LA Chargers: Will they finish winless and the first 0-17 team in NFL history?

The Los Angeles Chargers are 0-7 and the only winless team left in the league.

Coming out of their bye, the question is whether any team will keep them from a historic finish and be the first to fall to the Chargers. No team has gone 0-17 since the league moved to a 17-game schedule in 2021; the 2008 Lions and 2017 Browns both finished 0-16, and those remain the only "perfect" winless seasons of the 16-game era.

For now, the Dimers NFL predictions model doesn’t think the Chargers will be the first, at least not with any strong probability.

Are the LA Chargers actually as bad as a 0-17 record would suggest?

We currently give them a 0.3% chance of going winless. The market prices it at +4500, or about 2.2% implied, so Dimers is higher on the Chargers than the market is, though you're not going to find any value on them in our NFL Best Bets.

On Polymarket, the Chargers and Dolphins are both trading at 23% to have the worst record in the NFL, and with the Dolphins at 1-6, the public clearly expects the Chargers to pick up at least one win.

The Chargers rank last in the league at 14.1 points per game. They’re also last in EPA per play and success rate, and they’ve turned it over a league-high 17 times. Justin Herbert has thrown an interception in every game and leads the league with 10, and our NFL player projections haven't had him for more than 210 passing yards since Week 4. He has been sacked 23 times behind a banged-up offensive line, and the offense hasn’t scored a touchdown since the third quarter of Week 5.

But the defense has held up. It ranks ninth in EPA per play, which is why there are winnable games ahead.

The bigger question may be whether or not they'll want to win any of them. The Chargers also currently hold the No. 1 pick in the 2027 draft, and that brings us to the biggest caveat.

Before you make a bet on the Chargers

This is a data-based look at the likelihood the Chargers finish winless, and the path they might take to their final record.

There is going to be little, if any, betting value within, and what a Week 12 matchup looks like now could be very different to what it looks like at kickoff time.

A couple of things to note:

• A team going this deep into a season winless is rare, and the models haven’t been tested much in this scenario.
• Tanking is not factored in by our model. With the top pick in play, there’s no way to measure how much a team, or its opponents, might ease off. Look-ahead numbers like these might run a bit high on the Chargers for that reason.

One more note: the winless figure comes from our futures model. The week-by-week numbers below come from a look-ahead version of our pre-match model that runs through Week 16, and updates each game with the latest injury news, line movement and other factors.

When will the Chargers win their first game?

Each week below shows the Dimers chance that the Chargers’ first win comes in that game, next to the market price for the same outcome.

Week 9 vs. Houston Texans (Nov. 8)

First win: 31.9% (market +160, 38.5% implied)

Houston is just 2-5 but comes in off a bye, and the Texans have made the playoffs in each of the last three seasons. The Chargers also lost to Houston in both the 2024 playoffs and Week 17 of last season, leaving little in the way of recent confidence.

MATCHUP: Texans vs. Chargers prediction in Week 9

Week 10 at Baltimore Ravens (Nov. 16)

First win: 31.6% (market +140, 41.7% implied)

This is the game to watch most closely. Lamar Jackson is on IR with a thumb injury that could end his season. Backup Tyler Huntley has since been reported out for the year with a toe injury. If the Ravens are still starting undrafted rookie Joe Fagnano, the Chargers’ chances in Baltimore likely go up.

Baltimore is 4-4 and has lost three straight without Lamar Jackson, possibly setting up the Chargers with their best shot at a win all year.

DraftKings odds for the Chargers' first win.

Week 11 vs. New York Jets (Nov. 22)

First win: 27.3% (market +300, 25% implied)

If the Chargers are still winless, this is the model’s most likely breakthrough spot.

The Jets are 2-6, and this is the only week where Dimers rates the Chargers’ first win higher than the market does. But, it’s a home game against another team near the top of the draft order, so the tanking question applies to both sides.

Week 12 vs. New England Patriots (Nov. 29)

First win: 5.0% (market +1600, 5.9% implied)

The probability drops sharply from here. The games get harder for the most part, and because the Chargers would have to lose three more first, that compounds into a much smaller chance they even get to this point still winless.

The Patriots are 5-3 and will be the best team the Chargers have faced since Kansas City.

Week 13 at Tampa Bay Buccaneers (Dec. 6)

First win: 2.1% (market +1900, 5% implied)

Tampa Bay is 3-5 but has won two straight, and its defense leads the league in interceptions. That’s a flat-out bad matchup for a quarterback with 10 already.

Week 14 at Las Vegas Raiders (Dec. 13)

First win: 1.3% (market +2500, 3.8% implied)

Las Vegas (4-4) already beat the Chargers at SoFi in Week 2. If the streak is still alive by mid-December, this is a road divisional game with the Chargers just weeks away from sealing their fate as the first 0-17 team. 

Week 15 vs. San Francisco 49ers (Dec. 17)

First win: 0.4% (market +7500, 1.3% implied)

At 6-1, San Francisco is likely the toughest opponent left on the schedule, and the game is on a short week for both teams. Our futures predictions expect the Niners to have the division all but locked up at this point, but it would likely be too early to look into resting players for any significant time.

Week 16 at Miami Dolphins (Dec. 27)

First win: 0.3% (market +3500, 2.8% implied)

This might be the Super Bowl for the bad teams.

Miami is 1-6, and this could end up being the most draft-relevant game of the season. If both teams are still near the bottom in late December as expected, this is where the tanking factor would matter most and where the model is least equipped to account for it.

Week 17 vs. Kansas City Chiefs and Week 18 at Denver Broncos

First win in either game: <0.1%

Our look-ahead model doesn’t extend to these two games with so many unknowns, particularly for seemingly playoff-bound rosters, but at this point it has almost all of the probability accounted for across the previous games.

Kansas City (5-2) held the Chargers to a season-low six points in Week 6. Denver (6-2) beat them at SoFi in Week 5. If the Chargers fall to 0-15, we see virtually a 0% chance they pick up a win over the final two weeks.

Bad season for Los Angeles, but winless looks unlikely

The Dimers model gives the Chargers a better than 90% chance of winning at least once by Week 11.

The Jets game is the most likely single landing spot if Houston and Baltimore don’t come through. The market leans toward an earlier win than we do in Weeks 9 and 10, but it’s more pessimistic about the Chargers overall, pricing a winless season at roughly seven times our number.

The two things most likely to move these numbers are who lines up under center for Baltimore in Week 10, and how much the Chargers’ front office values that top pick.