Road to the Super Bowl 2023: Championship Sunday

Ladies and gentlemen… Championship Sunday.

Not often do we see the 4 best teams in the league in a championship round. This season we have that, this Sunday is going to be off the charts insane!

Remember to check the Bet slip at the end of the breakdowns. As always, the odds are given via Bet MGM.

2. 49ers @ 1. Eagles -2.5

We start off Championship Sunday with a heavyweight matchup in South Philly.  The 49ers come into this matchup riding a 12-game winning streak while the Eagles come into this matchup off an absolute route of the NY Giants.  9ers have covered 10 of their last 12 games.  Eagles haven’t been great ATS this season, but they hold the best record straight up and have a significant home field advantage.

The 49ers have been steamrolling teams up until last week against the Cowboys.  I can’t believe I’m typing this, but credit to the Cowboys defense.  The unit played very well.  They got to Purdy, they played tight coverage, and shut down the run game.  The Cowboys held the 49ers to 19 points.  Prior to that, only the Seahawks were able to keep Purdy & the 49ers under 30 points.  The takeaway from the divisional round matchup is that the 49ers are absolutely beatable.  The Seahawks and the Cowboys had the formula in place to shut down the 9ers offense.  They made Purdy uncomfortable, covered the check down, and stopped the run.  In the divisional round, the 9ers did just enough to win the game.

The elite pass rushers of the Eagles should be able to get to Purdy and rattle him.  The 9ers will try to establish a run game very early to take some of the workload off Purdy.  Not to mention the Eagles pass defense is the best in the NFL, one way to combat that is the run game.  The Eagles defense is giving up 121 rush yards per game.  Last week, the Cowboys gave up 113 on the ground.  If the Eagles can play slightly better than average against the rush, it will force Purdy to try to win the game.  This is a big if, Kyle Shanahan’s rushing play book is incredible, and he has multiple weapons who can tote the ball out of the backfield.  McCaffrey & Mitchell of course, Deebo, Juszczyk, Aiyuk, the list does on.  If the running game gets some steam, that will also open the play action pass which we’ve seen Aiyuk burn opponents with all post season long.

The Eagles have some major advantages in this matchup, which should elevate them over the 49ers.  First advantage is that there will be 69,896 ravenous fans screaming for Purdy’s head.  In 2013, I went to Lincoln Financial Field for a game between the Eagles and the Bears.  It was in December, a pretty much meaningless regular season game.  The Eagles won 54-11, and from before the game started until the last whistle, the stadium was literally shaking from the fans going crazy.  Eagles fans were born for this moment. 

The second advantage is the defensive line.  The Eagles defensive line had an historic season, being the first defensive line grouping having 4 players with 10+ sacks in one season.  Fletcher Cox has 7 of his own.  Last week the Eagles sacked Daniel Jones 5 times.  This was the most sacks of all the divisional round matchups, the next closest was the Chiefs with 2. 

The third advantage the Eagles have is their offensive line.  They’re just showing off at this point with 3 all-pro players on a 5 man unit.  The offensive line’s athleticism and skill not only keep Hurts clean, but also opens up the rushing play book immensely.  The Eagles offensive line thrives in the open field, and the running back group feeds off them. 

Lastly, but certainly not least, the Eagles have a heavy advantage at quarterback.  Jalen Hurts has taken the league by storm, and no one has been able to shut him down.  This past off season, we were all fed the narrative that ‘the league will figure him out’ and ‘he’s a running back playing quarterback, he’ll never be able to throw the deep ball’.  Jalen has completely shut down all negative narrative surrounding him… unless you’re Chris Simms.  The MVP candidate is so dynamic, that he doesn’t have to force anything.  If the 9ers give him all day to throw and turn down his rushing attack, Jalen can throw for 300 yards and 3 TDs.  If the 9ers play the pass and force Jalen to run, he can run the ball 10 times for 80 yards and a couple touchdowns.  If the 9ers mix it up and force Jalen to make decisions, he’s shown all season that he makes the right decisions.

3. Bengals @ 1. Chiefs -1

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before… The Bengals meet the Chiefs in Arrowhead for the AFC title, and a trip to the Super Bowl!  Only difference is this season, Mahomes is coming into this game with a question mark around his ankle.  This line is interesting, I’ve found the Chiefs as low at +2.5.  At 2.5, how can you not take the Chiefs?  You’ll almost never get a home dog during a conference championship game.

I gave this pattern last weekend, and it hit.  Now, in the last 7 games the Chiefs have played, the total was set at 50+ 4 times, and under 50 3 times.  Every time the total was set at 50+, the under hit.  Every time the total was set under 50, the over hit.  This game total is set at 47, so you know where my money will be.

This weekend’s game is the 5th straight AFC Championship game at Arrowhead.  The Chiefs are 2-2 straight up in their last 4 conference championship games.  Hands down, the Chiefs have the best offense in the NFL.  They lead the league in points per game, yards per game, TDs per game, and probably a lot more stats that I don’t need to find because simply put, the Chiefs offense is a juggernaut. A lot of this speculation has lead to questioning Mahomes’ mobility in this coming game.  I say forget all that speculation.  The Bengals don’t get to the QB too often.  Mahomes shouldn’t have to scramble against the Bengals.  The Chiefs offensive line should be able to give the downfield routes time to develop. The Chiefs are giving up the 2nd fewest sacks in the NFL and Mahomes has a cannon on one leg or two. Match that with the Bengals inability to get to the quarterback.  Mahomes will be fine.

Defensively, the Chiefs are a juggernaut as well. Led by Chris Jones and Frank Clark, this is the time those two start digging in and getting after it.  What’s crazy about Chris Jones is in 13 playoff games, he doesn’t have one sack!  The Clark & Jones tandem is elite.  The last thing the Bengals patchwork offensive line needs is Chris Jones getting a full head of steam.  Especially if Jones can get a sack on Burrow early in the game, it may open the floodgates.

How could you not root for the Bengals though?  They’re such a highly talented group, a lot of the core guys are young, home grown, and hungry for the first Super Bowl in franchise history.

The Bengals aerial attack carried them throughout the season, but last week they put on a running game clinic in Buffalo rushing for 172 yards.  With a depleted offensive line the Bengals were averaging 5.1 yards per carry on 34 carries.  Buffalo ran the ball 19 times, 6 times to Devin Singletary which is criminal, but that’s for another day.  Burrow absolutely torched the Bills through the air as well going for 242 yards and 2 TDs.  The Bengals offense has so many weapons, and their efficiency is off the charts.  Bottom line is this Bengals offense is very good.

The Bengals defense came away from last week’s game +1 in the turnover column with 1 INT against Josh Allen.  While Allen has been on his own planet when it comes to being careless with the ball, Mahomes isn’t the safest QB when it comes to turnovers.  He has a talented group of wide outs and will challenge them to catch some passes 1 on 1.  If the Bengals want to stop the high flying Chiefs offense, they will need to get to Mahomes.  Easier said than done for this Cincinnati defense that is bottom of the NFL in sack percentage, only getting home 4.98% of drop backs. That’s 29th in the league.  Expect the Bengals players to put it all on the line.  At this point it’s win or go home, and after all that tweeting, I guarantee Eli Apple doesn’t want to go home.

Bet Slip

Eagles -2.5 (-115)

Chiefs -1 (-110)

Over 48 Bengals @ Chiefs (-110)

Same Game Parlay: Eagles Money Line, McCaffrey & Hurts ATTS, Hurts 1+ Passing TD (+550)