As the 2026 offseason continues to roll along, it's becoming abundantly clear that the NFL world is expecting a wide-open and wild race in the AFC West.
The Denver Broncos are the reigning division champions, but the Kansas City Chiefs will be back with a chip on their shoulder after missing the playoffs entirely last season, and watching quarterback Patrick Mahomes go down late in the season with an ugly knee injury.
The Chargers added offensive guru Mike McDaniel to the coaching staff this offseason, while the Raiders brought in Klint Kubiak as their new head coach and Heisman winner Fernando Mendoza as their quarterback of the future.
This year could be one of the most interesting in recent memory for the AFC West, which figures to be as competitive as we've ever seen it. Our latest NFL Power Rankings are going to take a look at each team in the division, ranking them worst to best as we get closer to every team getting into OTAs and in the thick of their offseason work.
NFL Power Rankings: Broncos still on top of vastly improved AFC West for 2026
4. Las Vegas Raiders
As much as the Raiders have improved on paper, there is still plenty of work to be done.
Although the additions of Kirk Cousins and Fernando Mendoza are dominating the headlines, it's really the additions this team made defensively that could raise this team's floor for 2026. And not only the additions, but the one player they really couldn't afford to lose: Maxx Crosby.
The trade the Ravens backed out of kept Crosby in silver and black, at least for the time being, and that defense just looks so much better on paper with Crosby in it. The Raiders went out in free agency and upgraded the linebacker position with Nakobe Dean and Quay Walker, a couple of college teammates at Georgia who are now reunited in Vegas.
The secondary got a few major boosts from the additions of veteran Taron Johnson as well as 2nd-round pick Treydan Stukes and 4th-round pick Jermod McCoy.
Although it's going to take time for the vision to come to fruition, the Raiders have made a lot of necessary upgrades to be a lot more competitive in 2026.
3. Kansas City Chiefs
Let's start with the good news for the Kansas City Chiefs: Patrick Mahomes appears to be making a much faster comeback from the knee injury he suffered late last season than anyone could have possibly anticipated. The fact that the NFL put the Chiefs on Monday Night Football to open up the 2026 season is as telling as anything.
People expect Mahomes to be back. People are expecting the Chiefs to be back.
I'm a little less confident. The Chiefs have plenty of veterans who have been to the mountaintop before, and a coaching staff that knows how to endure a long regular season. But this is a roster full of question marks at the wide receiver position, on the offensive line, and with an almost-completely revamped defense.
There's a lot of "new" in Kansas City this year, and the roster looked like a rebuilding project that couldn't simply be fixed in one offseason.
Now, the Chiefs have Kenneth Walker at the running back position, and could be a much more balanced group offensively than we've seen. They're going to need to be to take pressure off of Mahomes, whose efficiency has declined in the past couple of seasons.
Still, this team with a clean slate and a chip on its shoulder has to be considered dangerous.
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