In NFL history, no division has ever seen a last-place team win 10 games. It sort of almost happened in the NFC North last year, as the Green Bay Packers, Minnesota Vikings and Detroit Lions all finished with 9 wins, and in 2023 the Cincinnati Bengals finished last at 9-8 (and had several chances to get to 10), but that’s kind of it for close calls. Prior to 2002, the NFL had 5-team divisions, and so this was functionally impossible. And since the league went to a 17-game season in 2021, it is much
more likely now.
The four teams of the 2026 NFC North are all quite good, and all have at least six wins as we enter week 10. No team is perfect, but the Lions have an outstanding offense, and their defense has improved with some players like safety Brian Branch getting healthy. The Vikings have a truly elite defense and have now re-added quarterback Kirk Cousins for the stretch run. The Bears and Packers have both been quite good on both sides of the ball, with the Packers slowly fixing their offensive line, and the Bears adding defensive lineman Jeffrey Simmons to help shore up their defense. These teams will all continue to win games.
In short, there’s a great chance that this division winds up with every team at 10-7 or better. I put together a very, very simple projection for the rest of the season (I want to stress how simple this was; it’s ugly, in Excel, and I made it primarily to work through what happens based on who wins the remaining division games, because I kept messing this up), and every team finishes with 10 wins in 30% of simulations. Every team finishes with 11 in almost 5%! (Yes, it is mathematically possible for every team to finish with 12, but it’s extremely unlikely.)
Weird hypothetical projections you made while Outlook was down are one thing, so let’s try to be more concrete. The Bears have seven wins in the bag, and while they have some very tough games against Buffalo and Jacksonville, they also get the Saints and Dolphins, which almost surely gets them to nine. They would then need just a single division game (of their four remaining, two against Detroit, one each against Minny and the Packers) to get it done.
The Vikings have six in the bag, with games remaining against the Commanders, Jets, Falcons, and Panthers. That might get them to ten without any additional help, but they also have three division games left, one against each North team, in addition to a tough battle with the 49ers.
The Lions also have six in the bag with non-division games against the Giants, Titans, Falcons, Bucs, and Patriots, teams that range from “meh” to “atrocious. Even if they fail to win four of those, they still have the Bears twice, and the Vikings and Packers each once.
And our Green Bay Packers, who sit at six wins, get the Rams without receivers Davante Adams or Puka Nacua, the Saints, the Dolphins, and the Texans, in addition to a tough matchup with the Bills. They will also face the Vikings in Kirk Cousins’ first game back, and one more each with the Bears and Lions.
When you look at it like this, you can really see how the ten-win scenario is really pretty likely, and how the eleven-win scenario is downright plausible. Even in this analysis, I focused primarily on the out-of-division games. Remember, someone HAS to win the in-division games, too; they are not just hypothetical. Let’s take a look at a fairly negative scenario for the Packers as an example.
Let’s assume the Bears and Lions split their remaining division games, each going 2-2, with the Vikings going 2-1, and the Packers finishing 1-2 in their remaining division games. That means, before accounting for any of the aforementioned trash out-of-division games, the Bears are 9-4, the Lions are 8-5, the Vikings are 8-3, and the Packers are 7-5. This puts the Packers in the worst spot, but still needing just three wins between New Orleans, Miami, Houston, an undermanned Rams team and Buffalo. It’s pretty likely! And in the event the Bears drop an additional division game or two, bolstering the Packers/Lions/Vikings, remember they have a one-game lead.
So, unless the division falls apart, this is VERY likely to happen. The Packers have the misfortune to play in one of the best divisions in the history of football. And I, for one, cannot wait to travel to the 7-10 NFC South champions for the first round of the playoffs.
