NFL preseason Power Rankings: How all 32 teams stack up, plus who’s under the most pressure

Schneider built the roster that won Super Bowl LX and now has to keep it. Jaxon Smith-Njigba and Devon Witherspoon are both extension-eligible, and both project to reset the market at their positions. Seattle returns most of a front seven Mike Macdonald has now had two full offseasons to teach. The Seahawks were first on a clear majority of ballots here. The panel was voting on the players, not on the cap sheet underneath them. Schneider has spent Jody Allen’s money before. He has not had to spend this much of it inside one calendar year.

Stafford is 38, and Los Angeles spent the offseason building like this is the last of it. The Rams sent a 2027 first-round pick, a 2028 second and a 2029 third to Cleveland in June for Myles Garrett, the reigning Defensive Player of the Year, who turns 31 in December. Puka Nacua and Davante Adams are both back. Sean McVay has the deepest roster of his tenure and a quarterback who has to hold up for 17 games and then January for any of that to mean anything.

New England reached Super Bowl LX and lost it, and the roster that got there is largely intact. Maye is entering his third season. The Patriots’ 2025 draft produced 11 selections plus four undrafted rookies who all made the roster, and they will not be picking in that neighborhood again in any round. Mike Vrabel’s defense was last season’s surprise. The offense was the quarterback, and most of the margin New England won on came from him. No. 3 here is a bet that he does it a second time.

Thirteen wins, and the offense finished 20th in scoring. Denver’s defense has been a top-three unit for two seasons, with Patrick Surtain II winning Defensive Player of the Year in 2024, and it is the reason this team is ranked fourth rather than 12th. Nix is in his third year and his second full offseason with Sean Payton, who is 62. The Broncos have not had a quarterback throw for 4,000 yards since Peyton Manning in 2014. Nix is the one variable Denver has not solved.

Ben Johnson’s first season in Chicago produced 12 wins, the franchise’s most since 2018. Williams was sacked 68 times as a rookie in 2024 and the offense was rebuilt around not letting that happen again, which worked. The Bears now have to do it a second time inside a division that won 41 games last season and returns three playoff teams. Williams is 24 and has thrown to the same top three receivers for two years. Chicago has not won a playoff game since the 2010 season.

This is Ballard’s 10th season running the Colts and the first that follows a 12-win year. Indianapolis has changed starting quarterbacks in five of the past six seasons, and the group he assembled around the position -- Jonathan Taylor, Quenton Nelson, a front seven drafted and re-drafted -- is old enough now that it should be finished. Ballard has never taken the Colts past the divisional round. Twelve wins raised the standard rather than settling the argument, and his contract runs into it.

Two years after Super Bowl LIX, the Eagles are a very good team with an unsettled offense. Saquon Barkley ran for 2,005 yards in 2024 and has not been close to it since. Jalen Hurts has four years left on his deal. Philadelphia is on its fourth offensive coordinator in five seasons. That number follows a head coach around whether or not it belongs to him. Sirianni has won a title and been to another. In this city that buys about a month.

The Packers gave up two first-round picks and Kenny Clark for Micah Parsons in August 2025. That is what a team does when it believes the roster is finished and the schedule is the only thing left. Green Bay won 11 games. LaFleur has two NFC Championship Game appearances, both losses, and none since the 2020 season. Jordan Love is signed through 2028 at $55 million a year. Green Bay has not played in a conference championship game with Love.

Buffalo’s run of five straight AFC East titles ended last season, and it ended against a team the Bills see twice a year now. McDermott begins a 10th season with one AFC Championship Game appearance, from 2020. Josh Allen won MVP in 2024 and his deal runs to 2030. The Bills move into the new Highmark Stadium this year. They won 11 games last season and did not play a home playoff game.

Five consecutive NFC South titles, and no conference championship game since the 2020 season. Bowles is 37-31 in Tampa Bay, which is a better record than the job has been credited with, and the division has never been the difficulty. Baker Mayfield threw for more than 4,000 yards in 2023 and again in 2024. The defense Bowles built himself has carried more of this than the record shows. Bowles is under contract through next season. Tampa Bay is not rebuilding.

