Poll: Which 2018 NFC playoff teams won’t make the playoffs in 2019?

Since the league moved to a 12-team playoff format in 1990, an average of about six new teams make the playoffs every year. This long history of churn among NFL teams means that it’s highly probable that five or six teams that made the playoffs in 2018 will miss the playoffs in 2019.

And what’s true for the NFL is true for the NFC as well: Six teams make the playoffs in the NFC every year, and it’s a virtual certainty that some of last year’s playoff teams won’t repeat.

In 2018, the Saints, Rams, and Eagles repeated as NFC playoff participants from the year before, the Cowboys, Bears, and Seahawks were the new playoff participants, and the Panthers, Falcons, and Vikings failed to repeat their 2017 playoff appearance

Coincidentally, that means that nine of the 16 NFC teams made the playoffs the last two seasons. And if we go back one more year, 12 of 16 NFC teams made the playoffs in the three-year span from 2016-2017. Remarkably, not a single NFC team made the playoffs in each of the last three years. Not one.

Almost as remarkably, only four teams failed to make the playoffs at any time over that three-year span: the perennially underachieving Redskins, the once-mighty 49ers, the woeful Cardinals, and the Bucs, who last made the playoffs under Jon Gruden in 2007.

Which brings us to our question of the day: Last year, the NFC was represented, in order of seeding, by the Saints, Rams, Bears, Cowboys, Seahawks, and Eagles. Which of these teams do you think are in for a rude awakening in 2019 and will not make it back to the playoffs?

ESPN posted the Westgate Las Vegas Superbook odds for each team to make the Super Bowl, and those odds have three tiers of favorites for the NFC:

• 8-1 odds: Rams & Saints
• 14-1 odds: Bears, Eagles, Packers
• 25-1 odds: Cowboys, Vikings, 49ers

Those odds would leave the Seahawks as the only team not repeating its playoff appearance, though history suggests it’ll be three teams failing to repeat.

Place your vote on which team you think won’t be back in the playoffs this year in the attached poll. We’ll assume that the three teams that get the most votes will not make the playoffs this season. In a follow-up post, you’ll be able to vote on which three new teams you think will make it to the postseason this year.

If you can’t see the poll on your device, feel free to leave your take in the comments section below.