Culture
Can an NFL team go from 0-2 to the playoffs? It’s a long shot, but these 9 teams did it
Nine NFL teams are still looking for their first win of the 2024 season after recording two consecutive losses to open their schedules.
Historically, starting 0-2 has meant the odds are stacked against you. The Athletic’s Austin Mock’s playoff odds reflect that. None of the current 0-2 teams have better than a 44 percent chance to make the playoffs or a 26 percent chance to win their division. Seven of the nine teams already have a less than 20 percent chance.
GO DEEPER
Which 0-2 NFL teams should panic? Model projects playoff chances for Ravens, Bengals and more
But going from 0-2 to the playoffs isn’t impossible.
Nine teams over the past 10 seasons have reached the postseason after an 0-2 start, and two franchises have accomplished the feat multiple times.
Here’s a look at which teams overcame a tough start to advance to the playoffs and how they did it.
How they finished: 10-7, AFC South champions
Postseason result: Lost in divisional round
Houston started 2023 with losses to the Ravens and the Colts, but the Texans had a young roster that hadn’t hit its stride quite yet.
Once rookie QB C.J. Stroud settled in and the Texans solidified the offensive line that would protect him, they got the season back on track.
In Weeks 1 and 2, the Texans allowed Stroud to be sacked 11 times and pressured 44 times, both league highs, according to TruMedia. Houston would allow the ninth-fewest pressures (188) for the rest of the season.
One of the keys to the Texans’ improved pass protection was simply getting their best offensive linemen healthy. Of the six linemen who made the most starts in Weeks 3-18, including Pro Bowler Laremy Tunsil, only Shaq Mason and George Fant started both of the first two games.
Houston, like a few teams on this list, benefited from a weaker division. No other team in the AFC South won more than nine games.
GO DEEPER
Everything is different for the Texans because of CJ Stroud: ‘He’s got some dog in him’
2022 Cincinnati Bengals
Joe Burrow and the Bengals overcame a slow start to the 2022 season to win 12 games. (Todd Olszewski / Getty Images)
How they finished: 12-4
Postseason result: Lost in conference championship
Coming off a Super Bowl appearance in 2021, the Bengals began 2022 with losses to the Pittsburgh Steelers (in overtime) and Dallas Cowboys before winning four of their next six and closing out the regular season with an eight-game win streak. (Their Week 17 matchup against the Buffalo Bills was canceled after Bills safety Damar Hamlin suffered a cardiac arrest on the field.)
Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow had his two worst games of the season during the 0-2 start, throwing a career-high four interceptions in Week 1 and passing for a season-low 199 yards in Week 2. As Burrow improved, so did the Bengals. In weeks 3-18, Burrow led the NFL in passer rating (105.5) and completion percentage (69.1). He also ranked second in passing touchdowns (32) and touchdown-to-interception ratio (4) during that span.
2018 Houston Texans
How they finished: 11-5
Postseason result: Lost in wild-card round
Houston opened the 2018 season 0-3 with losses to the New England Patriots, Titans and Giants, but a pair of overtime victories in Weeks 4 and 5 turned the tide after the dismal start.
Including those OT wins over the Colts and Cowboys, the Texans pieced together a nine-game win streak buoyed by their ball-hawking. From Weeks 4-13, the Texans forced 19 turnovers, the second-most in the NFL during that span, and scored 74 points off of them, the third-most in the league. After failing to force a turnover in two of those first three losses, Houston forced at least one turnover in every game the rest of the season.
How they finished: 10-6
Postseason result: Lost in wild-card round
The Seahawks struggled to get an effective rushing attack going early in the 2018 season, but after consecutive close losses to the Broncos and Chicago Bears, Seattle sorted out its ground game.
In those two matchups, the Seahawks rushed for 64 and 74 yards and turned the ball over five times. Week 3 saw Seattle finally eclipse 100 yards on the ground in a victory over the Cowboys, and then it was off to the races.
Seattle rushed for more than 100 yards in all but one game the rest of the season and from Weeks 3-17 led the NFL with 173 rushing yards per game. The Seahawks also lost only six turnovers the rest of the season.
