NFL Divisional Round Predictions: Which Teams Will Go On To Witness The Kick Of Destiny?

We’re out with the NFL’s wild-card weekend and in for a contentious divisional round weekend, as we have four teams facing off to decide who will emerge the NFC and AFC championships, and who will be headed to Arizona to face off in 2023’s Big Game! The NFL’s playoff picture is getting clearer, and so are the forecasted Super Bowl hopefuls.

Two top-seed teams in both divisions will be coming off a bye, and plenty of dogs eager to bite will be taking the field. Both Saturday and Sunday’s games will be integral in deciding who will advance to the Super Bowl, but even before we’ve settled on our final two candidates to win it all this year, you can still get your outright winner futures picks in on FanDuel Sportsbook!

This weekend will be full of heavy chalk moneyline favorites, but if you’re hungry for single bets with a little more juice and don’t mind longer-term gratification, futures bets might be where you want to look. It’s more difficult to make predictions on outcomes that are further away, but if you’re up for the challenge, you might stand a chance at a bigger payout than you’d get from most single lines.

Tight end Rob Gronkowski is also offering FanDuel users a decent bet credit payout, a potential share of the sportsbook’s $10 million promotional pool! So as the league’s divisional round looms just around the corner, let’s take a look at the oddsmakers' current outlook on the NFL’s playoff picture.

NFL Divisional Round Betting Lines

As the weekend approaches, we can see some clear NFL divisional round betting trends in the oddsmakers’ eyes, both for the two divisional games Saturday, as well as the two coming up this Sunday. The books see heavy chalk moneyline favorites in all four weekend games, and understandably so.

On Saturday, both the NFC and AFC top seeds will be returning to their home fields from a bye week’s rest. Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs will be fending off the Jacksonville Jaguars at Arrowhead Stadium, and later in the evening, the New York Giants’ will contest the Philadelphia Eagles’ top-seed spot at Lincoln Financial Field.

Quarterback Jalen Hurts is expected to return to the field and be playing through his recent shoulder injury, and doesn’t seem fazed or worried about it impacting his ability, telling the press that “I'm going to go out there and just play my game, and whatever happens, happens." (ESPN)

If the bookmakers are to be believed, Hurts shouldn’t have much to worry about this weekend, and neither should Patrick Mahomes. Both of their teams are respectively -360 and -490 moneyline favorites on FanDuel Sportsbook, and according to Dimers’ predictive computer betting algorithm (which simulates games 10,000 times over), both teams have a 76% implied probability of winning outright.

While that’s good news for both home favorites, it’s not great news for bettors hoping to turn a decent profit off of Saturday’s favored moneyline. That might make you want to consider looking at FanDuel’s point spreads, currently set at -8.5 for Kansas City’s home game, and -7.5 points for Philly. Per TeamRankings’ stats, despite both teams’ exemplary performance, neither team was great at covering the spread in 2022.

The Birds only covered the spread 47.1% of the time in 2022, while the Chiefs only covered it at a meager 37.5%. Fortunately, these two games still might have safer value in the over/under: Dimers’ algorithm sees a 54% probability of the Chiefs’ game going under, and a 51% probability of the Eagles doing the same.

Moving on to Sunday’s two-game slate, we have two more heavy moneyline favorites, competing for a chance to go against the top divisional seeds. The Buffalo Bills are -245 moneyline favorites against the Cincinnati Bengals, priced as +200 underdog favorites on FanDuel. That game is set to kick off at 3:01ET this Sunday, and at 6:31ET, the San Francisco 49ers will kick things off against the Dallas Cowboys.

The Niners are currently -200 favorites, while Dallas are +168 dogs. While both teams are rightly favored in their spots, there might still be potential value in the underdog point spreads. The Cincinnati Bengals (+5.5 on this game’s spread) had a 12-5 (70.6%) record ATS in the regular season, according to TeamRankings, while the Cowboys (who are just +3.5 points on the spread) have a 61.1% clip rate.

But this week isn’t just the NFL’s divisional round week: it’s also very likely the last week that NFL’s futures betting markets will be this wide open! From outrights, to the correct matchups, to the most valuable candidates for most valuable player, let’s look at the odds for FanDuel’s Super Bowl futures betting markets ahead of the Divisional Round.

