Why ‘Eight Teams, Maybe 10’ Can Win the Super Bowl

In this mad 2025 NFL season, the sufferers and the surprises and the playoff teams once left for dead are the favorites, but only because someone has to be.

Greg Bishop | 1 Hour Ago

Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts was named MVP of last year's Super Bowl. But the race for the Lombardi Trophy is wide open in 2025. / Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images

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In some ways, including the most obvious, 2025 is the kind of wait-what, topsy-turvy season the NFL has always wanted. How many times did the league hold up its vaunted parity? Twenty-six times since the start of this century, in fact. But of those 25 champions, with another to be crowned in February, two franchises—New England and Kansas City—won 36 percent of all titles. Add in teams that triumphed twice this century—Philadelphia, Tampa Bay, Baltimore, the New York Football Giants and Pittsburgh—and 76 percent of all championships won since the 2000 season kicked off have been seized by seven franchises.

Parity, then, seems more applicable to the NFL regular season, from 2000 through 2024. Favorites won Super Bowls so often that the majority of the league hasn’t won one since the Y2K scare.

This season feels different. This season has unfolded differently. Consider the odds for the NFL’s best teams to win the next Lombardi Trophy in Santa Clara, Calif., in about two months.

Most oddsmakers made the usual suspects—Kansas City and Philadelphia—their preseason favorites. Various books included other perceived top contenders—Buffalo, Baltimore and San Francisco were the most prominent of those.

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The 49ers’ odds shot up after Week 1. The Eagles’ odds were best-in-class after Week 2. Next, a shake-up: Buffalo and Baltimore became joint favorites after three weeks, with the Eagles close but falling, odds-wise, and the Chiefs continuing to fall.

Week 4: The Chiefs, back on top; 49ers, Bills, Eagles and Detroit, still in the mix.

Week 5: Buffalo became the favorite, while Green Bay joined the favorites’ party. This odds mixture was similar after weeks 6, 7 and 8. The Los Angeles Rams joined the odds-on favorites to win the NFL’s 60th Super Bowl after Week 7. Tampa Bay joined the top group after Week 8, as did Indianapolis.

The Ravens’ odds plummeted as Lamar Jackson remained out in the season’s middle and losses (absent him at quarterback) mounted. The Bills teetered. The Seahawks emerged. The Rams became the new favorite after nine weeks. The Chiefs hung around the top, likely through reputation and glimpses of the team they have been. New England’s odds continued rising, as did those for Denver. Both teams climbed atop the muddled AFC. Indianapolis slid due to injuries to critical players.

The Rams beat the Seahawks (Week 10) and the Bucs (11), but then fell at Carolina (12), before righting their late-season push with a blowout of Arizona (13).

“I really think there are at least eight teams that can win it. Maybe 10.”
- An AFC GM

The Seahawks lost to the Rams (Week 10) and barely outlasted Tennessee (11), but hammered Minnesota (12) and Atlanta (13) after that.

The Eagles have continued to slide. The Bills remain perplexing. The Chiefs are done. Same for the Ravens. The Packers looked terrible—before they appeared transcendent once again. The Ravens surged with Jackson back, only to start losing again. Houston’s odds are ticking upward. Same for Jacksonville.

The point: It’s hard to recall another, even relatively recent, NFL season like this one. Meaning: a year where there’s a favorite only because there has to be. In this 2025 NFL season, there really is … no favorite—parity, in other words, at the top.

“I really think there are at least eight teams that can win it,” responded one general manager for an AFC team, in a text message exchange with Sports Illustrated. “Maybe 10.”

Broncos quarterback Bo Nix has Denver on the verge of winning the AFC West, along with the top seed. / Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

Does this no-favorites season excite you?

Does this excite you, football fanatic? That depends on the vantage point. Eagles fans, Chiefs fans, Bills, Ravens and 49ers fans, all would likely vote for a favorite to be running away from this NFL season—at least, if that favorite and their fandom are the same franchise. Rams, Seahawks, Broncos, Packers, Jaguars and Patriots diehards must feel more optimistic.

Unexpectedly strong play in two divisions—NFC West and AFC South—contributed to this season’s madness, this no-favorites NFL campaign. So did unexpectedly weak divisions, such as the NFC East. (Although there’s zero reason to count the Eagles out yet, for roster talent alone.) Few expected Philadelphia, Kansas City, Baltimore and Buffalo to all struggle in 2025, at various points, to varying degrees. All have, whether from stalled offenses, Super Bowl hangovers/injuries, just injuries or not finding a certain MVP quarterback enough offensive help (respectively).

