The Jacksonville Jaguars are off to an encouraging start to the Liam Coen era. The first-year head coach is slowly overseeing a culture shift, and the Jags already won as many games this season as they did last year. That said, they got their work cut out.
Jacksonville has been plagued by things such as penalties and drops throughout the year. Similarly, several players who were expected to have a huge impact have underperformed. Now, there's still plenty of time to turn things around, but the Jaguars had better put it all together. Otherwise, they're going to be left out of the playoffs. In fact, their odds don't currently look great.
The Jaguars aren't currently part of the playoff picture
Jeff Kerr of CBS Sports posted the playoff picture after Week 8, and the Jaguars are missing. This isn't shocking when you take into account that the Indianapolis Colts have a three-game lead over them.
On top of that, the Buffalo Bills (6-2), the Los Angeles Chargers (5-3), and the Kansas City Chiefs (5-3) have a better record than Jacksonville, so if the playoffs were today, all three would qualify as the wild cards in the conference.
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The schedule favors the Jaguars in the second half of the season
Working in the Jaguars' favor is that they're going to get a favorable slate in the second half of the season. Already, they dealt with the toughest stretch of their schedule. After the BYE, Jacksonville will face off against the Las Vegas Raiders, the Houston Texans, twice the Tennessee Titans, the Arizona Cardinals, and the New York Jets. All those teams have a losing record.
On the other hand, Jacksonville still has the Colts twice and the Denver Broncos, so it's not going to be a walk in the park either. All things considered, though, the Jaguars are in a position to get hot in the second half.
It's also important to point out that Indy has yet to play its most difficult stretch of the season. Still on their schedule are the Kansas City Chiefs, the Seattle Seahawks, and the San Francisco 49ers. They're currently the team to beat in the division, but it's hard to see them come out unscathed from that part of their schedule.
Of course, the Jags need to beat the Raiders. Otherwise, it all becomes moot. If they lose to Las Vegas, and both Houston and the Colts win in Week 9, their odds of making the playoffs would decrease considerably. Sure, they would still have eight games to go, but they would be trying to keep up with their AFC South foes.
The bottom line is that the Jaguars are in control of their destiny. It will be up to them to cut down mistakes and truly take advantage of their favorable slate in the second half of the season.