2018 Midseason Review Part Two

As I did on Tuesday, I’m taking this midpoint of the season to take a step back and evaluate the playoff race shaping up before us. I have sixteen more teams today, the upper half of the league once again divided into four tiers, starting with the four teams that have separated themselves from the rest as the favorites to bring home the title this year.

The Contenders

There are a lot of good teams in the NFL, but these four have distanced themselves from the bunch. While the other teams fight to make the postseason, they have already turned their eyes ahead, to what they will have to do when the games turn single elimination to elevate themselves above the rest.

New England Patriots (7-2)

New England suffered a couple of disappointing early season losses, and they aren’t playing at the same level as everyone else in this group. But at this point they have earned more than just the benefit of the doubt, and they have to be considered the favorite to make it out of the AFC until someone else proves they can beat them.

Tom Brady is Tom Brady, and Bill Belichick is Bill Belichick, but there are other reasons to believe that this team can beat anyone they face. The additions of Josh Gordon and Cordarrelle Patterson give them a pair of rare athletes like they haven’t had in a long time, and both have come on strong in recent weeks. Rob Gronkowski will get healthy as the season goes along, as will Sony Michel, who has looked promising when he’s been on the field. The defense is still bland and uninteresting, but they avoid deadly mistakes, and with an offense that leaves them very few short fields to work with they are enough to get the job done.

Kansas City Chiefs (8-1)

We knew this was a possibility for the Chiefs, but I don’t think anyone counted on Pat Mahomes being this good this quickly. The talent on the offense is obviously among the best in the league, and Andy Reid remains the premier offensive mind in football. But Mahomes has elevated the talent around him to a new level. His arm strength and ability to make insane throws get all the attention, but he also does an excellent job diagnosing plays before the snap and finding the right place to go with the ball. This isn’t a flash in the pan, and Mahomes isn’t going to fall off a cliff the rest of the year.

There are reasonable questions to ask about this defense. They have a decent pass rush, but their secondary can’t keep up with anyone, and almost any offense they face is able to move the ball on them. Most of the time it doesn’t matter, because their own offense is lethal enough to run away with games. So far they’ve only faced two teams with offenses capable of keeping up with them, beating the Steelers and losing to the Patriots in a pair of shootouts. They are going to have to demonstrate the ability to get at least a couple stops, or else every postseason game is going to come down to whoever has the ball last.

Los Angeles Rams (8-1)

The Rams are in a very similar position to Kansas City. Their offense is deadly in a dozen different ways, dominating teams through talent, depth, and scheme. Jared Goff can rip defenses apart throwing to one of the best receiving corps in the league, while Todd Gurley is putting together a season that has him legitimately in conversation as MVP.

But as we saw last week against the Saints, this team can lose in a shootout. Their attempts to supercharge their defense in the offseason haven’t exactly panned out as they hoped. Aqib Talib can’t stay healthy, and Marcus Peters has been a disaster, keeping his regular missteps in coverage while not contributing any big plays. Aaron Donald is still a nightmare, but this defense is very shallow. They are going to need some of their other players to step up by the time the playoffs roll around.

New Orleans Saints (7-1)

The Saints suffered a shocking loss on opening day, and they have been just about flawless ever since. They weathered some rockiness in their defense over the first few weeks, seeming to improve with each game into back to back victories over the Vikings and the Rams. Their defense still has issues, but it might not matter with the offense clicking like it is. Drew Brees is in position to finally claim an elusive MVP trophy, distributing to the best group of weapons he has had at any point in his career.

Of all the teams in this tier, the Saints are the one that I feel the most hope for regarding their defense. Cam Jordan remains an underrated star along the front, and they look like they’ve found a partner for him in Sheldon Rankins, who is finally dominating like they hoped he would when they drafted him in the first round. Marshon Lattimore has struggled, but he showed last year that he can play at an elite level, and if he gets back to that this defense suddenly becomes extremely dangerous. Toss in more playing time for the promising Marcus Davenport, and this is the sort of young unit that could put this team over the top as the season winds down.

