AFC North Futures: Who Will Win the AFC North This Year?
Updated September 14, 2026
Updated September 14, 2026
Pittsburgh won the AFC North at 10-7 last season, while Baltimore finished 8-9, Cincinnati went 6-11, and Cleveland ended at 5-12. Yet the current futures market does not follow that order. Baltimore and Cincinnati have moved to the front of the race, with Pittsburgh sitting well behind the top 2 and Cleveland priced as a major outsider in the market. Here, we give you our expectations for each team and our AFC North prediction for this year.
Baltimore is the current market favorite to win the AFC North at Polymarket. The market is pricing Baltimore as the team with the best overall combination of quarterback play, roster quality, and upside, but there is enough uncertainty to keep Cincinnati within striking distance before either club has played a regular-season game.
The biggest reason to favor Baltimore is still Lamar Jackson. He is healthy after an injury-affected 2025 campaign in which the Ravens missed the playoffs despite finishing with a positive scoring differential. Derrick Henry remains alongside him, and new offensive coordinator Declan Doyle inherits a quarterback whose running ability and play-action threat can alter how defenses have to line up.
Baltimore also signed Trey Hendrickson after his contract with Cincinnati expired, adding a player who produced 17.5 sacks in both 2023 and 2024 before injuries limited his 2025 season. Hendrickson now gets to face Joe Burrow twice a year, while Baltimore adds a proven edge rusher to a defense that recorded only 30 sacks last season.
Cincinnati is priced close enough to Baltimore that Polymarket clearly sees this as more of a 2-team race than a runaway for the Ravens. Joe Burrow gives Cincinnati a realistic path to winning the division even if other parts of the roster are merely average. For futures purposes, the gap between Baltimore and Cincinnati largely comes down to how much confidence a buyer has in the Bengals fixing the defense that dragged the team down last season.
The offense was not the primary reason Cincinnati finished 6-11. The Bengals scored 414 points last season, but they allowed 492, the highest total in the division by a wide margin. Burrow remains the foundation of the entire case for a rebound, and Cincinnati has spent the offseason adjusting both the roster and its offensive approach around him. If Burrow stays healthy, another winning season is a realistic expectation simply because few teams can match Cincinnati's quarterback advantage from week to week.
Pittsburgh is the defending AFC North champion, but Polymarket is giving the Steelers considerably less credit than Baltimore or Cincinnati. That creates one of the more interesting disagreements between last season's standings and this season's futures expectations. Pittsburgh went 10-7 and closed the regular season strongly enough to take the division, yet the market appears skeptical that the formula will translate into another title.
Aaron Rodgers is back for what he has said will be his final NFL season. He was efficient in 2025, completing 65.7% of his passes for 3,322 yards, 24 touchdowns and 7 interceptions. Pittsburgh also won 3 games on fourth-quarter drives led by Rodgers. The team already showed it can win close games with this quarterback, and another season of low-turnover play would keep Pittsburgh relevant deep into the schedule.
Cleveland sits at the bottom of the market by a substantial distance, and that position is difficult to dispute. The Browns went 5-12 last season and scored only 279 points. Their defense performed much better than the offense, but winning the AFC North would require a major improvement from a unit that struggled to sustain drives and create consistent scoring chances.
Deshaun Watson won the starting quarterback job under new head coach Todd Monken. Watson is entering the final season of his fully guaranteed contract after injuries repeatedly interrupted his time in Cleveland. The Browns are also still sorting through the quarterback depth chart behind him, with rookie Taylen Green and Shedeur Sanders part of a crowded group.
Baltimore is the best choice to win the AFC North. Jackson is healthy entering the season, Henry remains a major part of the offense, and adding Hendrickson directly addresses one of Baltimore's biggest problems from 2025. The change from John Harbaugh to Jesse Minter introduces uncertainty, but Minter inherits a roster built to compete immediately rather than one starting a long rebuild.
The difference between Baltimore and Cincinnati is small enough that this race should stay interesting well into the season, but Baltimore has fewer areas that are questionable. That makes the Ravens the strongest AFC North futures selection at this time.
