0-2: Surprising NFL Cellar-Dwellers

If I’d have told you that the Indianapolis Colts, Seattle Seahawks, New Orleans Saints, Detroit Lions, Philadelphia Eagles, New York Giants, Houston Texans and Baltimore Ravens would all be 0–2 to start the NFL season you’d tell me that was impossible. Currently those are eight of the nine teams with that dubious record. The ninth is the Chicago Bears, and the one you probably could have guessed going into the season.

The problem is an 0 – 2 start is that very few teams who begin 0-2 make the postseason, and all the teams I just mentioned were at least in the discussion to be in the playoffs this year. The Colts and Seahawks were division winners last year. Detroit and the Ravens were wild card teams. To say these starts are unexpected is putting it more mildly than unflavored low-fat sour cream.  I suppose you could have guessed at the Giants and Saints. They finished with poor records last year and haven’t dramatically improved their teams during the off-season.  The Eagles and Texans only narrowly missed the playoffs in 2014. Surely some of these teams should not be sitting at 0-2.

So, in knowing this who is in the most trouble? In a word it’s the Saints. Coming out of the weakest division in football. You’d think that 0-2 would be easy enough to overcome. However currently there are two teams in the NFC South sporting  2-0 records. The only team at 1-1 (the Tampa Bay Buccaneers) just beat the Saints. Meaning that the Saints are basically two full games back of every other team in the division.

Of course there is still lots of football left to play that many of these teams can come back. But I think what has to be the most troubling aspect of these records for most of the teams is the idea that they’ve lost to at least one team they should have beaten. You can’t feel good about a losing record period. You have to feel even worse about it when you know that it’s a mark you and your team shouldn’t be wearing right now.