It’s always weird to talk about age when it comes to the NFL. You have guys who burn bright and fast, and then you have guys like Derrick Henry who refuse to think about dying. The truth is, just because you’re old doesn’t mean you’re bad, and just because you’re young doesn't mean you’re good
The reality is that the age of a team is a multiplier; It emphasizes the goodness and the badness of a team. That’s to say, if a team is good and young or old, it’s going to be really good. If you’re bad and young or old, it’s going to be really bad.
Now that we have every team’s 53-man roster, we can get a pretty solid idea of their average age. And lucky us: Jimmy Kempski of Philly Voice did the work and crunched the numbers … He ranked every team based on their average age.
These are the five youngest and five oldest teams in the NFL, what went into that age, and what that means for them.
Youngest Teams:
Dolphins: 25.0 years old
The Dolphins are the youngest team by a whole lot, and it’s because they just got rid of pretty much everyone who could bump that number up while also rostering a whole bunch of rookies. That’ll pretty much do it.
Do we expect them to be good? Absolutely not. They just hit the reset button, and this is what happens when you start a new game. This is a young and bad team.
Browns: 25.5 years old
The Browns are an interesting team because their roster is awesome except for the most important player, who is the worst in the NFL.
It really goes to show how important this year is for Cleveland to develop the young players, because once they draft a quarterback early next year, this team is going to be cheap and on the verge of being able to really compete.
Chiefs: 25.7 years old
The Chiefs being so young seems like a shocker because their historically awesome players (Mahomes, Kelce, and Jones) have been awesome for a long time, which means they’re old. Those guys also combine to be 28 percent of the Chiefs’ salary cap.
That means that they kind of have to have a whole bunch of young and cheap guys. Unfortunately, a bunch of their young guys from the past handful of drafts have not exactly panned out (relative to where they were drafted). It’s been said a billion times this offseason, but the Chiefs are on the verge of being bad … Except for the part where Mahomes is really good and as long as he stays that way, this will be a good team.
Jaguars: 25.9 years old
I thought it was kind of surprising that the Jaguars were so low on this list. They don’t exactly scream ‘YOUTH’ to me, but it makes sense when you think about it. They were a bad team for a long time, and they’ve gotten rid of pretty much everyone who was part of those teams. When they drafted a 21-year-old Trevor Lawrence in 2021, it marked the beginning of a rebuild that’s been going pretty well.
Those good players that they’ve been stockpiling are entering their prime and/or hitting their stride, and now the Jaguars are a competitive football team. This is exactly how you want a rebuild to go. It seems like their years of being a lovable loser might be coming to an end.
Titans: 25.9 years old
There are only two players on their entire roster that the Titans drafted before 2023: Jeffrey Simmons and Amani Hooker. That’s bonkers.
For what it’s worth, they only have three players on the roster from the 2024 draft (JC Latham, James Williams, and Cedric Gray), and two from the 2023 draft (Tyjae Spears and Peter Skoronski).
This is a young team because of years and years and years of bad drafting. If you were wondering how the Titans, as a franchise, got into the situation that they’re in right now … that’ll pretty much do it.
Oldest Teams:
Steelers: 27.1 years old
Not only do the Steelers have 12 players who are at least 30 years old, but they also have the 43-year-old Aaron Rodgers. That’ll bump your average age up big time.
As the oldest team in the league, they’re a little unique. Their old players are still playing at a pretty high level. Cam Heyward is 37 and coming off an All-Pro season. T.J. Watt is 32 and just had his eighth consecutive Pro Bowl season. Jalen Ramsay is 31, but he’s still pretty awesome. Jamel Dean and Cole Holcomb are 30 and still good ball players.
They also haven’t dumped huge amounts of resources into these old guys either. Sure, Heyward’s contract is for a couple of years, and Chris Boswell’s will keep him there until he’s 40 … But those guys will earn those paychecks.
Oh, and this doesn’t count toward their overall age, but when they hired a 62-year-old Mike McCarthy, it was the first time since 1969 that they hired a head coach who wasn’t in their 30s.
Falcons: 27.1 years old
The Falcons don't have a crazy number of olds or anything like that; their high average age is more about the glaring lack of young players. As a matter of fact, they only have seven players on their roster that are 23 years old or younger.
That means a mix of three things: They haven’t had big draft classes, they’ve drafted older players, and they haven’t really drafted particularly well … Which makes sense when you think about them trading three draft picks (including their 2026 first) to the Rams to get back in the first round of the draft to get James Pearce Jr.
I don’t know why I believe that Matt Ryan is going to be good at his new job as the President of Football since there’s zero proof that he will be … But you have to think that he’ll stop this boneheaded franchise from doing dumb stuff like that in the future. Hopefully he can get them back to being a serious team and hit some kind of reset button.
Broncos: 26.9 years old
The Broncos are steady, solid, old, and good. That’s perfect for who they are and what they’re trying to do … Which is to win right now.
Like the Falcons, their average is high because there aren’t a bunch of young guys and not because there are a bunch of old guys. Hell, there isn’t a single person on this roster that is younger than 23. Double hell, Patrick Surtain was drafted in 2021, and Bo Nix was drafted in 2024. They’re both 26 years old, and Nix is 48 days older than Surtain.
You look at their offensive line, and it’s bookended by Mike McGlinchey and Garrett Bolles. They’re 32 and 34 years old respectively, and they’re both awesome. This is a good roster that builds with tried, trusted, and real talent. There’s no problem with that … If you get it right.
Rams: 26.9 years old
It’s no surprise that the Rams are an old team. Matthew Stafford, Davante Adams, Myles Garrett, Poona Ford, and now Aaron Donald? Every single one of them is amazing at their jobs, and they’re all over 30 years old.
They’re the Super Bowl favorites for a reason … But let’s all remember what happened the last time they won a Super Bowl: They followed it with a 2022 season where they were the worst-performing Super Bowl champions in the history of the NFL. If they win this year, they’re going to lose a whole lot of guys and potentially be even worse than that 5-12 team … So that’ll be fun.
49ers: 26.9 years old
The 49ers are their own worst enemy. Every news story about them is about how they are dealing with some type of injury, and for young teams, that’s not a big deal … But when you’re talking about a 33-year-old Mike Evans bouncing back from a groin, it doesn’t sound nearly as good as a 22-year-old Makai Lemon bouncing back from a hammy.
This is a team with eight key players over 30, and half of them have had some type of injury in the past year. Then you think about an oft-injured 30-year-old Christian McCaffrey, who is their most important offensive player, coming off a season where he had over 400 touches … Brother … this spells all kinds of bad.
This team has the upside of a world champion, but the downside of a seven-win team. That’s purely because of the age of the important players and whether or not those guys’ bodies can hold up to a 17-game season.
Add us as a preferred source on Google