It's time for one of my favorite columns of the year, when I pick NFL teams with the best chances of improving their records this season. I'm using my trusty predictive metrics from previous years and have some new concepts to introduce. I'll hit the four teams most likely to decline in 2023 on Wednesday, so let's focus on the positive today.
Since this column started, the results have been pretty good: 23 of the 30 teams I've pegged to improve have pulled off that feat the following season, with the average squad jumping by just over three wins per 17 games. (Many of the numbers are from the 16-game era, so I've had to prorate many metrics to account for the extra regular-season game.)
I went 4-1 in last year's column. The Jaguars and Lions went from three-win seasons to topping .500, while the Ravens jumped by two games, even with Lamar Jackson getting injured for the second consecutive season. The Bills improved from 11 wins to 13 despite having to play a home game in Detroit and playing only 16 total games because their matchup with the Bengals was canceled after Damar Hamlin suffered cardiac arrest on the field. The only blemish was against the Broncos, who we'll talk about later in this piece.
For this column, I'm relying on metrics with a track record of helping predict which teams will likely improve or decline the following season. I have some say in making the decisions and picking the teams, but I'm not considering teams whose case to improve is more about what they did this offseason than their quantitative performance from 2022.
The Jets, for example, aren't on this list. I can understand why somebody would pick them when they've replaced quarterback Zach Wilson with Aaron Rodgers, and I would expect them to win more games than they did in 2022. The numbers I'm using don't have a strong case for Gang Green improving this season, however. The Jets didn't outperform their point differential, weren't unlucky in close games and were remarkably healthy on defense last season. If you want an example of how making a major upgrade at quarterback on paper isn't a guarantee of success, you only have to look back at what happened with the Broncos or Browns a year ago.
Most years, I pick five teams. This year, it just happened to work out that there were four teams that stood out as obvious candidates on either side of the divide, so I decided not to force a fifth. Leaving aside the Jets, let's run through my four favorites for 2023, starting with a team that should be more motivated to win than it was at this time last year.
More: Four teams likely to decline
Jump to a team:
Bears | Broncos
Browns | Rams
Chicago Bears
Record in 2022: 3-14
Point differential in 2022: minus-137
2022 record in games decided by seven points or fewer: 1-6
Projected strength of schedule, via ESPN's FPI: 9th easiest
The easiest pick on this list is a team that seemingly wasn't trying hard to compete in 2022. The Bears started the season 2-1 with wins over the 49ers and Texans, only to lose 13 of their final 14 games. Their lone victory in that stretch was against the Patriots on "Monday Night Football," when they recovered all six fumbles and forced three interceptions out of Mac Jones and Bailey Zappe. Trading away veterans Roquan Smith and Robert Quinn along the way, Chicago might as well have been tanking, right?
Let me start by poking a hole in that theory. The Bears didn't win many football games after September -- and they were lucky to claim the one they did win -- but they were more competitive than you might remember. Chicago went 1-6 in games decided by seven points or fewer, and most of those losses were close:
In Week 6, the Bears trailed by five points to the Commanders and had first-and-goal from the 5-yard line with 52 seconds left in the fourth quarter. They failed to score, with their final pass coming up just short of the end zone.
Three weeks later, the Bears scored to make it 35-32 against the Dolphins with just under 12 minutes to go in the game. Matt Eberflus' defense held the rest of the way, but the offense failed to get past midfield on two subsequent drives.
In Week 10, the Bears went up 30-24 on a touchdown with 9:11 to go in the game, only for Cairo Santos to miss the extra point. The Lions scored a touchdown and successfully converted their extra point to take the lead with 2:21 to go. Chicago failed to move into field-goal range on its final drive.
The following week, the Bears were tied up in the fourth quarter with the Falcons and had them stuck in no man's land on a fourth-and-2. Atlanta converted, and kicker Younghoe Koo booted a 53-yarder through to give the Falcons their three-point margin of victory.
The Bears encountered more tragic defeats along the way, but the Commanders' matchup is a perfect example of how close a game can be. Wins and losses are what matters in a given season, but if you're projecting how a team played on a snap-by-snap basis and what it means for the following season, does it make any sense that the Bears' loss by a half-yard to the Commanders counts for just as much as their 31-point loss to the Lions in Week 17? Of course not.
Using Chicago's point differential of minus-137, it projected to win 5.2 games. That 2.2-win gap between what it was expected to win and what it actually nailed down was the largest (on the negative side) of any team. Since 1991, 30 other teams have underperformed that win expectation by a figure between 2 and 2.5 wins. (The vast majority of those teams were playing a 16-game schedule.) Those teams won an average of just under two more games the following season.
