Honestly, does the strength of schedule change much because of the move to the division winner or does it change mostly based on the off divisions. We played the AFC north and NFC north this year. Those two divisions were, I think you could say, a little down this year. It looks like going from NFC north to NFC west is basically a lateral move, but the AFC West is likely to be better then the AFC North was this year. That being said the number of times we will play games against division winning teams doesn't change at all. Its just we're replacing two in division games against the NFCE division winner with two games against two other division winners. I have no clue what our record will look like, but I'll say that with what you know about the teams from this year that we match up well with pretty much everyone on our schedule. The AFC West, this year, was a division with one great offense, 2 good/great defenses, and the chargers. The problem is the two defenses had a problem against the run consistently, especially Denver. Oakland needs more defensive help then we do despite having a big time pass rusher. The NFC West Seattle vs GB is probably a wash or slightly to GB favor, depending on what Seattle does this off season. Arizona changed a lot and basically are getting a year older. The Rams are all speculation at this point. SF I'll just bet is going to be trash again in 2017. Seems very analogous.
We will have to see how things shake out. The team builds contract structures with the restructure in mind. Most teams don't, I'm guessing because most teams care more about their cash flow consistently where as Jerry would spend what it took pretty much every year if allowed to. I agree with the idea that if the cap goes flat for a few years that we will be in trouble, its a good thing that most of the TV contracts are locked in currently, iirc, means they have a good handle on what the cap should do for the near future. And I'll just bet that networks will fall all over themselves again to bid on football when it comes up. The TV contracts are locked in through 2023.
