Super Bowl LV is not about Tom Brady “passing the torch” to Patrick Mahomes. It is a battle to see if Mahomes can pull the lucky horseshoe out of Brady’s ass and end the longest drought without a repeat champion in NFL history.
It’s the possible real GOAT against the LOAT (Luckiest of All Time).
I have already written around 10,000 words on this game (links below), but the general theme is the same: Kansas City should win, but if the Buccaneers are to pull it off, it will take some fortunate breaks. That is the high standard for beating the Chiefs with Mahomes these days. This team moved on quickly from the “amazing offense, poor defense” team we saw in 2018 that Brady’s Patriots slipped by twice playing keep-away with the ball from Mahomes at the end. This defense is not great, but it is good enough under Steve Spagnuolo, who has a track record of success against Brady-led offenses.
Five-Piece Super Bowl Preview Links
This will not be one of my extra long blog previews for the Super Bowl since I have spent the last two weeks already doing five articles on the game for Sportsbook Review. These are companion pieces going over different aspects of the matchup with very little overlap other than me repeating that the Chiefs won 27-24 in Tampa Bay in Week 12, it’s the first time a team is playing the Super Bowl in its home stadium, the Chiefs can end the longest drought without a repeat champion in NFL history (2003-04 Patriots the last), the Eric Fisher injury is a wild card, and that 16 of the last 17 Super Bowls have been within one score in the fourth quarter. Also, we are looking for our first true fourth quarter lead change this postseason, something every postseason since 2006 has had.
Why the Chiefs Can Beat the Buccaneers – “Few champions have ever repeated with as much style and consistency, but the pairing of Reid and Mahomes has been heaven for Kansas City and hell for the rest of the NFL.” This first piece looks at the incredible lengths a team must go to beat the Chiefs, who are often their own worst enemy. This also takes on the Eric Fisher injury and some Week 12 recap.
Why the Buccaneers Can Beat the Chiefs – “It is hard to bet against the Chiefs, but it may be even harder to bet against Brady’s unrivaled luck and team success in big games like this one.” This one looks at how the Buccaneers actually scored more points this season than the Chiefs, the impact Leonard Fournette and Ronald Jones need to have, reasons to trust the Tampa Bay defense this time, and some of Brady’s luck in Super Bowls alone.
Matchup Analysis: Chiefs Offense vs. Buccaneers Defense – “The Chiefs already had a season-high 543 yards of offense in Tampa Bay in Week 12’s 27-24 win, but it was far from their most efficient scoring output this year. Now without left tackle Eric Fisher, can the Chiefs repeat their passing success, or will the Tampa Bay defense slow down a third straight legendary quarterback this postseason?” Fourth straight if you count Taylor Heinicke. This one looks at some stats on how the Chiefs are their own worst enemy (more on this below), a detailed recap of this matchup from Week 12, what might look different on Sunday, and how it all comes down to the four-minute offense.
Matchup Analysis: Buccaneers Offense vs. Chiefs Defense – “If the Buccaneers can get this game into the fourth quarter within reach, then they have done a great job of finishing this year. The 2020 Buccaneers have a plus-90 scoring differential in the fourth quarter, the highest for any team, including playoffs, since the 2013 Patriots (plus-103). The 2020 Chiefs are the only team in the last two seasons to allow over 40% of their opponent’s points in the fourth quarter. The 2020 Buccaneers have allowed 17.2% of their points in the fourth quarter, the lowest percentage in the NFL in the last five seasons.” This looks at the way Tampa Bay starts too many games slowly, needs to call more than just bad runs on first down, and how the offense has feasted on short fields this postseason. Also a Week 12 recap against the Chiefs, how things might look different this time, and the way the Chiefs do not fear blitzing Brady.
Super Bowl Game Pick and Prediction – “Can the Buccaneers replicate those breaks on top of playing great on both sides of the ball? Maybe the Chiefs will get cute with play-calling at the 1-yard line and have Kelce try to throw a touchdown to Mahomes before Reid shockingly settles for a field goal. Maybe Hardman will drop an 89-yard touchdown pass with no one around him. Maybe the defense can recover a Mahomes fumble in the red zone. Maybe the Chiefs will get called for offensive holding three times on one drive in the fourth quarter, leading to a punt after a dropped pass on third-and-27.
Oh wait, all those things already happened in Week 12 for the Buccaneers and they still lost to the Chiefs.”
This was my general prediction piece that touches on the Fisher injury, Tampa Bay’s likelihood of repeating the Raiders’ blueprint for beating the Chiefs, special teams mistakes by the Chiefs, and some very interesting notes on head referee Carl Cheffers and defensive pass interference, a penalty the 2020 Buccaneers have benefited from more than any team in the last 12 years (and perhaps all of NFL history).
But wait, there’s more…
How Do You Stop the Chiefs? (And the 2020 Packers for That Matter?)