There are other factors that should aid the Bears' chances of improving. They had the fifth-youngest roster in the NFL by snap-weighted age last season, and younger rosters typically improve the following season. They had the most cap space of any team and added good players on both offense (DJ Moore and Nate Davis) and defense (Tremaine Edmunds, Yannick Ngakoue and DeMarcus Walker) this offseason to supplement that young talent. Even after trading away the No. 32 overall pick for Chase Claypool at the trade deadline, Chicago had four of the top 64 picks in April's draft.
The Bears' schedule should also be easier. ESPN's Football Power Index (FPI) pegged them as facing the sixth-toughest schedule last season, while my model had them in fifth. In 2023, they instead project to face the ninth-easiest schedule, per the FPI, partly because they play four games against the NFC South.
The NFC North seems wide open in terms of strength of schedule. The Bears look a distant fourth place by record, but the margin is closer than it seems. The Vikings posted a negative point differential and finished last season 27th in DVOA (defense-adjusted value over average), just three spots ahead of the Bears. The Packers are starting over on offense with quarterback Jordan Love.
The Lions ended the season white hot, but that was courtesy of a remarkable run of avoiding turnovers. They turned the ball over just four times during their 7-2 stretch to end the season, which is the sort of ball protection that makes it easy to win games, even if it's tough to sustain moving forward. The 2020 Browns and 2021 Cardinals are examples of teams that seemed to be hitting new strides and then disappointed because they couldn't protect the football.
The last time the Bears were on this list was in 2018. Remember what happened? They jumped from 5-11 to 12-4 and won their first division title in seven seasons. With a leap forward from quarterback Justin Fields, could they pull that off again in 2023? I'm not willing to go quite that far, but I would be surprised if Chicago didn't take a significant step toward competitiveness. Anything short of seven wins would be a disappointment.
Denver Broncos
Record in 2022: 5-12
Point differential in 2022: minus-72
2022 record in games decided by seven points or fewer: 4-9
Projected strength of schedule, via ESPN's FPI: 11th toughest
Picking the Bears feels good. Picking the Broncos for the third consecutive season? Not the same feeling. Denver did improve from 5-11 to 7-10 in 2021, but it fell right back to the five-win mark last season, amid lofty expectations. You don't need me to tell you what happened with quarterback Russell Wilson, but I wrote a deep dive into Wilson's struggles last November. It went bad in about every way possible outside of serious injury.
While Wilson's disastrous season dominated the headlines, injuries might have played a similarly sized role in causing the 2022 Broncos to struggle. The injury woes started with Tim Patrick tearing his ACL during the summer and never seemed to subside. By Week 18, they were handing regular snaps to Quinn Bailey, Latavius Murray, Ja'Quan McMillian and Essang Bassey, players who either weren't on the Week 1 roster or weren't expected to play roles if things broke right.
By adjusted games lost, the Broncos were the NFL's most injured team a year ago. This isn't necessarily anything new -- they have ranked in the bottom 10 in injuries each of the past four seasons -- but the cycle of pain had not been quite as severe as it was in 2022. Just two players started all 17 games, safety Kareem Jackson and cornerback Pat Surtain II. The rest of the league averaged six 17-game starters.
Even with Wilson melting down, the injuries piling up and a coach who seemed overmatched for his job by the end of Week 1, the Broncos weren't as bad as they seemed. They had a chance to win two games with long field goals in the final minute of action, only for Brandon McManus to come up short. They lost all three of their games that went into overtime. A drive into the red zone to seal the game against the Colts ended in a turnover, and a subsequent drive to win the game in overtime failed to get 2 yards on two plays when they had third-and-2 from the 6-yard line. The defense failed to hold fourth-quarter leads against four teams, including an 18-play drive from the Lamar Jackson-less Ravens. Denver had realistic shots in the fourth quarter to win both of its games against the Chiefs.
It's almost too easy to paint a story in which this gets resolved with better second-half coaching and game management. Sean Payton's Saints never had a season in which they blew five games they led at halftime, as the Broncos did a year ago. A Denver team that has gone 9-19 in games decided by seven points or fewer over the past three seasons will be excited to welcome a coach whose teams went 57-47 in those same games in New Orleans. I don't think Payton has an innate ability to pull out the close ones, but he's a capable, experienced coach who will be able to differentiate between the success rates of a fourth-and-5 and a 64-yard field goal at sea level.
