AFC East is Best Division in Football

[zippo59]

http://www.coldhardfootballfacts.com/Article.php?Page=1203&Category=1

Almost every “pundit,” including the Cold, Hard Football Facts, had pegged the AFC East as the weakest division in football – or at least in the AFC – heading into the 2006 season. Turns out, it's the strongest. The Jets are a surprising 8-6; the Bills have come on strong and now stand at 7-7. The Dolphins are the only team in the division with a losing record (6-8), but have pulled off a number of shockers, including a smackdown of NFC powerhouse Chicago and a humiliating shutout of AFC powerhouse New England, the division leader.

There's only one way to measure divisions relative to each other: Find out who has won the most games out of their division. Here’s a look at how each division measures up in out-of-division play:

Division Record Win % Opposing Divisions*
AFC East 20-14 .588 AFC South, NFC North
AFC South 19-15 .559 AFC East, NFC East
AFC North 20-16 .556 AFC West, NFC South
AFC West 18-16 .529 AFC North, NFC West
NFC East 19-17 .528 AFC South, NFC South
NFC North 17-21 .447 AFC East, NFC West
NFC South 15-21 .417 AFC North, NFC East
NFC West 13-21 .382 AFC West, NFC North

Makes leading the division look even better.

 

[BradyManny]

Good post - it's funny, I was thinking about this the other day. Just look at the standings, our last place team would be competing for a playoff spot in the NFC right now.

 

[smg93]

Good post - it's funny, I was thinking about this the other day. Just look at the standings, our last place team would be competing for a playoff spot in the NFC right now.

If the Dolphins were playing in the NFC I doubt they would be playing for a wild card spot. They'd probably lead a division by now.

 

[mcsully]

http://www.coldhardfootballfacts.com/Article.php?Page=1203&Category=1



Makes leading the division look even better.

I usually say you can make facts work for you any way you want.. but to be honest.. That is a strong argument to go against.. Who would have thought the Jets or Bills would have been this good this early with their new coaches? Not me..

 

[jczxohn1]

As I commented last year-
God save us from the BB-tree AFC East, the division no one wants to play.
Last edited by jczxohn1 : 01-17-2006 at 10:27 PM.

 

[Box_O_Rocks]

As I commented last year-
God save us from the BB-tree AFC East, the division no one wants to play.
Last edited by jczxohn1 : 01-17-2006 at 10:27 PM.

Curse you Red Baron.

 

[RyanTheColtsFan]

No offense to your friends in the East, but nobody is scared of Miami, NYJ, or Buffalo.

 

[BelichickFan]

No offense to your friends in the East, but nobody is scared of Miami, NYJ, or Buffalo.

Based on the stats, maybe they should be ?

 

[ctpatsfan77]

No offense to your friends in the East, but nobody is scared of Miami, NYJ, or Buffalo.

And that's exactly the problem. By the time they do fear them, it'll be too late. ["The Miami Dolphins squeaked into the playoffs in week 17 after winning a game against the Jets. Amazingly, all four AFC East teams ended up with identical W-L records of 13-3. . . ."]

 

[PATRIOTSFANINPA]

No matter what the standings or stats are,IMO the AFC West is the best division in football with the best core overall of teams - There is no way Buffalo,The Jets and New England are better overall than Denver,San Diego and Kansas City - not counting Oakland of course .
If NE was in the West we might be looking at a high pick selection in next years draft...We DO NOT or have not fared well against ANY of those 3 teams,Especially in the Brady era...Imagine what the rest of the east would do as well,no better than this team and likely much worse.

 

[RyanTheColtsFan]

One game difference in terms of the South and East. I think the majority of the teams would rather play the Bills or Dolphins over the Titans and Jags.

 

[BelichickFan]

One game difference in terms of the South and East. I think the majority of the teams would rather play the Bills or Dolphins over the Titans and Jags.

Jaguars maybe. Titans ? Blah. I guess we'll see in the next two weeks

 

[Box_O_Rocks]

No offense to your friends in the East, but nobody is scared of Miami, NYJ, or Buffalo.

You're probably right, we know the mighty AFCS Champion Colts rolled over those lame Jets and Bills with ease, I think it was by a combined 4 points...

 

[TomBrady'sGoat]

One game difference in terms of the South and East. I think the majority of the teams would rather play the Bills or Dolphins over the Titans and Jags.

The fair comparison would be the Bills and Dolphins vs Titans and Texans. I'd rather play the lesser South teams than the lesser East teams.

And that's exactly the point of an exercise like this. Everyone always looks at the top teams. A perfect example is the setiment "not counting Oakland of course." Well yeah, when you change the parameters of course the answer changes. If the question is changed to "which division has the best top 3 teams?" the East makes its way down the list.

