Super Bowl LII Preview
The world of sports is full of underdog stories, they make the game that much more interesting because everyone likes to see that underdog beat the dominant team.
It is always one of the great parts of sport but there may not be a team that has embraced the underdog role better than the Philadelphia Eagles.
They are a strange underdog though as they ended the 2017 season as one of the top teams in the NFL.
Without looking at the full season and seeing the records and the numbers they put up it would be insane to think that they weren’t going to be playing at this point in the season.
Yet they were a team that ended the season and nobody even thought that they were that far up the standings.
It is all about the way their season went though as they snuck up on everyone and went on a massive run right in the middle of the season.
Things began to turn when the leader of the team went down as second-year QB Carson Wentz hurt his ACL in Week 14.
Wentz was proving to be the best decision the Eagles had made in the draft in a long time as he was headed to the MVP award.
He drove the Eagles to the top of the standings and was looking like a decent shot at beating out Tom Brady for the biggest individual award in the league.
His injury ended his season though and that injury had a lot of people looking at the EAfles as if everything had come to an end.
He was a major player for the team and so most analysts saw that he wasn’t going to play and believed it was over for the team.
It was believed to the point that they were constantly going through the rest of the weeks with everyone thinking that it was going to be the end of their run.
Every week though they continued to win and continued to climb up the standings to remain one of the best in the league.
Although Nick Foles was now at the helm and the offence wasn’t quite as potent as it had been the defence stepped up in a big way
With one of the best defences in the league, the Eagles remained the best team in the NFC and took the top spot in the playoffs.
That still didn’t stop everyone from writing them off in the playoffs as they were just not going to be good enough to beat some of the more experienced teams, especially with Foles running the offence.
The Eagles took out the Atlanta Falcons in a close battle and then they walked through the Minnesota Vikings for the NFC title.
Through it all, they were doubted and the team has embraced that better than most other teams.
They certainly feel slighted by the underdog status but with players wearing dog masks they are having fun with the distinction and telling everyone to just watch them.
That attitude has made some people start believing but there is little doubt that the majority of people have them as underdogs for another game.
That is because they meet the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl who are quite literally the definition of dominance.
With 5 Super Bowls since 2001 and 7 total Super Bowl appearances, this group is one of the most dominant franchises in NFL history.
Never has there been a group that has come together like owner Robert Kraft, head coach Bill Belichick and quarterback Tom Brady and accomplished what they have accomplished.
Brady and Belichick are headed to the Hall of Fame when they decide to retire and will lead the debate for the best coach and quarterback in the NFL.
At Super Bowl LII they will look to match the Pittsburgh Steelers as the most successful franchise in the Super Bowl era and if they win they will do it in far less time than the Steelers did.
So with this group in place, it is hard not to look at the match-up and see a massive underdog story.
Despite the fact that they both finished at the top of their conferences and had identical records along with the Eagles having the better defence, it is hard to bet against the Patriots.
They have only lost two Super Bowls and they seem to have a way to win every game whether they are up by multiple touchdowns or down by 25 points in the third quarter, see Super Bowl LI.
Still, the Eagles give people some pause because so many have already bet against them from Week 14 into the conference championship.
Can they pull off one of the biggest upsets in the Super Bowl by proving to everyone that they can beat the dynasty?
It is far from an easy task as a lot of great teams have tried and failed to beat them on the biggest stage.
The Sport Addiction 