While the Broncos lost promising defensive coordinator Ejiro Evero to the Panthers, the hope is that a defense that looked impressive before wearing down in the second half of the season can stay afloat for the entire year. Through Week 13, the Broncos' defense ranked fourth in the NFL in expected points added (EPA) per play and second in points per possession allowed. Surtain & Co. had a case to be considered right alongside the 49ers, Cowboys, Jets and Patriots as one of football's best defenses.
From Week 14 on, though, they ranked 29th in EPA per play and 31st in points per possession allowed. By then, the Broncos had traded Bradley Chubb to the Dolphins and were almost entirely without free-agent addition Randy Gregory. Fellow signing D.J. Jones went down with an injury during the final month of the season, as did Dre'Mont Jones, who inked a big deal with the Seahawks this offseason. Only five teams faced more possessions during the first 13 weeks than the Broncos; perhaps it was inevitable the load of carrying the team and injuries would wear them out.
While the Broncos didn't have much draft capital after trading for Wilson and Payton, the organization spent a lot of money in free agency to supplement its talent. Mike McGlinchey and Ben Powers joined to start along the offensive line, which also gets back Garett Bolles from a season-ending injury. Samaje Perine and Chris Manhertz were imported to help the running game. Dre'Mont Jones was replaced by Zach Allen, who is coming off a career year in Arizona under new Broncos defensive coordinator Vance Joseph. The Broncos added Frank Clark to supplement the pass-rush depth, and maybe they can convince him that the regular season is actually the postseason and get him to produce before January.
The Broncos already are without Patrick for another season after the lanky wideout tore an Achilles in camp, but with average luck and even an above-average rate of injuries, they should be able to win another game or two this season. I suspect that won't be a satisfying conclusion, given that they have a roster (on paper) capable of doing much more and a coach with a track record of success.
The real question of Denver's ceiling comes down to what Payton can do with Wilson, who fell apart a year ago. When I looked into his future in my deep dive, I found other veteran quarterbacks who took similar dives and returned to relevancy, including Brett Favre, Eli Manning, Philip Rivers and Steve McNair. Wilson is a unique player, and it's always possible that an undersized quarterback who relied so heavily on his legs to extend plays as a passer might not be able to thrive in his mid-30s, but he was a valuable player for the Seahawks in 2021.
Even if the Broncos don't get the version of Wilson they imagined when they went all-in to trade for him a year ago, I still believe they'll get something more than the quarterback who looked shell-shocked by the end of last season. If they can match that with something closer to the defense we saw from the first three months of the season, they likely will be a playoff team, even in the crucible of the AFC West.
Cleveland Browns
Record in 2022: 7-10
Point differential in 2022: minus-20
2022 record in games decided by seven points or fewer: 2-5
Projected strength of schedule, via ESPN's FPI: 13th easiest
If you didn't pay much attention to the 2022 Browns, I can't blame you. It was a lost season, as quarterback Deshaun Watson, who was acquired in a big trade last March, was suspended for the first 11 games after he was accused by more than two dozen women of sexual misconduct during massage sessions. Cleveland started 2-5 and quickly fell out of the playoff picture in the AFC North, and I suspect even Browns fans started finding other things to do on Sundays.
The Browns were anonymous for most of the season and embarrassing after Watson was able to play. He was significantly worse than journeyman Jacoby Brissett, failing to complete even 59% of his passes and averaging just 6.5 yards per attempt. He ranked 29th in QBR after making his Browns debut, behind subpar signal-callers Tyler Huntley and Davis Mills. Only Baker Mayfield was worse among regular starters, and he had to learn the Rams' playbook on the fly while playing behind a third-string offensive line.
Other metrics were more optimistic about the Browns than their record and season-long story would indicate. DVOA rated Cleveland as the 11th-best team, ahead of five of the league's playoff teams. The only non-playoff team ranked higher was Detroit.
Mind you, Kevin Stefanski & Co. did this with a backup quarterback holding things down for three months. Brissett is one of the league's top backups, but the Browns had their primary quarterback (Watson) throw just 31.5% of their pass attempts. The only teams with access to their primary quarterback less often were the 49ers (Trey Lance) and Saints (Jameis Winston, who was injured and then benched for Andy Dalton).
Teams that don't often get to play with a primary quarterback unsurprisingly usually improve the following season. Since 2002, there have been 47 teams that had a primary quarterback take between 20% to 40% of the pass attempts in a given season. ("Primary" quarterbacks include first-round picks who take over the job quickly, as Kenny Pickett did for the Steelers last season.) The following season, with the primary QB taking an average of about 70% of the offensive snaps, those teams improved by an average of just under two wins per 17 games.