Stroud was sacked 52 times in 2024 and Houston has spent two drafts and two free agencies making sure that number never appears again. It worked. The Texans have won the AFC South three years running and lost in the divisional round twice. Nico Collins is signed long term and the defense has been top five in points allowed for two seasons. Stroud’s second and third years have not looked like his first, and the panel put Houston 11th while it waits on the fourth.

Kansas City finished 8-9, its first losing season since 2012, and spent the spring watching Patrick Mahomes rehab a left knee. Veach has to rebuild the support around him for the second time in five years, and this time without the benefit of picking late because the roster was good. The Chiefs have not had a 1,000-yard receiver since Tyreek Hill in 2021. Andy Reid is 68 and signed through 2029. The coaching has not been the variable in Kansas City for a decade.

Saleh’s return produced a 10-7 season and a defense that finished in the middle of the league, which is not what San Francisco brought him back for. The 49ers used six of their 11 picks in the 2025 draft on defense and most of those players are now expected to start, so the excuse of youth expires this year. Brock Purdy is on a $265 million extension. Kyle Shanahan has been to two Super Bowls and lost both. The offense is not the problem in San Francisco.

Campbell replaced both coordinators after the 2024 season and the Lions went from 15 wins to 10. That is the sequence, and it is the one Campbell has been asked about since January. Jared Goff is 32 and signed through 2028. Amon-Ra St. Brown and Penei Sewell are both on top-of-market deals. This is a team built to be finished rather than one being assembled. Detroit has three postseason wins in Campbell’s five seasons, all of them in one January.

The question the Chargers have not answered is what they are in January. Harbaugh is 21-13 across two regular seasons in Los Angeles and has lost the only playoff game he has coached here. Justin Herbert is signed through 2029 at $52.5 million a year. The Chargers rebuilt the offensive line in consecutive drafts, starting with Joe Alt fifth overall in 2024, and the run game followed. None of that has produced a postseason result the franchise can point at.

Gladstone traded up to No. 2 in his first draft and took Travis Hunter, then watched Jacksonville win 10 games in Liam Coen’s first year. Trevor Lawrence’s extension runs through 2030 and is worth $275 million. The Jaguars have not put together consecutive winning seasons since 2004 and 2005, which is the specific thing a second-year general manager gets measured on here. Jacksonville opens at home against Cleveland on Sept. 13.

Nineteen seasons is a long time to coach one team, and Harbaugh has spent the past several of them explaining Januarys. Baltimore started 1-5 last season and finished 10-7, which is a good coaching job and also a season the Ravens should not have needed to rescue. Lamar Jackson has two MVP awards and one AFC Championship Game appearance. Derrick Henry turns 33 in January. Baltimore has won at least 10 games in five of the past six seasons and has one Super Bowl appearance in the last 13.

Pittsburgh has not won a playoff game since the 2016 season. Khan gave T.J. Watt three years and $123 million last summer to keep the defense’s best player, and the defense is the reason this team sits 18th instead of 25th. Mike Tomlin has not finished a year under .500 in 19 of them, a streak that has come to function as its own argument. Khan has spent draft capital on veterans in consecutive offseasons. Watt turns 32 in October.

Schottenheimer inherited a 7-10 team, had its best defensive player traded out from under him in August and finished 9-8. That is the least discussed coaching job of last season. Dak Prescott is 33 and makes $60 million a year through 2028. CeeDee Lamb is under contract into the next decade. Dallas has not reached a conference championship game since the 1995 season. A second-year head coach here gets asked about that weekly.

McCarthy started 17 games last season, his first as a professional, and Minnesota went 8-9. He was the 10th pick in 2024 and did not play as a rookie. Kevin O’Connell has won 13 games in a season with Kirk Cousins and 14 with Sam Darnold, so the offense is not waiting on a system. Justin Jefferson is 27 and in the third year of a $140 million contract. McCarthy’s rookie contract runs through 2027.

