The AFC West was hyped up as the best division in NFL history this offseason, and four weeks in, it’s pretty clear that was a big pile of nonsense, as three of the division’s teams are already looking pretty flawed.
That said, it still figures to be an entertaining division up until the very end. How will it shake out and who’s on top right now? Let’s take a look.
1. Kansas City Chiefs (-)
The Kansas City Chiefs quickly made any post-Week 3 pearl-clutching look foolish, as they quickly exacted their Super Bowl revenge against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, in front of a national audience.
Entering Week 3, general consensus has the Buccaneers labeled as the top defense in football, only for the Chiefs to drop a 40-burger on their heads like it was nothing. Sure, Travis Kelce is no longer at his peak, and they’d likely be even better with Tyreek Hill, but as of now, this still looks like the best offense in football.
Meanwhile, the Kansas City defense is performing the best it has in the early portion of the season during the Patrick Mahomes era. Generally, it’s been a porous squad for the first half of the season, before hitting its stride down the stretch.
If this defense follows a similar path of progression, the Chiefs should coast to an AFC West crown, and potentially, another Super Bowl.
2. Las Vegas Raiders (+2)
Once again, it feels like the AFC West is a division of ‘Kansas City and everybody else.’
Here, we have the Las Vegas Raiders as the top Non-Chiefs team, but you could rank these remaining three teams in any order you want. It was just too difficult to give the nod to either the Broncos or the Chargers, after suffering embarrassing Week 4 results and a rash of injuries.
It’s just hard to feel great about the Raiders at this point.
The Josh McDaniels hire and offense have been underwhelming so far — even if they haven’t been quite as disastrous as Nathaniel Hackett and the Denver Broncos — and most every aspect of the roster seems to be underperforming relative to expectations. The offensive line and defense have been predictably bad, but these early-season struggles from Derek Carr, Darren Waller, and Hunter Renfrow weren’t expected.
If the Raiders can continue to build upon the line play and rushing attack they showed in Week 4, it could be the key to unlocking the rest of this offense, and making Vegas the rare team to become frisky after an 0-3 start.
3. Denver Broncos (-1)
The Denver Broncos find themselves ranked here in the AFC West largely because of the debilitating injuries they’ve suffered across the roster, rather than the loss to the Raiders.
That loss to the Raiders actually showcased a lot of positives, primarily the quarterback finally looking good. Now, there were some three-and-out stinkers mixed in there, but that’s kinda been the story of Russell Wilson’s whole career. There is still room for improvement, but he played a perfect first-half, and made some remarkable plays to keep Denver in the game in the second half.
Quarterback play potentially becoming a sudden strength is worth quite a lot.
Plus, given what the defense showed against the run from Weeks 1 through 3, one would think that defensive performance should be an outlier.
If Wilson can play like he did against the Raiders, and the defense can play like it did the first three weeks, this will be a quality team that will give every single opponent a hard time.
That said, it’s a big if considering how many stars the Broncos have already lost. We could easily see the offense and Wilson regress, as they lose the most reliable part of their offense — Javonte Williams on the ground.
4. Los Angeles Chargers (-1)
What is going on with the Los Angeles Chargers?
For all the hype surrounding their offseason, they currently appear to be a deeply flawed and poorly coached team. Now, injuries have definitely helped magnify some of those problems, but they were there nonetheless (wait, am I talking about the Broncos or the Chargers here), and are currently costing Los Angeles a shot to compete for the AFC West title.
The defense isn’t bad, but it’s a far cry from being the special unit that was promised, and the offense has been knee-capped by the team’s very own offensive coordinator, who demands they draw up plays for Justin Herbert that could also be run by a late-stage Drew Brees. Pair that philosophy with a complete lack of explosive offensive weapons, and you have an attack that is underperfoming to a laughable extent.
All of those problems were extremely apparent on Sunday, as the Houston Texans suddenly sprung to life in the second half and nearly upset the Chargers, after the Bolts’ offense became comatose.
Jamaree Salyer did surprisingly well filling in for Rashawn Slater, but the loss of Joey Bosa is looming large.
