The Green Bay Packers (12-0) are in and so are the San Francisco 49ers (10-2). Barring a major meltdown the New Orleans Saints (9-3) will claim the third spot which means there are basically three playoff spots left in the NFC Conference.
There are four teams in the NFC with 7-5 records: the Atlanta Falcons, Dallas Cowboys, Detroit Lions, and Chicago Bears. Then you have the New York Giants who are sitting in second place in the NFC East with a 6-6 record.
Atlanta has the easiest schedule out of the five remaining teams so it wouldn’t surprise anyone to see them in the playoffs. Only one of their remaining opponents has a winning record (the Saints) and their two remaining home games are against the 3-9 Jacksonville Jaguars and the 4-8 Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
The Lions and Bears are both sitting behind the Packers in the NFC North at 7-5 apiece. Each team still has to play the Packers in Green Bay. Other than that, Detroit has two winnable games at home versus the Minnesota Vikings (2-10) and the San Diego Chargers (5-7). The Bears only have one more game left at home and that is against the Seattle Seahawks (5-7).
Chicago is in real danger of missing the playoffs. Over the past couple of weeks they have lost both their starting quarterback Jay Cutler and their leading rusher Matt Forte for the season. That’s not good news when you have to go on the road and play against both a hot Denver Broncos team and the undefeated Packers. The Seahawks and Vikings will give them problems too if they can’t find ways to score.
Although the Cowboys have a one game lead over the Giants in the NFC East, these two teams comprise half of each others’ remaining games. They are set to face off this Sunday in Dallas then once again January 1st in New York. This division is still very much up for grabs so look for two very intense games in the coming weeks.
Besides their two games against each other, the Cowboys still have to go to Tampa Bay and have a rematch against the struggling Philadelphia Eagles at home. The Giants essentially have two home games since they play the Washington Redskins at home and play a “road” game versus the New York Jets who share MetLife Stadium with them.
The loser out of the Cowboys and Giants probably won’t make the playoffs and at this point the Lions have a slight edge over the Bears in the NFC North. Both the Lions and Falcons have shown a penchant for shooting themselves in the foot over the past couple of weeks so it’s still a chance that one of them could be sitting on the outside looking in come playoff time. I’m pretty sure that this didn’t clear up the playoff race for anyone but thanks for reading. It’s going to be an interesting four weeks.
Roosevelt Hall is an NFL Blogger for In Between The Tackles and also writes for both The Penalty Flag and Outside The Redzone. He can be contacted at RHall_TPFB@Yahoo.com. Follow him on Twitter @rhall_tpfb.
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