The 49ers were NFC Champions last season, and as such have become the team to beat in the conference in 2020-21.
The NFC was very top-heavy in 2019, so the 49ers topping that conference is a testament to how good they were. But I see the NFC being even tougher this year.
The reason for this is because so many NFC teams on the cusp last season improved immensely. The Buccaneers are getting Tom Brady which automatically makes them a real contender given how good the rest of that roster is. The Cardinals acquired a top WR in Hopkins and now have multiple top receivers in year two of Kingsbury and Murray to work magic with their air raid offense. The Eagles added some very good pieces on defense and look to be a team that can improve upon last year. The Bears upgraded at QB with Foles and he won’t have to be great with that defense, just good, something Trubisky wasn’t. Teams like the Cowboys and Rams are hit and miss but could be good if things go right for them. The Falcons ended last year on a hot stretch and could carry that into 2020, and with Ryan and Jones, they are always dangerous.
Then there’s the playoff teams from last year. A step back from the Vikings and Seahawks is possible, more so the Vikings after losing Diggs, Joseph, Waynes and Rhodes. But Cousins, Cook and Thielen give that team a chance. The Seahawks typically figure things out no matter what. The Packers and Saints will bring back mostly the same teams as well, so they’ll be there as well. Maybe not 13-3 good, but still good.
So I think the conference won’t be so top-heavy. I only see a select few teams being bad. The Lions, Redskins and Giants could very well be the only non-contenders in the conference, especially with a 7-team playoff field in 2020-21. It’ll probably be a pretty compact conference with the teams so close to one another.
And the 49ers will be right in the middle of it. They have one of the best rosters in the league, but have not, to this point, done anything to boost it. There offseason philosophy has been to keep their own, which is fine. But that isn’t a step forward. And most people, for whatever reason, are just shrugging off the fact that they traded their best defensive player like it doesn’t matter. This team, as currently constructed, isn’t better than the one we saw make a Super Bowl run.
They will get some players back from injury, like Taylor, Hurd, McKinnon, Jones and Blair, but none of these guys are core players. They don’t make up for losing Buckner, again the best defensive player on the best defense in the league.
Adding two 1st round picks would certainly help as well, but rookies can be so hit and miss. They don’t all come in and perform like Bosa did last season. Sometimes they struggle, sometimes they show inconsistencies, sometimes they are busts. And with the pre-draft process being as compromised as ever, the draft will be an even greater crapshoot than usual. So I doubt the rookies make up for it either, at least not immediately.
Often times, Super Bowl teams, especially the losers, just become obsessed with retaining and rewarding their own as they think that’s the formula for returning to the big game. Often times, it doesn’t work out that way. The reason? Because doing that isn’t a step forward. It’s running in place. It’s stagnation. And people don’t talk about it enough.
The rest of the conference is making moves to catch and surpass the 49ers while the 49ers have stopped running and are instead just standing there letting it happen. In fact, they might have even run a bit backwards. And I’m worried that there’s a chance they get left behind with that strategy. It’s happened so many times, and that’s why I hate seeing it going this way, the strategy I’ve seen fail for so many teams.
Now this is subject to change at a moment’s notice if the 49ers make that big move that changes things. But as of now, I am not sensing that’ll be the case. It looks as though the 49ers are more than content with retaining their own at the cost of their best defensive player so they have the cap space in order to do that. It feels like an incomplete plan, and it might be. The 49ers might have something brewing to make all that I’m saying moot, and I hope they do. Because right now, I just don’t see a better 49ers team while I see a good bit of much-improved NFC teams coming for the 49ers.
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