7 NFL Teams on the Brink of Collapse as Midseason Approaches

Week 8 of the 2022 NFL season has already begun. For Super Bowl hopefuls like the Philadelphia Eagles, Kansas City Chiefs and New York Giants (yes, really), the march toward the playoffs continues. For rebuilding franchises like the Detroit Lions and Houston Texans, it's already time to play for next year.

In between these two ends of the spectrum is a swatch of teams good enough to chase the playoffs but very close to letting the season slip away.

Below, you'll find a look at seven teams on the brink of collapse as midseason draws near. We'll examine what's gone wrong for these disappointing squads, what needs to change and why collapse may be imminent.

Teams are listed in alphabetical order.

We'll kick things off with a team most probably didn't expect to make the playoffs in 2022. The Cleveland Browns finished last season with an 8-9 record and will play the bulk of this year without new quarterback Deshaun Watson—who is serving an 11-game suspension for violation of the personal conduct policy after more than two dozen women accused him of sexual assault or misconduct.

Still, the Browns are a team loaded with talent. From Nick Chubb and Amari Cooper to Myles Garrett, Jadeveon Clowney and Denzel Ward, the Cleveland roster is littered with former first-round picks and Pro Bowlers. However, the Browns sit at 2-5 because they've struggled to operate as a complete team.

Cleveland has experienced exactly one blowout loss this season—to the New England Patriots—while losing its other four games by a combined nine points.

"I think you guys understand how frustrating it is when you try to win in this league, you come close and you don’t get it done, that is really frustrating," head coach Kevin Stefanski recently told reporters.

Of course, Stefanski has to bear much of the blame here. The Browns have regularly failed to execute on offense, have experienced multiple blown plays on defense and have averaged more than six penalties per game.

The Browns are undisciplined and incapable of making the plays necessary to win close games. That's a coaching problem.

Hypothetically, Cleveland could go on a late run once Watson returns. However, that's not guaranteed, considering Watson hasn't played in two years. Regardless, the Browns probably aren't making the playoffs if they're 3-8 or 4-7 upon Watson's return.

If Cleveland falls to the Cincinnati Bengals on Monday night, they'll be 2-6 and looking at another lost season.

The Denver Broncos are a team that many expected to be playoff-relevant in 2022. Denver had the league's third-ranked scoring defense last season. It has an offense loaded with weapons like Javonte Williams, Jerry Jeudy, Courtland Sutton, and oh yeah, it added quarterback Russell Wilson in the offseason.

Unfortunately, Wilson hasn't made the Broncos a Super Bowl contender. Instead, his play has been shockingly bad. The nine-time Pro Bowler has completed just 58.6 percent of his passes, tossed a mere five touchdowns and posted a miserable 83.4 quarterback rating.

That's not much better than the Browns are getting out of placeholder Jacoby Brissett (82.3 rating).

While Wilson—who missed Week 7 with a hamstring injury—has been Denver's biggest problem, he's not its only one. Williams is out for the year with a torn ACL, and rookie head coach Nathaniel Hackett appears to be in well over his head.

Hackett has mismanaged game situations repeatedly and can't get his offense (32nd in scoring) with any semblance of a rhythm. Yet, the Broncos are still backing their coach.

"I believe in Nathaniel. I support Nathaniel 100 percent," general manager George Paton told Troy Renck of Denver7. “He’s been in this seven games as a head coach. The scrutiny he’s faced is unprecedented."

It will be interesting to see just how much support Hackett has if the 2-5 Broncos fall to the Jacksonville Jaguars in London on Sunday. The 5-2 Chiefs and 4-3 Los Angeles Chargers are quickly separating themselves from the rest of the AFC West, while Denver is bringing up the rear.

Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers hasn't been as bad as Wilson, but he hasn't looked like the same quarterback who won back-to-back MVP awards over the last two seasons.

Rodgers has posted a solid 94.9 passer rating but hasn't been carving up defenses as he has done in recent years. The Green Bay offense is averaging just 5.8 yards per pass play and just over 18 points per game.

The defense, meanwhile, has been putrid against the run, allowing an average of 4.8 yards per carry.

According to Rodgers, Green Bay's struggles are the result of players not going their jobs.

"It's definitely not just one play here or there," Rodgers told the Pat McAfee Show (h/t Michael David Smith of ProFootballTalk). "It's 20 percent of the time. If we have 50 plays and we have 10 missed assignments or mental errors, that’s 20 percent of the time. So that’s way too high."

Rodgers is visibly frustrated at 3-4, and his frustration will only continue to mount if things don't change quickly. The decision to trade Davante Adams in the offseason has had a massive negative impact on the offense, and the defense just hasn't been good enough to compensate.

Green Bay has to find a way to spark the offense—perhaps by trading for a receiver before Tuesday's deadline—and get Rodgers back to MVP form. Otherwise, the 5-1 Minnesota Vikings may run away with the NFC North.

Here's the good news for the Las Vegas Raiders. They've won two of their last three games and have a winnable matchup against the injury-riddled New Orleans Saints in Week 8. The Raiders are also coming off their best game of the season, a 38-20 romp over the Texans.

"We talked about some things over the bye week and we saw some fruit of our labor," head coach Josh McDaniels said, per The Athletic's Vic Tafur. "We talked about trying to improve offensively and defensively in the red zone, we took care of the football … and then scoring on defense can really go a long way."

Now, here's the bad news. Las Vegas is sitting at 2-4 and, like Denver, is in serious danger of falling out of the AFC West chase.