The Broncos and Patriots won behind the NFL's most divisive quarterback (Bo Nix) and a surprise MVP candidate (Drake Maye). Would you, football fan, trust Bo Nix to lead the Broncos to victory in late January? Maybe. How about Maye, in New England? More likely. The Colts, with Phillip Rivers back to play quarterback at 44 years old? Sam Darnold, in Seattle, after last season’s playoff exit in Minnesota? The Bills, not to implode just once in January? Can the Eagles run the football effectively, ever?

See: 2025 is a question, lots of questions, all the questions … 2025 has no answers, not firm ones, not yet.

The circuitous nature has made wild scenarios become much less far-fetched. Consider Dallas, which started 3-5-1, then won three straight. At that point, before a Thursday Night Football clash with the Lions, the Cowboys had every possible playoff scenario in play, despite their 6-5-1 record and uptick! They could still make the playoffs as a wild-card entry. They could still win the NFC East, despite two teams—Philadelphia and Washington—entering this season ranked highly on most lists. Heck, they could even wrap up the No. 1 seed for the conference, if they won out and a bunch of other things fell their way.

Then Dallas flew to Detroit and lost. Its playoff odds plummeted to 10 percent. Win again in this topsy-turvy season, with the right losses across the league, and those odds can rise, and not by a small amount.

With four weeks remaining in this season, no single franchise has clinched a playoff berth. Nine teams, according to the NFL’s playoff picture, hold postseason odds of at least 90%—Broncos (99), Patriots (99), Rams (98), Seahawks (98) Jaguars (97), Bills (96), Packers (94), Eagles (93) and 49ers (90). The Texans, per this same model, have an 88% chance of earning a postseason bid. The other slots are legitimately unspoken for—and the teams that slot into them can win the Super Bowl in February, too.

Among those nine teams, who do you, football fan, like most? Rams, but … Seahawks, but … Patriots, but … Broncos, but …

“I could make a case for or against any of them,” the GM wrote.

Andy Reid and his Chiefs could miss the playoffs for the first time since the 2014 season. / Denny Medley-Imagn Images

The NFL, sports books love this new trend

Two entities love this (perhaps) one-season, (possibly) new-to-stay trend more than any other. The first is the NFL. The league wants viewers to be locked in over the season’s final month. The madness of 2025 should ensure highest numbers ever. The second entity is those sports books. They can all but count their Chiefs cash, from whatever bet anyone made from the preseason to now. That’s likely to continue over the season’s final month.

Perhaps Kansas City, in Week 14, highlighted the (one or maybe more) seasons without a favorite. The Chiefs, you might have heard, made five of the last six Super Bowls, winning three. But on that week, last Sunday, right after K.C. surged back into what looked like its true contender form, Mahomes and Reid and the dynasty lost a regular-season home game to the suddenly surging Texans. Their postseason probability plummeted to 11 percent.

While the Chiefs season all but ended in Week 14, the Jaguars blew out another division rival (the Colts), the Seahawks mollywhopped the Falcons, the Bills survived the Bengals, the Bucs, with Mayfield, fell to the Saints, the Steelers stomped the Ravens, the Broncos won (although maybe not convincingly enough for skeptics), the Rams hit turbo buttons again, the Packers reminded the Bears of divisional supremacy and the Eagles fell again, in OT, to the Chargers.

Any team that anyone might like in that group above has, at one point or another in this oddest of NFL seasons, looked antithetical compared to a Super Bowl contender. Each has suffered. Each has faltered. But there’s beauty in that, too. Because in this mad 2025 NFL season, the sufferers and the surprises and the playoff teams once left for dead, well, they’re the favorites. But only because someone has to be.

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GREG BISHOP

Greg Bishop is a senior writer for Sports Illustrated who has covered every kind of sport and every major event across six continents for more than two decades. He previously worked for The Seattle Times and The New York Times. He is the co-author of two books: Jim Gray's memoir, "Talking to GOATs"; and Laurent Duvernay Tardif's "Red Zone". Bishop has written for Showtime Sports, Prime Video and DAZN, and has been nominated for eight sports Emmys, winning two, both for production. He has completed more than a dozen documentary film projects, with a wide range of duties. Bishop, who graduated from the Newhouse School at Syracuse University, is based in Seattle.