Super Bowl Betting Odds

Super Bowl LVII - Outright Betting

• Kansas City Chiefs, +300

• Buffalo Bills, +330

• San Francisco 49ers, +450

• Philadelphia Eagles, +500

• Cincinnati Bengals, +750

• Dallas Cowboys, +850

• New York Giants, +2500

• Jacksonville Jaguars, +3300

Despite currently being a top seed to win their division, Philadelphia is still seen as a +500 underdog (in the eyes of the oddsmakers) to win the Super Bowl. It’s also surprising that there’s quite a few teams favored below +1000 odds in this outright betting market, but this weekend is likely to cut down quite a few of those favorites.

The bookmakers think it will most likely be one of the top four teams to make it all the way, a trend which is also pretty apparent in their futures market for predicting the correct Super Bowl LVII contenders:

Super Bowl LVII Correct Matchup

• Buffalo Bills vs Dallas Cowboys, +1000

• Buffalo Bills vs New York Giants, +3500

• Buffalo Bills vs Philadelphia Eagles, +550

• Buffalo Bills vs San Francisco 49ers, +600

• Cincinnati Bengals vs Dallas Cowboys, +2000

• Cincinnati Bengals vs New York Giants, +6500

• Cincinnati Bengals vs Philadelphia Eagles, +1100

• Cincinnati Bengals vs San Francisco 49ers, +1200

• Jacksonville Jaguars vs Dallas Cowboys, +5500

• Jacksonville Jaguars vs New York Giants, +19000

• Jacksonville Jaguars vs Philadelphia Eagles, +3400

• Jacksonville Jaguars vs San Francisco 49ers, +3600

• Kansas City Chiefs vs Dallas Cowboys, +900

• Kansas City Chiefs vs New York Giants, +3200

• Kansas City Chiefs vs Philadelphia Eagles, +500

• Kansas City Chiefs vs San Francisco 49ers, +500

Even though the Eagles are seeded in fourth place to win the Super Bowl outright, they are still favored among one of the two most heavily favored outcomes in this market; to face Kansas City, priced here at +500 odds. The other +500 odds pick is on the Chiefs to face off against the 49ers, but Philly is still favored (at +550 odds) to potentially face off with Buffalo.

If you’re feeling particularly confident about your futures betting ability, FanDuel also has another futures market allowing you to predict which team will outright win the Super Bowl against which team. Currently, the top three most favored outcomes in this market are all priced at +1000 odds:

1. Kansas City Chiefs to beat Philadelphia Eagles (+1000)

2. Buffalo Bills to beat Philadelphia Eagles (+1000)

3. Kansas City Chiefs to beat S.F. 49ers (+1000)

There are a lot of potential outcomes you can currently find in that market (a lot more than we can condense here), but these are the three most favored outcomes right now. It’s likely that the outcomes over the coming weekend will greatly cut down on these options, so check them out while you can. Finally, let’s check in on the AP NFL MVP odds ahead of the divisional weekend.

Super Bowl MVP Odds

Super Bowl LVII MVP

• Patrick Mahomes, +350

• Josh Allen, +400

• Jalen Hurts, +700

• Brock Purdy, +750

• Joe Burrow, +850

The top five picks in this futures market shouldn’t come as any surprise if you’ve been following our prior coverage on Super Bowl MVP favorites and AP NFL MVP dark horses. Two out of the top three QBs are playing on top-seed teams overall, and unless we see any underdog upsets over the divisional round weekend, we can expect them to remain likely favored candidates here.

Still, there are more questions to be asked about Super Bowl LVII. For instance, will Gronk be able to make the Kick of Destiny?

FanDuel Gronk Promo

From now until Super Bowl LVII game day, FanDuel users who place pre-live Super Bowl wagers could stand to win a non-withdrawable share of a $10 million bet credit pool, if Rob Gronkowski manages to kick a 25-yard field goal during the sportsbook’s Super Bowl ad break!

Read our full review to find out more about FanDuel, and you can follow our signup link to claim their welcome bonus.

Wager responsibly.