Alvin Kamara won Offensive Rookie of the Year in 2017, helping New Orleans get to the playoffs. (Harry How / Getty Images)
How they finished: 11-5
Postseason result: Lost in divisional round
After three straight 7-9 campaigns, the start of the Saints 2007 season appeared to foreshadow more of the same as New Orleans suffered losses to the Minnesota Vikings and Patriots. But stars would soon emerge during an eight-game win streak that followed.
Before the season, the Saints drafted both the Offensive and Defensive Rookies of the Year in Alvin Kamara and Marshon Lattimore, in addition to players like Ryan Ramczyk, Alex Anzalone and Trey Hendrickson, who’ve become starters in the NFL. The Saints also signed running back Adrian Peterson.
When New Orleans began to feature Kamara more, eventually trading Peterson, their offense, led by quarterback Drew Brees, became more explosive. In Weeks 3-17, the Saints led the NFL with 391.9 yards per game and ranked third in scoring with 26.8 offensive points per game, according to TruMedia.
Kamara led the NFL with 6.1 yards per carry and caught 81 passes for 826 yards. He was one of seven Saints named to the Pro Bowl that season.
How they finished: 10-6
Postseason result: Lost in wild-card round
The Dolphins snagged their first win of the 2016 slate in Week 3 with an overtime victory against the Cleveland Browns, but the turnaround wasn’t immediate as two more losses followed. With a 1-4 record heading into Week 6, Miami was trending down.
Then a crucial piece of the offense returned.
Jay Ajayi, a fifth-round pick in the 2015 NFL Draft, was inactive in Week 1 and saw limited touches in Weeks 2-5. In Week 6, he carried the ball 25 times for 204 yards and two touchdowns, leading Miami to a 30-15 win against the Steelers.
He followed that up with another 200-yard game against the Bills in Week 7. Ajayi finished the season with 1,272 rushing yards and eight touchdowns as Miami won nine out of 11 to close the season and clinch a wild-card playoff berth.
2015 Houston Texans
How they finished: 9-7
Postseason result: Lost in wild-card round
The Texans dropped their first two games en route to a 1-4 start to the season. Houston was 3-5 at its Week 9 bye, but closed out the season winning six of its last eight with three straight division wins to secure an AFC South championship and a playoff berth.
Houston went 5-1 in its division that season, despite starting four different quarterbacks.
How did the Texans do it? Houston’s defense ranked third in the NFL, allowing 310.2 yards per game. The strength of that unit kept the Texans in games despite the inconsistency at QB, whether due to poor play or injuries.
Houston seemed to get just enough out of their QBs, including Brandon Weeden, who was claimed by Houston after being released by the Cowboys, and T.J. Yates, who signed with the Texans just before their bye week. Both players started and played in games for Houston after its bye and helped the team win five out of the six games either played in.
2015 Seattle Seahawks
The Seahawks twice went from 0-2 to the playoffs with Pete Carroll and Russell Wilson. (Otto Greule Jr / Getty Images)
How they finished: 10-6
Postseason result: Lost in divisional round
The Seahawks opened the season 0-2 but were 4-4 by their Week 9 bye. Seattle finished the year winning six of its final eight to secure a wild-card playoff berth.
In each of those first four losses, the Seahawks held a fourth-quarter lead but were unable to close out the game. Once it kicked the habit of blowing leads, Seattle’s offense and staunch defense, which allowed the second-fewest yards per game that season, were able to propel the club back into the playoffs.
2014 Indianapolis Colts
How they finished: 11-5
Postseason result: Lost in conference championship
The Colts had the unfortunate luck of opening their 2014 campaign against two Super Bowl contenders. Despite hanging close in one-score games with the Broncos, who won 12 games and led the NFL in offensive points per game that season, and the Philadelphia Eagles, who finished the season with a top-five offense, Indianapolis still had to carry an 0-2 record into Week 3, when it demolished the Jacksonville Jaguars to jump-start its season.
The Colts would only lose three more times the rest of the year en route to an appearance in the AFC Championship Game.
(Photo: Dylan Buell / Getty Images)
Whatever you do, don’t think of a bird.
Now: What kind of bird are you not thinking about? A pigeon? A bald eagle? Something more poetic, like a skylark or a nightingale? In any case, would you say that this bird you aren’t thinking about is real?
