2. 1998 Arizona Cardinals
Regular season: 9-7 | Playoffs: 1-1
The 1998 Cardinals reached the playoffs despite a point differential of minus-53 (sixth-worst of all the teams on our list) and the easiest schedule of any team on our list. Dallas won the NFC East in 1998 with a 10-6 record, and the Cowboys were the only team the Cardinals played that year who ended their season with a winning record — which means that they beat no teams with winning records, because the Cowboys swept Arizona in the regular season. Quarterback Jake Plummer led the offense with a 59.2% completion rate and 17 touchdown passes to 20 interceptions, and though Adrian Murrell had a nice season with 1,042 rushing yards and eight touchdowns on the ground, it was an opportunistic defense defined by safeties Kwamie Lassiter (who had eight interceptions that season) and Aeneas Williams that lifted the Cards past their own mediocrity. Arizona did manage to beat Dallas in the wild-card round before being summarily dismissed in the divisional frame by the point-a-minute Vikings.