The Las Vegas Raiders have the first pick in the 2026 National Football League draft which will be staged in Pittsburgh beginning on April 23. The Raiders “earned” the first pick based on compiling the worst record in football last year. It is a case of the league rewarding failure. That is something Al Davis said was fundamentally wrong.
His opinion was based on the premise that success should be rewarded. When he adopted that opinion the Raiders were always picking late in the first round because they were a championship caliber team and as common in the playoffs as Santa Claus is on Christmas. Today, if he was still with us, he might alter his thinking.
The NFL not only gives preference to the worst teams with the highest draft choices, in recent years they adopted a formula for the schedule that has the teams with the worst records one season playing a perceived softer schedule the next year. It is worth noting that the 2025 AFC Champion New England Patriots got a last place schedule based on their dismal 2024 season which landed them at the bottom of the standings in the AFC East Division.
Teams that finish in last place are “awarded” games against teams in interconference matchups against other last place teams. First place teams have opponents that also finished in first place and the same pattern holds true for second and third place finishers. What that means is that a last place team will have three games each year against other teams that also finished last the prior season.
In practice, that means last year the Patriots had on their schedule the Las Vegas Raiders, Cleveland Browns and Tennessee Titans. The team that finished first in the AFC East in 2024, the Buffalo Bills, were forced to battle the Baltimore Ravens, Kansas City Chiefs and Houston Texans. This is another example of the league’s penchant for competition.
Does it work?
Well, since the NFL adopted the schedule based on the previous year’s results, we have had an increase in last place teams one season jumping to the playoffs the next year. Three years ago, it was the Houston Texans, two seasons ago the Los Angeles Chargers, last year the Denver Broncos and the Patriots this season.
And how about the draft? How has that worked out on shuffling the playoff participants?
It seems that year-after-year a handful of the same teams are picking early based on crummy regular season records. You can give the New York Jets a high draft choice every year and still they can be the cause of a person’s fictional suicide on the television show Curb Your Enthusiasm. How many actual suicides have been committed based on the Jets is not an established figure.
High draft choices help collect top college prospects, but once they arrive to play for their new teams there are a lot more influential factors that play a role in their team’s success. We can see that ownership plays a major role and while the quarterback is the most important position on the field the head coach of a team is paramount to success. Even the Jets cracked the playoff field when Bill Parcells was coaching the team.
The Raiders have the first pick in the draft, which based on recent seasons is like giving a four-year-old an ice cream cone to eat outside on a hot sunny day. We are only moments away from a total mess. Hopes melted away by incompetence and circumstances.
Still, the Washington Redskins of the early 1970’s appears the only exception to the rule that champions are built through the draft. Washington’s Head Coach George Allen was a glutton for experienced players. After one draft he showed up at the Oakland Raiders offices and in Al Davis' quarters used a chalk board to list the veterans he had acquired by trading away draft choices.
“I am getting guys I know can play the game for athletes who have never worn an NFL uniform,” Allen enthusiastically announced while listing his veteran roster.
It worked, for a short time in Washington with Allen. The Redskins parlayed his veteran philosophy all the way to Super Bowl VII, where the “Over the Hill Gang” were upset by the undefeated Miami Dolphins to complete the 1972 season. But his roster got old quickly, and while the Pittsburgh Steelers were spending draft choices to add future Hall of Fame enshrinees to their Super Bowl winning rosters, the Redskins needed to reload through the draft and hire Joe Gibbs to return to glory.
Yeah, Joe Gibbs. He was a great coach. Show me a Super Bowl winner and I will show you not only a top franchise quarterback but a head coach of renown. Starting with Vince Lombardi and following with head men like Don Shula, Chuck Knoll, Bill Walsh, Bill Belichick, Andy Reid and Sean Payton, the men leading their squad as head coach makes a huge difference.
Okay, so how do we locate the next last place team to crack the playoff field in 2026.
Let’s see, we need talent that didn’t fire the prior year. Success in the draft with their high pick and a coach that can put it all together.
Who fits that mold?
The New York Giants.
They got flashes of brilliance last year from their rookie signal caller, Jaxson Dart. The Giants have a defense that is dotted with outstanding talent collected while picking high in recent drafts. And now, they have added the lynchpin to success, a head coach that can get it done.
After his kicker missed a field goal that would have extended the Baltimore Ravens run in last month’s playoffs, the Ravens decided to end their relationship with John Harbaugh. Their former coach had worked for 18 seasons in Baltimore, won a Super Bowl and guided the Ravens into the postseason 13 times while winning 193 games.
Harbaugh was not on the coaching market for long. Before the team that eliminated Baltimore in the playoffs was out of the postseason themselves, Harbaugh was headed to the Big Apple to move into the top spot with the Giants.
The Giants pick fifth in this year’s draft, an ammunition point where the keen eye of a competent head coach is poised to fill in the spots in New York to vault his team from the cellar to Super Bowl contention.