When Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers (10-6) won the Super Bowl six years ago, they did so as a Wild Card team after finishing second behind the Chicago Bears in the NFC North.
That was the last time a Wild Card team won the big game, and the odds of it happening this year are long at +1000 (bet $100 to win $1,000) compared to -5000 (bet $5,000 to win $100) that it will not. The New York Giants (11-5) also accomplished the feat two years before the Packers.
Ironically, the Giants will be visiting Green Bay on Sunday as a Wild Card team, and they won at Lambeau Field in 2008 en route to defeating the 18-0 New England Patriots in the biggest upset in Super Bowl history. New York probably has the best chance of any of the four Wild Card teams this season to get back to the Super Bowl considering the team’s past success in the postseason, especially on the road and at Lambeau.
Eli Manning’s Giants are a perfect 6-0 against the spread in their last six road playoff games, and that includes two wins as big underdogs against the Packers. Manning beat Brett Favre in his last postseason game in Green Bay and topped a Rodgers-led team that went an NFL-best 15-1 during the regular season, so he definitely has what it takes.
As for the other three Wild Card teams, the Detroit Lions (9-7) could also be a nice sleeper pick if you throw out how they played the last three weeks of the regular season. The Lions looked like they were in control of the NFC North before a three-game skid at the end of the year pushed them into the Wild Card spot with a road matchup versus the Seattle Seahawks (10-5-1) and gave the Packers the division title.
In the AFC, it is hard to fathom the Oakland Raiders (12-4) and Miami Dolphins (10-6) winning more than one game combined in the playoffs because both of them are playing without their starting quarterbacks.
Oakland will give rookie Connor Cook his first career start against the Houston Texans (9-7) on Saturday, and Miami will turn to veteran Matt Moore for the fourth straight game at the Pittsburgh Steelers (11-5) on Sunday in place of Ryan Tannehill. The odds of Moore or Cook recording the most passing yards during Wild Card Weekend are listed at +1000 and +2000, respectively. Manning is +500, and Pittsburgh’s Ben Roethlisberger is the +200 favorite.
In addition, the over/under on wins for Wild Card teams this weekend is 1.5, with the under favored heavily at -300. Last season, all four road teams won Wild Card games, something that has virtually no shot to happen this year due to the extremely weak field. The most likely scenario is one Wild Card team winning at a price of +120, with Oakland and New York the favorites of that group. The second-most likely is no teams at +200.