Remaining on the mountaintop is more difficult than the journey there. It’s easier to be the hunter than the hunted. “Hungry dogs run faster.”
Pick your cliché – and let’s hope your favorite motivational phrase actually becomes one, Jason Kelce. But it’s wise to mind them in the NFL, where going from champion or, at minimum, a contender to also-ran status is a commonplace, annual occurrence.
Since 1990, an average of nearly six new teams reach the playoffs, compared to the previous season, every year. The variance has been especially pronounced since 2020, when the postseason field expanded from 12 teams to 14 – clubs qualifying during this period enjoying only 52% odds of returning year over year.
Perhaps there was no bigger surprise entry into last season’s playoffs than the Texans, who are now charged with fulfilling the newfound hype surrounding the reigning AFC South champions going into the 2024 campaign.
“It's not going to be easy. It's going to be harder. We have a target on our back this year. That's how you should want it,” said Houston QB C.J. Stroud at the start of training camp, his team set to open the preseason in Thursday night’s Pro Football Hall of Fame Game against the Chicago Bears in Canton, Ohio.
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“I definitely do think that (with) all the expectations, (if) we just work, everything will take care of itself. The story is already written.”
Maybe Stroud has early access to the proverbial NFL script. Or maybe USA TODAY Sports does, projecting the Texans, despite their notable offseason acquisitions, to fall one win short of reaching the Super Bowl 59 tournament – one of six teams from the 2023 postseason we predict won’t make it back.
Here’s a ranking of the teams that made the playoffs last season – from least likely to most – based on how probable we think they are to miss them this time around:
In their case, just chuck the percentages further than a downfield strike from (underpaid?) QB Patrick Mahomes. Sure, the numbers might not be in their favor as it pertains to becoming the first team to ever pull off a Super Bowl three-peat. Otherwise? Expect K.C., which is riding a streak of eight consecutive division crowns and has missed the playoffs once (2014) in HC Andy Reid’s 11 seasons, to at least get close to making history. The postseason path seems especially favorable given what seems the generally weakened state of the AFC West.
Once again a Super Bowl victim of the Chiefs, the Niners also appear to be virtual playoff locks – assuming they avoid the catastrophic injuries that have proven the only consistent mechanism for derailing HC Kyle Shanahan’s teams. They’ve advanced at least as far as the NFC title game in four of the past five seasons, 2020 – when San Francisco had to employ three starting quarterbacks – the lone exception. Though they may not enjoy the relative divisional cakewalk Kansas City seems to be facing, the 49ers are armed with what’s arguably the league’s strongest top-to-bottom roster … presuming contractual resolutions with the likes of WR Brandon Aiyuk and All-Pro LT Trent Williams.
It’s an ambitious assessment for a very young club that went 9-8 in 2023 and barely got to the playoffs – before doing significant damage once there. But the Pack are also our NFC Super Bowl pick this year, especially if a talent-laden defense realizes achievable gains after ranking 17th overall last season. And, not for nothing, but HC Matt LaFleur has overseen a playoff outfit in four of his five seasons at the helm to date.
They’ve most definitely arrived as a bona fide title threat and might be a safer bet to reach the Super Bowl, which they barely missed last season, for the first time in franchise history than miss the playoffs entirely. Yet the NFC North projects as a much tougher obstacle course moving forward, and the Lions certainly aren’t going to sneak up on anyone in 2024. Still, given their copious and ascending talent, they seem a solid bet to make consecutive postseason trips for the first time in nearly three decades.
Smooth sailing has hardly been the typical routine under HC Nick Sirianni. Nevertheless, he’s successfully guided Philly into a playoff port in each of his three seasons, and the franchise has only failed to get that far once (2020) since winning Super Bowl 52. Despite Kelce’s departure, the arrival of RB Saquon Barkley and two seasoned coordinators (Vic Fangio and Kellen Moore) should provide needed stability in the wake of 2023’s late-season collapse. It also seems like the other teams in the NFC East are facing much broader systemic issues.
The retirement of their best player, DL Aaron Donald, will likely define this squad in high-definition … until it doesn’t. But what seem like a bountiful draft and free agency expenditure suggest this organization remains in win-now mode under the leadership of HC Sean McVay, still only 38, and QB Matthew Stafford, now 36. And the Donald-less defense’s margin for error could grow significantly if RB Kyren Williams and WR Cooper Kupp aren’t as limited by injuries as they were in 2023.
Though we've forecast them to clinch a sixth straight playoff berth, it’s only by virtue of a favorable tiebreaker verdict in what’s shaping up as an airtight conference. However the Bills will likely have to be much better at hitting their marks after sleepwalking though the middle of last season – and while adapting to the absences of several veteran mainstays beyond WR Stefon Diggs. The second and third levels of the defense, notably at safety, could be especially vulnerable and might force QB Josh Allen back into the hero-ball mode that's gotten him into trouble.
