Super Bowl 57: Teams Analysis, Odds and Predictions

The Eagles and Chiefs face off in Super Bowl LV11 on Sunday, and for the first time in five years, it pits two teams seeded first in their respective conferences. The matchup looks every bit as great as that implies. Each team comes in with a 14-3 mark on the back of an explosive offense as measured by both basic and advanced stats. Our prediction The Kansas City Chiefs will win by 3 points and the scores will reach the mid to late 30’s.

When the Chiefs Have the Ball

The Chiefs traded away Tyreek Hill in the offseason, by far their most explosive offensive player, and somehow got a little better on offense. They led the NFL with 496 points in the regular season, an average of 29.18 per game, and also led in yards per play at 6.3. That was about a point per game and 0.2 YPP better than in 2021.

FootballOutsiders Defense-adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA) “breaks down the entire season play-by-play, comparing success on each play to the league average based on a number of variables including down, distance, location on the field, current score gap, quarter, and opponent quality”. The Chief’s offense paced the league at 25.2%, meaning they were that percentage better than a league-average team on offense. They particularly excelled via the pass with a 41.1% DVOA thanks of course to their already historically great QB Patrick Mahomes. The superstar threw for a career-high 5250 yards total on 7.93 Adjusted Net Yards per pass attempt (ANY/A), good for second in the NFL. 

Top target Travis Kelce led all NFL tight ends with 110 catches for 1338 yards and 12 TD’s, all at the age of 33. JuJu Smith-Schuster was the top wide receiver with 78 catches for 933 yards, but just three TDs. 

Mahomes presence alone opens up the run game, but as usual, the Chiefs did not excel at it. They only run on 38% of their plays, are 25th in the league, and gain 4.6 yards per rush. Isaiah Pacheco paced the team with 833 yards on 170 carries. The Chiefs ranked 9th in rushing DVOA so their ground attack does prove effective enough to keep opponents from completely selling out vs the pass.

The Eagles have one of the better defenses in the league, yielding a league-best 4.7 YPP and placing 6th in overall defensive DVOA at -9.7% (negative defensive DVOA is best). Plus they would seem to match strength vs strength as they rank best in Pass DVOA. This flipside is that they graded out as just 21st in Run DVOA.  Philly tried to bulk up their run defense with some mid-season signings and it worked to an extent as they improved to the 14th-best defensive run DVOA in the second half of the season, but they simultaneously weakened to the 12th-best pass defense DVOA, thanks in part to some key injuries in their secondary.

When the Eagles Have the Ball

The Birds are not quite the Chiefs, but they are very close. They scored 28.05 PPG, third in the league with 5.8 yards per play. Philly’s offense graded out at a 15.1% DVOA, also third best. This might all undersell them a bit as they had a tendency to get some big early leads and then just melt the game in the second halves. The Eagles led the league in first-half points per game with 18.2 and 2nd quarter points per game with 12.4 while they were a middling offensive team in second halves. 

The Eagles ran much more frequently than the Chiefs as they ranked 4th in the league with a 50% rush percentage though they only placed 11th with 4.6 YPC. They did often When adjusting for situations however they had the best rush attack in the league according to Rush DVOA at 15.4% led by Miles Sanders with 1269 yards on 259 carries and 11 TDs. QB Jalen Hurts was a major factor as well with 760 yards on 165 carries to go with a whopping 13 rushing TD’s. 

Of course, teams can not just hyper-focus on stopping the Eagle’s rush game as they have a huge pass attack, ranked ninth in Pass DVOA. Hurts placed fifth in ANY/A at 7.31. Wide Receivers AJ Brown (88 catches for 1496 yards and 11 TDS) and DeVonta Smith (95-1196-7) each posed huge threats all over the field while Dallas Goedert (55-702-3 in just 12 games) adds one of the best Tight End targets in the league not named Kelce. The Eagle’s offensive line makes it all click as they grade out as one of the league’s best on both runs and passes.

The Chiefs will need to figure out a way to get a few stops as they grade out as a middling defense. They placed 17th in overall defensive DVOA at 1.7%, modestly better vs the run at -6.9% DVOA (15th) than the pass at 6.5% DVOA (20th).

The Spreads

The Chiefs opened as 1-point favorites, then Eagles money came in within minutes, pushing it up quickly to Philly -2.5 before it ultimately settled at Eagles -1.5 over at BetMGM. The Total has remained relatively steady at 50.5. New customers can use the BetMGM bonus code and take advantage of their $1000 First Bet offer. Lose your first bet and you can get up to $1000 back in bonus bets.

With the teams looking evenly matched, so much will come down to the health of their All World quarterbacks. Hurts dinged his throwing shoulder late in the season and missed two games, both Eagles losses. He came back for a glorified exhibition game vs the Giants in Week 18 then did not need to do much in two blowout playoff wins. It has been a long time now since the injury, and Hurts is presumably at full health, but he may have to let it rip more in this game than he has in quite some time.

Mahomes of course has had the more recent injury, playing through a high ankle sprain in the AFC championship. Despite clearly compromised mobility, he still went 29-43 for 326 yards and scrambled for a monstrous First Down on the game-clinching drive. With two weeks of healing it is likely he will move better in the Super Bowl but not quite at 100%. 

Further, the Chiefs receiving corps looks extremely banged up. Kelce played through a back injury in the AFC Championship but caught seven passes for 78 yards and a TD anyway. Most of the wide receivers did not make it to the end of the game, though KaDarius Toney and JuJu Smith-Schuster are expected to play in the Super Bowl. MeCole Hardman is officially out. 

It is rough to ever bet against Mahomes producing enough magic to win. The Eagles just look a little healthier, have a more diversified offensive attack, and perhaps can get an extra stop or two than the Chief’s defense.