The San Francisco 49ers are careening rapidly toward the abyss of irrelevance for the 2024 season.
Despite a convincing Week 14 win over the Chicago Bears, the 49ers still sit on the outside looking in at the rest of the NFC West.
While San Francisco is only a couple games out of first place in the division, their actual place in the pecking order is illustrated in the USA TODAY NFL power rankings, where the 49ers are still way behind the division.
Their win over the Bears did push them up three spots from No. 21 overall to No. 18, but they’re two spots behind the Arizona Cardinals (No. 16), seven spots behind the Seattle Seahawks (No. 11) and eight spots behind the Los Angeles Rams (No. 10).
Injuries have certainly played a role in the 49ers’ struggles this season, but they had leads in the fourth quarter of loss to each of their divisional opponents. Their inability to close those games has now come back to bite them and put them well behind the curve in an imminently winnable division.
The only real silver lining for the 49ers is that they still have the Rams and Cardinals remaining on their schedule. Those games will be key as long as the 49ers are in striking distance. San Francisco also has one game left against the 20th-ranked Miami Dolphins. If they take care of business in those games they’ll have a real shot. If they don’t, they’ll continue looking up at the rest of their division in both the standings and the power rankings.
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