Like the Bills, both are projected to win 10 games – the Browns barely returning to postseason ahead of the Ravens by virtue of the strength-of-victory tiebreaker in USA TODAY Sports’ 2024 outlook. Said another way, very little seems to separate these teams at present, though near-inevitable injuries will likely create daylight at some point – and in a division, almost inarguably the NFL’s best, where very little currently exists.
Baltimore, a No. 1 playoff seed last season, is dealing with significant turnover on the field and, to a lesser extent, on the coaching staff – though former DC Mike Macdonald’s headset will be tough to fill. And though reigning league MVP Lamar Jackson made it through last season virtually intact, having failed to do so in 2021 and ’22, will he manage it again behind an offensive line breaking in three new starters? Also, it might not be a foregone conclusion that such deeply established players as Jackson and new RB1 Derrick Henry are necessarily able to mesh their signature styles.
In Cleveland, the Browns relied heavily on their top-ranked defense in 2023. But, ironically, they didn’t really catch fire until QB Deshaun Watson joined a lengthy list of injuries with a season-ending shoulder ailment in mid-November. The arrival of WR Jerry Jeudy and return of RB Nick Chubb should help, but Watson still must prove he can pilot this offense at the caliber veteran retread Joe Flacco did almost immediately during the Browns’ torrid regular-season flourish. The mélange of unknowns here make Cleveland an especially hard team to read.
Let’s say it again: They last fell short of postseason in 2019. Let’s say it again: The Bucs are 18-19 over the past two seasons – and actually holistically improved with QB Baker Mayfield in 2023 as compared to Tom Brady's swan song in 2022. Still, the NFC South again presents as an underwhelming crapshoot – the Carolina Panthers notwithstanding – and likely to produce just one, likely fourth-seeded, playoff qualifier.
Maybe the arrivals of Diggs, RB Joe Mixon and DE Danielle Hunter, among others, propels them to the AFC championship game, and perhaps beyond, for the first time in their 22-year history in the wake of an unexpectedly bountiful 2023 emergence. Yet it’s also wise to remember that a Week 18 win over a damaged Indianapolis squad was the difference between winning the division and being a quaint, and likely much less-vaunted, 9-8 team. The Colts and Jacksonville Jaguars, who both finished a game back of Houston in 2023 despite significant personnel issues, could do far more than lurk this time around.
Their talent is readily apparent. And, perhaps, All-Pro WR CeeDee Lamb’s lingering holdout and the even more uncertain futures faced by lame-duck HC Mike McCarthy and QB Dak Prescott are unfairly skewing perception of the reigning NFC East titlists before they’ve even played a down … the first since their unsightly playoff ouster at the hands of the Packers at Jerry World in January. But there’s no spinning the loss of DC Dan Quinn or free agent exodus by several of Dallas’ less-heralded starters, nor the fact that the breach has yet to be filled by noteworthy on-field replacements (aside from the name recognition of prodigal RB Ezekiel Elliott). Doesn’t seem like the formula to end the division’s two-decade stretch without a repeat champion … nor the one to provide the deep postseason run McCarthy – and maybe even Prescott – almost certainly requires to remain rooted in North Texas.
Like the Browns, Ravens and presumably resurgent Cincinnati Bengals, the Steelers are also tasked with navigating a gauntlet of a division where a winning record, even by the last-place finisher, hardly guarantees an 18th game. After barely securing the AFC’s No. 7 seed in 2023, Pittsburgh actually appears improved on paper – QBs Russell Wilson and/or Justin Fields, LB Patrick Queen and a widely hailed draft class all seeming to fortify perceived weak spots. But the roster upgrades may not necessarily translate to more wins, playoff or otherwise, for a team saddled with the league’s third-toughest scheduled (based on opponents’ winning percentages in 2023) and unlikely to enjoy another sweep of Joe Burrow-less Bengals.
Others may have fewer concerns about the Fins, playoff participants in both of HC Mike McDaniel’s seasons, and maybe aren’t discouraged by their weakness in the trenches or a schedule that lends itself to an even steeper late-season nosedive than those that materialized in 2022 and ’23. Yet the Dolphins' seemingly disrespectful spot in this ranking is more a function of having to slot what is, by definition, some capable club here as well as an overall testament to the depth and quality that seem endemic to the AFC given its lineup of star quarterbacks. The difference between Miami and Buffalo, which snatched the division crown in last season’s regular-season finale – and the teams listed between them here – is quite marginal in actuality.
***Follow USA TODAY Sports' Nate Davis on X, formerly Twitter, @ByNateDavis.
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