I think it's important to consider both the teams' performance before Allen's 1st year, as well as Loomis' assessment of the team when he was hired and throughout this year.
1) Allen inherited a borderline playoff roster after Sean left, as we were technically in contention with a MASH unit of a team in 2021
2) Upon hiring Allen, Loomis maintained he felt we had a winning culture and the parts to be a winning team. After his first year, the consensus by both Loomis and Allen was QB was the biggest hole, so we went out and signed Carr.
Now, I do agree that the team's overall talent is probably overrated and we need to get younger. However, several observers felt we had a good enough roster to be a playoff team at least.