Before you answer, read this poem, which is quite literally about not thinking of a bird.
Human consciousness is full of riddles. Neuroscientists, philosophers and dorm-room stoners argue continually about what it is and whether it even exists. For Wallace Stevens, the experience of having a mind was a perpetual source of wonder, puzzlement and delight — perfectly ordinary and utterly transcendent at the same time. He explored the mysteries and pleasures of consciousness in countless poems over the course of his long poetic career. It was arguably his great theme.
Stevens was born in 1879 and published his first book, “Harmonium,” in 1923, making him something of a late bloomer among American modernists. For much of his adult life, he worked as an executive for the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company, rising to the rank of vice president. He viewed insurance less as a day job to support his poetry than as a parallel vocation. He pursued both activities with quiet diligence, spending his days at the office and composing poems in his head as he walked to and from work.
As a young man, Stevens dreamed of traveling to Europe, though he never crossed the Atlantic. In middle age he made regular trips to Florida, and his poems are frequently infused with ideas of Paris and Rome and memories of Key West. Others partake of the stringent beauty of New England. But the landscapes he explores, wintry or tropical, provincial or cosmopolitan, are above all mental landscapes, created by and in the imagination.
Are those worlds real?
Let’s return to the palm tree and its avian inhabitant, in that tranquil Key West sunset of the mind.
Until then, we find consolation in fangles.
When the director Rob Reiner cast his leads in the 1986 film “Stand by Me,” he looked for young actors who were as close as possible to the personalities of the four children they’d be playing. There was the wise beyond his years kid from a rough family (River Phoenix), the slightly dim worrywart (Jerry O’Connell), the cutup with a temper (Corey Feldman) and the sensitive, bookish boy.
Wil Wheaton was perfect for that last one, Gordie Lachance, a doe-eyed child who is ignored by his family in favor of his late older brother. Now, 40 years later, he’s traveling the country to attend anniversary screenings of the film, alongside O’Connell and Feldman, which has thrown him back into the turmoil that he felt as an adolescent.
Wheaton has channeled those emotions and his on-set memories into his latest project: narrating a new audiobook version of “The Body,” the 1982 Stephen King novella on which the film was based.
A few years ago, Wheaton started to float the idea of returning to the story that gave him his big break — that of a quartet of boys in 1959 Oregon, in their last days before high school, setting out to find a classmate’s dead body. “I’ve been telling the story of ‘Stand By Me’ since I was 12 years old,” he said.
But this time was different. Wheaton, who has narrated dozens of audiobooks, including Andy Weir’s “The Martian” and Ernest Cline’s “Ready Player One,” says he has come to enjoy narration more than screen acting. “I’m safe, I’m in the booth, nobody’s looking at me and I can just tell you a story.”
The fact that he, an older man looking back on his younger years, is narrating a story about an older man looking back on his younger years, is not lost on Wheaton. King’s original story is bathed in nostalgia. Coming to terms with death and loss is one of its primary themes.
Two days after appearing on stage at the Academy Awards as part of a tribute to Reiner — who was murdered in 2025 alongside his wife, Michele — Wheaton got on the phone to talk about recording the audiobook, reliving his favorite scenes from the film and reexamining a quintessential story of childhood loss through the lens of his own.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
“I felt really close to him, and my memory of him.”
Wheaton on channeling a co-star’s performance.
There’s this wonderful scene in “Stand By Me.” Gordie and Chris are walking down the tracks talking about junior high. Chris is telling Gordie, “I wish to hell I was your dad, because I care about you, and he obviously doesn’t.”
It’s just so honest and direct, in a way that kids talk to each other that adults don’t. And I think that one of the reasons that really sticks with people, and that piece really lands on a lot of audiences, and has for 40 years, is, just too many people have been Gordie in that scene.
That scene is virtually word for word taken from the text of the book. And when I was narrating that, I made a deliberate choice to do my best to recreate what River did in that scene.
“You’re just a kid,
Gordie–”
“I wish to fuck
I was your father!”
he said angrily.
“You wouldn’t go around
talking about takin those stupid shop courses if I was!
