Speculating On A Non-Purdy Super Bowl MVP

To those who say that it’s more efficient to just bet the winning QB to be the MVP of the Super Bowl than to bet the winner of the game because the QB is the most impactful player, I give you Brock Purdy.

Let’s see who the leading candidates are for MVP and include some seemingly mispriced massive longshots on the assumption that a defensive player takes home the ultimate prize in the ultimate game.

Yes, MVPs have been QBs in 14 of the 23 Super Bowls this century, 61%.

So to make the math simple, if you have a team with a 50% chance to win, there’s a 30% chance the QB will be the MVP; so anything better than +225 is a good bet.

That’s exactly the Best Odds for Patrick Mahomes to win the award. And the Chiefs are 2.5-point underdogs.

But all QBs are not equal and a Chiefs victory will almost certainly result in Mahomes winning the award.

He doesn’t even have to have a great game since he’s unquestionably the team’s best player.

The market at +225 given the point spread is saying he has a 70% chance to win. That seems conservative.

That brings us to Purdy. The consensus seems to be that Purdy is the fourth or fifth-best player on his own offense.

If there was an MVP award given for the first two playoff games this year, Purdy possibly won one but probably lost two.

Purdy loses to Christian McCaffrey in the divisional round and probably loses to him in the Championship game but let’s say that’s 50/50.

Still, that’s at best a 25% implied probability for Purdy.

Even though the Niners are favored with an implied 56% win probability at -130, the oddsmakers are saying a teammate is more likely to be the MVP of the game (55% for the field vs. 45% for Purdy).

CMC MVP Of Both 2024 Postseason Wins?

McCaffrey was the MVP in one of the postseason wins for sure and probably both of them.

He’s priced conservatively probably because a RB has not won the Award since the 1997 season (Terrell Davis).

That was the fifth RB win out of the prior 16 Super Bowls. But again, zero RB wins this century. Teams with great backs just haven’t advanced to the Super Bowl.

But McCaffrey is a great back.

He had 132 yards and two touchdowns in the NFC Championship game and 128 and two touchdowns in the Divisional Round win.

McCaffrey’s Best Odds are +550, which implies a 15.4% chance to win the award.

If he’s merely the likely winner, which seems very fair to believe, his price should be about +270 given that the Niners are favorites in the game.

So if you want to bet on the player/team and not the history of the award, McCaffrey has an attractive price.

Let’s move to an offensive position that’s gotten a lot of love in recent years: wide receiver (two of the last five Super Bowl MVPs).

While Mahomes will get the lion’s share of the credit for any production his receivers generate, that’s not the case for Purdy, who gains a lot of passing yards due to the run-after catch by his receivers.

Deebo Generates His Own Yards

The poster boy for this is Deebo Samuel, who runs designed plays from scrimmage, too.

He can score once receiving and once running. His receiving yards are likely to be more owned by him than the club’s other weapons.

However, McCaffrey is also a running/receiving threat and will get far more opportunities to make big plays than Samuel, who is plus +2100.

Is McCaffrey four times as likely to win MVP than Samuel? I’d say it’s closer to twice as likely.

San Francisco’s other main wideout is Brandon Aiyuk at +4600. Aiyuk would need 100+ yards and two TDs. He did that one time in 2023.

That’s about 6% where his implied probability to win MVP is 2.1%. But Aiyuk is way more likely to share credit for his big plays with Purdy than is Samuel.

No tight end has ever won the award and Kittle doesn’t get enough targets to believe in, despite his great talent. His Best Odds are +7100. For comparison’s sake, Travis Kelce’s are +1500.

If you want to hit Yahtzee, look at defensive MVP candidates. Again, if the QB is unlikely to win, which we’re all in agreement on, that opens up a pathway for a defensive MVP.

There have been nine defensive players to win Super Bowl MVP, a base rate of 16%.

But again, it seems more likely than average in this game due to the expected weakness of Purdy as a potential winner, in addition to the Niners being the favorite.

A Pick Six Payoff?

Best Odds has San Francisco’s leading defensive MVP candidates as Nick Bosa (+10100), Fred Warner (+18100), Chase Young (+26100), Javon Hargrave (+3200), Arik Armstead (+35100), Randy Gregory (+40100) and Charvarius Ward (+40100).

Mahomes doesn’t get sacked, generally. So the lineman seems suboptimal long shots. He also doesn’t throw picks, generally, but it’s possible.

He did have the highest interception rate of his career. You’ll probably need a long return and probably a Pick Six to cash.

There have been 13 Pick Sixes in Super Bowl history. All but one of those teams has won the game. And two of the players with Pick Sixes have been the Super Bowl MVP. That’s about a 3.5% chance.

The 49ers defenders with the most picks this year are Charvarius Ward (5) and Fred Warner (4). So they’re most likely to get pick six.

If you put $10 Ward, and he hits, you win $4,020. Warner is so central to the defense overall (and an All-Pro) that he can win without a return touchdown.

If you put $10 on Warner, the payout would be $1,820.