Our initial foray into the blogosphere will be the first half of a two-part entry in which we'll be looking back at our 2018 preseason record predictions for all 32 NFL teams and comparing them to the real-life results.
We've created some handy graphics (one for each division) to visualize where JB and TK thought each team would end up, and alongside them, the actual 2018 record. JB's preseason predictions are in green, TK's in purple (Go Ravens!), and the real deal in black. Also, please note the four teams with ties are graphed as finishing with an extra half-win. That's Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Minnesota, and Green Bay.
So without further ado: on to the American Football Conference.
TK: The AFC East felt fairly safe in that you could rely on New England winning at least 10 games and you could rely on Miami, Buffalo, and New York to finish below .500.
JB: The AFC East has been in lock-down for the last 18 years, so you could have made the picks without looking (and I did). It is fun to see that the Bills and Jets performed better than TK or I predicted. There may be a light at the end of this tunnel... Or is that a train... OH NO!!! LOOK OUT!!!
TK: Miami definitely gave me a scare as I had them being worse off than they actually were, but in the end they basically finished in my acceptable wiggle-room window. Opening the season 3-0 really killed my predictions as I had them starting 1-2, picking up the win over a traveling Oakland. But when you look at who they beat: Tennessee in Miami with Mariota exiting after suffering the first of 2 trillion injuries, and New York with a rookie quarterback in Sam Darnold, I suppose the extra wins aren't too surprising.
JB: The only pick I would like back is the Patriots. I overestimated the success they would have on both sides of the ball. It should come as no surprise that they're being exposed more and more each year. They haven't had a top 10 pick since... I'm not looking it up. [I'll look it up. It was 2008, linebacker Jerod Mayo. selected 10th overall. BUT! That was obtained via trade. New England moved #7 overall and #164 to drop back to #10, plus #78. They got the #7 pick by trading with San Francisco the year before. Their last natural top 10 draft pick was in 2001 when defensive end Richard Seymour was taken 6th overall. -TK] They've been performing on both sides of the ball with a roster made up of misfit toys. This is the real story of the Pats; doing more with less.
TK: I'm also very disappointed in Buffalo. Six wins is far too many for a team with so many things wrong with it. Josh Allen is nowhere near good enough to have finished with a respectable 5-6 record in games started. And the Bills' sixth win came on the shoulders of who now? MATT BARKLEY?! Unacceptable. There's no denying that defense is good though. If general manager Brandon Beane and head coach Sean McDermott can figure out a way to supply the offense with a couple dependable linemen and a decent pass-catching tight end and one more reliable wide receiver... and I suppose a new lead running back for that matter, Buffalo could be a team lingering in the playoff picture despite Josh Allen.
JB: I'm proud of the Bills. Still can't believe they took that Jugs-machine-rookie QB, played him most of the year, and wound up a game below .500. Does it change the way I look at the franchise? Maybe a little. I found myself tuning in to Bills games to watch Allen, but staying to watch Tremaine Edmunds. So impressive in his rookie year playing middle linebacker. Well done Buffalo
JB: Feels like we hit the nail on the head in the AFC North. We both had Pittsburgh and Cleveland doing better than they did, but only by a couple of games. We both fell a game short of where Baltimore ended up, but let's be honest; everyone fell a game or two short of that. Cincinnati over performed, but it wasn't enough to keep Marv Lewis in groceries. Good luck to the Bungles on filling that coaching vacancy. So far they've interviewed Vance Joseph and Hue Jackson.
TK: We probably would have been even further off on Cincinnati's win total had Andy Dalton stayed healthy. Say what you will, but he's a heck of a lot better than Jeff Driskel. They suffered through a ton of injuries (Eifert, Dalton, Mixon, A.J. Green, Gio) and that's just offense! I'm not entirely convinced Vance Joseph is a failure, his quarterbacks have been bad. Andy Dalton would be a significant upgrade for him, as ridiculous as that sounds.
JB: We both had Pittsburgh at 11 wins. I wonder what would have happened if Bell had been convinced to sign. Would he have bumped the needle to the tune of another win and a half? With Bell's contract, Brown's tantrum, Ben's age, and Tomlin's uhh... Failure to live up to high expectations? This may be the last time we see this version of the Steelers. It's disappointing and also satisfying to watch them implode.
TK: You know what, you're probably right. Bell probably gets them over the hump at the very least for the tie with Cleveland. I think that right there is enough to edge Baltimore out of the playoffs. Maybe they don't lose to Baltimore in the first match-up, or lose to Oakland. Who knows? Maybe they play worse!
JB: What a run for Baltimore to finish up the Regular Season and make the playoffs! Lamar Jackson and the Ravens' defense pull the team over the finish line, eking out the Steelers in the last game of the season. Tough for Flacco getting hurt, but good on Jackson for stepping in and having immediate success. Kudos to the Offensive coaching staff (looking at you Marty Mornhinweg) for designing and calling a game plan that he could be successful with. Jackson will still need to develop as a passer, but this is a great start. Very encouraging.
TK: Certainly encouraging as a Ravens fan, but I'm giving more credit to Greg Roman. He is on staff as the Assistant (to the) Head Coach and I suspect had much more to do with the offense's success, seeing as he was the OC for San Francisco during the Colin Kaepernick era. At any rate, you're right, he needs to develop in a major way this offseason. The AFC North is going to be a tough nut to crack in 2019. Cleveland may very well sit atop the division, Pittsburgh at the bottom. And that would be something. Pittsburgh hasn't finished in last in their division since 1988. Cleveland hasn't won it since 1989.