Carolina’s 8-9 finish was the franchise’s best since 2017 and Young was responsible for more of it than the people who watched him get benched in 2024 expected. He was the first pick in 2023. Tetairoa McMillan went eighth in 2025 and gave the offense a target it had lacked since D.J. Moore left. Dave Canales is 3-for-3 at making quarterbacks better and 0-for-3 at winning seasons. Young is 24, and this is the fourth year.

Gannon is 18-33 in three seasons and Arizona has not finished above .500 in any of them. Kyler Murray turned 29 this month with three years left on his contract. Marvin Harrison Jr. was the fourth pick in 2024 and the offense has not yet been built to make that obvious. This is the fourth year of the rebuild Gannon and general manager Monti Ossenfort started together, and fourth years are where those two names stop being spoken as one.

The Bengals paid the offense and did not pay the defense, and the bill arrives in the same place every autumn. Ja’Marr Chase signed for $161 million in 2025 and Tee Higgins for $115 million the same spring. Joe Burrow is on $275 million. Cincinnati has missed the playoffs three years running. Taylor is entering his eighth season, took this franchise to a Super Bowl and has now presided over the longest stretch of Januarys without football since Burrow arrived.

Washington traded for Laremy Tunsil and Deebo Samuel in the same offseason and then won six games. Peters is in his third year, and the team he assembled around Jayden Daniels -- the 2024 Offensive Rookie of the Year, on a team that reached the NFC Championship Game that season -- did not hold up for a second one. The Commanders have had one winning season in nine years. Whether 2024 or 2025 was the outlier is the argument Peters has to settle with players he has already acquired.

Atlanta spent two first-round picks on edge rushers in the 2025 draft, taking Jalon Walker 15th and trading back into the round for James Pearce Jr. at 26. The Falcons went 6-11 anyway. Michael Penix Jr. was the eighth pick in 2024 and has now had a full season as the starter. Morris is in his third year. Atlanta’s last winning season was 2017, and the defense Morris was hired to fix has finished in the bottom 10 in points allowed in each of the past four years.

Miami is carrying $182.29 million in dead money this season. That is 60.5% of the salary cap and the highest share any team has ever carried, and it is the frame around everything else here. The Dolphins released Tua Tagovailoa in March and took on $99.2 million across two years to do it. Waddle signed for $84.75 million in 2024, is under contract through 2028 and has not had a 1,000-yard season since 2023. Waddle is the most expensive skill player Miami has left.

Dart took the job during his rookie season and the Giants won four games. New York traded back into the first round to take him 25th in 2025, the same night it took Abdul Carter third overall, so the two most important players on this roster arrived together and are graded together. Malik Nabers had 1,204 yards as a rookie. The Giants have not won a division title since 2011. Everything on this team is early, and none of the people running it are.

Four wins in Moore’s first season, most of them with a rookie quarterback taken 40th overall. Tyler Shough is 26, which is old for a second-year player and young for what New Orleans is asking him to be. Moore called the offense in a Super Bowl win in Philadelphia 18 months ago and has not had a functional one since arriving. The Saints have restructured their way through the cap in every year since 2020. They have not been to the playoffs since the 2020 season.

Glenn’s first season produced three wins, and the Jets traded Sauce Gardner and Quinnen Williams in the middle of it. Those were the two best players on the team and the return was draft capital. A front office makes that decision and a head coach lives inside it. Justin Fields is on a two-year, $40 million contract that ends after this season. New York has not been to the playoffs since 2010, the longest active drought in the four major North American leagues. Glenn is 3-14 as a head coach.

Carroll turns 75 in September. The Raiders won three games in his first season, and Las Vegas has had one winning year since 2016. Ashton Jeanty was the sixth pick in 2025 and remains the one settled piece of the offense. Geno Smith is 36 and under contract through 2027. Carroll took the job at 73. Las Vegas needed about five years of work then and needs most of it still.

Ward was the first pick of the 2025 draft and the Titans won two games around him. Tennessee has finished last in the AFC South in each of the past two seasons and has used a top-10 selection in three consecutive drafts. That accumulation is the only reason a 2-15 team is ranked ahead of anybody. The Titans scored fewer points than any team in the league last season. Ward is 24 and the second season is the one that usually starts producing answers.