Saints Wire has put Tampa Bay Buccaneers tackle Tristan Wirfs at the top of its All-NFC South Team of the 2020s offensive line ranking, giving him a combined score of 111. The list closes out the outlet’s decade team series by measuring the division’s blockers with a formula built on Approximate Value, All-Pro selections and Pro Bowl appearances.
That matters now because the piece is not just naming the best linemen in the NFC South so far this decade. It is also showing how those players stack up inside a narrow field that includes only the Atlanta Falcons, Carolina Panthers, New Orleans Saints and Tampa Bay Buccaneers, which makes every honor and every season of production count twice.
Wirfs’ total is easy to trace from the scoring system. He posted an AV of 71, earned five Pro Bowl appearances, and added two first-team All-Pro selections plus one second-team nod. The formula awards 10 points for first-team All-Pro, five for second-team All-Pro and three for each Pro Bowl, while using only work done for the four NFC South teams. By that math, Wirfs did not just lead the group; he ran away with it.
The ranking also explains why durability still shapes the conversation around the position. One of the names in the mix, Matthews, had not missed a start since his rookie season in 2014, yet still had not gotten the Pro Bowl and All-Pro recognition that kind of availability usually suggests. That gap is part of what makes the list feel less like a recap and more like an argument about value, because the scoring rewards both staying on the field and drawing leaguewide honors.
There is another layer to Wirfs’ case that helps separate him from the rest. He spent his first three years at right tackle before moving to the left side, and he had not started a game there since Sept. 28, 2019 at Iowa before making that switch in the NFL. Against that backdrop, his total is the clearest proof that the top of the NFC South line is being defined by both versatility and sustained production.
Behind Wirfs, the rest of the list begins to fill in with more familiar profiles: Lindstrom, who had four consecutive Pro Bowls, four straight All-Pro second-team appearances, an AV of 53 and a score of 85; Erik McCoy, a two-time Pro Bowler whose score was 35 after injuries cost him time in recent years; and Cesar Ruiz, whose score was 22 after a regression in 2025 that could leave him in a fight for his starting job if it continues. The full offensive line list was not completed in the excerpt, but the shape of the ranking is already clear enough: in this decade, the NFC South’s best linemen are being judged by what they did, how often they did it and whether the league noticed.
