Every year, a team emerges as a trendy preseason Super Bowl pick. Do those squads usually succeed? Let's evaluate 20 recent candidates.
Green Bay Packers.
The league's youngest team was propelled forward by a remarkable stretch from Jordan Love, who led the league in QBR over the final seven weeks of the season. The Packers won six of their final eight to sneak into the postseason as the 7-seed, where they promptly embarrassed the Cowboys in Dallas, going up 27-0 before eventually winning by 16 points. They gave San Francisco a run for their money in the divisional round, too, as it took a late field goal miss by Anders Carlson and a touchdown run by Christian McCaffrey with 1:41 to go to give the 49ers a 24-21 victory.
The Packers' breakout, at least in terms of wins, just wasn't quite as impressive as most of the others we'll get to on this list. They had a 7.5-win projection heading into the season and went 9-8, albeit with many of those wins weighted later in the season. I'm optimistic about Green Bay this season and see it as a Super Bowl contender, but it would be getting much more in the way of Super Bowl hype if it had finished 11-6 instead.
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