It’s like
God gave you something,
all those stories
you can make up, and He said:
This is what we got for you, kid.
Try not to lose it.
But kids lose everything
unless somebody looks out for them and if your folks
are too fucked up to do it
then maybe I ought to.”
I watched that scene a couple of times because I really wanted — I don’t know why it was so important to me to — well, I know: because I loved him, and I miss him. And I wanted to bring him into this as best as I could, right?
So I was reading that scene, and the words are identical to the script. And I had this very powerful flashback to being on the train tracks that day in Cottage Grove, Oregon. And I could see River standing next to them. They’re shooting my side of the scene and there’s River, right next to the camera, doing his off-camera dialogue, and there’s the sound guy, and there’s the boom operator. There’s my key light.
I could hear and feel it. It was the weirdest thing. It’s like I was right back there.
I was able to really take in the emotional memory of being Gordie in all of those scenes. So when I was narrating him and I’m me and I’m old with all of this experience, I just drew on what I remembered from being that little boy and what I remember of those friendships and what they meant to me and what they mean to me today.
“Rob gave me a gift. Rob gave me a career.”
Wheaton recalls the “Stand By Me” director’s way with kids on set, as well as his recent Oscars tribute.
Rob really encouraged us to be kids.
Jerry tells the most amazing story about that scene, where we were all sitting around, and doing our bit, and he improvised. He was just goofing around — we were just playing — and he said something about spitting water at the fat kid.
We get to the end of the scene, and he hears Rob. Rob comes around from behind the thing, and he goes, “Jerry!” And Jerry thinks, “Oh no, I’m in trouble. I’m in trouble because I improvised, and I’m not supposed to improvise.”
The context for Jerry is that he had been told by the adults in his life, “Sit on your hands and shut up. Stop trying to be a cutup. Stop trying to be funny. Stop disrupting people. Just be quiet.” And Jerry thinks, “Oh my God. I didn’t shut up. I’m in trouble. I’m gonna get fired.”
Rob leans in to all of us, and Rob says, “Hey, guys, do you see that? More of that. Do that!”
The whole time when you’re a kid actor, you’re just around all these adults who are constantly telling you to grow up. They’re mad that you’re being a kid. Rob just created an environment where not only was it supported that we would be kids — and have fun, and follow those kid instincts and do what was natural — it was expected. It was encouraged. We were supposed to do it.
They chanted together:
“I don’t shut up,
I grow up.
And when I look at you I throw up.”
“Then your mother goes around the corner
and licks it up,”
I said, and hauled ass out of there,
giving them the finger over my shoulder as I went.
I never had any friends later on
like the ones I had when I was twelve.
Jesus, did you?
When we were at the Oscars, I looked at Jerry. And we looked at this remarkable assemblage of the most amazingly talented, beautiful artists and storytellers. We looked around, and Jerry leans down, and he said, “We all got our start with Rob Reiner. He trusted every single one of us.”
And to stand there for him, when I really thought that I would be standing with him to talk about this stuff — it was a lot.
“I was really really really excited — like jumping up and down.”
The scene Wheaton was most looking forward to narrating: the tale of Lard Ass Hogan.
I was so excited to narrate it. It’s a great story! It’s a funny story. It’s such a lovely break — it’s an emotional and tonal shift from what’s happening in the movie.
I know this as a writer: You work to increase and release tension throughout a narrative, and Stephen King uses humor really effectively to release that tension. But it also raises the stakes, because we have these moments of joy and these moments of things being very silly in the midst of a lot of intensity.
That’s why the story of Lard Ass Hogan is so fun for me to tell. Because in the middle of that, we stop to do something that’s very, very fun, and very silly and very celebratory.
“Will you shut up and let him tell it?”
Teddy hollered.
Vern blinked.
“Sure. Yeah.
Okay.”
“Go on, Gordie,”
Chris said. “It’s not really much—”
“Naw,
we don’t expect much from a wet end like you,”
Teddy said,
“but tell it anyway.”
I cleared my throat. “So anyway.
It’s Pioneer Days,
and on the last night
they have these three big events.
There’s an egg-roll for the little kids and a sack-race for kids that are like eight or nine,
and then there’s the pie-eating contest.
