What’s happened to Super Bowl favorites?
They couldn’t give enough points to the Kansas City Chiefs and Oakland Raiders in the first two Super Bowls, which at the time was called the AFL and NFL Championship Game. Vince Lombardi’s Packers were 17-point favorites against Kansas City and 13-point favorites versus the Raiders and won the first two title games by 25 and 19 points.
To complete the 1968 season, the betting world knew how dominant the National Football League was versus the American Football League and didn’t buy Joe Namath’s guarantee, piling on the Baltimore Colts like they were a sure thing while giving 17½ points on the line.
Upset number one. Jets win, 16-7.
The following year, the last Super Bowl played before the leagues merged into the American and National Football Conferences, the underdog Chiefs downed the 10-point favored Minnesota Vikings, 23-7. Super Bowl results after four games showed favorites winning two games and covering two of the four games against the line. In the ensuing 37 years, favorites in the Super Bowl won 27 of 37 games straight-up and compiled a point spread record of 21-15-1.
The public usually bets the favorite, so you know the books were going to start eroding the advantage with the perceived better teams. But few would have expected that not only would the extra points edge the advantage to the underdogs, but the underdogs suddenly became viable money line plays.