Hey, Anything Can Happen in the Playoffs

There are more warts on these teams than the ones in the tier above. But they have shown the ability to play at a very high level, and they have clear roads ahead to the playoffs. Once the season becomes single elimination, any one of these teams could get hot and go on a deep run.

Minnesota Vikings (5-3-1)

The start of the season was shaky for Minnesota, but things have quieted down. After some embarrassing performances from their defense they have rediscovered their old dominance, eating Matthew Stafford alive like they always do (seriously, just short of 20% of Stafford’s career sacks have come against Minnesota). Adam Thielen was quiet last week, but he has been the best receiver in the league this year, and a healthy Dalvin Cook gives them another explosive playmaker to work with on offense.

Is there reason to be concerned by their failure in each of the games they played against top teams in the NFC? Maybe, and it’s enough to drop them into this second tier. They fought hard against the Rams in a game that was set up against them, having to travel out to the west coast on a short week. The loss to the Saints was less excusable, set up by their own self destructive actions. The concern is that these sort of plays are inevitable with Kirk Cousins at quarterback. Of all the teams in the top two tiers, the Vikings are the one with the least confidence in their man under center, and there is a very good chance that comes back to haunt them once again this postseason.

Pittsburgh Steelers (6-2-1)

Five straight victories culminating with total domination of Carolina on Thursday night have the Steelers feeling fairly comfortable heading into the home stretch of the season. There were a lot of issues both on and off the field early in the season, but everything is going smoothly now, as their offense has settled into a rhythm and their defense has discovered a pass rush. It's looking unlikely that they will get Le'Veon Bell back, but it might not matter with James Conner a revelation in the backfield.

Inconsistency has doomed this team for the past few years, and I’m not convinced they are past it yet. Their defense is plagued by the same issues that I mentioned with Kansas City and Los Angeles above, a bunch of unathletic sludge mixed with marvelous athletes who don’t know what the hell they’re doing, and against better offenses like New England and Kansas City they will get ripped apart. But Ben Roethlisberger seems to have steadied somewhat after a rough start to the year, and with a new offensive coordinator they may be able to harness a more consistent offense that can keep them in games even when their defense struggles.

Los Angeles Chargers (6-2)

A 1-2 start had a lot of people rolling their eyes at the Chargers, thinking we had fallen into the same trap as always. Five wins later, it’s become clear that their rough start was almost entirely due to bad schedule luck that had them facing the Chiefs and the Rams early in the year. With these as still their only two losses, the Chargers have clinched a spot in the second tier of the league, and now they have to figure out what it’s going to take to knock off the teams above them.

One key factor will be Joey Bosa, who will hopefully return sometime over the second half of the season. The Chargers rank 28^th in adjusted sack rate in 2018, after finishing seventh a season ago. Give them a quality pass rush, and things will open up in the back end, allowing Defensive Rookie of the Year frontrunner Derwin James to play even more aggressively. Bosa is the sort of dominant player who elevates everyone around him, and he could be the difference between an early playoff exit and a championship run.

Prove It

On paper these teams look like they’re in good shape, but as they always say, the games aren’t played on paper. Despite excellent records at the midpoint of the season, I’m not convinced that any of these teams are actually that good. Sooner or later they are going to have to prove themselves against top competition, or else face an early playoff exit.

Chicago Bears (5-3)

The Bears are the perfect encapsulation of this category. Their five wins this year have come over teams with a combined 14-28 record, while the three toughest opponents they’ve faced—the Patriots, the Packers, and the Dolphins—have all gotten the better of them. To Chicago’s credit, they had a good chance to win all three of those games, and when they’ve played lesser competition they have blown them out of the water.

