touchdowns, 22nd in rushing yards, and 10th in rushing touchdowns allowed.

Teams gouge this team through the air; they rank 27th in air yards per play, and 29th in yards after the catch. They sit in the bottom half of the league in sacks and pressure percentage. However, they did manage to absolutely devastate Sam Darnold last week, sacking him nine times en route to a very convincing 27-9 win.

Path to Victory: The defense is going to need to stand up again like they did against Minnesota. Contain Hurts, force him to beat you through the air and get the Eagles into obvious passing situations. Ideally you get up by at least a couple scores, but that's going to be tough to do against this defense. Turn it into a rock fight and hope your rock is just a little bit bigger.

The Verdict: I didn't think the Rams would beat the Vikings last week, and I could not have been more wrong. But the Eagles aren't the Vikings, and while they're not a perfect team, we've seen them run over the Rams before this season. There's no reason to think they can't do it again here. I like the Eagles to keep things rolling.

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