There’s no league with more year-to-year turnover among playoff teams than the NFL. Worst-to-first is a common refrain for a league with a hard salary cap and the ability to rapidly construct a contender with a free agent signing or two and one good draft. It’s part of what makes the league entertaining. It’s also part of why we can’t use 2019 records as an indicator for strength of schedule in 2020.
Football analytics guru Warren Sharp put together a chart of schedule strength based on preseason win totals from a variety of sports books. San Francisco lands almost exactly in the middle of the league with the 17th-most difficult schedule:
A better way to consider 2020 strength of schedule is by using projected 2020 win totals from the betting market.
Using odds from multiple sportsbooks updated as of today…
2020 Strength of Schedule is pictured & linked here:https://t.co/IDGC24L4Pk pic.twitter.com/pnXX1TmvZO
— Warren Sharp (@SharpFootball) May 7, 2020
While it’s still an imperfect measure, those win totals set by sports books account for offseason changes much more than the 2019 win-loss record does.
For example, the Patriots lost Tom Brady in the offseason. New England won 12 games a season ago. Their over/under total is 9.5 for the 2020 season. The Patriots entering the season look like a much less daunting foe without Brady at the helm, and the over/under reflects that dramatic change.
Using 2019 win totals, the 49ers would have the fourth-hardest schedule.
Another Super Bowl run won’t be easy for San Francisco regardless of what barometer is used for preseason schedule strength. Bouncing back from a championship loss is exceptionally difficult regardless of the teams on the following year’s slate. If the 49ers do make it back, it’ll be impressive no matter what their strength of schedule looks like at the end of the year.
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