Three of four teams in the NFC West last year won 12 regular season games or more, which is simply insane. As the regular season rapidly approaches, and is now less than a week away, it does again feel possible for three teams to rack up a ton of wins.
You could also argue that the three best teams are all Super Bowl contenders, too. And given what transpired this offseason, it would not be a shock if an NFC West representative was again playing in February and ultimately hoisted the Lombardi Trophy.
Let's rank the NFC West one final time as the 2026 regular season approaches.
Power ranking the NFC West before the 2026 regular season
4. Arizona Cardinals
You never truly want to rule out a team for any season and say that they have no hope, but the Arizona Cardinals truly have no hope, as it's a triple-whammy of things going against them. The Cardinals have one of the toughest schedules in the league, are housed in the best division in football, and also have a bottom-5 roster, which includes a less-than-ideal quarterback situation.
It's really something, and it does truly mean that 2026 is going to be a lost year, but what could come out of this is the team scoring the top pick in the 2027 NFL Draft, which could be used on the best QB prospect next year, whoever that may end up being.
The Cardinals do have some nice, young players on the offensive side of the ball and honestly have a nice infrastructure with their playmakers. Jeremiyah Love, Trey McBride, Marvin Harrison Jr, and Michael Wilson is a playoff-caliber group of playmakers, but wiith how many other things are going against this team, it's likely that 2027 is the absolute soonest they could make any noise.
3. San Francisco 49ers
The San Francisco 49ers are far from a bad team, but when you see a team ranked No. 3 in any division, you might be led to believe that they are a struggling group, but that isn't the case. In an offseason littered with offseason stories, the 49ers do have enough talent on paper to make a deep playoff run and check just about every single box.
This team did recently make a trip to the Super Bowl, but one thing that continues to plague this roster are countless injuries that never fully seem to go away. A fully healthy 49ers team would be a massive juggernaut, but it feels like we simply never see that at this point.
Add us as a preferred source on Google