NFC North Ranked As Third-Best Division in Football

The Vikings, Packers, Bears, and Lions could all realistically be good in 2020.

The NFC North – sometimes referred to as the "Black and Blue division" – has a long history of being physical and competitive. It also has a long history of being a three-team race. The Packers (second), Bears (fourth), and Vikings (seventh) all have top-seven winning percentages in NFL history. The Lions are 25th.

However, since drafting Matthew Stafford in 2009, the Lions have at least been competitive at times. In 2011, they snapped a ten-year streak of losing seasons and won ten games for the first time since 1995. They're still searching for their first division title since 1993, but the Lions have a chance to be feisty in 2020.

CBS Sports recently ranked all eight of the NFL's divisions, and the NFC North came in at No. 3. Led by two playoff teams from a year ago (the Packers and Vikings) and a Bears team that won the division in 2018 with a loaded defense, the north is full of potential contenders.

However, the Lions had the best offseason out of any team in the division, according to CBS Sports' John Breech:

If these rankings were based on the top-three teams in each division – or if the Lions didn't exist – you could probably make the argument that the NFC North should be in the two-spot in these rankings. However, the Lions do exist, which is why this division is ranked third overall. 

Ironically enough, the Lions probably had the best offseason of any team in the division. Not only did they add multiple potential starters with players like Jamie Collins, Desmond Trufant and Halapoulivaati Vaitai, but Matthew Stafford should also be 100% healthy when the season starts. Of course, saying the Lions had the best offseason isn't really saying much, because the other teams in the division practically handed them the title. The Packers botched the draft, the Vikings let half their defense walk in free agency and the Bears decided not to upgrade at quarterback despite going into the offseason knowing that they needed to make an upgrade at quarterback (And no, Nick Foles does not qualify as an upgrade. That's a lateral move at best). 

The interesting thing about this division is that you can realistically talk yourself into any of the four teams having success in 2020, but you can just as easily talk yourself out of each one. 

The Packers remain the de-facto favorites after a 13-3 season, but Aaron Rodgers isn't getting any younger and they had an absolutely bizarre draft. The Vikings lost a lot of pieces this offseason, but they still have star power at several positions and crushed the draft. The Bears need only decent quarterback play to complement their defense, but I'm not sure they're going to get that from Mitch Trubisky or Nick Foles. And the Lions have a talented offense, but there are still a ton of questions on the other side of the ball.

What this all means is that the NFC North should be a crapshoot in 2020, which makes sense, because this has been one of the most unpredictable divisions in the NFL over the past few years. No NFC division embraces parity quite like the North. For one, this is the only division in the NFL that has produced three different winners over the past three seasons. Also, the NFC North is one of just just two divisions that has sent all four of its teams to the playoffs over the past four years (The AFC South is the other).

The one other thing about the NFC North is that it was one of only two divisions in the NFL that had three teams finish .500 or better last season (The NFC West was the other). 

Last year, the four NFC North teams went 22-17-1 against non-divisional opponents. If you exclude a 12-4 record against the NFC East, they were just 10-13-1 against everyone else. That includes an 0-3-1 mark against the NFC West.

The NFC West is No. 1 on CBS Sports' list, followed by the NFC South at No. 2. The NFC East is all the way down in dead last.

Check out all of our Vikings 2020 season preview content right here.

Join the conversation at InsideTheVikings by clicking the follow button in the upper right-hand corner of this page (mobile users, tap the bell icon – you may have to click ‘News’ first), and follow @WillRagatz on Twitter.