Major League Baseball teams play 162 regular-season games, while NBA and NHL clubs play 82. Thus, a regular-season result between two championship contenders doesn’t carry much if any weight in those leagues. There are too many games for one to make a difference in futures odds, plus NBA and NHL teams play every other team in the league at least twice.
Odds courtesy of OddsShark.com
One might think it’s different in the NFL, which has just 16 regular-season games. Every team plays 10 different opponents once and then the other three foes in the same division twice. So, one victory should carry a ton of weight, especially against a non-division club.
Yet as we look at the odds to win Super Bowl LIII, the Los Angeles Rams are +325 favorites. Hard to argue against that considering the Rams were the last team to lose in 2018, but they are ahead of the team that beat them: The red-hot New Orleans Saints (+400). If the Rams and Saints finish with the same regular-season record, New Orleans would get to host a potential playoff game between the two. That’s big.
The oddsmakers didn’t take a head-to-head result into consideration in the AFC, either, as the New England Patriots are +650 on the Super Bowl 53 odds with the Kansas City Chiefs at +500. The Chiefs have a better record, but their only loss was at New England. The Patriots, then, hold a crucial tiebreaker. They were actually favored for the Super Bowl ahead of Kansas City until losing big Sunday at Tennessee.
These Super Bowl odds are likely to change after Week 11 because the Chiefs “visit” the Rams in Mexico City on Monday night in arguably the game of the year between 9-1 teams.
The Pittsburgh Steelers were incredibly impressive on Thursday in Week 10 with a 52-21 destruction of a very good Carolina Panthers team, and the Steelers are now +1000 on the Super Bowl futures. If wondering, the Steelers don’t play the Chiefs in the regular season but do host the Patriots in Week 15.
The Los Angeles Chargers, winners of six straight, are next at +1200, followed by the Minnesota Vikings at +1600. Minnesota trails the Chicago Bears in the NFC North yet has better futures odds than Chicago (+2000). Those two play Sunday night in the Windy City.
The defending Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles sank to +3300 to repeat after being surprised at home Sunday night by the Dallas Cowboys (+5000).