TK: The South was tightly contested, I'm proud to say I got fairly close on how this one shook out. Tennessee continues to disappoint, I think largely due to Mariota's inability to stay on the field. I have no idea where I'll view them for 2019, but I suspect somewhere near .500 as I don't trust him anymore. We'll see how the summer goes.
JB: I missed on Houston, Indianapolis, and Jacksonville to the tune of 5+ games each. Congrats to the Texans. They went on a great run this year. I still don't have any faith in them. I thought it would take the Colts a year or two to transition to Frank Reich as a Head Coach. Instead it took about 4 games. Good on them! The Jaguars unraveled faster than a sweater with a loose piece of yarn in a Peanuts cartoon.
TK: Nothing we both enjoyed more than watching Blake Bortles' stock come back down to earth. He is the epitome of "average quarterback." I look forward to seeing where they end up at the quarterback position in 2019. And the running back spot as well now, Lenny is digging himself a grave! And looks like you weren't wrong to have no faith in the Texans. They pert' near laid an egg at home in the Wild Card game. I'm loving this Colts team.
JB: Jacksonville fell off a cliff. It started with Leonard Fournette hurting his hamstring, and ended with Tom Coughlin publicly admonishing Fournette and T.J. Yeldon for not being enthusiastic enough on the sidelines during the last game. When Fournette went down so did the running game. Bortles wasn't able to generate 1st downs, or points from the passing game (417 Points For in 2017, 245 in 2018). Playing without the lead, the Defense wasn't able to match last years turnover numbers (45 in 2017, 26 in 2018), and ended up allowing more points (268 in 2017, 316 in 2018). The Offense was forced to play from behind, again putting pressure on Bortles to carry the team.
TK: You just had to reignite the Jaguars talk. You hate the Jaguars. I gave you an opening for the Colts, or even the Texans. I even tried to goad you into some Mariota talk (Go Ducks!) in the beginning. I don't like what OC Matt LaFleur did with Mariota this year, I wouldn't mind seeing Vrabel look elsewhere. I also wouldn't mind seeing Tennessee bottom out. Houston needs to fix their offensive line and I think they'll be fine. Indianapolis should add more defensive reinforcements, and Golden Tate.
JB: Mariota may be on his last legs in Tennessee. He's on the last year of his rookie deal, and at this point I don't think he's done enough to guarantee a 2nd contract as a starter. If Matt LaFleur returns as OC, it would be good if the team took a hard look at the QB position. Houston is close, and it was good to see J.J. Watt finish the year up playing instead of on the sidelines.
JB: FINE! I admit it. I missed the boat with Kansas City. I was pretty sure that Patrick Mahomes would take a few games to get acclimated to the NFL game. I also didn't see the cresting wave of scoring that the Chiefs would put up. Mahomes 50 TD/5000 Yds passing are incredible numbers. One of the great stories of the 2018 NFL season. On the other end of the spectrum, I feel pretty good about picking the Raiders to struggle this year. What I didn't see was the roster churn that the team would undergo. It feels like the franchise took big step backwards this year.
TK: If you say to me today that you had Kansas City pegged to be in the playoffs before the season started you're either a liar, a homer, or part of the organization itself. I had the good fortune of at least getting small glimpses of Mahomes before we made these predictions, otherwise I probably would have gone with fewer than 7 wins. As for Oakland, I started out buying all the horse manure Gruden sold. As the season wore on though, I became less sure that Gruden knew much of anything about coaching an NFL team. I think he lucked into a Super Bowl win.
JB: I was bullish on the Chargers going into the year, but broke an ankle jumping off the bandwagon after the 1-2 start. It turns out that those two losses were against Kansas City and the Rams. Two of the most explosive offensive teams in the league. It was easy to give up on the Chargers since I can't stand the man baby, AKA Fast "Philly" Rivers. Turns out they are probably the most complete team in the AFC, narrowly missing out on the Division Championship by means of losing the tie breaker to KC.
TK: I thought I liked Los Diego more than you, but apparently not. At any rate, I believed in them harder than you. They survived the road Wild Card game, overcoming a dominant defense and another sub-200 yard pass performance from Rivers. It feels wrong to hope they succeed after Spanos screwed San Diego though.
JB: The Broncos had troubles this year. It turns out Case Keenum isn't a franchise QB (duh?). Six wins wasn't enough for Vance Joseph to keep his job. I'm not sure where the team turns next for Head Coach. It sounds like Gary Kubiak might be wanting to return to the NFL, but as an Offensive Coordinator, not Head Coach. Would the Broncos consider bringing him back in that capacity? This seems like a team with some nice pieces. Looking at the roster it seems like they should have a better record than they do.
TK: They do have a nice roster. They dealt with injuries again (Jake Butt), but found out that rolling with four white ends is a legit offensive concept (see: Baltimore - Mark Andrews, Nick Boyle, Hayden Hurst, Maxx Williams). The grouping of Matt LaCosse, Jeff Heuerman, Brian Parker, and Jake Butt (plus bonus Troy Fumagalli) should help the Donkeys succeed next year. Kubiak had a nice season as the OC for Baltimore in 2014, getting them the 8th best scoring offense. That's a Baltimore best under Flacco. Denver brings in the right coach and things could get tricky in the West. I don't even think they'd need a new quarterback under Kubiak.
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