NFL 2024 – Knocking Out The Champ – AFC Teams vs Kansas City Chiefs
Knocking Out The Chiefs
READ MORE: NFL 2024 – Knocking Out The Champs – NFC Teams vs San Francisco 49ers
I thought it would be interesting to compare all the NFL teams against their respective conference champion. So for this exercise, all the AFC teams will have their 2023 stats compared to the Chiefs’ stats. This is not taking into account draft picks or free agent acquistions in the offseason. It is simply looking at how far away, or close, each team is to matching up favorably with the champion of their conference.
AFC Teams vs Kansas City Chiefs
Below all the AFC teams’ stats were compared to the Chiefs’ stats to see how they stack up against the defending AFC Champion. Thus all the color coding is confernce wide. This allows easy comparison between a team and the Chiefs. These are the raw stat values for each stat. Offenses are the top charts and the defenses are the bottom chart.
Where Is Kansas City Vulnerable?
The Chiefs show weakness in special teams with both kickoff and punt return averages in the red. Couple that with poor kickoff return coverage as seen in the defensive area, and they have some special teams things to iron out. With the new kickoff rules we can basically throw the kickoff return stat out becaue we have no idea which teams will excel at the new format.
The only offensive stats in the red are interception % and rushing yards per game(which is very slightly in the red). But if you were going to trust anyone to clean up a few poor decisions or bad throws, it is probably Mahomes. Without stating the obvious, his receivers did him no favors in 2023 which probably led to a few of those interceptions.
On defense it is almost a mirror image of the offense. The defense gave up a bit too much on the ground, both per game and per carry. They also had a very low interception %, a mere 1.44%. They could be a bit better on 3rd down, but there really aren’t too many kinks in the defensive armor.
Who Can Challenge The Chiefs Offensively?
As we can see from the green offensive columns, the main offensive contenders are Baltimore, Buffalo, & Miami, in that order. Baltimore would appear to be more potent than Kansas City on offensive statistically. The Bills are probably right about even with Kansas City, and Miami might be a tick behind the two of them.
At the other end of the spectrum, New England, Tennessee, & Las Vegas all appear ill equipped to match the Chief on offense. You could throw the Jets in there as well, but let’s see them with Rodgers under center and chalk up all the 2023 red to the carousel of incompetence they trotted out at quarterback last year.
Who Can Challenge The Chiefs Defensively?
Again it appears there are three teams that stand out as contenders based on defensive stats; Baltimore, Cleveland, & NY Jets. Buffalo might be just behind the top three so with some tweaking and additions they could gain ground.
Baltimore’s yards/rush is surprisingly low considering how good Jackson is running the ball. The running back situation clearly affected that stat.
Cleveland is absolutely woeful in redzone and goal to go situations. I’m not sure how they can be so good for 80 yards, and be so bad in the last 20, but clearly it needs to be addressed. The Jets could also clean up their rushing, and goal to go, defense. Buffalo has real issues on 3rd down, 4th down, red zone and goal to go situations. This would appear to be a sign that the defense not handling pressure well.
AFC Championship Odds
Here are estimated odds for the AFC Conference Champion.
The chart on the left assumes the 49ers make the AFC Championship game. In this chart % champ means appearance in the AFC Championship game.
The chart on the right are odds for all AFC teams and % champ means exactly that, chance of winning the AFC Championship.
Teams in green had a significant QB injury in 2023 that impacted their ratings.
AFC Contenders vs Each Other
In this second AFC team comparison chart there are a few changes. The first is that while Kansas City’s raw stats still appear, all the other stats show the difference between the Chiefs’ stats and the respective teams’ stats. So this chart is showing how much above/below, or better/worse, a teams’ stats are compared to the Chiefs.
The second major difference is that in the chart below, the conditional color coding DOES NOT include the Chiefs. Thus this is attempting to show how the contenders match up against each other, or who is the most likely threats to the Chiefs.
Which Team Is The #1 Contender For The Chief’s Crown?
Whether we look at the chart with the Chiefs included or the one with them excluded, it is pretty clear that Baltimore is the clear #1 contender in the AFC based on statistics. If they simply play like they did in 2023, they would be favored to reach the AFC championship over anyone but the Chiefs.
After that, the Bills are probably the strongest contender statistically. However they need to fix that situational defense in order to win close games, get a high seed, and make other teams come to Buffalo in January.
The #3 position is probably a fight between Cleveland, Miami, & NY Jets, assuming Rodgers is 90% of what he was. Both the Browns and Jets have defenses that can not only keep a team in the game, but basically win a game with little help from an offense. Miami has an explosive offense and a semi suspect defense when looking at the stats. If they can make strides over the summer to bring the defense up another level, it could be a real dogfight in the AFC East.
The elephant in the corner of the room are the Bengals. If Burrow is healthy, and his injuries are not the kind that linger or sapped him, then Cincinnati should be back to a 10-11 win team.
If you want to pick a real sleeper, how about the Patriots? Their defense should keep them in games If Maye is the real deal, and they can find a few NFL caliber receivers hanging out at the local bus stop, they may be a team that can make life difficult for other AFC teams. The issue is the division they play in. On paper they simply are not as good as any of the other 3 teams in their division and they have to play them each twice.
