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Philly-- www.sportsnoise.com said 07/07, 08:48 PM
Good Luck Ghost

The team that won their division last year that will not win it again this year has to be the Pittsburgh Steelers. The Cleveland Browns will win the AFC North this upcoming season.

The Steelers are still a good team but there are a few reasons why I believe that they will not win the division again.

First, a ridiculously tough schedule. Probably the toughest schedule I have ever seen. Lets take a quick look.

vs. Houston
@ Cleveland
@ Philadelphia
Baltimore
@ Jacksonville
Bye
@ Cincinnati
NY Giants
@ Washington
Indianapolis
San Diego
Cincinnati
@ New England
Dallas
@ Baltimore
@ Tennessee
Cleveland

There are no easy wins in that schedule only very tough games. They play 8 participants of last years playoffs, including both Superbowl participants. They also play teams that were on the verge of making the playoffs, teams like the Eagles, Texans, and Browns twice. That leaves the final 4 games for division foes Baltimore and Cincy, both of who had bad seasons last year but neither are pushovers.

There are also other reasons but I am out of room.

Philly-- www.sportsnoise.com said 07/08, 12:46 PM
The second reason that the Steelers will not win their division is because of a huge free agent loss.

Alan Faneca left the Steelers and is now a Jet. Faneca has been the best player on the Steelers line for years. He is also known as one of the best OG in the game. How do you replace a 7 time Pro Bowler and 5 time All Pro on an already shaky offensive line. Last year the Steelers line gave up 47 sacks good for 7th most in the NFL, now the lost their best Olinemen.

As for the Bucs and Saints. The Bucs still have a solid team and fixed some of their biggest needs by adding OLinemen Jeff Faine from the Saints. They too have a pretty easy schedule only playing 4 playoff teams. The Saints play 5.

The Bucs lost their last 2 last year but so did the Saints, losses to the Bears and Eagles.

Sedrick Ellis is a rookie, how much can he help? Morgan has retired and won't make any difference. Gay will not fix the huge problems the Saints have in their secondary. They gave up 245ypg, good for 3rd worst in the league.

Bush has yet to be the force he was supposed to be and is just an average back. McAllister is a huge question mark, coming off his 2nd knee injury in as many year

Philly-- www.sportsnoise.com said 07/08, 11:14 PM
You mentioned losing Oline, they lost Wade but replaced him with Faine, a sure upgrade.

Their other lose mentioned...Lehr. He is replaceable too, he didn't start 1 game and saw most of his time playing special teams. I wouldn't considered those big losses.

The Bucs have been know for a great defense and they can rely on their D to carry them. Last year they allowed just 16.9ppg good for 3rd in the league, 278 ypg good for 2nd best, just 170pass yards per game which was the best in the NFL, and 108 rushing yard per game. They still have a dominant defense.

So the Saints D allowed less rypg than the Bucs. The rest of their D can not compete. The Bucs have the best pass D the Saints have the worst. There is only a few players that can make a big enough difference to fix that D, the Saints are not lucky enough to have one.

Since when do the Saints have a better offense than the Browns? In PPG, the only offensive stat that matter when winning games, the Browns had the 8th best average, the Saints the 13th best.

It comes down to the fact that the Steelers have the toughest schedule in the leaugue, no matter how good a team they are, they will have a tough time breaking .500.