It's the Chiefs, Bills, Eagles, Lions (and Maybe Vikings) Versus the Field
Five teams currently own more than 75 percent of the Super Bowl probability.
Much is still left to be determined in the 2024 NFL season, including the fates of the four divisions that haven’t been effectively locked up yet, playoff spots for the 13 teams with odds above zero and below 99 percent, league leaders in a variety of categories, and whether award favorite Josh Allen can seal up his first career MVP nod.
But if we zoom out to stare at the very big picture, the one that leads to some team grabbing the Lombardi Trophy from Roger Goodell in New Orleans, we already have an odd amount of clarity around who will (probably) win Super Bowl LIX.1
According to my Elo simulations through Week 15, four teams — the Chiefs, Bills, Lions and Eagles — have a combined 70 percent chance to win the championship. Add in the Vikings, and the five leading teams gobble up 76 percent of the available Super Bowl probability, leaving just 24 percent to be split by the remaining 17 teams with nonzero playoff odds:
That doesn’t mean there’s no chance for some team from outside of that group to crash the party in New Orleans. But there’s only a 7 percent chance that our five-team group of favorites gets completely locked out of the Super Bowl, with a 93 percent probability that at least one of those five makes it and a 55 percent chance that both big-game combatants hail from that group.
For each of those teams — plus the field — let’s quickly run through the case why they can, and can’t, make good on these odds:
Kansas City Chiefs
Why they can: Patrick Mahomes in the clutch + an elite SRS defense has proven time and again to be a tough combo to beat in the playoffs.
Why they can’t: They have been absurdly, ridiculously, ludicrously lucky to win as many games as they have in 2024. If this were any other team, with any other QB, we’d be dismissing them as the second coming of the 2022 Vikings.
Buffalo Bills
Why they can: Allen is having the best season of his career, and the Bills have never been better on offense in this current era. Of the other four top contenders, Buffalo has beaten two of them (Detroit and K.C.).2
Why they can’t: Buffalo’s defense is good (+0.7 SRS) but not as great as it’s been in recent seasons. In the Elo sims, there’s a 36 percent chance that the Bills have to go through the kryptonite Chiefs in the playoffs — including a 29 percent chance they’ll do it at K.C.
Detroit Lions
Why they can: This has been a historically great season for Dan Campbell’s squad. They’re the NFL’s top team by SRS, with the league’s best offense and fifth-best defense. As the oldest of the league’s four franchises to never make a Super Bowl, this has to be Detroit’s time… right??
Why they can’t: The Packers and Bills recently showed that an elite offense can hang points on the board against this D. While they have a 7-2 record (and rank fourth with a +3.8 PPG differential) against opponents with winning records, they’ve also done much of their damage (5-0, +28.6 diff.) against losing teams who’ll be long gone by the playoffs.
Philadelphia Eagles
Why they can: They’re hot — no team has gained more points of Elo rating since Week 8 than Philly. Much-improved defense ranks as the league’s best by SRS this season.
Why they can’t: Drama seems to follow Nick Sirianni and the Birds. Saquon Barkley’s brilliance is a double-edged sword; 36 percent of the team’s yards and 41 percent of touches go through a previously fragile running back who joins Derrick Henry and Dalvin Cook as the only players to run at least 20 times per game this decade.
Minnesota Vikings
Why they can: Talk about perfect balance: Minnesota has exactly a +3.8 SRS on both sides of the ball. Only Baltimore has a better PPG differential against winning opponents.
Why they can’t: There’s still a chance Sam Darnold turns into a pumpkin. They’ve also been lucky in terms of forced turnovers and converting field position into points. And lest we forget — the Vikings are always doom dressed up as hope.
The Field!
Why they can: If I’m taking anybody from the best of the rest, I am looking at the Ravens and Packers. Both rank among the Top 6 in SRS, and both have great QBs. And here’s what might be a weirdo pick: Baker Mayfield and the Buccaneers. Though they’re not quite as good as the top contenders, they’re not far off — their offense is strong, plus they’ll probably win the NFC South (and therefore be seeded to host a first-round game).
Why they can’t: All of the alternative choices to our Big Five have glaring flaws — from the Ravens’ defense (and Lamar Jackson’s playoff resume) to Green Bay’s inability to beat Detroit or Minnesota. While it’s certainly possible that the leading favorites get knocked off early — would anybody be shocked if the Chiefs’ luck runs out in an immediate blowout L? — and some will have to cannibalize each other, this is officially a top-heavy season until proven otherwise.
I’ll leave you all with one of my favorite byproducts from these types of simulations — a matrix of all possible Super Bowl combos from the latest run of sims:
Among the Super Bowl LIX matchups that happened once — and only once — in 1,000 simulations: Lions-Bengals, Vikings-Colts, Vikings-Dolphins, Bucs-Chargers, Rams-Chargers, Ravens-Seahawks, Colts-Seahawks, Steelers-Commanders, Ravens-Falcons and Texans-Falcons.
Filed under: NFL, Football Bytes
Which will hopefully be pronounced as “Licks”.
The Bills don’t play either Philly or Minnesota this year.
Any idea why KC-DET is more likely than KC-PHI but the inverse is true (ever so slightly) for BUF-DET/BUF-PHI? Is it just random variance? Looking at the four teams' remaining schedules I would expect the AFC Super Bowl participant to be pretty independent of the NFC participant so I would expect the relative proportions of KC-DET vs. KC-PHI odds to be similar to BUF-DET vs BUF-PHI odds.