Frankly, I am tired. I wish it were gameday instead of Friday. This is the last section I am writing before Sunday night. Originally, this was going to be research I used for what I hoped was a Chiefs-Packers Super Bowl where I can talk about the MVP award between Aaron Rodgers and Patrick Mahomes. Of course, Green Bay didn’t get here again, so now I’m left with charting data I spent a good number of hours in late December compiling.
Like I said, I’m tired, and I know it’s not like me to turn in something incomplete, but including any data on Green Bay at all feels like a gift anyway. So the following data is for the Chiefs’ whole season, but only the regular season is included for Green Bay. Only drives started by Aaron Rodgers or Mahomes are included, and kneeldown-only drives are excluded as always.
How do you stop these offenses? Well, they both scored more times than they didn’t this year, but here’s a look at what I found when charting what ended the non-touchdown drives.
I fully expect Aaron Rodgers to win the MVP, and I get it, I really do. Personally, I voted for Mahomes on my PFWA ballot and thought he had the more valuable season, and some of my argument for that would have been reflected in these stats. Let’s not make this a big MVP debate, but let’s go through some of these numbers.
Both offenses were fantastic, but I felt like Rodgers had a bit more help from his teammates than Mahomes did. The first section that highlights teammate mistakes on non-touchdown drives shows an extra four lost fumbles by Mahomes’ teammates, five extra failures in short-yardage situations (those are mostly runs), two more touchdowns wiped out by penalty, and more missed kicks by Kansas City. There were a similar number of drops, but the Chiefs lost three more probable touchdowns and had more come on third or fourth down plays.
The section titled “OTHER THIRD DOWN STOPS” are the drives where the defense really stepped up and earned the stop of these offenses, usually on third down. The numbers there are similar though the Chiefs had considerably more passes defensed or batted at the line or Mahomes hit in motion.
As for QB turnovers, again, I thought it was silly how Mahomes having eight turnovers (one in one loss) to Rodgers having seven (five in three losses) was supposed to be a positive for Rodgers. It never was. Mahomes’ only “failure” on fourth down was a play against the Ravens where he just chucked up a pass in the final 30 seconds with a 34-20 lead. No biggie.
The final section, CLOCK & MISC., are drives that were not even really defensive stops, but the offenses were up against the time crunch late in the half or were just working the clock. It also makes note of the playoff drive against Cleveland where Mahomes was knocked out with his injury.
Finally for some more context, here are the reasons why the Chiefs settled for 32 field goal attempts this season:
This kind of analysis was something I have always wanted to do. To answer the question of “what caused the drive to end?” to see if I can figure out how much a great offense was stopped versus how often they stopped themselves.
In the case of the Chiefs, I do think they are their own worst enemy a lot of the times, and the numbers here support this to a degree when you consider they are scoring more than they aren’t.
Also, Marques Valdes-Scantling is frustrating as hell with his consistency, and he was responsible for several of the Green Bay mistakes this year, but obviously he played very well in the NFC Championship Game. Just a shame we are not talking about a Chiefs-Packers game so we could see who gets the Super Bowl MVP between Rodgers and Mahomes in their first ever matchup while both had such great seasons.
But of course, we get the potential real GOAT vs. the LOAT.
Twitter Highlights
Here are some research tweets I have made in the leadup to the big game:
Déjà vu?
I said this in my Super Bowl LIV preview last year about the Chiefs-49ers matchup:
“I have seen some concerns that this could be a Seahawks-Broncos sized blowout with the 49ers’ physical defense attacking a “finesse” Kansas City offense, but I really don’t buy that narrative. Yes, pass-happy teams have a rather poor history in title games against tough defenses, but some teams are just different.”
Yes, the Chiefs are just different, but this year the story is looking similar. Replace the 49ers with the Buccaneers, add some extra tension over the offensive line shortcomings, and I am seeing the same things said this week. I even have someone in my Twitter mentions taking bets with people that the Chiefs won’t score more than 14 points.
I don’t want to make a “they’re only going to score 14 points?” remark, because I’ve already seen enough comparisons between the 2007 Giants and 2020 Buccaneers. It started with beating the Saints in the divisional round after getting swept by them in the regular season, something we’ve only seen the 2007 Giants do to Dallas. Then both won a one-score game in the NFC Championship Game in Green Bay. Both teams have three road wins to reach the Super Bowl. Both teams have won three games this postseason despite allowing at least a 50% conversion rate on third down, which is the most wins in a playoff run since 1991.
While the Chiefs aren’t undefeated, it’s pretty close with Mahomes having won 25 of his last 26 starts. To be safe, I threw a couple bucks on a Tampa Bay 17-14 win, but I’d hold my breath on that one from cashing. This is arguably the most skill player firepower in Super Bowl history and I expect both teams to score at least 20 points. Every Tampa Bay opponent has scored at least 20 this postseason.
