BroncoTalk Offseason Award – Most Improved Division

The BroncoTalk Offseason Awards continue! Blogging bright and early today, talking divisions again, and it’s time to celebrate a group of teams that have become all the more competitive. Which division has gone from top heavy to uber-competitive in the months since the Super Bowl?

The BroncoTalk Offseason Award for Most Improved Division goes to…

The NFC West
HONORABLE MENTION:
AFC North, AFC West

I still think the Seahawks are the heavy favorites in the NFC West – I mean, if Matt Hasselbeck and Shaun Alexander can stay healthy, they’ll be in the mix for the NFC’s Super Bowl representative again. But the other three teams – the Arizona Cardinals, the St. Louis Rams, and the San Francisco 49ers – all made strides to close the gap between the Seahawks and “the other guys.”

First off, the Cardinals won the first-ever BroncoTalk Offseason Award, given for Best Coaching Decision when they hired Ken Whisenhunt and Russ Grimm. I expect the culture in Arizona, where I happen to live, to change with the new coaching move. The Cardinals, after all, are the oldest franchise in the entire NFL (little known fact), but the culture has always been one of loser (well known fact). While this kind of culture change doesn’t happen overnight, or over a single offseason, I really hope the Cardinals will stick with these coaches because they come from a winning condition and have the potential to alter the fortunes of Cardinals players and fans for years to come.

Then the other teams, the Niners and Rams, also made a lot of great moves to improve. Patricularly the Niners, who rivaled our own Broncos and the Patriots in their spending spree. Not only did they sign Nate Clements to a mega deal (winner of worst free agent signing, but it DOES make the team better), they also picked up Michael Lewis and Darrell Jackson while cleaning up on draft day when they picked Patrick Willis and Joe Staley, both in the first round. Meanwhile, the Rams improved their Special Teams with the trade for Dante Hall, and they also had a solid draft with Amobi Okoye highlighting the bunch. Oh, and they still have one of the most underrated quarterbacks in the business in Marc Bulger.

I expect the Seahawks to take the division again, but watching the other 3 teams fight for a wild card in the wide open NFC will be exciting to watch for the pure football fans out there like me.