NFL teams
David Fleming, ESPN Senior Writer 10y

How early oh-fers can change course

NFL, Indianapolis Colts, Jacksonville Jaguars, Kansas City Chiefs, New Orleans Saints, Oakland Raiders

Welcome to oh-fer week in the NFL, where by now you've been reminded 1,876 times that since 1990 when the playoffs expanded, of the 196 teams that started 0-2, just 23 (8.5 percent) have made it to the postseason. Three of those teams (1.5 percent) went on to win the Super Bowl. So, if your team is a 2014 oh-fer, you might already be looking into joining a book club or an MLS fantasy league.

But I'm here to tell you: When it comes to oh-fer teams and their chances of still winning the Super Bowl, I don't like to think of the glass as being 98.5 percent empty. To me and my oh-fers, that thing is 1.5 percent full.

Sure, of the 60 teams to make the playoffs since 2008, only one (the 2013 Panthers) was an oh-fer. But before then, shoot, it was almost cool to be 0-2. In 2008, oh-fers in Miami, Minnie and San Diego all made the playoffs. (Yes, the oh-fer Detroit Lions also finished 0-16 that same year, but, like I said, we're all trying to stay positive here.)

What's important is this: Each of those successful teams in 2008 did something dramatic to turn its season around. Miami invented the Wildcat. (Or, I should say, reinvented, since the concept was about 75 years old.) The Vikes went old-school by running the ball and stopping the run on defense. The Chargers opened things up and started scoring lots and lots of points. On top of that, the year before, the New York Giants became the patron saints of all oh-fer teams when their attack-style defense came alive -- they gave up 80 points in Weeks 1-2, but the defense allowed just 65 in the six games that followed -- and they rebounded all the way to the Lombardi.

Rather than giving up on your oh-fer teams and starting to study the 2015 draft, read on for my foolproof plan for each of them to rebound and make the playoffs, or even the Super Bowl.

So despair no more.

I say, drink up, oh-fers, the glass is 1.5 percent full!

NEW YORK GIANTS

The plan: Tom Coughlin is a Hall of Fame coach and a highly respectable human being in a league short on them, but it's starting to seem like, after a decade in New York, the Giants are tuning him out. So, I'm not even sure how well this will work.

But in 2007, Coughlin took the Giants from 0-2 to the Vince Lombardi Trophy by changing the team's personality with an attack-style defense. After an ugly 0-2 start, the 2007 team piled up 28 sacks in its next six games, all wins. The 2014 Giants offense doesn't have enough talent to turn this around. If there's any hope, and I'm not sure there is, it's on the defense -- again.

NEW ORLEANS

The plan: Relax. If ever there was a team that could start the season oh-fer and still win the Super Bowl (like the 2007 Giants), it's this Saints team. New Orleans just needs to do what I always do when faced with a deep existential crisis: Follow the words of Matthew McConaughey. In this case, just keep doing what you're doing, man.

For the Saints, who own the most consistently high-powered offense of the modern era but rarely get credit for it, the next 14 weeks are about following the lead of the 2008 Chargers, who started 0-2, opened up their offense, scored 439 points and still made the playoffs. Score points. Lots and lots of points. All right, all right, all right.

TAMPA BAY

The plan: Honestly? Become Tampa Bay Lightning fans.

INDIANAPOLIS

The plan: How bad can an oh-fer start to the season be if the last time you did it (2011), it helped you land my pick for 2014 NFL MVP (Andrew Luck)? There's no replacing Robert Mathis, of course, but I think you will see linebacker D'Qwell Jackson evolve into a team leader and a force on defense. Plus, you also have the perfect remedy for an 0-2 start: a game against the Jags.

JACKSONVILLE

The plan: Eventually, GM Dave Caldwell and coach Gus Bradley will get this figured out. Until then, did you see on "Hard Knocks" how distracted the Falcons were while watching the action in your stadium's hot tub? I say, take the tarps off, fill the whole damn upper section of the stadium with water and make the whole thing clothing optional. The Jags might not win any more games this way, but the attendance problem? Solved.

KANSAS CITY

The plan: Only one oh-fer team since 2008 has made the playoffs, and that was the Carolina Panthers last year. How did they do it? The same way the Chiefs will: old-school. Run the ball and stop the run. It won't be easy, especially on defense, with the loss of Derrick Johnson and Mike DeVito, who both suffered ruptured Achilles tendons in Week 1.

On offense, geez, all ya gotta do is hand, pass, toss, pitch, shuffle or roll the ball to Jamaal Charles. He can handle the load as long as he's healthy. He had the fourth-most offensive touches in the NFL last year. Put him to work. Or, back to work, I should say. But the unheralded Knile Davis proved in Week 2 (105 combined yards and two TDs) that he's a solid fallback option if Charles' ankle sprain keeps him out of action.

OAKLAND

The plan: You have a rookie QB; you can't run the ball (Maurice Jones-Drew rushed for 11 yards in Week 1) or stop the run; and you're staring at the 12th non-winning season in a row? Honestly? Until the NFL institutes relegation, I got nothing.

I mean, you can't spell "O"-fer without a big black hole, right? I say pack up and move the franchise to a place where no one is familiar with your recent run of colossal failures or the low playoff odds of a team that starts 0-2.

Try Mars.

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