The matchup in two weeks against the Vikings looms large as Chicago’s chance to prove themselves. Until then, I’m still concerned about the state of their offense. They can run the ball when they’re sitting on a comfortable lead, but Mitch Trubisky has been all over the place, and I don’t trust this passing game to get it done against defenses besides Tampa Bay. There is plenty of room for them to grow—and plenty of time for them to prove me wrong—but for now I’m going to hedge my bet on the Bears.

Carolina Panthers (6-3)

I can’t say I expected the Panthers to be here right now, and even after being thoroughly dismantled by Pittsburgh on Thursday night, I still feel pretty good about their playoff chances going forward. The last three weeks of their schedule are brutal, with a pair against the Saints sandwiching a game against the Falcons, but four very winnable games before then will give them an opportunity to coast into the playoffs. This from a team that I felt had done very little to improve themselves in the offseason and was facing another year of middling performance in a difficult conference.

Ron Rivera’s defense has been playing to the level we expect, and most of the credit for the turnaround has to go to their offense. Christian McCaffrey has taken a leap forward as both a runner and a receiver, becoming tougher and more aggressive with the ball in his hands. With him alongside a receiving corps that now includes Curtis Samuel and DJ Moore, they have built an offense of raw weapons that most defenses simply aren’t athletic enough to keep up with. And somehow this is all being coordinated by Norv Turner, who used his time away from football to develop creativity that was very much lacking in his last few stops, allowing him to get the best performance possible from Cam Newton and this high upside offense.

Washington Redskins (5-3)

The strategy the Redskins are using shouldn’t work in the modern NFL. This is a team that has doubled down on the running game, counting on dominating the line of scrimmage on both sides of the ball to win. Adrian Peterson has had a fantastic season after being signed off the street, and their young defensive line led by a pair of first round picks out of Alabama has stuffed up the competition.

This strategy can work, but only in very specific circumstances. We saw what happened last week when they fell behind early against the Falcons and could not do anything the rest of the game. So far it’s worked out for Washington, but they are playing a very dangerous game, and sooner or later I think it’s going to bite them. Now suffering from multiple injuries on the offensive line, their margin of error has gotten even slimmer. They still have a chance at winning the division if they can sweep the two games remaining against Philadelphia, but past that I don’t see any way this team can consistently compete with the top teams in the conference.

Houston Texans (6-3)

The Texans have pulled off the never before done feat of losing their first three games then winning their next six, and they have done so without a single impressive win in the bunch. They have rolled their way through narrow victories over the Colts, Cowboys, Bills, and Broncos, four of the worst teams that any team will find in a six week stretch on their schedule. And it’s not even that they consistently beat up on bad teams. They lost to the Giants as well, the only team so far to endure that humiliation.

There are a lot of good players on this team, and maybe they’ll step up their game when they face better competition. Deshaun Watson has picked his game up after a slow start. DeAndre Hopkins and JJ Watt are as dominant as ever. They have the top end talent to match any team in the AFC, and maybe they can do that. We won’t find out until the playoffs of course, since their remaining opponents consist of the Redskins, Titans, Browns, Colts, Jets, Eagles, and Jaguars. The Texans will coast to the playoffs, and if they’re lucky they’ll find themselves matched up with the next team on my list and have a shot to make it to the second round without playing a single above average opponent since the start of the season.

Cincinnati Bengals (5-3)

The Bengals sit in the driver’s seat for the last AFC wild card spot, a game ahead of the Ravens and half a game over the Dolphins with victories over each of them. On paper both are quality wins, but the victory over the Ravens is muted somewhat by it being a home game on Thursday night (home teams are 8-2 on Thursdays this year), and the Dolphins win came thanks to a pair of freakish defensive touchdowns.

The Bengals have suffered major letdowns in their two most important games, a seven point loss to the Steelers that wasn’t nearly that close and a 45-10 drubbing by the Chiefs. They had to hold on for dear life against the Buccaneers despite four first half Jameis Winston interceptions. They have more spark on both sides of the ball than in recent years, and they’ll be competitive down the stretch. But until they show that they can beat a team like the Steelers, I’m penciling them in for another first round exit.

