It’s combine season. Prospective NFL players are strutting their stuff on the field, and NFL fans everywhere are anxiously looking towards the NFL Draft and what that will mean for their beloved teams. Free agents are chatting with teams, and the rumor mill is running wild. In the wake of Super Bowl LVII, what are the prospects for each team in 2023-2024?
Who is the most desperate to go all the way to the Super Bowl, and who is most likely to break their fans’ hearts (again)? For some, this can make or break a betting strategy when placing a NFL wager via one of the best NJ sportsbook apps, such as BetMGM.
NJ.Bet, an online sports betting guide for New Jersey, surveyed fans across the U.S. about NFL teams: who wants to win, what obstacles are in the way, and whether there’s some favoritism going on. We also looked at a variety of team stats and created a “heartbreak calculator” to learn which teams are most likely to break hearts in the upcoming 2023-2024 season.
NFL Teams Most Likely to Break Fan Hearts in 2023
Heartbreak is a multi-variable affair: this calculator shows the likelihood that a given NFL team will break fan hearts in the coming football season. To figure this out, we looked at year-over-year record improvement (or lack thereof), injury rates, team age, number of 2023 Pro Bowl players, and Super Bowl wins in the last 10 years; and determined that these are the teams that are going to break hearts in 2023.
Bad news for Arizona fans: it is almost a sure bet with bet365 that they’ll be heartbroken in the 2023-2024 season. After analyzing team data like average age, pro bowl players, fan confidence, and year-over-year record improvement, the Arizona Cardinals came out as the team with the highest heartbreak calculator score– 100! After the Cardinals come the New Orleans Saints, Houston Texans, Indianapolis Colts, and Detroit Lions.
With the exception of the Lions, each of these potentially heartbreaking teams had worse records from 2021 to 2022, and they all had a fairly high number of player injuries during the 2022 season. All of this adds up to a fair likelihood of heartbreak in the 2023 season.
At the other end of the heartbreak calculator lie the teams that might just help fans find love again: these are the teams least likely to break hearts in the 2023-2024 season. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Kansas City Chiefs sit on top of that list for the 2023-2024 season, clearly riding high on their Super Bowl victory.
Other teams likely to build fans up rather than inspire heartbreak include the Philadelphia Eagles, Seattle Seahawks, New England Patriots, and Dallas Cowboys. Fan confidence is riding high for all of these contenders, but especially Kansas City and Philadelphia, given their success in making Super Bowl LVII. These are healthy teams, with improving win rates (except for New England), and 4 of the top 5 teams have won at least one Super Bowl out of the last 10. All of this adds up to pretty good odds of these fans avoiding heartbreak in 2023.
NFL Teams who want a Super Bowl Victory the Most
Breaking hearts or not, it’s no question that all NFL teams want to win the Super Bowl – it is the culmination of every season. But who wants it the most? To NFL fans, the Philadelphia Eagles are the thirstiest franchise in the NFL, followed by the Buffalo Bills, the Cincinnati Bengals, the most recent champs Kansas City Chiefs, and the Dallas Cowboys. The Eagles came closest in 2023….but you never know if they’re a sure bet.
While nearly seven in 10 NFL fans are confident that their team will make the playoffs next season, nearly three in four are convinced their team won’t make the Super Bowl – they’ll have to rely on fantasy teams to feel the joys of victory at the highest level.
Not only that, but 48% of fans had their hearts broken in the 2022-2023 NFL season. Will next year be any better?
What Fans Think Stands in the Way of Winning the Super Bowl
NFL fans are in it for life- the average time spent being a fan is over two decades–23 years to be exact! Sadly, heartbreak also can be a lifelong commitment: 36% of NFL fans have never seen their NFL team win the Super Bowl in their lifetime.
What stands in the way? Top obstacles to victory include bad players, injuries, the coaching staff, poor offense, and just plain bad luck- over one in five blame luck as an obstacle to victory!
Another potential obstacle is favoritism by officials: over half of NFL fans believe that officials play favorites. The most favored teams by the referees? The Kansas City Chiefs top the list, followed by the New England Patriots, Dallas Cowboys, Green Bay Packers, and Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
NFL fans think it goes beyond just favoritism for a certain team, over one in six fans believe that the league itself is rigged. However, some fans buy into this theory more than others, for example, 42% of Atlanta Falcons fans believe the NFL is rigged, followed by 40% of New York Jets fans, 36% of Jacksonville Jaguar fans, 36% of Las Vegas Raiders fans, and 33% of Arizona Cardinals fans.
Whether or not there’s a secret cabal of scriptwriters determining the season, or if the game is as pure as the scent of a tailgate on game day, there is no denying that fans can’t wait for the 2023 NFL season. How will the draft affect a team’s prospects? Will some rookies save teams from heartbreak? We can only stay tuned to find out!
Methodology
For the fan survey, we surveyed 1,006 NFL fans nationwide on their thoughts about the upcoming season. Among respondents, every NFL team fandom was represented. 50% were men, 49% women, and 1% were non-binary. Ages ranged from 18-85 with an average age of 41.
To create the heartbreak calculator, we analyzed win increases year over year from the last two seasons, fan confidence (as taken by survey), Super Bowls won in the last 10 years, players in the Pro Bowl, injury rates, and average team age to calculate the likelihood a team will be heartbroken next year. Data was gathered from NFL.com, www.pro-football-reference.com, and each NFL team’s website.
Fair Use
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