Afc West

Times NFL writer Sam Farmer poses the big questions as each team readies for training camp: AFC WEST Despite regularly getting off to slow starts, the San Diego Chargers have won four consecutive AFC West titles. Is this the season that changes? By all indications, the division has gotten tougher, especially now that Oakland has cut ties with quarterback JaMarcus Russell and moved on to capable Jason Campbell . Denver, meanwhile, has blown chances to run away with the division the last two years and is looking to finally close the deal.

Peyton Manning flaps his arms, stamps his foot and plays traffic cop, sending Denver Broncos teammates this way and that. All the while, the play clock is winding down. Manning isn't just playing quarterback. He's playing chicken with the defense, baiting it to reveal strategy. His success before the snap is a reason he is counted among the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history, and it's a tactic he will use Saturday in a divisional playoff game against Baltimore at Sports Authority Field.

With five weeks to go in the NFL season, here's a look into the crystal football at what will happen: Déjà (powder) blue The San Diego Chargers will run the table and win their remaining five games to claim their fifth consecutive AFC West crown. We've seen this movie before: The Chargers are a disaster to begin the season ? this year they got off to a 2-5 start ? before hitting their stride and powering into the playoffs. As we know, that's when they've hit the wall.

San Diego Coach Norv Turner was in the middle of a news conference Monday night following what had to be one of the most devastating losses of his career -- 35-24 to the Denver Broncos in a game the Chargers led, 24-0, at halftime -- when a reporter spoke up: "There are a ton of Chargers fans out there saying this is a bye week, this is a time to make a change. What would you say to that?" Turner said calmly, "I don't know what you're talking about. " The reporter tried to make himself more clear: "I've been hearing, people have been saying time to make a change of Norv Turner, and they wanted it at the end of the season and, you know, two collapses in a row right now. " Turner again kept his composure.

Denver Broncos Last season: 11-5 (second in AFC West). Coach: Mike Shanahan (71-34-0 with Denver). Key losses: TE Byron Chamberlain (Minnesota), CB Ray Crockett (Kansas City). Key acquisitions: QB Steve Beuerlein (Carolina), DT Chester McGlockton (Kansas City). Offense: Quarterback Brian Griese has added bulk and strengthened the shoulder that has ailed him the past two seasons. Beuerlein was brought in for insurance but tore up his elbow and might be sidelined for the season.

The draft will be held Saturday and Sunday in New York. The Times' NFL writer, Sam Farmer, examines the needs of each team by division: After trading Jay Cutler to Chicago, the pressure is on new Denver Coach Josh McDaniels and Broncos brass to find a better-than-capable successor. That could entail packaging picks to trade up for USC's Mark Sanchez or possibly Kansas State's Josh Freeman.

As NFL divisions go, the AFC West is the AFC Weirdest. Wasn't Denver supposed to be doomed? The Broncos are 4-0 for the first time since 2003, and rookie Coach Josh McDaniels , who bumbled into town by first alienating then trading Jay Cutler , is beginning to look like a star. He's even mended fences with sulky receiver Brandon Marshall , who only weeks ago wanted out of Denver in the worst way. Even more surprising, last season's 29th-ranked defense is suddenly a force of nature, ranked first in points allowed and second in yards.

While a case for winning the division can be made for all four teams in the NFC West, the same cannot be said about the AFC West. The race is expected to involve only two teams -- San Diego and Denver. The Chargers, who went an NFL-best 14-2 in the regular season a year ago only to lose to New England in their first playoff game, are the 1-2 favorite on the website Vegasinsider.com to repeat in the West in their first season under new Coach Norv Turner.

The AFC West is widely considered the toughest division in pro football, and you won't get any argument from the Chargers. They have lost 11 straight games to AFC West opponents, going back to Dec. 11, 1983. On that date they defeated the Kansas City Chiefs, 41-38. The Chargers--winless in two meetings with AFC West teams this year--try to put things right today against a Kansas City team viewed by many as one of, if not the most potent in the division.

The Chargers last season were about as far from the Super Bowl as it's possible to get and still be in the National Football League. Coach Al Saunders believes his team, which finished last in the AFC West with a 4-12 record, has the weakest personnel in the division. Not surprisingly, he regards the Denver Broncos, who lost to the New York Giants in last season's Super Bowl, as the team to beat in the division.

