It's a minor lead, as the Lions play Monday Night Football this week, but with the Vikings win over the Packers this afternoon, they have the lead in the division by a half game!

The Eagles have clinched the NFC East.

Both the NFC West and South have teams separated by one win at the top, so they may be down to tie-breakers after next week's game if the team currently in the lead loses and their corresponding second place team wins.

The NFC North is dominant this season, with three of its four teams guaranteed a playoff spot.

The Packers are a wildcard team for sure, with either the Lions or Vikings as the leader and the other as a wildcard team.

It looks like the Commanders are most likely to get a wildcard spot, but they're currently playing (and tied in) this week's game, so a couple losses for them combined with pair of wins for the Falcons (who the Commanders are tied with currently) would lead to similar records and tie-breakers. Should the Commanders win today, I think it looks like they'll have their spot clinched. The Commanders won their game and clinched a wildcard spot. The Commanders and Packers have the same records, so there will be a race for their ranking in next week's games!

The Lions play at the 49ers tomorrow, and that holds a lot for the NFC North and the wildcard layout. Should the Lions lose, the Vikings will be alone in first in the division by a game over the Lions. Should they win, they'll be tied for first with the Vikings on 14-2 records.

Next week, the Vikings play at the Lions, and the standings after this week make a lot of difference. If the Lions lose tomorrow and next week, its an easy forecast as the Vikings will be first in the division by two games. If the Lions lose tomorrow but win next week, there will be a 14-3 record tie in the division, so tie breakers will come into play and the Lions will win based on two head-to-head wins and a solid 6-0 division record. If the Lions win tomorrow, the division champion will be the winner of next week's game, or the Lions will take the division if the game ends in a tie as they will have the better head-to-head and division records. 

Who is in the number one spot for the conference depends on how the Lions do, too. If they lose the division to the Vikings, the Vikings will be the first place team in the NFC, eeking out an extra win over the Eagles' record if the Eagles also win next week. If the Lions win both their next two games, they'll eek out that extra win over the Eagles for first place. If the Lions win the NFC North after losing tomorrow but winning next week, then it'll depend on whether the Eagles win their last game, giving them both 14-3 records and leading to tie breaker rules (which I don't care to suss out), or the Eagles lose their last game, where the Lions will eek out a game ahead NFC first place.

Of course, that first-place spot has a first-round bye in the playoffs, which is important for both player health and whether we have home games to attend. The NFL playoffs is determined by the worst-at-best bracketing, where the position of the teams at the end of the season determine where team stand, and that standing sticks through the playoffs, determining who plays after each round.

Should the Vikings be in first-place, we'll get the bye for the Wildcard playoff round, and then host the worst team to survive the Wildcard round in the Division round.

Should the Vikings end up the top wildcard team, as the top-ranked NFC wildcard team, they'll play away at the division leader from the NFC South or West with the worst record, as they don't have records strong enough to pass the NFC North or East.

If the Vikings make it to the Conference round as the NFC North division leader (and won their Division round, of course), as they're also the NFC conference leader. If the Vikings make it through the Division round as a wildcard team (after winning their Wildcard round game), they'll host only if another wildcard team also makes it to the Conference round, but playing a division leader who makes it to the Conference round will be an away game. I think that's right.

Of course, the Super Bowl is going to be played in New Orleans this year. It's the 59th Super Bowl, so as an odd number, the NFC Conference champion will be the home team. If it's the Vikings, we'll be watching on television.