When we previewed the season in both FTN Football Almanac 2025 and here on the FTN Fantasy site, one of the talking points was that the San Francisco 49ers had a very easy projected schedule. So you might be surprised to look at the current DVOA ratings and see that the 49ers are listed with an above-average schedule. Their schedule strength by average DVOA of opponent ranks 11th so far this year and seventh over the final four weeks. In fact, for the season as a whole, their schedule strength of 3.8% ranks fifth in the NFL.
What happened?
The best answer is that the Rams and Seahawks happened. We had the Rams ranked 10th in our preseason projections with the Seahawks way down at 22nd. Instead, the Rams and Seahawks are the top two teams in the league by DVOA with historic levels of performance. That dramatically changes how we measure the schedule for the 49ers as well as the Arizona Cardinals.
It also doesn’t help that the NFC West plays the AFC South this season, and the AFC South has three teams that are playing much better than expected this season. We now have Indianapolis fourth, Houston seventh and Jacksonville ninth. Before the season, their projected DVOA ratings ranked 29th, 16th and 17th respectively.
As a result, the 49ers schedule is much harder than expected. Same goes for the Arizona Cardinals, whose schedule was projected 23rd and is now going to be the hardest schedule in the league (8.8% average opponent based on current ratings).
A lot of fans will say “Of course, we know that projected schedule strength doesn’t mean anything in the NFL. Too many teams change too much from year to year for it to mean anything.” However, it turns out that is not true. Projected schedule strength has significant value. It just didn’t this year.
From 2021 through 2024, the correlation coefficient of projected schedule to actual schedule, based on average DVOA of opponent, was 0.43.
For 2025, the correlation coefficient of projected schedule to actual schedule is exactly zero.
So this year is just weird. Teams playing much better or worse than expectation happen to be grouped into specific divisions, and those divisions play each other. The NFC West and AFC South are much better than expected. The AFC North and NFC East are worse than expected. (The NFC North plays both of those divisions, so their schedules have been a lot easier than we projected before the season.)
However, we can expect in future years that projected schedule strength will go back to meaning something.
Here’s a look at our projected schedules from before the season and the schedule strength over all 17 games (not just the 13 already played) based on current DVOA ratings:
Team
Projected
Rk
Actual
Rk
ARI
-1.8%
23
8.8%
1
TEN
-2.5%
24
7.6%
2
HOU
0.6%
14
5.5%
3
LAR
0.3%
15
4.9%
4
SF
-5.1%
32
3.8%
5
MIN
3.7%
6
3.2%
6
IND
-1.2%
21
2.9%
7
JAX
-4.1%
31
2.3%
8
WAS
1.3%
12
1.7%
9
SEA
-0.9%
19
1.5%
10
LV
-0.9%
20
0.9%
11
CAR
-1.2%
22
0.9%
12
TB
-2.7%
26
0.8%
13
PHI
4.0%
4
0.7%
14
BAL
0.9%
13
0.2%
15
PIT
1.6%
11
-0.2%
16
Team
Projected
Rk
Actual
Rk
KC
1.8%
10
-0.4%
17
DET
4.3%
2
-0.4%
18
NYG
4.3%
3
-0.6%
19
ATL
-3.4%
27
-1.2%
20
CIN
2.1%
8
-1.3%
21
LAC
0.1%
16
-1.8%
22
CHI
4.5%
1
-2.2%
23
NO
-3.7%
30
-2.7%
24
GB
2.9%
7
-3.2%
25
DEN
-0.6%
17
-3.6%
26
DAL
2.1%
9
-3.7%
27
NYJ
-0.7%
18
-3.9%
28
CLE
3.8%
5
-4.1%
29
MIA
-2.6%
25
-6.3%
30
BUF
-3.4%
28
-6.8%
31
NE
-3.5%
29
-12.5%
32