The Raiders got into an 0-3 hole because of offensive mistakes—Derek Carr tossed four interceptions in his first three games—and flat-out bad defense. While Carr has been better since, and Las Vegas has found a spark in running back Josh Jacobs, the defense is still pretty bad.

Las Vegas ranks 24th in total defense and 26th in points allowed. Their "prize" free-agent acquisition, Chandler Jones, has done little to spark a pass rush that has notched a mere nine sacks.

Jones and Adams were supposed to transform Las Vegas from a wild-card team into a legitimate title contender. That hasn't happened. The Raiders have only beaten the Broncos and the Texans, and if they can't come out of a favorable stretch—at New Orleans, at the Jacksonville Jaguars, against the Indianapolis Colts and at Denver—with a winning record, they may miss the playoffs entirely.

Super Bowl hangovers are real, but the Los Angeles Rams cannot blame their status as defending champions for a disappointing 3-3 start to the season.

Los Angeles' offense is a shell of what it was last year. The Rams cannot find a reliable complement to Cooper Kupp at receiver, Matthew Stafford (8 INTs, 84.6 rating) has been just plain bad, and there's nothing resembling a strong ground game in L.A.

The Rams rank last in rushing yards and 31st in yards per carry.

The defense, which ranks 16th in points allowed, hasn't been good enough to carry the Rams either. Oh, and L.A. missed out on its chase for former Carolina Panthers running back Christian McCaffrey. Instead, the Rams watched as McCaffrey went to the rival San Francisco 49ers.

"As a competitor, you say, ‘Hey, they got him.’ We've gotta be able to move forward accordingly and it just so happens that they're on the schedule this week," head coach Sean McVay told reporters.

A second loss to San Francisco will drop the Rams to 3-4 and potentially, to the bottom of the NFC West standings. Now, this is a very winnable division—the 49ers and Arizona Cardinals are 3-4, while the Seattle Seahawks lead at 4-3—but .500 is not where the Rams envisioned themselves while holding the Lombardi Trophy back in February.

The Rams need more help on offense, and if Tuesday's trade deadline comes and goes without it, they could be staring down a very disappointing follow-up to last year's Super Bowl success.

The Patriots were a playoff team in 2021, and at 3-4, they can still make a push to the postseason this year. However, New England has a serious quarterback problem that could cause the season to spiral in a hurry.

2021 first-round pick Mac Jones has missed time with an ankle injury, and he hasn't been particularly good when healthy. He was replaced by rookie Bailey Zappe during Monday's blowout loss to the Chicago Bears—Zappe also filled in during Jones' absence—and has been a hindrance more than a help.

Jones has tossed six interceptions in four games while posting a dismal 70.8 passer rating. The Patriots offense has committed 15 turnovers in seven outings.

More alarming, perhaps, is the fact that Jones' relationship with the Patriots appears strained.

"I think things did get a little sideways, really over the last couple of months," Sports Illustrated's Albert Breer said during NBC Sports Boston's Week 6 pregame coverage *h/t Dakota Randall of NESN). "And I think it’s going back from the change to Josh McDaniels. ‘Why are we bringing in Joe Judge and Matt Patricia when Bill O’Brien’s sitting out there and potentially we could’ve made a run at him? Why does it make sense to have a defensive guy and a special teams guy here?"

The reality is that Zappe (100.9 rating) has performed better than Jones in most instances, though he did toss a pair of interceptions against Chicago.

Any sort of quarterback controversy could cause big chemistry issues in New England. And, if the Patriots cannot find and sustain some quality quarterback play this season, their 3-4 record may quickly turn into a position well outside of the playoffs.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady is sitting at 3-5 for the first time in his 23-year playing career. However, Brady is far from the only problem the Buccaneers are facing this season.

Now, Brady hasn't been great. He's thrown only nine touchdowns through eight games and cannot seem to get on the same page with his receivers. However, that's not entirely his fault. The offense has seemed out of sync all year, and it seems Bruce Arians' decision to step down as head coach is negatively impacting that side of the ball.

Tampa has scored just 43 points over its last three games. This was an offense that averaged 30.1 points per game under Arians last season.

"This Buccaneers team has looked poorly coached all year. Mistakes that just shouldn't be made, they keep making. Bruce Arians may not have gotten enough credit," Michael David Smith of ProFootballTalk tweeted during Thursday's loss to the Baltimore Ravens.

However, Tampa's issues go beyond a lack of offensive chemistry. The defense is as banged up as any in the NFL and just lost star pass-rusher Shaq Barrett to a torn Achilles.

Carlton Davis (hip), Sean Murphy-Bunting (quad), and Antoine Winfield Jr. (concussion) were all inactive on Thursday. Logan Ryan is on injured reserve with a foot injury.

Even when the defense has been healthy, it has struggled to contain the run. The Ravens racked up 231 rushing yards on Thursday, and that marked the fourth time this season that Tampa has surrendered at least 150 yards on the ground.

Brady and the offense have to find a rhythm quickly because this banged-up defense is incapable of carrying the team.

The good news for Bucs fans is that the NFC South is wide open, and the Buccaneers face only two opponents the rest of the season that currently has a winning record (the Seattle Seahawks and the Cincinnati Bengals in Week 10 and 15 respectively). But if Tampa doesn't go 2-0 against an inconsistent Rams and Seahawks before the Week 11 bye, it may be time to start thinking about what 2023 has in store.