As with Russell Wilson, there's a longer view in play here. It seems more likely we'll see a version of Watson closer to the player who excelled between 2017 and 2020 than the one who looked lost last season. He might end up as an awkward fit in Stefanski's preferred style of offense -- and he might not have the sort of receivers a team would hope to see in a great passing attack -- but he should be able to recreate what Brissett did a year ago, at the minimum.
That version of the offense was quite good. The Browns were sixth in EPA per play with Brissett in the lineup, just behind the Eagles. They went 4-7 over that stretch because of poor timing and bad luck. To the latter point, they recovered just 36.6% of the fumbles in their games, the second-worst mark in the league. Recovering fumbles is almost entirely luck; teams with a sub-40% fumble recovery rate since 2002 have recovered an average of 50.1% of those fumbles the following season, winning an average of 1.2 more games in the process.
The season quickly became irrelevant because the team couldn't hold a series of leads. In Week 2, a Nick Chubb touchdown put the Browns up 30-17 with 1:55 to go. The Jets -- the Jets! -- scored on a long Corey Davis reception from blown coverage, recovered an onside kick and then drove downfield for a winning touchdown with 22 seconds to go. That's a loss from a situation in which the Browns had a 99.9% win expectancy inside of the final two minutes.
Two weeks later, the Browns were up 20-17 on the Falcons in the fourth quarter after another Chubb touchdown, only for Atlanta to pick up 42-yard gains on consecutive drives and set up two field goal tries. Brissett & Co. made it onto Atlanta's side of the field two drives in a row, but the offense stalled out just beyond Cade York's field goal range.
The following week's game against the Chargers was more of a group effort. Up 28-27 entering the fourth quarter, the Browns allowed a field goal and then trailed by two points. The offense drove inside the 10-yard line with 2:54 to go, but Brissett threw a dismal interception on third down when a field goal would have given them the lead. They then stopped the Chargers on downs, but York missed a 53-yarder with 16 seconds to go.
York, whom the Browns surprisingly drafted in the fourth round last April, wasn't great as a rookie. He cost the Browns 7.1 points on scoring plays versus the performance of an average kicker, the fifth-worst mark in the NFL. He did win the game against Carolina in Week 1 with a 58-yarder, but he missed two kicks against the Chargers and had three kicks blocked, including a 60-yarder to tie the game late against the Ravens. All three of his blocked kicks came from players on the line of scrimmage instead of players who snuck through an open gap or around the edge. He needs to be better in his sophomore season.
For a team that sports a great offensive line and Chubb, arguably the league's best running back, the Browns were wildly disappointing inside the red zone. They ranked 27th in points per red zone trip on offseason last season, down from a league-average rate in 2021 and the NFL's third-best performance during Stefanski's debut season in 2020. Here, Watson might need to contribute both as a passer and as a runner. It seemed telling that Cleveland gave him a designed run inside the 10-yard line during its last preseason game. I also expect Cleveland to be among the teams that adopt Philadelphia's "tush push" play for quarterback sneaks this season, which should help a team that went for it more often on fourth down than any other team.
Defense is the side of the ball the Browns need to improve to seriously contend in the AFC North. There are reasons to believe they'll be better, although that was also the case in 2021 and 2022. They have swapped oft-criticized defensive coordinator Joe Woods for former Lions coach Jim Schwartz, who won Super Bowl LII during his time with the Eagles. Dalvin Tomlinson, signed away from the Vikings, gives the Browns a much-needed force on the interior to aid a run defense ranked 29th in EPA per play allowed over the past two seasons.
For the Browns to truly thrive, their major draft investments need to pan out. Myles Garrett (2017) is a superstar, but Denzel Ward (2018) had a down season in 2022. Martin Emerson Jr. (2022) was the best cornerback in the secondary last season, but 2021 first-round pick Greg Newsome II has been inconsistent and reportedly wanted to be traded for a stretch this offseason. Speedy linebacker Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah (2021) was banged up and has to prove he's strong enough to play the position at the pro level.
Both sides of the ball have to improve. Even a vintage season from Watson isn't necessarily enough; remember that the 27-year-old averaged nearly 9 yards per attempt and led the NFL in passing yards in 2020 for a Texans team that went 4-12. There's legitimate upside here, though, and the Browns have a better shot at winning 12 games than any of the other teams that missed the postseason. They could also just as easily finish last again in the AFC North.