Long Odds

There is a lot of talent on these teams, and if everything had broken right they could easily have found themselves a couple tiers above. They could prove dangerous when the playoffs come around, but just getting that far is going to be a struggle. They’ve dug pretty deep holes for themselves, and while they have the ability to climb out, the odds are stacked against them.

Philadelphia Eagles (4-4)

We’re only halfway through the season, and the defending Super Bowl champions have already lost more games this year than they did last year. Some of this can be blamed on the absence and then rust of Carson Wentz, but on the whole this team has not come close to the pure domination they had a season ago. Their secondary has been exposed repeatedly, and their offensive line has struggled to open holes in the running game and keep the quarterback on his feet.

Of the teams in this category the Eagles have the easiest route to the playoffs. They are only a game back in the division, and as I mentioned above things are looking a little grim for the Redskins. But the Eagles are going to have to do far more than just hold on if they want to repeat last year’s deep run. They are going to have to rediscover their running game without Jay Ajayi, and their pass rush needs to step up to save their vulnerable secondary. They added Golden Tate in the hope that he could bring a spark to their offense, and we’ll see if that has any effect (I don’t think he’s that significant an improvement over Nelson Agholor.) Most importantly, they need to figure out how to close out games, as two of their early season losses came due to big leads blown in the fourth quarter.

Atlanta Falcons (4-4)

A 1-4 start looked like it had basically sealed things for my Super Bowl pick, but three weeks later they suddenly find themselves very much alive. Now facing back to back games against the Browns and the Cowboys, they will very likely enter their Thursday night matchup with the Saints on a five game winning streak. They’re probably too far back to win the division, but they have a shot at a wild card spot, and from there I still believe this team has the talent to run deep into the playoffs.

Matt Ryan is having another MVP caliber season, Julio Jones is a monster despite his struggles to find the endzone, and Calvin Ridley is even better than they had hoped in his rookie year. But the story of this team remains around their defense. They suffered multiple brutal injuries at the start of the year, and even though Keanu Neal isn’t coming back, the rest of their core looks like it’s on its way to being healthy. The return of Deion Jones, as well as the addition of Bruce Irvin, gives them a flash of athleticism in their front seven that most teams cannot match, enough to make a difference if they can sneak into the playoffs.

Green Bay Packers (3-4-1)

The Packers currently have the tenth best record in the NFC, sit in third place in their division, and face a difficult schedule with games left against the Bears, Dolphins, Seahawks, Vikings, and Falcons. They have glaring holes everywhere on their defense, an offense that matches a lack of weaponry with the blandest scheme imaginable, and they have shown no sign of being able to make any changes to the way they do things.

Any other team in this situation I’d feel comfortable writing off. But I can’t do it here, because of Aaron Rodgers. We all know what he is capable of at this point, and even in the midst of what qualifies as a disappointing season for him, he has the ability to turn it on and carry this team streaking into the postseason.  A decade of cheering for a team in his division has left me terrified of him as long as he is kept breathing, and I won’t give up on the Packers until they are mathematically written off. I could try to rationalize this as a belief in their solid offensive line, or in the improvement of their young but talented secondary led by Jaire Alexander. But in the end it all comes down to Rodgers, as does everything written about this team for the past five years.

Seattle Seahawks (4-4)

The more I think of it, the more I suspect that I should have included Seattle in the first post this week. Because despite the fact that they are still very much in the hunt in the NFC, I can’t figure out what exactly they do well. Their once heralded defense has lost pretty much everyone except Bobby Wagner, they still can’t run the ball worth a damn on offense, and only years of absolute catastrophe on the offensive line have convinced people that what they have now is passable.

Russell Wilson is very good, I guess. And they still have three games against the bottom feeders of their division. But they also still have to face the Packers, Panthers, Vikings, Rams, and Chiefs. So you know what? Just flip them and the Ravens, and accept that there is almost no chance this team is going to keep playing after the season ends.