These Power Rankings are less and less fun the farther the Seahawks fall.
- New England (11-3)
- Carolina (10-4)
- Minnesota (11-3)
- New Orleans (10-4)
- Pittsburgh (11-3)
- Jacksonville (10-4)
- Philadelphia (12-2)
- L.A. Rams (10-4)
That’s a pretty good looking group of 8 teams. Your Super Bowl participants and your eventual winner are somewhere in there. For what it’s worth, I do think it’ll boil down to New England vs. Pittsburgh in the AFC. Which, yeah, should be a great game; but also, ugh, New England or Pittsburgh will be going BACK to the Super Bowl. Fuck those teams. It’s not a whole helluva lot better on the NFC side. I think it’ll come down to Minnesota vs. Carolina (I think the Rams are a year away from winning it all, FYI), and I think there’s a very real chance we see the Panthers back in the title game.
- Atlanta (9-5)
- Baltimore (8-6)
- Detroit (8-6)
- Dallas (8-6)
- Kansas City (8-6)
- L.A. Chargers (7-7)
- Tennessee (8-6)
- Buffalo (8-6)
The Wild Cards! For the NFC, you’ve got three teams vying for that 6-seed, and honestly I think it’ll come down to either Dallas or Detroit (I believe the Lions have the tie-breaker, but I’m not going to do the math to confirm. On the AFC side, I guess we’re locked into Baltimore and Kansas City, with the Chargers fighting the Titans for the final spot. I still like the Chargers, but damn they dug themselves a HUGE hole.
- Seattle (8-6)
- Green Bay (7-7)
- Washington (6-8)
- Miami (6-8)
- Arizona (6-8)
- Oakland (6-8)
- San Francisco (4-10)
- N.Y. Jets (5-9)
It’s fucking weird that we won’t see either of Seattle or Green Bay in the playoffs. 2017 can suck it. Watch out for those 4-win 49ers! They’re going to be SO MANY pundits’ dark horse playoff team next year! (they might actually be two years away, but you didn’t hear that from me).
- Cincinnati (5-9)
- Denver (5-9)
- Chicago (4-10)
- Tampa Bay (4-10)
- Houston (4-10)
- N.Y. Giants (2-12)
- Indianapolis (3-11)
- Cleveland (0-14)
Houston will be the AFC pick as dark horses, but that’s going to be faulty logic. I think that team will be legitimately great and a contender for a Top 2 seed next year. Of course, I was pretty damn sure about the same thing for the Raiders this year, and look at what happened. There’s one thing we can all agree on: the Browns will always stink.