NFL Power Rankings: 5 Super Bowl favorites

Seattle Seahawks

The Seahawks should be the early favorites to take home the Lombardi Trophy for the second consecutive season. Winning back-to-back Super Bowls is difficult, as only eight teams have been able to do it since 1967, but, according to Football Outsiders’ DVOA metric, Seattle has been the best team in football each of the last two seasons.

They did lose a few key players – a virtual guarantee for any Super Bowl champion in this modern day NFL climate – but were able to keep defensive end Michael Bennett and locked up other core players – Richard Sherman, Earl Thomas, Doug Baldwin – with contract extensions.

Marshawn Lynch may hold out, but they have two very good backups in Christine Michael and Robert Turbin that they can rely on. Seattle’s passing attack also becomes much scarier if speedster Percy Harvin is healthy for the entire season. The core of this team remains in tact and is still very young. They’re only going to get better.