Super Bowl LVII predictions and 2022 NFL season preview: Rams can run it back

Free American football tips, best bets and analysis for the 2022 NFL season, which starts on Thursday.

Best bets for Super Bowl LVII

Los Angeles Rams
2pts each-way 11-1 bet365, BoyleSports

Baltimore Ravens
1pt each-way 18-1 general

Minnesota Vikings
0.5 each-way 40-1 general

2022 NFL season preview

Repeat Super Bowl champions and good Hollywood sequels have one thing in common: they are few and far between.

But if one Los Angeles institution can rehash the same script and make it work, it's a top-class Rams side with the potential to become the eighth NFL franchise to win back-to-back titles.

It’s been Super Bowl or bust for the Rams since they swapped St Louis for LA in 2016 and after three failed playoff runs, including a loss at Super Bowl 53, the franchise’s gambles finally paid off last term.

A trouble-free 12-5 regular season was followed by a strong post-season performance, culminating in a narrow Super Bowl success at their SoFi Stadium home at the expense of 150-1 underdogs the Cincinnati Bengals.

A lot has changed since the ticker tape dropped on the Rams and with the dust settled on an incident-packed off-season, the NFL landscape now looks very different. Nine teams have new starting quarterbacks, for better or worse, following a summer of chopping and changing.

The end result is the likes of the Denver Broncos, who made the biggest splash in the trade window when landing quarterback Russell Wilson from Seattle, and a defensively reinforced Los Angeles Chargers have seen their Super Bowl odds shorten significantly.

They feature among a strong group of AFC contenders, topped by Super Bowl favourites the Buffalo Bills, who have been dumped out of the playoffs by another serious championship hopeful, the Kansas City Chiefs, in each of the last two years.

At least ten teams harbour playoff ambitions in the AFC, while the pool of potential Super Bowl representatives from the NFC is far smaller. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are rated as the conference’s best hope at 15-2 after quarterback Tom Brady decided he wasn’t ready for retirement yet.

Brady’s return is a boost for the Bucs but they look weaker than last year, as do the Green Bay Packers and San Francisco 49ers, clearing a path for the Rams to return to February's season-defining dance.

Best bet for Super Bowl LVII

Los Angeles Rams

While their rivals have lost key personnel, LA have retained 16 of the 22 starters from their Super Bowl win and have arguably nabbed upgrades on a few of the players who have left.

Wide receiver Allen Robinson arrives from Chicago to replace Robert Woods opposite Super Bowl MVP and the NFL's top wideout Cooper Kupp, providing a different type of target for quarterback Matthew Stafford.

Stafford enjoyed a career-best season under the Rams' head coach and offensive guru Sean McVay following his switch from the Detroit Lions last year, and any potential backers put off by talk of an elbow injury in pre-season have since had their fears put to rest.

On defence, Bobby Wagner and Troy Hill are nice additions to a unit which has lost Von Miller but can still call upon star cornerback Jalen Ramsey and, most importantly, Aaron Donald. A one-man wrecking machine, Donald was recently ranked the second-best player in the NFL after posting a career-high 84 tackles and 12.5 sacks last season.

The Rams are a well-balanced team with star quality on both sides of the ball, finishing last season ranked in the top ten for numerous key offensive and defensive metrics. It’s not hard to see them keeping up those standards and plotting a course to the Super Bowl.

Next best bet

Baltimore Ravens

The Ravens were the hard-luck story of last season, losing numerous starters on both sides of the ball to serious injuries while becoming only the fifth side in league history to lose four games by two points or less in a single campaign.

The end result was an 8-9 record and fourth place in the AFC North. It was the second-worst season of John Harbaugh’s 15-year reign but he has enough credit in the bank as a head coach to think he can turn several of those narrow losses into wins with a fully fit squad.

Dual-threat quarterback Lamar Jackson enters the season with a chip on his shoulder as he seeks to show why he's demanding a new, record-breaking contract from Baltimore and we should expect the best of the dynamic Ravens signal caller, who was league MVP in 2019.

Baltimore drafted well, improving the offensive line, and their defence is set up well to combat the aerial threat posed by their AFC rivals.

This is a gritty Ravens team, built to grind down their opponents, but with an X-factor in their midst in the form of Jackson, and they look equipped to survive what will be an attritional AFC playoff race.

Best Super Bowl LVII outsider

Minnesota Vikings

Mike Zimmer didn’t get the best out of an extremely talented Vikings roster over the last two years and back-to-back losing seasons was enough to prompt a coaching change in Minnesota.

Former LA Rams offensive coordinator Kevin O’Connell is the man now charged with maximising the potential of an offence boasting elite talents like Justin Jefferson, a contender to be the league’s top receiver this year, and star running back Dalvin Cook.

At quarterback is the grossly underestimated Kirk Cousins. Cousins' name receives far too many snorts of derision given he ranked in the top ten for passing yards and touchdowns last season, while he rarely turns the ball over.

Za'Darius Smith’s addition upgrades a defence which has potential and showed up well in some key areas, ranking second for sacks and tenth in interceptions.

In a relatively weak NFC, the Vikings are capable of outperforming their 40-1 odds and making a run at the Lombardi trophy.

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