Underdogs Pay On Championship Sunday

Article ByKyle Garlett

January 29, 2024

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Posted in: US Sports Betting News, US Gambling News

Our Super Bowl Sunday is set. 

Moving on to Las Vegas in two weeks from the AFC are the Kansas City Chiefs. For the second straight week, they were an underdog. And for the second straight week, they proved that point spread to be woefully inaccurate.

For the 11th time in the career of Patrick Mahomes, football bettors were getting the two-time MVP as an underdog. He is now 8-3 straight up when that happens, and 9-1-1 against the spread when he is getting points.

In the NFC, the San Francisco 49ers were victorious. But if you were an NFL bettor for this game, you only cashed your ticket if you took the underdog Detroit Lions. The 49ers are playing in their eighth Super Bowl all-time, much to their delight. The Lions lost by just three points, 34-31, much to the delight of patrons at Michigan online sportsbooks.

And that is our matchup for Super Bowl Sunday. The Chiefs and 49ers, the same game we saw for Super Bowl LIV, the first of this streak for Kansas City that has now seen them go to four of the last five Super Bowls.

San Francisco led by as many as 10 points in the fourth quarter, but ultimately lost the Lombardi Trophy to Mahomes, 31-20. In that game four years ago, the Chiefs were 1.5-point favorites.

The opening line for Super Bowl LVIII at BetUS.com has the 49ers as 1-point favorites.

And we just talked about how you should bet on Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs when they are underdogs.

The 49ers Betting Road to Las Vegas

From the first week of the season, the 49ers looked like a Super Bowl team. They crushed the Pittsburgh Steelers on the opening Sunday of the season, winning 30-7. They went on to begin the season with five straight wins, and they were 4-1 against the spread.

Making the 49ers one of the best teams in football and one of the best bets to place in the NFL was an average margin of victory of 20 points.

The 49ers hit a mid-season speed bump, losing three straight games to the Cleveland Browns, Minnesota Vikings, and Cincinnati Bengals. But from Week 10 onward, they were outstanding. From their 34-3 win over the Jacksonville Jaguars to their week 17 win over the Washington Commanders, the Niners were 7-1 straight up, and 5-3 against the spread.

The over also hit in 10 of 17 regular season games, as it did in the NFC Championship win over the Lions.

The Chiefs Betting Road to Las Vegas

Preseason, the Chiefs were a Super Bowl favorite. They were the defending champions, and the best NFL online sportsbooks across the country had them as one of the favorites to go to the game again as AFC champs.

Then they lost at home in Week 1 to the Lions. The Chiefs went on to win their next six games, sitting at 6-1 before they traveled to Denver in Week 8. But something was off. They struggled to beat the New York Jets and Minnesota Vikings, and their offense struggled in wins over the Jaguars and Denver Broncos, and the wide receiving corps looked out of sorts.

Then they lost a game to the Broncos, the beginning of a stretch of losses in five of eight games, including a loss at home against the Las Vegas Raiders. And on the sideline in that game, there appeared to be a growing schism among the stars.

The Chiefs had fallen from +600 to win the Super Bowl at the beginning of the season to +1000 after losing to Las Vegas.

But since that Christmas night, the Chiefs have won five straight games, covering the spread in all five games. And now they have one more game to play – Super Bowl LVIII.