The Denver Broncos have made huge strides under head coach Sean Payton and after qualifying for the playoffs last season, many are expecting the team to make a run in 2025. But will that include a division title?
The Kansas City Chiefs have won the AFC West in each of the last nine seasons. Though most feel the Chiefs still have the league’s best quarterback and best head coach, the gap between them and the rest of the division no longer feels miles apart.Ā
Jeffri Chadiha of NFL.com, while making some offseason bold predictions, believes that the Chiefs won’t win a 10th straight division crown and feels that it will be the Broncos, not the Chargers or Raiders, who claim the top spot. Here is what Chadiha had to say:
“The Chiefs have reigned over the division since 2016 and they’ve barely been challenged during most of the years that quarterbackĀ Patrick Mahomes has been under center. Most of that success comes down to the Chiefs’ greatness but they’ve also been helped plenty by the ineptitude of the teams sharing the AFC West with them. Kansas City has been led by futureĀ Hall of Fame coach Andy Reid during that entire run of dominance. Every other team in the division has had at least four different head coaches within that same stretch. That churn appears to have slowed, though, with Pete Carroll (Raiders), Jim Harbaugh (Chargers) and Sean Payton (Broncos) now working in the AFC West. Of those three coaches — all of whom have either reached or won the Super Bowl — Payton is sitting on the most impressive team aside from the Chiefs.
The Broncos have an elite defense, and it looks like they landed a franchise quarterback inĀ Bo Nix in last year’s draft. We know Payton can coach up the offense, especially as the Broncos add more playmakers. We’ve also seen how DenverĀ gave Kansas City fitsĀ last season in Arrowhead, withĀ a blocked field goalĀ keeping them from securing an impressive upset. Denver is good enough to win this division now. With the other teams also creating more resistance to the Chiefs — who went 5-1 in the AFC West after resting their starters inĀ a Week 18 lossĀ to the Broncos — Denver will earn its first crown since Peyton Manning was their quarterback”
This is a huge vote of confidence for the Broncos and the team they are building. Though some don’t see them as true Super Bowl contenders until the 2026 campaign, it’s a far cry from where the franchise was just two years ago.Ā
Chadiha also predicts that the Buffalo Bills will win the Super Bowl this year, so he doesn’t see the Broncos being the best team in the league, but the fact that he has them rising to the top of what is probably the most competitive division in the league can’t be seen as anything but a positive.Ā
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