And the main guy of the story
is this fat kid nobody likes
named Davie Hogan.”
When I narrate this story — whenever there is a moment of levity or humor, whenever there are those brief little moments that are the seasoning of the meal that makes it all so real and relatable — yes, it was very important to me to capture those moments.
I’m shifting in my chair, so I can feel each of those characters. It’s something that doesn’t exist in live action. It doesn’t exist in any other media.
“I feel the loss.”
Wheaton remembers River Phoenix.
The novella “The Body” is very much about Gordie remembering Chris. It’s darker, and it’s more painful, than the movie is.
I’ve been watching the movie on this tour and seeing River a lot. I remember him as a 14- and 15-year-old kid who just seemed so much older, and so much more experienced and so much wiser than me, and I’m only a year younger than him.
What hurts me now, and what I really felt when I was narrating this, is knowing what River was going through then. We didn’t know. I still don’t know the extent of how he was mistreated, but I know that he was. I know that adults failed him. That he should have been protected in every way that matters. And he just wasn’t.
And I, like Gordie, remember a boy who was loving. So loving, and generous and cared deeply about everyone around him, all the time. Who deserved to live a full life. Who had so much to offer the world. And it’s so unfair that he’s gone and taken from us. I had to go through a decades-long grieving process to come to terms with him dying.
Near the end
of 1971,
Chris
went into a Chicken Delight in Portland
to get a three-piece Snack Bucket.
Just ahead of him,
two men started arguing
about which one had been first in line. One of them pulled a knife.
Chris,
who had always been the best of us
at making peace,
stepped between them and was stabbed in the throat.
The man with the knife had spent time in four different institutions;
he had been released from Shawshank State Prison
only the week before.
Chris died almost instantly.
It is a privilege that I was allowed to tell this story. I get to tell Gordie Lachance’s story as originally imagined by Stephen King, with all of the experience of having lived my whole adult life with the memory of spending three months in Gordie Lachance’s skin.
Welcome to Great Adaptations, the Book Review’s regular multiple-choice quiz about printed works that have gone on to find new life as movies, television shows, theatrical productions and more. This week’s challenge highlights offbeat television shows that began as comic books. Just tap or click your answers to the five questions below. And scroll down after you finish the last question for links to the comics and their screen versions.
Newly released body cam footage shows response to massive industrial explosion in Gloucester County
Grass fire burning thousands of acres in Quay County
2 Candidates Emerge in NC State’s Coaching Search
Former North Dakota deputy remains free on bail despite new charge
Remains of Ohio airmen killed in Iraq will be brought back March 29
Florida High School Football Rankings: Top 25 teams – Oct. 21
How old is Bo Nix? What to know about Oregon quarterback ahead of 2024 NFL Draft
Cleary's 21 help Le Moyne down Central Connecticut State 69-64 in OT
99th annual Pony Swim held in Virginia
Indiana Members Credit Union announced as new anchor tenant at Bottleworks District
WATCH: Senate hearing goes silent after Angel Father confronts top Dem over daughter’s death
US diplomat Marco Rubio denounces settler violence, tolls in Hormuz strait
Iran-linked hackers have breached FBI Director Kash Patel’s personal emails | CNN Politics
Live: CPAC 2026 Day 2
Video: Will ICE Change Under Its New Leader?
-
Detroit, MI1 week agoDrummer Brian Pastoria, longtime Detroit music advocate, dies at 68
-
Movie Reviews1 week ago‘Youth’ Twitter review: Ken Karunaas impresses audiences; Suraj Venjaramoodu adds charm; music wins praise | – The Times of India
-
Sports6 days agoIOC addresses execution of 19-year-old Iranian wrestler Saleh Mohammadi
-
New Mexico5 days agoClovis shooting leaves one dead, four injured
-
Business1 week agoDisney’s new CEO says his focus is on storytelling and creativity
-
Technology5 days agoYouTube job scam text: How to spot it fast
-
Tennessee4 days agoTennessee Police Investigating Alleged Assault Involving ‘Reacher’ Star Alan Ritchson
-
Texas1 week agoHow to buy Houston vs. Texas A&M 2026 March Madness tickets