This past February, the Green Bay Packers defied a plethora of injuries and four top-seeded teams to become the second sixth seed in history to take home the Lombardi Trophy. Following a shortened offseason, most experts predict them to be Super Bowl favorites yet again this year. Completely aside from the general respect that Super Bowl champions deserve, the rhetoric behind the support of Green Bay is simple: healthy players and all key pieces returning.

Of course, no one seems to take the notion seriously. Repeat champions are such a rarity in this sport that even repeating once has some labeling you as a "dynasty." With 32 teams all vying for the same prize come winter, even the loser of the Super Bowl has a target on its back in the following season.

Is repeating such a far-fetched notion? Many people like to point out the parity and the long odds staring in the face of the repeat. Yet, paradoxically, more franchises have repeated than the number of franchises that have failed to appear in the Super Bowl in the first place; even taking into account the two newer franchises.

After the jump, let's take a look at the seasons of the defending champions following past Super Bowls.

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After filling retirement paperwork with the NFL earlier this week, it appears that Brett Favre has finally retired for good. Obviously you never want to close the door on him changing his mind again considering what transpired over the last few years, but it does seem as though he is finally done playing football.

Not only did he seemingly suffer more injuries this past season than previously in his entire career, but now that he has filed retirement paperwork, Favre is already doing damage control with Green Bay Packers fans. After a messy divorce that ultimately resulted in him playing for the rival Minnesota Vikings, Favre managed to turn himself into a villain for many in Green Bay. In order to start mending some fences, though, he is jumping on the Packers bandwagon for the rest of the playoffs, telling Ed Werder in an e-mail that they are "by far" the best team left in the playoffs and that he thinks they will win the Super Bowl.

Even if he has in fact retired for good we probably haven't heard the last of Brett Favre. Not only did he push himself back into the spotlight by sharing his Super Bowl pick with ESPN, but he has the whole Jenn Sterger thing hanging over his head. This obviously sucks for Favre, but it provides us with lots of material to make fun of him. I'll admit that many of the Favre jokes have grown tired, but the ones in the video below are absolutely hilarious. The video is a spoof of LeBron James' infamous "What should I do?" Nike commercial. Many of the spoofs of that commercial have grown equally as stale as the Favre jokes, but again, this is not one of them. It is probably the funniest video you will watch all day, and despite just being uploaded yesterday, it is already going viral. Check it out:

(Via KSK)

Every September when Michigan and Notre Dame play each other in football, Michigan State fans jokingly root for stadium implosion, as cheering for one of their rivals is just not going to happen. The same thing happens with Michigan fans a week later when the Spartans play the Fighting Irish. Michigan fans don't want to see MSU win, but they don't want to see Notre Dame win either. It's a case of there being two evils with neither being the lesser.

With four teams left in the NFL playoffs, I'm experiencing that September feeling all over again. The NFC title game will be between the Chicago Bears and the Green Bay Packers, two division rivals of the Detroit Lions. In the AFC, the Pittsburgh Steelers will take on the New York Jets in a game between two teams that are almost impossible to root for unless you're a fan of them.

Every year in the playoffs I root for certain teams and against others for a variety of reasons. Some teams with former Michigan players will get my support during a playoff run just because I like seeing ex-Wolverines do well. I will root for an underdog story like the Saints last year or the Cardinals a couple years ago. And I will especially root against teams like the Steelers and Jets just because. Perhaps I'm a bit jealous of other teams consistently doing well in the playoffs when the Lions haven't even been in the postseason in so long, but some teams are just tough to root for.

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The Lions' win over the Vikings today not only gave them their fourth straight victory, it also moved Detroit out of the cellar of the NFC North. The final NFC North standings for 2010 have the Lions and Vikings tied for third place, but based on divisional record, Detroit is actually ahead of Minnesota in the standings. On paper they are just tied, but if you go by divisional record, the Lions are listed third and the Vikes are at the bottom of the NFC North standings. That is certainly a welcomed change.

As you can see above, the Lions finished with the third-best divisional record in the NFC North. That's pretty good considering they were on a 19-game division losing streak just last month. Over the course of their four-game winning streak they picked up two wins against NFC North foes. The Vikings had only one win in the division all season.

The Bears finished atop the NFC North standings despite losing to the Packers today. They are the 2010 division champions, which I certainly didn't expect at the start of the season, especially after how the Week 1 game between Chicago and Detroit played out. The NFC North is always good for a surprise or two each season, and I'm hoping next year the Lions will be the surprise team everybody is talking about. Seeing them on top of the division at the end of the season would be quite the sight.

