NFL Champion LA Rams Aren't Favorites to Win Super Bowl Next Season

Despite the LA Rams winning Super Bowl LVI over the Cincinnati Bengals 23-20 by virtue of Cooper Kupp catching a 1-yard pass from Matthew Stafford with 1:25 remaining, sportsbooks around the country do not have the reigning NFL champions listed as favorites to win it all next season.

Although the Rams are projected by most books as the top NFC team next season, the Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills of the AFC are the favorites to win next February’s Super Bowl. The Bengals, who beat the Chiefs weeks ago, are tied with the Baltimore Ravens with the third-best odds to win it all out of the AFC, but the Rams, Packers, 49ers and Cowboys of the NFC are all listed ahead of them.

That’s probably fair as the Rams, who destroyed the Cardinals in the first round of the playoffs but nearly lost all three of their subsequent postseason games including yesterday’s matchup with the Bengals, are on uncertain ground with a number of key players and also have a 34-year-old quarterback, Matthew Stafford, who has likely already played his best football.

That’s not the case with Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen, respectively of the Chiefs and Bills, which is the primary reason why their teams are favored to win the Super Bowl next season. There are other factors in the equation, but Mahomes and Allen and their explosiveness, which was was evident in the Divisional Round when Kansas City snuck by Buffalo in overtime, are the biggest piece of why their teams are favored to claim victory in Super Bowl LVII.

“This is the fourth straight year that the Chiefs have opened as Super Bowl favorites,” said Adam Pullen, assistant director of trading at Caesars Sportsbook. “But usually the public will jump on the longer shots early on. A lot of people just want a lot of bang for their buck, even though they know the Chiefs will most likely be one of the best teams. There’s just not as much value with them this far out. I wouldn’t be surprised to see bettors shy about these teams. If I were a bettor, I would be. But we basically have to assume they have the same rosters they do now, outside of [Tom] Brady retiring. There’s going to be likely changes with these three teams, but we just have to go with what the information is now. I’m not going to move the Packers up to a higher number until I know that [Aaron] Rodgers isn’t going to be there. Same with the 49ers if [Jimmy] Garoppolo is gone and they give the keys to the car to Trey Lance. I don’t blame the public for waiting and seeing what’s going on with some of these teams.”

Teams that are nearly guaranteed to have very shaky quarterback situations, the Texans and Lions, have the longest odds of winning the Super Bowl next season, with the Jets, Giants, and Jaguars rounding out the projected bottom five.