During every NFL season, one (or two) teams emerge at the top regarding their success in regular games. This season [reporting from Week #17], the Philadelphia Eagles show the most success with a 13-3 record, far beating every other NFL team so far. Knowing that each team displays its success in this 18-week window, can we assume that the team with the most wins is bound to win the SB?

There are countless examples of successful runs and failures when it comes to these specific situations. On one hand, we see teams like the 2017-2018 Philadelphia Eagles, who had the most wins during the season with a 13-3 record and won the SB, but on the other hand, we see teams like the 2015-2016 Carolina Panthers, who also had the most wins during the season with a 15-1 record but lost the SB by two scores against the 12-4 Denver Broncos. When looking at a larger set of data (i.e. more seasons), it becomes apparent that regular season records do not signify playoff dominance at all.

A multitude of factors can be implemented when determining a team’s regular season record: the strength of schedule (SOS), the amount of talent on both sides of the ball, or the competition in both their division and conference, indicating that a team’s success relies on a variety of factors. Nonetheless, there are also a variety of factors that cause these teams to fail. To advance the point even further, I will analyze the success of three teams: the 2019-2020 Baltimore Ravens, the 2021-2022 Green Bay Packers, and the 2022-2023 Philadelphia Eagles (just to predict).

The 2019-2020 Baltimore Ravens were expected to impact the league that year: they had drafted WR Hollywood Brown, their defense kept on improving (placed 2nd out of 32 teams in points against the year prior), but most importantly, QB Lamar Jackson showed significant potential through the off-season. All of these beliefs came out to become true: Hollywood Brown had 7 TD receptions in 14 games, Lamar Jackson won the AP MVP award, and their defense placed 3rd out of 32 teams in points against, and as a result, their record came out to be 14-2. They had secured a first-round bye in the AFC playoffs and when all WC games were finished, they faced off against the 9-7 Tennessee Titans, who were thought as significant underdogs all-season round. When the game happened, though, the Titans were quick to score, being 14 – 0 at the start of the 2nd quarter, and the momentum would stay in the Titans’ favor the entire game, ending in a 28 TEN – 12 BAL victory. Even though the Baltimore Ravens had the best record with a decently-balanced schedule, an upset (by a change in game momentum) caused their season to end.

Before the 2021-2022 season started, many people (not only including Packers fans) thought that the 2021-2022 Green Bay Packers were going to win it all: they had an easy schedule, QB Aaron Rodgers had the best season of his career the season prior (eventually winning the AP MVP award), WR Davante Adams was the best WR in the NFL, and their defense was on the better side of all teams (ranked 13th out of 32 teams in points against), so it was going to be no surprise that they would dominate. However, Packers fans had much to worry about during their first game against the Saints: they lost 3 GB – 38 NO, with Aaron Rodgers throwing no TDs and 2 INTs (a 36.8 passer rating), and the defense letting up 5 passing TDs against new QB Jameis Winston (with a 130.8 passer rating), which raised up the question if Aaron Rodgers wanted to play on the Packers anymore. Well, they wouldn’t really encounter this problem until the end of the season (in which the Packers won 13 out of 16 games after), so it seemed like the Packers could have another shot at a deep playoff run. The Packers were set to face the 10-7 San Francisco 49ers, in which the Packers had momentum as the 49ers wiped them from the SB two seasons prior. The Packers were expected to win (GB -240 ML compared to SF +200 ML), and when the game went through the 4th quarter, the game was 10 GB – 3 SF, but a stroke of bad luck came to the Packer’s side, where the 49ers’ special teams recovered a blocked punt for a TD with 5 minutes left in the game (note the fact that the Packers defense did not even try to chase the ball after it was blocked), and the luck would only continue even further where the Packers turned over the ball with 3 minutes left in the game, eventually giving the 49ers a field goal opportunity in the last minute, where they scored and won the game 13 SF – 10 GB. The loss was devastating to (especially) Aaron Rodgers and the Packers and it would eventually frustrate the organization as they came extremely close to success for 3 years straight, but the key point to this loss was that [1] even though teams could have a completely different season record, they could still be equally as good in the playoffs and [2] a small frustration during some point in the game could cause the team to lose the game entirely, so the small things could cause a team to lose, which was apparent in the Packers case.

Now, here’s the fun part: using all the information presented in the past two examples, we are going to use this information to predict the 2022-2023 Philadelphia Eagles’ playoff success. The Eagles are a classic case of the 2020-2021 Pittsburgh Steelers: they have an extremely easy schedule, they beat the easy teams (and some difficult teams, most notably the Minnesota Vikings in Week #2), but they lose against most of the harder teams as they do not have enough talent to beat them. This has now been apparent with the Eagles: they lost 34 PHI – 40 DAL against the 11-4 Dallas Cowboys in Week #16, and 10 PHI – 20 NO against the 7-9 New Orleans Saints. Nonetheless, they still have the best record in the NFL, but as seen in the previous two examples, many teams currently are comparable to the Philadelphia Eagles and this would be shown in the playoffs, where neither team would really have an advantage. Even though I somewhat believe that the Philadelphia Eagles could have a chance of reaching the NFC Championship depending on who they play, if it were to be any team that finished top of their conference (excluding the NFC South for obvious reasons), it is very possible that they can get eliminated in the divisional round, which could be determined by many factors.

Ultimately, the big takeaway from this thought is that any team’s schedule could be completely different from one another, which causes one team to have massive success or another to completely fail, even if both teams have the same amount of talent. When looking at the numbers and reasoning, though, it is apparent that a few factors actually cause a team’s demise during the playoff, whether it is by a shift of team momentum in the last quarter, a close game that is ended by a field goal, or a frustration that eventually leads a team to give up, even if this “team” was the most successful during the regular season.

Image courtesy of Lori M. Nichols of NJ Advance Media