2023 Super Bowl: Who Will Win the Big Game?
Quantifying factors related to sports psychology.
The Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles kick-off the 2023 Super Bowl in about one week. About a decade ago, a colleague and I performed research on decades’ worth of championship results across the major sports, including the NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL.
Our goal is to quantify the impact of factors related to sports psychology. Early results were mentioned in our book, “Who Will Win the Big Game: A Psychological and Mathematical Method.”
The research launched a series of articles that has been published by the Wall Street Journal and New York Times — and has picked the correct winner of major sporting events about 65% of the time. Here is one of our earlier articles written with the Wall Street Journal.
Wall St. Journal: Measuring What Wins a Super Bowl
What do our “championship factors” say about this year’s Super Bowl?
Big Game Experience
Our book and series of articles is entitled “Who Will Win the Big Game?” And, it turns out that “big game experience” is one of the key factors related to winning championships. This may be due to confidence, experience — or the simple fact that getting to the finals again means that your team is not a fluke. No matter what: the fact remains that big game experience is correlated to winning titles. The Kansas City Chiefs return to the Super Bowl once again (also in 2020 and 2021) and take this factor. Edge: Kansas City.
Leadership and Minimizing Errors
In today’s high-scoring NFL, the quarterback is the most important player on the field. Interestingly, the QB metric most related to winning the Super Bowl is NOT glitzy TD or QB Rating statistics, but fewest interceptions! The team with fewer INTs during the regular season has gone on to win close to 70% of all Super Bowls. Philadelphia’s Jalen Hurts led one of the NFL’s best offenses using both his legs and his arm — and Philly threw just 9 INTs. This compares to 12 for Kansas City. Edge: Philadelphia.
Defense
Our quant facts show that the old line, “Defense wins champsionships,” is true. Of course, you need to score to win a game. However, a good offense can sometimes run up the score during the regular season against weaker opponents. This may help strong offenses gain an overstated advantage with fans. The same is not often the case for a strong defense. More often than not, a strong defense beats a strong offense. Edge: Philadelphia.
Consistency — Offense
Consistency-related factors can help teams and athletes get into a rhythm during the pressure of playoffs and championships. In fact, the higher level of competition can sometimes stifle a team’s offense. Thus, the numbers show that certain consistency factors across every sport are correlated to winning the big game. KC and Philly are close in this category, but the edge goes to KC, and their 4.7 average yards per carry. The element of surprise, relative to KC’s strong passing game is a weapon. Edge: KC.
Consistency — Defense
The numbers show that defense really does championships. This is true to such a degree, that our key consistency factor related to winning the Super Bowl is on the defensive side. That is, if your defense can prevent your opponent from mounting a good consistent offense, you are well on the way to winning the big game. KC’s defensive line is strong, and beats Philly in this area. Edge: KC.
Summary
The championship factors favor Kansas City 3-2, so the Kansas City Chiefs are our official quant fact prediction for this year’s Super Bowl. At the time of this writing, Philadelphia is a very slight 1.5 favorite — meaning KC is a slight underdog. And while oddsmakers say this game is a tossup Monte Carlo simulations show that there is more than a 50% chance that the game is decided by 10 or more points — for either team!
Enjoy the big game!
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Quant Facts & Who Will Win the 2022 Super Bowl?
Carlton Chin, a graduate of MIT, is an investment officer and portfolio strategist. When not studying alternative investments, downside risk, and portfolio construction, he enjoys applying numbers and probability to sports analytics. He has worked with various sports organizations, including the Sacramento Kings — and has been quoted by the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and ESPN.
Dr. Jay Granat, psychotherapist, named one of America’s Top 10 Mental Gurus by Golf Digest, has worked with Olympic athletes & sports organizations. He is the owner of StayInTheZone.com and has authored several books on sport psychology — appearing on ESPN, CBS & Good Morning America.