Remember when everyone thought that this would be the toughest division in football? With three AFC West teams starting off poorly, the Raiders, Chargers, and Broncos, it just further highlights that acquiring Super Bowl winning pieces is far easier than winning with them.
“The AFC West will have FOUR teams make the playoffs this season! This will be the greatest division in the NFL!” we all heard for hours and hours in sports media this past summer. And, to be honest, many of us (including myself) believed it.
The AFC West teams, the Denver Broncos, Kansas City Chiefs, Las Vegas Raiders, and Los Angeles Chargers, all went out into the offseason and acquired big name free agent signings and trade acquisitions to bolster their rosters for a playoff run this season.
Apart from the Chiefs, who lost Tyreek Hill and Tyraian Mathieu (though, they have Patrick Mahomes, so they didn’t really need to splurge too much), each team in this division became substantial better on paper through the Free Agent market and from trades as they all seemed destined to all compete for the deep playoff run to the Super Bowl.
How could they not? They were all ‘super teams’.
The Raiders brough in Patriots offensive genius HC Josh McDaniels, Pro-Bowl DE Chandler Jones and All-Pro WR Devante Adams, the Chargers acquired All-Pro DE Khalil Mack, All-Pro CB J.C. Jackson, while the Denver Broncos brought in future Hall of Fame QB Russell Wilson and former Packers offensive mastermind Nathainel Hackett to be their head coach.
With the Chiefs already having the Super Bowl-winning duo of Andy Reid and Patrick Mahomes, this division was sacked to the brim with All-Pro and Super Bowl level talent that had more than enough will, skill, and determination to bring the 2023 Super Bowl to any one of these franchises…or so we thought.
Like I said in the beginning, it’s much easier to bring in elite talent than it is to win with it.
Acquiring guys like Wilson, Mack, Jackson, Adams, and Jones is just a matter of bargaining, contract negotiation skill, and cap flexibility by each team’s, respective, general manager. Winning with them is a whole different matter.
And the start to the season by the Los Angles Charges, Las Vegas Raiders, and Denver Broncos has proven it.
I’ll start with the Chargers as this team, in my opinion, has the best chance to turn their 1-2 start around and rebound into the playoffs.
To be honest, the issue with the Chargers is not their quarterback (who’s outstanding) or their coach (who has been pretty good, though the jury’s still out on him), or even their new acquisitions on defense (which hasn’t been that bad aside from the Jaguars game), but rather a fault in the organization’s DNA.
Simply put, the Chargers are losers at heart.
Okay, I don’t mean that in a derogatory way, but rather that the Chargers just can’t seem to win in the biggest and brightest of moments. Just in the past two seasons, the Chargers lost a crucial ‘win-and-your-in’ game against the Raiders in a Week 17 matchup because of a boneheaded timeout call that their HC took.
Then, a few weeks ago, they had the Kansas City Chiefs on the ropes and were poised on taking the lead in the division standings, only to then blow the game by throwing a 4th Quarter Pick 6 while they were on the Chiefs’ 3-yard line.
The Chargers have always been a team that has had lots of potential, but zero nerve in the big games. And this season has been no different.
Moving on, the Raiders are a little bit different as they once had a winning culture but have lost it completely in the mire that has followed the death of the late Al Davis.
And that’s down to one man…Mark Davis.
I’m not trying to hate on Mark Davis, Al Davis’ son, as an owner, but he’s been absolutely awful. From firing Jack Del Rio (the man who led the Raiders to their best record in the past two decades of 12-4 back in 2016), hiring Jon Gruden and Mike Mayock to run this organization into the ground for four years, to now hiring Josh Mcdaniels to replace the beloved Interim HC Rich Bisaccia, everything Davis has done from an executive point of view has failed.
The 2019, 2020, and 2021 draft picks classes under Gruden and Mayock idiotic reign have mostly been busts, while Josh McDaniels has seemingly zero leadership in this team as the Raiders have blown their first three games to be the only team in the entire NFL to be stuck at 0-3.
Sure, the Raiders have only lost their three games by one score, but doesn’t that just show that McDaniels and this team can’t win a game in the clutch?
I mean, it’s not like this is McDaniels first rodeo as a head coach. With the Raiders loss to the Titans this past Sunday, his coaching record is now a miserable 11-20 with not a single winning season to his name. I loved the guy as the offensive coordinator for the Pats, but it’s pretty obvious he can’t manage all the operations of a team cohesively.
And that is why the Raiders are 0-3.
As for the Broncos, this team may be 2-1, but don’t be fooled by that record. They scrapped by (in every sense of the word) against the 49ers last Sunday to win 11-10 and just squeaked out a 16-9 win against the lowly Texans. In truth, this team should also be 0-3 and stuck on the ground floor of the NFL standing with their divisional rivals in Las Vegas.
Actually, by the end of the season, I’d be surprised if this version of the Broncos wasn’t lower ranked than the Raiders. This offense is just flat out bad.
Though, if they just moved out one man, I would be so much higher up on this team. The Denver Broncos NEED to get rid of Nathainel Hackett or else they’ll miss the playoffs.
In the three games Hackett has been the head coach and offensive play caller, the Broncos have failed to score more than 20 points each time. In fact, the Broncos offense has just scored 43 points across those three games and only three offensive touchdowns.
Meanwhile, the Kansas City Chiefs scored 44 points against the Arizona Cardinals in Week 1, with Patrick Mahomes throwing for 5 TDs by himself.
In other words, the Broncos toughest division rival has scored more points IN A SINGLE GAME than the Broncos have ALL SEASON LONG! That’s insane.
Hackett needs to go as he’s in way over his head, even worse than Josh McDaniels. And every Broncos fan around the country agrees with me as Hackett has turned a future Hall of fame QB in Russell Wilson into Brock Osweiler overnight, which is probably the greatest sin an offensive play caller can commit.
Anway, I hope this kind of clears up why the AFC West has been so lame thus far. In all seriousness, I’d expect two teams from this division (the Chiefs and Chargers are my bet) to make the playoffs, though with Joey Bosa going down on IR today, it might only be the Chiefs that make it to January football.
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