At the start of the 2019 regular season, the National Football League had 32 franchises angling for the right to hoist the Lombardi Trophy as Super Bowl champions. Twelve teams made the postseason, and four fell out in the wild card round, with four more falling out in the divisional round.
Now there are just four teams left, as Kansas City prepares to host Tennessee in the AFC Championship and San Francisco welcomes Green Bay in the NFC Championship. Kansas City hosts the AFC Championship for the second straight year, looking to make their first Super Bowl in fifty years.
If the Chiefs and Packers prevail, we would have a rematch of the very first Super Bowl — back when Len Dawson and Bart Starr (respectively) quarterbacked the two teams. We have the updated odds to win Super Bowl LIV for each of the remaining four teams as well as thoughts about each squad’s chances for success.
Updated Super Bowl LIV Odds – January 14th Edition
.@DanHanzus‘ Championship Round Power Rankings: 1. @49ers 2. @Chiefs 3. @Titans 4-8: https://t.co/hDfG9QOimi (by @Energizer) pic.twitter.com/dRaajVQdDl
— NFL (@NFL) January 14, 2020
Odds to Win Super Bowl LIV
- Kansas City Chiefs +130
- San Francisco 49ers +155
- Green Bay Packers +600
- Tennessee Titans +700
The Kansas City Chiefs did score 41 unanswered points in their divisional playoff win over Houston — but that was after they spotted the Texans to a 24-0 lead. Special teams were a nightmare for Kansas City, as they had a punt blocked for a touchdown and then muffed a punt, leading to another easy Houston score. They even missed an extra point, but by that point they were scoring at such a high rate that the stadium ran out of celebratory fireworks. They did set a couple of firsts — no team in the history of the NFL had trailed by at least 24 points in the first half and then gone into halftime with a lead. They were the first playoff team ever to trail by 20 in a game and to win the game by at least 20 points. Since the merger in 1970, no team had scored touchdowns on seven consecutive drives. However, if the Chiefs give the Titans that big a lead, they will have a much harder time clawing out of that hole.
The San Francisco 49ers showed that their defense was back after a four-week hiatus, holding the Minnesota Vikings to 147 yards of offense — while running for 186 yards against a Minnesota defense that had bottled up the New Orleans Saints the week before. San Francisco had 21 first downs to just seven for the Vikings, and they possessed the ball for over 38 minutes. The 49ers had not looked that dominant since…the last time they played the Packers, as they rolled to a 37-8 rout of Green Bay at Levi’s Stadium back in November. The Packers haven’t lost since then, running off six wins in a row.
The Green Bay Packers should have lost to Seattle last week. The problem was that, when it was third-and-long, there was nothing the Seahawks could do to stop Aaron Rodgers. He kept floating perfect passes to the likes of Davante Adams and Jimmy Graham. He had pass rushers coming for him, but he would dance to one side or the other and flick the perfect pass. That hasn’t always worked for Green Bay this year; several of their wins have featured the defense shutting down the opposition while the offense sputters, and several others have relied heavily on the running game. But the Packers keep winning, and it’s hard to argue for betting against a gunslinger like Rodgers.
The Tennessee Titans made the conference championship as a six-seed. That hasn’t happened since 2010, when both the Packers and the Jets did it. Tennessee advanced by posting a +3 turnover ratio in their wild card and divisional round games, throwing an interception against the Patriots but also getting a pick-six in that game. Against Baltimore, they picked off Lamar Jackson twice and got him on a strip-sack, turning that fumble into points as well. Ryan Tannehill didn’t throw for 100 yards in either game, but he had at least one touchdown pass in each game. The last quarterback to do that and win consecutive playoff games? None other than Terry Bradshaw. The Titans’ offense goes through Derrick Henry, who ran for 195 yards against the Ravens. Can he keep grinding? Maybe, but the Chiefs’ offense moves fast enough to avenge the 35-32 win that Tennessee got back in November.