Los Angeles Rams
Record in 2022: 5-12
Point differential in 2022: minus-77
2022 record in games decided by seven points or fewer: 2-4
Projected strength of schedule, via ESPN's FPI: 14th toughest
The 2022 Rams were one of the most surprising disappointments in recent memory. According to Pro Football Reference's data, the Rams' five wins placed them 5.5 below their preseason over-under expectation from Caesars Sportsbook (10.5 wins). The only team to be as disappointing last season was the Broncos, who matched that 5.5-win difference. Of course, the Broncos weren't coming off a Super Bowl title.
Teams that grossly underperform their preseason over/under typically improve the following season. There's an adjustment between 16-game and 17-game over/unders, but if we go back through 1989, there are 40 teams that finished between five and six wins short of their total. Those teams won an average of 3.7 more games outright the following season, which would round closer to four with the 17-game schedule. The most recent example is the 2020 Eagles, who were featured in this column in 2021 and made an immediate trip back to the postseason with a nine-win campaign.
It's easy to understand why the Rams fell short of expectations last season: Everybody got injured. Sean McVay's team ranked second in the league in adjusted games lost behind the Broncos, but the Rams' losses were more concentrated. Injuries decimated the depth chart at wide receiver, defensive back and particularly offensive line. Thirteen players suited up for at least 50 snaps on their offensive line.
The only other team that needed to top that mark over the past decade was, coincidentally, the 2021 Eagles, who got there partly by resting their starters in Week 18. The Rams didn't have starters left to rest by then outside of Rob Havenstein, who looked like he was either down on his confidence or playing through an injury for most of the season. They are getting many of those injured linemen back and even used a second-round pick on guard Steve Avila, so the hope has to be that they aren't forced to turn to free agents by the end of 2023.
So many building-block players who helped the Rams win Super Bowl LVI were on the sideline for the second half of 2023. Matthew Stafford and Cooper Kupp were done for the year after nine games. Aaron Donald was sidelined after 11 starts. Each of those players has age-related injury concerns, but it would be a surprise if they were again all off the field for good by December. The easiest case for L.A. is that it's healthier and will improve as a result.
If you wanted to be even more optimistic, consider that the Rams were a little better than their record a year ago. They underperformed their point differential by 1.3 wins. A 51-14 win over the Broncos in December fueled some of that gap, but they were 2-4 in games decided by seven points or fewer. They blew a fourth-quarter lead to the Buccaneers in the game that started their spiral, then failed to hold on to a pair of fourth-quarter leads in their games against the Seahawks.
All aboard the Rams bandwagon for a trip back to the Super Bowl? It certainly doesn't feel that way when you consider what they did this offseason. Trying to reset their cap after years of pushing for a championship, general manager Les Snead & Co. moved on from free agent additions Allen Robinson II and Bobby Wagner, cut veteran Leonard Floyd, let a handful of starters from the 2021 team leave in free agency and traded away Jalen Ramsey to the Dolphins for a third-round pick and backup tight end Hunter Long. The Rams' biggest free-agent signing of the offseason was Ahkello Witherspoon. This roster, especially on defense, looks virtually unrecognizable.
The offense, though, has plenty of solid players. Stafford and Kupp were one of the most the most feared combinations in 2021. Cam Akers finally looked healthy at the end of 2022, when he ran off three consecutive 100-yard games to finish the season. Tyler Higbee won't have to be used as a blocker quite as often with a healthier line. Replacing Robinson with anybody might be a plus. The Rams were sixth in EPA per play on offense in 2021; it's not difficult to imagine them returning to the top 10 again with everybody back on board.
How good does the defense have to be for the Rams to have a real chance at posting a winning record? Getting Donald back for more action will obviously help, although he's surrounded by virtually zero known quantities in the pass rush or the secondary. Nerds like me are excited about Cobie Durant and Michael Hoecht, but those are guys who might be borderline starters on good teams. Here, they must break through for L.A. to have real hopes of contending.
The other hope is that the Rams' schedule will be easier, partly because they fell from first to third in the NFC West. My model pegged the Rams as facing the fourth-toughest schedule last season, while Football Outsiders had the Rams at eight. The FTN Football Almanac projects McVay's team to face the 12th-toughest schedule this season, which isn't exactly a breeze, but there might be a way things break easier. The Cardinals are tanking. What if the 49ers lose some offensive starters and have a lost season like the ones they endured in 2018 and 2020? What if Geno Smith can't keep up his new level of play for a second season?
I'm not saying the Rams will reclaim the NFC West, but I wouldn't be so quick to peg the division as a two-team race because it was a year ago. There's a universe in which the Rams win nine games, and that's enough to win the West. As it is, if defensive coordinator Raheem Morris can coach up a few of his young players to be contributors around Donald, the offense will recover enough for the franchise to compete for a playoff spot.