With the Lions winning on Sunday and Minnesota losing, there is now a two-way tie for third place in the NFC North between the two teams. The post-Week 8 NFC North standings look like this:

Two quick comments: 1) The Vikings play at home against Arizona next Sunday, which is a very winnable game. If the Lions want to keep pace, they will likely have to upset the Jets. 2) Had the referees not screwed Detroit in the first game of the season, the Lions and Bears would be tied for second right now. I don't think I'm ever going to be able to move past the what-if scenarios regarding what the standings could look like. Oh, well.

The Lions' bye week is winding down, and soon they will start preparing for their Week 8 matchup against the Redskins. Before we start looking ahead to Washington, though, I want to take a quick look at where the NFC North stands following seven weeks of action this season:

So what have the first seven weeks taught us? My observations for each team are after the jump.

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Eagles - 26 :: Vikings - 14

This was only a two-point game midway through the fourth quarter before Brian Westbrook basically sent the Eagles to the next round of the playoffs on one play.  Westbrook caught a pass on a screen type of play and took off.  He picked up some great blocks downfield and navigated his way into the end zone to score a 71-yard touchdown.  The TD put the Eagles on top 23-14 and put the Vikings in a huge hole, especially since their offense couldn't move the ball.

Adrian Peterson did his best to keep the Vikings in the game during the first half with a pair of touchdowns.  One came from 40 yards away and the other was from 3 yards out.  Peterson's first TD actually gave the Vikings the lead until David Akers nailed a field goal and Asante Samuel picked off Tarvaris Jackson and ran the interception back 44 yards for a touchdown.  At that point it looked like this game was going to become very one-sided, but Peterson scored on the proceeding drive to keep things close until the fourth quarter.

The Daily Norseman was happy with the Vikings' season despite the loss.

Well, the Vikings slugged it out with the Eagles for four quarters.  They let up one big play to the one guy that they couldn't afford to give up a big play to late, and did nothing offensively in the second half.

Overall, however, this was a pretty successful season for the Vikings.  They captured a division championship, fought hard in the first round of the post-season, and have a lot of things to build on going into 2009.

There are now no more NFC North teams left in the playoffs, as Minnesota was the only one to begin with.  The only other team that had a shot at the playoffs was Chicago, and they blew their chance in the last week of the season.  Given that, Around the NFC North is officially on vacation until next season.  Here's to a stronger division from top to bottom in 2009.

Giants - 19 :: Vikings - 20

The Vikes fell behind 19-9 in the fourth quarter and things weren't looking good.  That is, until Tarvaris Jackson hooked up with Bernard Berrian for a 54-yard touchdown to cut the Giants' lead down to 2 points.  That slim lead meant that a field goal would win the game for Minnesota and clinch them an NFC North title.  As the clock expired, that is exactly what happened.  Ryan Longwell nailed a kick from 50 yards out to win the game and the NFC North for the Vikings.

The Daily Norseman was ecstatic after the win.

It wasn't necessarily pretty, and it wasn't always fun to watch. . .but by God. . .

THE MINNESOTA VIKINGS ARE THE 2008 NFC NORTH DIVISION CHAMPIONS!!

And they earned it by going out and doing what they needed to do.  They didn't "back in," and they didn't wait for Chicago to lose (even though it was pretty nice that they did). . .nope, they won their game, and they got into the post-season.

Bears - 24 :: Texans - 31

With the Raiders' upset of the Buccaneers and the Eagles' win over the Cowboys, the Bears would have made the playoffs had they won on Sunday.  Problem is they didn't.  The Texans and Bears went back and forth, and eventually it was Houston that came away with a win. 

The Texans trailed 10-0 at one time but then scored three unanswered touchdowns.  A Bears TD cut down the margin, but a Texans field goal and another TD made it a 14-point game.  The lead went on to become 7 points when Kyle Orton scored a late touchdown, but Chicago simply ran out of time, as did their playoff hopes.

Windy City Gridiron was upset after the game, as you can imagine.

It took Houston a quarter to realize what the rest of the league already knew.  The Bears cannot stop anybody in the pass game.  They cannot stop wide receivers, they cannot stop tight ends, they cannot stop tackle eligibles and they cannot stop quarterbacks in a wildcat formation.  The Bears could not stop the Texans pass game and as soon as they overplayed the pass, the Houston run game tore us up.

The Vikings are the only NFC North team alive and will host the Philadelphia Eagles in the first-round of the playoffs on Sunday at 4:30 p.m. ET.