I can change the question "which division would you rather play" by adding on "on a neautral field in Wisconsin in December." Suddenly no one wants any part of the East and is laughing at the thought of playing teams from the South.

The lack of a rock-bottom team makes the East a tough division to play against and play in.

The numbers are far from perfect and I do not doubt that going a little deeper you could easily come up with numbers that say the AFC South is indeed the top division because the South had to play the NFC East while the AFC East got to feast on the NFC North. Maybe the AFC East isn't the best division in football, but it is far from the laughingstock it was viewed as entering the season.

 

[smg93]

I should add too that the Bears have only two losses, both of which came at the hands of the AFC East.

 

[PatsDeb]

No offense to your friends in the East, but nobody is scared of Miami, NYJ, or Buffalo.

Well, they may not be scared of them, but they lose to them often enough.

 

[BruschiOnTap]

No matter what the standings or stats are,IMO the AFC West is the best division in football with the best core overall of teams - There is no way Buffalo,The Jets and New England are better overall than Denver,San Diego and Kansas City - not counting Oakland of course .
If NE was in the West we might be looking at a high pick selection in next years draft...We DO NOT or have not fared well against ANY of those 3 teams,Especially in the Brady era...Imagine what the rest of the east would do as well,no better than this team and likely much worse.

No way, I'd take the Jets/Dolphins over any of those teams. I hate saying this but I think the Jets are the best-coached team in football right now and they've shown their killer instinct in games against 'tougher' opponents. The Phins have also got their acts together and I don't think Denver, KC, or Oakland can say the same thing.

Going into the season I would have believed the same as you but the way this season has been panning out, and with those numbers, I'm inclined to agree with the poster of this thread. Besides, any division with Herm Edwards, Art Shell, and Marty Schottenheimer in head coaching positions can't be the best in football...

 

[Bill B.]

No offense to your friends in the East, but nobody is scared of Miami, NYJ, or Buffalo.

With all due respect, the best thing to ever happen to the Colts was getting out of the AFC East. The Colts were usually the basement dwellers in the AFC East when they were there. In re-alignment after 2001, they got put in a division with an expansion team, a weak Jaguars team and the Titans, who were pretty good at the time but has steadily gone down hill since. I doubt that Peyton Manning and the Colt would have had the success they had if they had to play the Patriots, Jets, Dolphins and Bills twice a year.

 

[patfanken]

FYI - Here is the Pats schedule for next year. After the killer schedules in 2003 and 2004, the NFL TRIED to give the Pats a break THIS season, but it is clear from what you see below that the one year break IS OVER !!! The only good news is that the rest of the division is going have to play virtually the same schedule.

Miami 2x
New York J 2x
Buffalo 2x
Baltimore
Cincinnati
Pittsburgh
Cleveland
Indianapolis
San Diego
Dallas
Philadelphia
New York G
Washington

Just a couple of quick comments on the obviouis reasons why the division SHOULD get a lot better this off season

Jets- The jets will be better because their OL will get better, they have 2 very good rookies who WILL improve an already decent OL. They will be in their 2nd year with their defense. We all know that the Pats 3-4 is the most complex defense to learn and install. DRob who was a bust at DT seems to be more impactful as a NT.

Bills - It looks like Losman is finally "getting it". If he plays even decently with MaGahee and Evens the Bills will finally have a decent offense to go with their already very good defense and excellent special teams.

Dolphins - I don't know who will show up, the team that lost to Houston or the one who crushed us a couple of weeks ago. They will shore up the OL and RB slots in FA and the draft. IF they come up with a decent QB next season they could be all of the things people thought they would be this season.

BTW - I also think the Pats will be much improved next season. They will fix the WR situation. They will add size and speed to the secondary and speed and youth to the LB corp between the draft and FA. I think we will have more money under the cap than any team in the division, so I believe we WILL sign at least one Colvin type FA for the defense, most likely 2, AND keep Graham and Samuel

Bottom line This is a hellacious schedule and anything over 10 wins will be a really fine season for anyone in the division. JMHO

 

[tombonneau]

One game difference in terms of the South and East. I think the majority of the teams would rather play the Bills or Dolphins over the Titans and Jags.

A bit disingenous of you to make a choice btwn the #3 & #4 teams in the AFC vs. the #2 & #3 teams in the AFCS.

Shouldn't the choice be:

Jags or Jets
Titans or Bills

I think every team in the league would rather play JAX. Titans are hot so you might have a point with that one.

And I'll forgive you for omitting Houston from the discussion, as I'm every team in the league (with the exception of the Jags) would rather play Houston than Miami.

On a side note, interesting that two top divisions are AFCE & AFCS despite the fact that the divisions play each other this year.