NFL’s 2023–24 Winners and Losers: Chiefs’ Dynasty Arrives As Cowboys, Jets Remain Punchlines

Kansas City has won the title again, but the Chiefs aren’t the only big winners of the season. On the flip side, several teams are stuck in neutral—or took big steps backward.

Author:
Gilberto Manzano
Publish date:
Feb 14, 2024

In this story:

The Kansas City Chiefs have become the league’s latest NFL dynasty—and that might not sit well with some.

To those who are bothered by that statement, they’re probably fans of one of the three other teams in the AFC West, or simply might have extremely high expectations. Nothing wrong with high expectations, because the San Francisco 49ers might view their 2023 season as a failure, despite making the Super Bowl in Las Vegas.

49ers coach Kyle Shanahan is still ringless, and the organization hasn’t won a Super Bowl in nearly three decades. The prestigious franchise will need to make tweaks for another Super Bowl-or-bust season in 2024.

As for the Chiefs, they have advanced to six consecutive AFC title games and have played in four Super Bowls since Patrick Mahomes became the starter in 2018. Talks of him being as good as Tom Brady or even Joe Montana might be a bit premature, but he’s on the right track to surpass both legendary quarterbacks. That alone says plenty. So yes, the Chiefs are a dynasty.

Kansas City won big during the 2023–24 season, but a few other teams did plenty of winning as well. Here are our winners and losers from this past season.

Winners

Chiefs

As punter Tommy Townsend told me after the Super Bowl, there’s no more debate about whether the Chiefs are a dynasty. Brady and Bill Belichick’s New England Patriots, the Dallas Cowboys of the 1990s, the 49ers of the ’80s, the Pittsburgh Steelers of the ’70s. And now the Chiefs from 2019 to now.

Of course, there are other teams to be considered for dynasties, but I think most would agree the groups mentioned above are clear-cut dynasties. Specifically for the Chiefs, they achieved one of the hardest feats in the sport by winning back-to-back titles. Four Super Bowl appearances with three rings during a five-year span is truly remarkable.

Lions

We can now safely call the Detroit Lions a winning organization, possibly for the first time since Barry Sanders’s Lions in the ’90s.

And I probably wouldn’t strongly disagree if this take is premature because Matthew Stafford’s Lions made the postseason three times, but never in back-to-back seasons. Dan Campbell’s Lions will need to make it back to the playoffs in 2024 to prove the dwindling numbers of skeptics wrong.

But to win two postseason games this past season, and based on the team’s positive track record since the Lions hired Campbell and general manager Brad Holmes in 2021, I have no issue calling them a winning organization.

Texans

Outside of winning the Super Bowl, the biggest accomplishment an organization can achieve is landing and developing a superstar quarterback. That’s what Houston has in C.J. Stroud, who delivered one of the best rookie seasons ever for a quarterback.

The Offensive Rookie of the Year guided the Houston Texans to the AFC South title and the divisional round of the playoffs. This followed three awful seasons in which the Texans won a combined 11 games. With coach DeMeco Ryans and Stroud, the Texans won 11 games in 2023, including the playoff game vs. the Cleveland Browns.

Rams

Sticking with the theme of surprising 2023 squads, coach Sean McVay did a sensational job getting a roster filled with rookies and newcomers to mesh together for an impressive midseason turn around.

The Los Angeles Rams still have Stafford, Aaron Donald and Cooper Kupp, but a dominant rookie class that featured wide receiver Puka Nacua was instrumental in helping Los Angeles return to the playoffs. They might need to make upgrades defensively, but they’ll likely be in the mix again because of McVay and a new crop of star players.

Bears

I’m sure many will laugh at this one, but the Chicago Bears won big by trading their 2023 No. 1 pick to the Carolina Panthers and landing a boatload of picks and stud wide receiver DJ Moore.

And, yes, the Bears could have drafted Stroud, but that mega trade allowed Chicago to gain this year’s No. 1 pick to possibly select Caleb Williams, who’s regarded by many as the best prospect in years and would have been the clear-cut top pick in last year’s draft had he been eligible to enter.

For the Justin Fields supporters, the Bears would gain more valuable draft picks if they decide to trade out of the No. 1 spot again. It’s good to have these types of options. It’s on general manager Ryan Poles to make the right decision for the Bears to finally start winning games.

Colts

The Indianapolis Colts will be a trendy playoff pick in 2024 because of what the team did this past season. The Colts fell one game short of making the playoffs, but they have a star-in-the-making coach in Shane Steichen and the future appears bright for quarterback Anthony Richardson based on what he showed before his rookie season was cut short due to injury. Some franchises go years without game-changing coaches and quarterbacks. Indianapolis appears to have both.

Packers

The Green Bay Packers aren’t one of those organizations that goes years without a star quarterback. Jordan Love had a special first season as the starter, following in the footsteps of Aaron Rodgers and Brett Favre.

Love will need to cut down his turnovers in crunch time, but he has the skill set to be a stud quarterback for many years to come. What makes Green Bay more intriguing is the abundance of promising skill players to help Love. Also plenty of credit to coach Matt LaFleur, who proved he could win without Rodgers.

Browns

I nearly left the Browns off the winner’s section because of their uncertainty with quarterback Deshaun Watson. But Cleveland did plenty right this season under Kevin Stefanski, the NFL Coach of the Year. With Watson sidelined, Stefanski altered his offensive scheme multiple times to keep the team in the postseason mix. The Browns took off once they turned to Joe Flacco as the starting quarterback.

