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I agree. Last yr, between our core player injuries, young player injuries (esp on D) and the continued development of Ryan (who also missed time), why not? We basically won 9 games despite all that, plus the schedule was much, much tougher last year.

Flash forward to now, hopefully a slimmer Turner and Co. can stay healthy, esp Ryan. We finally seem to be getting all our young studs on D healthy, along with HDouglas to liven up the O. We have an easier schedule, and our division should be between us and NO, and we only lost to them by a combined 11 pts, and Ryan didn't play one of those games. Plus I really like our ability to be a disruptive (turnover producing) D once the young talent has more time to gel, and I'm pretty stoked about Spoon as well.

So better core health, better foundation for the youth now health wise, continuity from staff and core players, development of Ryan and his stamp on the O and an easier schedule. Why wouldn't we be in the playoffs? Hell I'm hoping we can pull a NOrleans this year.

New Orleans
Dallas
Green Bay
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Minnesota - top tier w/ Favre, 3rd tier w/o
Atlanta
Philly
SF
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Washington
Arizona
Chicago

- Those are my NFC tiers for playoff proj's. Certainly a dark horse could emerge, but likely it would be teams from the 2nd/3rd tiers swapping. SF has a leg up w/ their perpetually weak West division, so it actually could be the NO/Atl, Dal/Phi and GB/Minny runners up trying to not be the 3rd team looking in from the outside come playoff time.

I'd flip flop Minnesota/Green Bay assuming Favre is the starting QB. Which he will be.

Yeah, tell me again why GB is rated over Minnesota? That would be like rating the Falcons over the Saints. And while I've seen a few so-called experts and preview mags do that, I can't say I agree with it. The potential is there, but the proof is in the pudding. Both the Falcons and Packers were swept by their division rivals last year, and neither team made huge off-season moves to get over that hump nor did the Saints or Vikings really lose anybody to make you think they will be significantly worse.

I thought I had already put the caveat in w/ Minny above? W/ Favre, they'd be above Dallas to me, behind NO. W/o, meaning Tavaris is starting, then they're right they're w/ SF, good team, but what is the QB gonna do. They also have to sort out a few things on D too.

W/ GB, I just see them on the cusp of playing for a NFC title game or beyond. Rodgers is legit, WR's deep and legit, TE legit, improving oline and AR is tough as hell to get beat up like he did and still put up gaudy numbers. Hell its not like most qb's that get hit 50x ever do that. Only thing on O was I thought they could have added, say a Brian Westbrook to add another dimension to their offense, since Grant isn't that type of back.

W/ their D, I was pretty amazed how well they transitioned to the 34 in year 1. Minus some youth development at CB, this D should only get better, and they produce a ton of turnovers. Clay Matthews is a budding star to me too. I just don't see them getting any worse, and w/ some good breaks could easily be playing in Dallas at the end of the year imho.