NFL Power Rankings 2015: Full League Outlook Heading into Final Preseason Games

For hundreds of NFL hopefuls, Week 4 of the preseason is the most important of their lives. Decisions about their professional future will be made hours after the final whistle sounds, with more than 700 guys getting the dreaded phone call.

For fans, though, the games are almost completely meaningless. Starters will play minimally (if at all), and a majority of the players on the roster bubble will have little impact on the 2015 season. Barring major injuries—which is a distinct possibility given the way this preseason has gone—no projections for how the Super Bowl picture will play out should change.

Which, of course, means any power rankings released now should look awfully similar heading into Week 1. So rather than wait around for games to be played that we'll forget about in two days, let's instead look ahead at the league-wide rankings and take a deep dive into some of the league's most intriguing teams.

NFL Power Rankings

Rank	Team
1	Seattle Seahawks
2	New England Patriots
3	Green Bay Packers
4	Denver Broncos
5	Indianapolis Colts
6	Baltimore Ravens
7	Philadelphia Eagles
8	Dallas Cowboys
9	Pittsburgh Steelers
10	Detroit Lions
11	Cincinnati Bengals
12	Arizona Cardinals
13	Miami Dolphins
14	Buffalo Bills
15	Atlanta Falcons
16	Kansas City Chiefs
17	Houston Texans
18	San Francisco 49ers
19	San Diego Chargers
20	New Orleans Saints
21	Carolina Panthers
22	Minnesota Vikings
23	Chicago Bears
24	New York Giants
25	St. Louis Rams
26	Cleveland Browns
27	New York Jets
28	Jacksonville Jaguars
29	Oakland Raiders
30	Tampa Bay Buccaneers
31	Washington
32	Tennessee Titans

Teams to Watch 

9. Pittsburgh Steelers

Bill Wippert/Associated Press

The Super Bowl contender undone by its players' enjoyment of recreational drugs. Ben Roethlisberger will be without top running back Le'Veon Bell for two games and downfield threat Martavis Bryant for four due to their marijuana-related infractions. Bell was suspended for a 2014 DUI and violation of the league's substance-abuse policy. Bryant failed "multiple" drug tests to earn his four-game ban.

"We're in the process of working out a plan and what's appropriate for him the individual, not the player," Steelers coach Mike Tomlin said of Bryant, per Jeremy Fowler of ESPN.com. "I think that's an element of this we need to keep in perspective as we move forward with him. He has issues that he's dealing with that are bigger than football. We're committed to assisting the man in that."

Bell is perhaps the NFL's best running back, putting together more than 2,200 yards of total offense last season. He'll be replaced by a combination of DeAngelo Williams and Dri Archer, which is like trading in your new G-Wagon for a 1997 Ford Tempo.

Bryant, meanwhile, was one of the league's best downfield playmakers in 2014, averaging 21.1 yards per reception and racking up eight touchdowns on his 26 grabs. He was expected to take a bigger offensive role in his second NFL season, emerging as more of an all-around option. That might not be the case now—especially with rookie Sammie Coates potentially vulturing his downfield opportunities.

Still, the offensive uncertainty saps excitement about Pittsburgh's best unit and shifts the focus to a defensive unit that still has massive concerns in the secondary. If the Steelers can get through their first couple of games unscathed, it will say a lot about their chances at back-to-back playoff berths.

14. Buffalo Bills

Bill Wippert/Associated Press

The Bills have all the makings of a playoff team. They have one of the NFL's best defenses, a dominant pass-rushing unit that led the NFL in sacks last season and added defensive maven Rex Ryan as their head coach. Only two teams allowed fewer passing yards per attempt (Denver and Seattle), and the Bills were one of two squads to have more interceptions than touchdowns allowed.

Football Outsiders ranked Buffalo second in defensive DVOA, the second straight season it ranked inside the top five.

Again: This. Team. Added. Rex. Ryan. As. Its. Head. Coach.

Even if Buffalo doesn't ascend to Super Bowl contention, it's going to be hell twice a year for the other AFC East teams.

Offensively, there are the makings of a solid unit. Second-year receiver Sammy Watkins put up nearly 1,000 yards last season and has the physical talent to develop into a yearly Pro Bowler. Percy Harvin signed a one-year contract this offseason in hopes of reinvigorating his career after two lost seasons. LeSean McCoy has a contractual commitment I wouldn't make at running back, but his "disappointing" 2014 campaign involved rushing for 1,319 yards.

This has all the makings of a team that could challenge New England for division supremacy.

One problem: This is a Rex Ryan team. Which means there is no competency to be seen at quarterback. Tyrod Taylor, who is in his fifth season and has thrown all of 35 NFL passes, will start for Buffalo Week 1. He beat out Matt Cassel and EJ Manuel during a preseason battle that, well, was a preseason battle between Tyrod Taylor, Matt Cassel and EJ Manuel.

All three looked generally competent, but Taylor is the only one we can plausibly believe has starter-level talent. Cassel has now lost three starting jobs in the last four years. Manuel's NFL career has gone so poorly that the previous regime signed Kyle Orton last year out of desperation.

Maybe Taylor is great. But maybe this is a team with 12-4 talent that will be hanging around .500 because its quarterback situation is such a mess.

31. Washington

Nick Wass/Associated Press

A 75-man, soon-to-be-53-man dumpster fire. There is no coherence to Washington's organizational plan, starting with owner Dan Snyder down to head coach Jay Gruden down to whatever "intern" is running Robert Griffin III's Instagram account.

We can start with the quarterback situation, which is perhaps the best example of organizational dysfunction in sports. Nothing about Washington's decision to bench Griffin makes sense. One could point out the fundamental flaws in Griffin's game—specifically that he takes too many sacks and has accuracy issues—and apply even more damning statistics to Kirk Cousins.

For his career, Cousins has thrown interceptions on 4.7 percent of his passes; Griffin has thrown picks on 2.2 percent of his throws. In three seasons, Cousins has never had an interception rate of below 4.5 percent; Griffin has never gone higher than 2.8 percent.

While Griffin is prone to fumbles and injuries, it's impossible to argue Washington's ceiling is higher with Cousins. We have a 407-pass, three-season sample that shows Cousins is a dreadful decision-maker who needs idyllic protection and coverage to succeed. Griffin is still only three years removed from one of the finest rookie seasons in NFL history.

He's dealt with confidence issues—internal and external—ever since. Clashes with former head coach Mike Shanahan played out in public and private, while Gruden has been seemingly lukewarm on Griffin since taking the job. It's hard for any player, let alone one trying to come back from major injury issues, to find success in that type of environment.

Still, given the organizational investment in Griffin, it's befuddling that Gruden has so publicly moved on. There is either much more to this story than we know or this is an organization being run by the South Park manatees.

Hot take: I do not know the correct answer.

Follow Tyler Conway (@tylerconway22) on Twitter.