But I will say I was watching some of Chiefs-49ers the other day and that was a grind for Kansas City’s offense. I don’t think the Tampa Bay defense is as good as the 49ers, but if JPP and Shaq Barrett go nuts against that line, well, pressure is pressure, and it makes any offense look bad. It was wild to remember that the Chiefs had 10 points halfway through the fourth quarter, and you can argue it’s the least impressive playoff start of the Mahomes era. That 31-20 final may be the most misleading in Super Bowl history for how that game actually played out. It was not an easy win for the Chiefs, but you still have to stop them for 60 minutes, not 53.
Tyreek Hill Dud Incoming?
Finally, one last piece of research I was interested in this week that could be telling in how this game plays out, or at the very least could have use for people placing bets (especially SGP) is what happens in a playoff rematch after a receiver torches a defense in the regular season?
Hill had 269 yards and three touchdowns in Tampa Bay in Week 12, making Carlton Davis look like Carlton Banks. Obviously, that won’t happen again on Sunday, but should we expect Hill to put up 60 yards, 120 yards, 20 yards, or what? He went from 20 yards against Buffalo in Week 6 to 172 yards in the AFC Championship Game, so you just never know. This is the reverse situation though. Hill had 66 yards in the final three quarters in Week 12 after that absurd 203 yards in the first quarter alone.
For my approach to finding similar examples, I did not want to limit it to 200-yard days, since those are rare. I also did not want to go down to 150 and dig through a lot of game logs, so I capped it at 175 yards and found that this will be the 19th time since 1970 that a receiver is getting a playoff rematch with a defense he torched for 175+ yards in the regular season. This does not include what would have been another example when Antonio Brown had 189 yards against the 2015 Broncos, but was unavailable for the playoff rematch after getting knocked out by Vontaze Burfict in Cincinnati.
Here are the results sorted by the biggest declines in receiving yards in the playoffs.
This is not a ton of examples in 50 years, and Hill may be the most dangerous receiver on the list, but this is not an encouraging sign for him going off again. The average receiver declined by almost 140 yards in the playoffs and only two of the 18 (Tim Brown and Michael Haynes) were able to hit 100 yards again. Touchdowns also dropped from 28 to six. There were also four extra losses in the playoffs, and the only Super Bowl on the list saw Charlie Brown’s 1983 Washington team get blown out 38-9.
I thought Washington’s Gary Clark (-241 yards) in the 1986 NFC Championship Game may have been injured early, but I checked the gamebook and it looks like he caught zero balls on 13 targets with four drops. Ouch. Don Beebe going off for 220 yards against the 49ers in 1996 is pretty damn amusing as well. It’s not that big of a surprise he only had 2 yards in the playoffs.
My gut is on Travis Kelce taking over as the leading receiver for the Chiefs this week. No one has been able to effectively shut Hill and Kelce down in the same game outside of maybe Denver in the snow. They held them to 86 yards and one touchdown.
Hill going off for 200 yards again in the Super Bowl would be legendary, but I’m putting my money more on Kelce, and if I do include Hill in my parlays, I’m likely taking the under 94.5.
Prediction Time
I put a $25 bet on Bucs 31-27 (+13000), basically repeating the Week 12 game script, except for an ending where Tampa Bay gets the ball back and scores a game-winning touchdown late. No, I still wouldn’t be happy if I nailed it. Last year, I had the Chiefs winning by four, which was in the bank until Darrel Williams took that last run 38 yards for a touchdown.
If you’ve followed me for a little or a long time, you know it’s S.O.P. for me to pick the Brady-led team in these things. It stems back to how I’d often pick against the Patriots and they would still win, so I stopped doing it for the 2006 AFC Championship Game in Indianapolis, which the Colts came back to win. So I automatically pick Brady as a reverse jinx. You basically have to ignore my final prediction and read what I wrote in the preview to gauge if I think his team is going to win or not.
In this one, I think it’s clear I believe the Chiefs should win, but I just know how close to the vest they play it and how that could easily backfire against Tampa. Especially when you are at a disadvantage in the trenches. Especially when you are facing the LOAT. Especially when Arians has the magic beans that shit out close wins as well as any active coach in the NFL.
But like Mahomes said after the Buffalo win, he trusts his guys over anybody, and I trust him (and Reid and Kelce and Mathieu, etc.). I trust this team so much that I am going to pick the Chiefs straight up to win the whole damn thing again.
(But you know damn well I am hedging like crazy in bets on Tampa Bay winning just in case, and Tampa Bay +3.5 is legitimately a good pick in my opinion)
Final: Chiefs 31, Buccaneers 28 (MVP: Patrick Mahomes)
Captain Comeback: NFL Analysis by Scott Kacsmar 
That is the worst article I have ever read….awful. Did the writer even play sports?