Our NFL preseason predictions got a couple things right and many things wrong

The 2025-26 NFL season has been one of the least-predictable of the modern era. Seemingly every week there was a new upset, a stunning result, or something that turned everything about the season on its head. Now the the playoffs are upon us there’s no better time to go back and look at some of our preseason predictions to give ourselves a pat on the back for the calls we got right, and relentlessly mock the things we got horrible wrong.

If anything, this will be a lesson in trying to make predictions about football before the season begins.

“The Raiders will be surprisingly good” — WRONG

Okay, we drank the Kool Aid too much on this one, sue us. On paper it really seemed like the Raiders were poised to have a breakout year. We loved the team adding Geno Smith, thought Pete Carroll was the right guy, and believed Ashton Jeanty had rookie of the year potential. Add all that to a 4-13 team that had solid talent in Maxx Crosby, and Brock Bowers — well, it had it all feeling like this was going to be a surprise team in 2025.

Nope. They’re picking No. 1.

“Christian McCaffrey will win Comeback Player of the Year” — RIGHT

We don’t really deserve a big pat on the back here. McCaffrey is the runaway favorite to win the award this year after the 49ers made the playoffs. This could have been a closer race with Aidan Hutchinson if the Lions performed as well.

“The Ravens will have the NFL’s best defense” — WRONG

In 2024 Baltimore had the No. 1 ranked defense in yards allowed, and were 3rd in points allowed. It wasn’t that much of a stretch to imagine that they could find a way to get even better and become the best in the league without anyone else being close.

Instead we watched as the Ravens went through one of the most stunning drops in recent memory. Nothing worked without Mike Macdonald, who turned the Seahawks defense into one of the best units in the NFL. Meanwhile the Ravens are left to lick their wounds

“Everyone in the NFC South will finish below .500” — RIGHT

The NFC is a mess at the best of times, but turns out they’re also a mess in normal times too. The Panthers, Buccaneers, and Falcons all finished the season 8-9, with Carolina prevailing by default. We were still right about all these teams being bad.

“Lamar Jackson will win MVP” — WRONG

Injury played a major part in this, but so did a down year from Jackson overall. Overall we just expected a lot more out of the Ravens than they gave us in 2025, which is par for the course for Baltimore who have become one of the league’s perennial underachievers.

At this point it’s just a cruel joke. Jackson will never have more than one weapon in a season. For years it was Mark Andrews, now he’s fallen off and all they have is Zay Flowers.

“Ja’Marr Chase will have a big year” — RIGHT

It’s a testament to how good Ja’Marr Chase is that he still had over 1,400 receiving yards this season even though Joe Burrow missed over half the season. Chase kept big performances rolling with Joe Flacco and Jake Browning under center, but we have to admit this was a bit of a letdown. When we were really thinking “big year” it was under the idea this might have been close to a 2,000 yard season.

So yes, we were right that the season was “big,” but not quite as dramatic as we had hoped it might be.

“Travis Hunter will win a Rookie of the Year award” — WRONG

The Jaguars had a brilliant season, but we all gave them a pass on how they set Travis Hunter up for failure in 2025. Instead of putting him in a role where he could be a third receiver and Nickel corner, instead they tried to put him outside at receiver, and spell him at outside corner. It clearly overloaded Hunter, who suffered as a result.

Time will tell whether or not Hunter was worth his draft spot, or if Jacksonville will regret trading up for him — but they definitely didn’t help his adjustment to the NFL before the injury. We thought this could have been a much bigger season for him, and it’s a shame we never got to see much pop from the former Heisman winner.

“The Chiefs will be Super Bowl contenders again” — WRONG

We’d been faked out by Kansas City before thinking they were done only for them to run through the league, but everything went wrong for Patrick Mahomes and Co. in 2025. All those close wins from a year ago became losses, and it led to the Chiefs becoming the third ranked team in the AFC West this year.

Will they bounce back? Sure, because it’s Kansas City — but for the first time in a while we’re seeing a team that needs to make significant changes in order to get back on track.