One question the Chiefs, Broncos and every AFC West team must answer after the NFL Draft

Want to hear a wild fact? In 2025, the Kansas City Chiefs did NOT win the AFC West. No, I'm not messing with you. Really. I know you don't believe me, but the Denver Broncos won this division! They really did. This isn't a prank.

Will the Broncos do it again? Will the Chiefs get back on top? And what about the Chargers with Justin Herbert and the Raiders with No. 1 overall pick Fernando Mendoza? Following the NFL Draft, things are a little bit clearer in the AFC West, but some questions remain still ahead of the 2026 season.

Denver Broncos

Is betting on continuity the right move?

There is a very good chance that when Week 1 of the 2026 NFL season kicks off, wide receiver Jaylen Waddle is the only Denver Broncos starter who was not on the roster last season. The team focused on re-signing its own players during the offseason before trading for Waddle, with the biggest free agent addition being ... safety Tycen Anderson? I guess he wins by default, as he was the only player the team signed. He'll be battling for the fifth safety spot.

As far as draft picks go, the Broncos didn't make a selection until the third round, adding Texas A&M defensive tackle Tyler Onyedim at pick No. 66. He'll have a role, but likely not as a starter out of the gate. That was the only Day 2 pick for the team, and the Day 3 picks are mostly just going to be bench guys for now. Washington running back Jonah Coleman and Boise State offensive tackle Kage Casey are intriguing, but I wouldn't expect much from either in 2026.

Instead, Denver is running it back with a team that went 14-3 and made the AFC Championship Game, with the bet being that Waddle is the missing piece to put the team over the top. It's not a terrible approach, but one has to wonder about stagnation here, right? No one thought Denver would be this good in 2025, so what if this was just a fluke? What if adding Waddle isn't the difference-maker, and the lack of aggression this offseason winds up wasting a year of Bo Nix's rookie contract?

Kansas City Chiefs

What is Patrick Mahomes' timeline?

I like what the Chiefs did in the NFL Draft. I mean, trading up for Mansoor Delane was risky, but Kansas City knew it had a lot of defensive needs and worked to fill them.

It was a good strategy, but it also requires something important to work, which is having quarterback Patrick Mahomes back for a long enough stretch of the season that he can cover up for issues on the offense. It's something a healthy Mahomes could barely do in 2025, and now he'll be returning from an ACL injury. But aside from questions about how he'll play, the bigger question is when he'll play.

Kansas City signed Justin Fields this offseason to get them through the Mahomes injury, but obviously, they'd prefer to not have to turn to Fields for long. Mahomes is reportedly going to participate in OTAs in May and would be on track, then, to be the Week 1 starter barring a setback, but the possibility of a setback probably scares the bejeebers out of the Chiefs.

Las Vegas Raiders

Who is the starting quarterback?

The Las Vegas Raiders have already seemingly made their decision here about the quarterback position, with the expectation being that the team will start Kirk Cousins over Mendoza to open the season. When Mendoza gets a shot to play after that is a mystery.

Despite that, I think the smarter move for the Raiders is to treat this offseason like there are stakes, like Cousins could lose the starting job or Mendoza could steal it. Why? Aside from the whole "competition can be healthy" thing, there's the fact that Vegas needs to be thinking about its future far more than their present.

You obviously don't want to play Mendoza until you feel comfortable doing so, but you also don't want to rule out the possibility that Mendoza will show over the next few months that he's ready to take an NFL field. Despite the whole "let rookies sit" wisdom that gets thrown around, rookies — especially No. 1 overall picks — don't often sit. Some of that is teams rushing them onto the field, but another element is just that a quarterback taken at No. 1 is usually being taken there because he's a very good prospect, and very good prospects can usually play pretty soon. In fact, the last time a quarterback taken with the No. 1 overall pick wasn't the Week 1 starter was Baker Mayfield in 2018.

Cousins might give the team the best chance to win in 2026, but the team needs to question whether it wants to win a few extra games now or whether it wants to see what Mendoza can do as the starter.

Los Angeles Chargers

Did they do enough to protect Justin Herbert?

It seemed like every time Justin Herbert dropped back to pass in 2025, the defense recorded a sack. The numbers show that while that's not actually the case, it's also not totally inaccurate.

Herbert was sacked a career-high 54 times, with the Los Angeles Chargers quarterback being sacked on 9.5 percent of dropbacks, also the worst mark of his career. A big part of that was the absence of the team's two starting tackles, as Rashawn Slater missed the entire season with a torn patellar tendon while Joe Alt played just six games. With those two out, there was no one to help cover for the team's interior offensive line issues and everything cratered.

Good news, though: both are on track to play in 2026, and the Chargers signed center Tyler Biadasz and guard Cole Strange while using a second-round pick on guard Jake Slaughter. Will that trio hold up? Time will tell, but I'm still concerned about tackle depth for Los Angeles, so if Slater or Alt goes down, could things go south again?

If you're the Chargers front office, do you spend the rest of the offseason scouting potential roster cutdown guys to shore up depth? Or are you okay going into the 2026 season with three or four rookie linemen on the roster? The team drafted four offensive linemen and added maybe the best UDFA tackle in Isaiah World, but do you trust those guys in 2026 if you're forced to play them?

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