King relies on four points in favor of the Packers' number 1 rank: the maturation of Aaron Rodgers, the carryover from the somewhat fluky way their season ended in overtime, the points scored vs. points against differential (a category in which they were exceeded only by the Saints) and his prediction that Jermichael Finley will become a star in his second season. All of these are good points, with the possible exception of his point about the fluky end to the season. Sure, it was fluky, but I am not sure I see why that gives the Packers a leg up. I think you could just as reasonably make the argument that the fluky ending must have been so heart-breaking that they will have a hard time recovering from it. Bottom-line: I think that is just a make-weight add-on to his argument.
He ranks the Vikings as number 13, i.e., one would assume, just missing the playoffs. He says that whether "old What's His Name" comes back or not, they have an offensive line in decline. Interestingly, he has the Lions at number 24, with the Bears bottoming out the division at number 25. What a shame.
Well, who cares what Peter King thinks in May? And just because he picks the Packers as the number 1 team doesn't even mean that he thinks they will go to or win the Super Bowl. In fact, although he doesn't explicitly make Super Bowl picks in the article, he does make a comment suggesting that he thinks the Panthers will be the NFC representative in the Super Bowl.
One comment by one writer, in May, doesn't make a consensus, but it certainly gets the discussion going. The last time I can remember there being a consensus that the Packers were the team to beat was in 1996. I still have the Sports Illustrated cover around here somewhere, on which they predicted a Packers-Chiefs Super Bowl. That obviously did not happen, but it was the year that the Packers beat the Patriots in Super Bowl XXXI.