Maybe San Diego quarterback Philip Rivers was still in shock. But after a historic collapse against Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos on "Monday Night Football," Rivers basically characterized what had just happened on the football field as just another loss. “Every loss hurts,” he said after the 35-24 loss to the Broncos. “Regardless of what negative or bad plays or how you lose a game, when you lose a game, it's rough. Especially a game when you had such a big lead.

Denver (2-3) at San Diego (3-2) Time: 5:30. TV: ESPN. Story line: San Diego would like to take a two-game AFC West lead (and 3-0 division record) into its bye next week while the Broncos will work to claim a share of the lead through a grueling opening schedule. Chargers QB Philip Rivers is 9-3 against Denver. The Chargers have been tough on Peyton Manning, twice eliminating him from the playoffs as a Colt, ending an unbeaten season another time, and recording six- and four-interception games.

The beeping you hear is coming from the AFC West champion Denver Broncos, who are moving in reverse, having lost three games in a row. The bleeping you hear is coming from the Black Hole, which watched the Oakland Raiders blow a chance Sunday to get to the playoffs for the first time since 2002. How the West was won? It was more like, does anybody want the West? The Broncos, who will play host to Pittsburgh in a first-round playoff game Sunday, came into their regular-season finale against Kansas City in control of their destiny.

What began with a lockout ends Sunday with a luck-out. Thirteen of the NFL's 16 games in Week 17 are truly meaningful , either to the playoffs or the 2012 draft, and the schedule culminates with a high-profile finale for all the marbles — Dallas at the New York Giants — the winner claiming the NFC East and the loser eliminated. "What we hope each year is that our 256th and final regular-season game will be incredibly relevant," said Howard Katz, the NFL's senior vice president of media and operations.

'Tis not the season. Not even close. With two weeks remaining on the NFL schedule, the playoff picture is still ridiculously murky, especially in the AFC West, where each of the four teams -- the Broncos, Raiders, Chargers and Chiefs -- is still eligible to win the division. There are also plenty of undetermined wild card possibilities. In San Diego, Coach Norv Turner and his players are keeping their calculators holstered, though, knowing that their best chance to sneak into the mix is by winning their final two games, at Detroit and Oakland.

Someone asked Denver Broncos Coach John Fox this week how this storybook run of dramatic victories by quarterback Tim Tebow will end. "I have no idea," Fox said, jolly again after the latest Tebow-directed improbable victory — 13-10 in overtime against the Chicago Bears. "When you find out, let me know. " Well, we know now that Tebow and the 8-5 Broncos appear to be headed to the playoffs as AFC West champions. They have a one-game lead over the Oakland Raiders and a one-game cushion in the first tiebreaker, which is division record.

That noise you heard around noon Sunday, it came out of southern Texas. It was the Chargers. It was the NFL's surprise team completing a three-week fall that has taken it past fame, past mediocrity. It was the scraping of a chin on what looks like, and sounds like, rock bottom. The Chargers lost to the Houston Oilers, 33-18, in a 3 1/2-hour game that was exactly that close, and exactly that long.

The Seattle Seahawks arrived here at the Ohio River's icy edge with enough winter gear to keep them toasty for months, though they'd settle for, say, a single afternoon's worth of warmed digits. In fact, today's American Football Conference semifinal playoff game against the Cincinnati Bengals would do them just fine. The Seahawks packed all sorts of goodies for the trip: cold-weather gloves . . . gloves for cold and wet conditions . . . hoods . . . undershirts . . .

The Denver Broncos' amazing turnaround since Tim Tebow has taken over at quarterback hasn't just resulted in a startling series of fortuitous events on the field. Now, the new co-leaders of the AFC West have gotten a break in what had been expected to be a likely nonconference defeat by the visiting Chicago Bears. Two weeks ago, the Bears were on their way to 7-3 when quarterback Jay Cutler suffered a broken thumb in the fourth quarter, forcing backup Caleb Hanie to finish the regular season.

The Denver Broncos sent a clear message Sunday to the Minnesota Vikings: Ponder this Christian. That's right, Tim Tebow pulled off another stirring win, guiding the Broncos to a 35-32 victory at the Metrodome to grab a share of first place in the AFC West. It was the fifth consecutive road win for Denver, a streak the franchise hasn't known since John Elway was quarterback in 1998. The team is 6-1 with Tebow starting at quarterback, although those have been far from virtuoso performances, as the defense has played a huge role in the success.