The 2023-24 NFL season is nearly upon us, with preseason beginning to wind down seemingly as quickly as it started. We simply cannot wait for the week-to-week action of the NFL schedule. It's by far one of the most exciting times to bet on sports all year long and with just 17 regular season games for each team, our opportunities are limited compared to other sports. That's why we have so much fun diving into NFL futures markets.
Everything from division winner parlays to longshot exact Super Bowl futures results, there are endless ways to bet on the NFL season before it even begins. Some of these markets can give us action from Week 1 through the final whistle of Super Bowl LVIII, while others might even pay off in the early weeks of the season. Either way, we've been using the power of our A.I. model's predictive analytics to identify value in a plethora of NFL markets over the past month and now we're focusing on a fun one with some really interesting longer odds plays: the NFL's most-improved team in 2023.
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How Does a Team win Most Improved?
Though it sounds like your usual end-of-season award, this is not an official NFL honor, so much as it is a tangible recognition of a team improving their win total from the year before. Simply put: the NFL's most improved team is whoever increases their total number of wins by the highest amount compared to the previous season.
In order to identify which teams are the best bets in in this market, we need to isolate who has the best chance to increase their win total. Then, we need to determine what the most likely threshold will be, so we can see which teams have a reasonable chance to achieve this feat. Finally, we look at those teams, their schedules and our model's season-long projections to find out where we should invest our money. Let's get started.
Who Has Been the NFL's Most Improved Team in the Past?
To give us a gauge of what we're looking for, let's see which teams have achieved this feat over the past 10 seasons.
| SEASON | MOST IMPROVED TEAMS + RECORD | WIN TOTAL INCREASE |
| 2022* | DET Lions (9-8) JAX Jaguars (9-8) |
6 |
| 2021* | CIN Bengals (10-7) DAL Cowboys (12-5) |
6 |
| 2020 | MIA Dolphins (10-6) CLE Browns (11-5) |
5 |
| 2019 | SF 49ers (13-3) | 9 |
| 2018 | CHI Bears (12-4) HOU Texans (11-5) |
7 |
| 2017 | JAX Jaguars (13-3) LA Rams (11-5) |
7 |
| 2016 | DA Cowboys (13-3) | 9 |
| 2015 | CAR Panthers (15-1) | 8 |
| 2014 | HOU Texans (9-7) | 7 |
| 2013 | KC Chiefs (11-5) | 9 |
*
There's some interesting stuff in here; If you were to guess, you probably wouldn't think a team has improved by nine wins three times in just the past ten years, but here we are. Additionally, we see that the largest improvement was less than seven wins just three times, resulting in a tie each time (the past three seasons).
Four times the most improved team was following up a season with a key injury to their quarterback: the 2021 Bengals and Cowboys, 2019 49ers and 2016 Cowboys.
50% of the time, two teams tied for the same increase, including the past three years. That's important to consider as Dead Heat rules would cut the payout by half for each team that was to tie, making the longer odds more appealing in the event that was to happen.
The Week 18 impact: It's worth noting that in the two years since Week 18 was added to the schedule, three of the teams that tied for the largest improvement – the Cowboys in 2021, and the Jaguars and Lions in 2022 – earned their final win in the added week. However, only 2021 would have been affected, as the Bengals (10-6) were ahead of the Cowboys (11-5) after Week 17.
On average, the most improved team adds 7.07 wins to their total, falling right on the median between five and nine. However, since a seven-win improvement is so difficult to forecast and you can see the threshold has been on the lowest end in the past three seasons, we'll use six wins as our benchmark.
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Eliminating the Obvious Teams
We've got a pool of 32 teams to work from, with odds ranging from the Bears at +210 to the Eagles and Vikings all the way out at +25000. We must narrow down this pool so let's start by eliminating the teams we know mathematically can't improve by the required number.
Although we are operating under the “six-plus wins” rule, we're going to first eliminate teams that fall entirely outside of our 5-9 range. 17 wins is the maximum for any team so even if these teams have it in them to go undefeated in the regular season, right off the bat we can axe the Chiefs, Eagles, Bills, Vikings and 49ers. The Bengals finished with 12 wins but just 16 games played due to the Damar Hamlin on-field scare. For the sake of argument, we'll remove them too, as a win in that game would put them over the threshold, and our model gives them a 0.04% chance of 17-0 season anyway.
This brings us to 25 teams. Next, let's exclude teams that our model projects with the same or fewer wins as last season. These teams either have too steep of a climb to be the league's most improved or are trending in the opposite direction. This eliminates a large portion of the teams that are left, leaving us with the Jaguars, Browns, Broncos, Falcons, Panthers, Saints, Jets, Titans, Raiders, Rams, Colts, Texans, Cardinals and Bears.
Narrowing Down the Field
14 teams make a significantly smaller field than the 32 we started with but let's go one step further. First of all, let's toss the Jaguars. No team in the past 10 years that finished with a .500 or better record in the previous season went on to be the league's most improved. Then, let's cut the teams that our model projects for an average improvement of less than two wins since our data doesn't support a significant improvement.
This leaves us with eight teams: the Browns, Broncos, Colts, Texans, Saints, Jets, Rams and Bears, and guess what? Those are the eight teams with the shortest odds by the books. We just reverse-engineered their own process. Now let's figure out how to take some money from 'em.
Analyzing the Finalists
2022 record: 3-14
2023 most likely record: 7-10
The Bears are far and away the favorite in this market. With Justin Fields as one of the most popular MVP bets, a new high-end WR in DJ Moore, among other factors, the hype train is rolling with the Bears, If there's one thing to keep in mind when betting is how much the hype factor raises expectations for a team coming off a season with the worst record in the NFL.
Our model does project Chicago for an improvement, with their most likely record of 7-10 coming in at 17.1% of the time in our simulations. We give them a 32.2% chance of reaching our benchmark improvement of six additional wins and at least a 9-8 record. Our model favors the Bears as well, but the value is not so appealing. If you really think the Bears can come close to pulling this off, you can bet them to finish with exactly 8 or 9 wins, both priced at +600. There's simply better value in this market.
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2022 record: 5-12
2023 most likely record: 8-9
Denver has a strong chance to hit this mark if they can make last season's disastrous effort a distant memory. Sean Payton has proven his ability to guide Super Bowl winning quarterbacks to 11+ win seasons but he'll find his competition in the division a bit stiffer these days with four games against the Chiefs and Chargers. Though they have a talented offensive roster, our model doesn't project them to even eclipse the .500 mark very easily.
A bounce-back for Russell Wilson and Denver is still in the cards, but their receiver corps just took a hit with Jerry Jeudy carted off with a hamstring injury last week and a largely uninspiring group of offensive skill weapons behind him. With just a 12.5% chance to hit our six-win improvement, they look like a pass in this market with their odds implying a 19.1% chance.