For 49ers, Seattle game big but not must-win

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Start the hyperventilating now. Break out the exclamation marks. It's Seattle week! The biggest game of the year! The one that pundits are already calling a "must-win" for the 49ers. Absolutely, positively, enormously gigantic.

Except that it's not.

This is not a must-win. A win over Seattle would not really change the 49ers' status.

Sure, a win could give the 49ers some reclaimed swagger and ego. A bit more self-assurance heading toward January. A little fun at Pete Carroll's expense. Some padding over Philadelphia in case the Eagles are a legitimate playoff contender.

But this game will not decide a playoff berth. It probably won't have much impact on playoff positioning.

The 49ers are extremely unlikely to win the NFC West: that would require a huge collapse down the stretch by Seattle. And if you thought that was going to happen, Seattle's dominant showing against the Saints on Monday night should have disabused you of the notion. The Seahawks looked like the best team in the league, which they have been for the last calendar year.

The 49ers are, based on their remaining schedule, likely to head into the playoffs as either the No. 5 or the No. 6 seed, most likely the latter depending on how Carolina handles its final four games.

And you know what? That's just fine.

Because, based on recent history, the 49ers might be sitting in the best position.

For the past three years, the Lombardi Trophy has not belonged to any of the top seeds in the NFL. The best regular-season record has meant nothing once the final seconds tick off the Super Bowl clock.

The team that forges its way through December and gets hot in January is, in this current era, the team most likely to win the Super Bowl in February. The past three champions finished this way:

In 2012, the 10-6 Baltimore Ravens were a No. 4 seed.

In 2011, the 9-7 New York Giants were a No. 4 seed.

In 2010, the 10-6 Green Bay Packers were a No. 6 seed.

All of those teams did not have a bye the first weekend of the playoffs. All of those teams had to go on the road to win games, including conference championship games. All of those teams lost games in December. Last December, the Ravens lost three games as their warm-up before charging through January and winning the Super Bowl, eliminating the top two seeds in the AFC and the No. 2 seed in the NFC - the 49ers - along the way.

If Jim Harbaugh has any thoughts about why good seeding has meant nothing recently - and he knows because his team was the No. 2 seed the past two years - he isn't saying.

"I have a few ideas," he said. "No, I don't want to share them."

Some of his ideas might stem from seeing his brother's team playing with, as they like to say in the Harbaugh family, a "maniacal focus" and "an enthusiasm unknown to mankind" in its playoff games last season, while the 49ers came out flat in both the NFC Championship Game and the Super Bowl and had to play catch-up.

Harbaugh knows that his team has to click down the stretch and find its confidence. He alluded to that last week, when he talked about how late-season football is only for the hearty.

"There are a lot of guys that can play in April and May when you're going through the OTAs and minicamps," Harbaugh said. "A lot of guys who participate in August and even September.

"But there's a real toughness and a hardness about playing down the stretch, both mentally and physically. Those guys have been through 11, 12 games. It has an effect and toll on the physical nature, but also mentally. The pressure. The stakes.

"It's only for the tough."

All four of the 49ers' remaining games are important, which is why, despite the chatter in the Bay Area, the team can't put too much importance on the Seattle matchup. As soon as the St. Louis game was over, the 49ers began talking about being embarrassed in Seattle and their natural impulse for payback.

Too much emphasis on one game?

"You could probably say that for every game we play," Harbaugh said before breaking out the tweed jacket with the elbow patches. "I guess you could make the societal argument that we put too much emphasis on all these games."

Ah, yes.

Certainly, inappropriate societal emphasis will be the case this week. Seattle arrives for the first time since becoming Most Hated Team in the 49ers' universe.

When the Seahawks were here in October 2012, they were simply another team. They had yet to morph into a front-runner as the best team in the NFC. They had yet to administer two beatdowns of the 49ers by the combined score of 71-16.

The 49ers want to beat Seattle, of course, to prove something to themselves. To, as Harbaugh remarked, receive validation.

But it's not a must-win. The 49ers don't have to beat Seattle. In fact, given the NFL trend, the sneakiest strategy might be to make sure the Seahawks receive the top seed.

Either way, the road ahead is only for the tough. Which could be why, in recent years, only the toughest have survived.