It will be interesting to see if the Browns go back to Watson, who has struggled since arriving in Cleveland. They might not have the option of benching him or letting him go because of the fully guaranteed $230 million contract they gave him a few years back. But at least Cleveland has a quality coach and a dominant defense led by Defensive Player of the Year Myles Garrett.

Losers

49ers

Yes, the 49ers clinched the No. 1 seed in the NFC and advanced to the Super Bowl. That’s a lot of winning. But it’s always been Super Bowl or bust for the star-studded 49ers. Anything less than that was going to be viewed as a failure. Now this group might lose a few key pieces because of the lack of cap space, and they need to pay wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk, as the 2020 first-round pick is due for a contract extension.

The 49ers had the best defensive front on paper, but that group disappointed for their lofty standards, especially the defensive line. San Francisco has something good, maybe great, with quarterback Brock Purdy, who guided the team to two come-from-behind postseason victories. But the team with Mahomes won the Super Bowl. Perhaps Shanahan and general manager John Lynch will look to add a star signal-caller in 2024.

Cowboys

The Cowboys are somewhat like the Chiefs when it comes to ignoring what they do in the regular season, but for opposite reasons. Here’s a reminder to myself if the Cowboys win another 10-plus games and capture the NFC East title next season: Don’t forget to yawn and shrug.

I find myself wondering whether owner Jerry Jones cares more about making money than winning. That’s a serious question, because Jones has been very patient with most of his head coaches since the turn of the century. None of them have gotten past the divisional round. The Cowboys and the Washington Commanders are the only two NFC teams to not have played in an NFC title game since 1996. That’s how mediocre Dallas has been, and Jones decided to run it back with practically the same group for 2024. Jones needs to put pressure on coach Mike McCarthy and quarterback Dak Prescott to deliver in the postseason.

Bills

The Buffalo Bills are similar to Dallas when it comes to postseason failures in recent memory. The Bills have at least advanced to a conference championship game when they lost to the Chiefs during the 2020 season. But Josh Allen & Co. have run out of excuses for why they haven’t been able to advance to a Super Bowl since the team traded for Stefon Diggs before the ’20 season.

The Bills finally got the Chiefs at their house for a playoff game and they still fell short. The window with Allen throwing to Diggs might be closed because the star wideout’s play diminished this past season and the team needs to find ways to get under the salary cap limit. It wouldn’t be surprising to see Diggs traded in the offseason. If the Bills decide to tweak their offensive scheme, they better make sure Allen is fully committed because he tends to go away from the productive, savvy plays during crunch time. For example: the final quarter against the Chiefs in the divisional round.

Ravens

This might sound harsh, but it’s a testament to the high bar Lamar Jackson has set for himself as a two-time MVP. Like Josh Allen, Jackson needs to be better in the postseason to be regarded as an elite quarterback.

The Baltimore Ravens and Bills are like the New York Knicks and Indiana Pacers of the 1990s, two teams that couldn’t get past Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls in the playoffs. Mahomes, obviously, is Jordan, and the Chiefs’ elite QB continues to haunt the rest of the AFC.

Baltimore knows how to get to the postseason regularly, but Jackson will eventually need to find a way to beat the Chiefs because they’re not going anywhere anytime soon. And it’s not all on Jackson. His best wide receiver was a rookie (Zay Flowers) in 2023 and his running back crew consisted of Gus Edwards and Justice Hill. They need upgrades at the skill positions.

Bengals

Joe Burrow has beaten Mahomes in a postseason game. Only two quarterbacks can say that (Brady is the other).

The Cincinnati Bengals are the Chiefs’ biggest rivals because they know they can hang with them. But they were nowhere to be found when the postseason arrived last month. Burrow sustained a season-ending wrist injury in November. Who knows whether Cincinnati would have made another postseason run had Burrow stayed healthy, but they had many issues before Burrow went down.

Cincinnati’s offense was stagnant for the first month of the season due to Burrow’s lingering calf injury, and the defense had a down season. It was a good sign, however, that Zac Taylor’s crew made a late playoff push with backup Jake Browning. The Bengals are well-coached, but they need Burrow healthy from July to February. Also, they need to find a way to re-sign wide receiver Tee Higgins.

Jets

The New York Jets had the most hype throughout the offseason, but their season essentially only lasted four plays before Rodgers tore his Achilles tendon in the season opener against the Bills.

New York made the mistake of not having an ideal backup plan in case their 40-year-old quarterback suffered a season-ending injury. That was evident with how poorly the team adjusted when Zach Wilson, the 2021 No. 2 pick, took over as the starter. People in that building knew Wilson wasn’t up to the task, yet they decided not to add a quality backup because of how highly they drafted Wilson. The Jets better have a solid Plan B and C in case Rodgers sustains another injury in his age-41 season.

Patriots

New England didn’t land a top-two draft pick, making its miserable season worse. Williams and Drake Maye are viewed as future star quarterbacks and will likely be drafted by the Bears and Commanders, respectively.

The Patriots, slotted at No. 3, will need to decide between the third-best quarterback, taking the best available player or trading down. And they will need to make this decision without Belichick, who’s gone after 24 seasons in New England. All eyes will be on rookie coach Jerod Mayo during the first season of the post-Belichick era.

Panthers

Without a doubt, the Panthers were the worst team in 2023. They also don’t have a first-round pick—that belongs to the Bears—and their quarterback, Bryce Young, is coming off a rough rookie season.

The Panthers are in rough shape and could be years away from entering the postseason mix. But they might have something with new coach Dave Canales, who helped Baker Mayfield and Geno Smith review their careers in Tampa Bay and Seattle, respectively. There’s hope for Young in Carolina because of Canales’s arrival.