The NFL is about up for groups to quickly flip issues round from one season to the following, and it isn’t unusual for a last-place staff to bounce again with a playoff look only one 12 months later.
So let’s check out the eight last-place groups from 2025 and rank them so as of which one is almost certainly to be within the playoffs this season.
A straightforward name.
The Lions usually are not your typical last-place staff. They completed with a profitable report (9-8) in what was one of many hardest divisions in soccer, nonetheless have an incredible roster with a top-12 quarterback (Jared Goff), and it is vitally, very possible that the 2025 season was an enormous fluke and outlier. It might truthfully be a shock if they’re not within the playoffs.
Pencil them in.
There are a few issues working within the Giants’ favor right here.
- The NFC East is normally wildly unpredictable from 12 months to 12 months. Bizarre issues occur right here.
- They’ve a brand new coach in John Harbaugh who brings a component of credibility and success to the group. The playoff success might have dried up with the Baltimore Ravens, however he can win.
- They’ve a superb younger quarterback in Jaxson Dart who could be prepared for an enormous leap, in addition to a celebrity extensive receiver in Malik Nabers getting back from damage.
Have a look at it this manner: No staff on this division had a profitable report in 2025. It was received with eight wins, and each staff right here has huge, huge flaws.
The Saints additionally performed extraordinarily effectively down the stretch, profitable 5 of their last eight video games with Tyler Shough at quarterback.
Is Shough the long-term man? We do not know. Will he be good this 12 months? We do not know that, both.
However the division and everyone round them goes to maintain the door open. The bar is low right here within the NFC South.
Very like the NFC East and NFC South, the AFC South may also be wildly unpredictable, and whereas the roster has its share of shortcomings, there may be one massive wild card that would change issues dramatically, and that’s quarterback Cam Ward.
His expertise is actual, and his upside is huge. If he places all of it collectively, this staff may shock, just because quarterbacks change every little thing. He has that kind of means.
The division might be out of attain with the Buffalo Bills and New England Patriots more likely to combat it out for the highest spot, however a wild-card spot may not less than be one thing you’ll be able to dream about right here.
There’s some expertise on this roster, particularly after having three first-round picks within the 2026 NFL Draft, however plenty of it will come all the way down to what sort of season Geno Smith places collectively.
Of the groups on the underside half of this listing, the Raiders might need the perfect long-term outlook given the presence of Fernando Mendoza at quarterback. They could be constructing one thing long-term. However the query isn’t which of those groups has the perfect five-year outlook. It is which staff is almost certainly to make the playoffs this season. Mendoza goes to play finally, and there’ll possible be rising pains. Asking a rookie to take final 12 months’s worst staff within the NFL to the playoffs in a single 12 months might be asking rather a lot.
Particularly within the AFC West.
Have persistence, Raiders followers.
The protection ought to nonetheless be good even with out Myles Garrett, however you’ll be able to’t take the NFL’s finest defensive participant off of that unit and count on it to get higher. And even keep the identical.
Even when it does, the quarterback scenario right here is as bleak as any staff within the NFL proper now.
An early-season contender for the No. 1 general choose.
The Cardinals play within the NFL’s hardest division, play a brutal schedule, have an equally grim quarterback scenario as Cleveland, and have a roster that’s even worse round it.
The Browns and Cardinals will possible be preventing it out for the highest choose this season.
