Super Bowl 59 MVP Longshots: Can Travis Kelce Win?
In today's Betting Life Newsletter, presented by Guillotine Leagues:
We’re now on the clock.
As you’re reading this newsletter (right now, this second) we are officially a week out from Super Bowl Sunday.
That’s right, in seven days you’ll be so neck deep in SGPs, props, and national anthem bets that you’ll likely have to take off half a day on Monday just to tally up your P/L.
Super Bowl MVP Longshots
Today I want to talk about one of the biggest betting markets out there for Super Bowl 59—MVP.
If you’re betting on MVP it’s important to know the implications of betting on specific players. For example, if I’m taking Jalen Hurts to win MVP (+350), then I’m not only planning on an Eagles win, but I also think Philadelphia is likely to be pushed a little by KC, and Hurts will likely rack up some good yards through the air.
Could Hurts run for 80 yards and a couple of TDs in an Eagles blowout? Sure. But taking him to win MVP means I’m likely playing for a game where the Eagles attack more via the pass, and Saquon Barkley gets semi-neutralized.
There are also historical factors to consider. As you likely have already guessed, Super Bowl MVP tends to be a very QB-dominated award. Not quite to the extent that league MVP is (which is just a best-QB award nowadays), but close.
Since QBs tend to dominate, that also means we don’t tend to get a ton of longshot winners either (although there are exceptions).
Here’s a quick rundown of where the award tends to fall (by position), along with the last six winners of the award, and their odds.
Super Bowl MVP winners—By Position
- QB: 33
- RB: 7
- WR: 8
- TE: 0
Defensive Player: 8
Super Bowl MVP Winners (last six years)
2024 Patrick Mahomes (QB) +130
2023 Patrick Mahomes (QB) +135
2022 Cooper Kupp (WR) +600
2021 Tom Brady (QB) +175
2020 Patrick Mahomes (QB) +115
2019 Julian Edelman (WR) +2500
As you can see, the play is usually just to bet the QB of the winning team—BTW, if you know who is going to win the Super Bowl this year, please DM me.
However, there have been exceptions, and recently those exceptions have tended to be receivers who go off at far more significant odds than their QB.
I’m going to break down a couple of my favorite longshot bets at MVP this season below (surprise, they’re both receivers) and then finish off with another receiving prop to get your Super Bowl week started.
Whichever way you’re betting, Good Luck out there. And remember, the anthem doesn’t end until the sportsbook says it does.
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Super Bowl 59 MVP Award 🏈💥—Will Goedert or Kelce Break the TE Curse?
THE BETS
Travis Kelce Super Bowl 59 MVP +1800 (FanDuel)
Dallas Goedert Super Bowl 59 MVP +12000 (DraftKings)
Going into this year’s Super Bowl, no TE has ever won the MVP award. That seems astonishing in and of itself, as we have had eight defensive players win the award, including two defensive linemen in the last 12 years (Von Miller—2016; Malcolm Smith—2014).
While no TE has ever won the award we have had two receivers—Cooper Kupp (2022) and Julian Edelman (2019)—win the award over the last decade. Both men finished the game with massive statlines.
Kupp—8 receptions, 92 yards, and 2 TDs
Edelman—10 receptions, 141 yards and a TD (game-winning)
If any receiver in Super Bowl 59 is going to win the award, they’re most likely going to have to post a similar sort of line.
While both Dallas Goedert and Travis Kelce are priced differently, and in much different offensive schemes, I do think both men present some decent value at their current levels — and have the potential to become the first TE to win Super Bowl MVP.
Travis Kelce +1800
Kelce has the lowest Super Bowl MVP odds of any pass catcher in this game, but it’s for a reason. The Chiefs don’t have a dominant WR1. They barely have a WR1 at all. As nicely as Xavier Worthy has come along this season, he didn’t top 7 targets in either of the Chiefs’ playoffs game and he’s also posted zero 100+ yard receiving games as a pro.
Kelce may have had a down season, but he’s proven that he can still pop for big games when the Chiefs need him too. He went for a career-best 14 catches vs. the Buccaneers in Week 9 and destroyed a legit pass defense in the Texans in the Divisional Round for 7 receptions, 117 yards, and a TD.
If the Chiefs win, that kind of line may be enough to get him the award, especially since there will likely be some Patrick Mahomes, Super Bowl MVP fatigue among voters.
Kelce’s current line (+1800) falls pretty close to what Julian Edelman went off at in 2019 when the Patriots won a low-scoring game vs. the Rams. Given that Kelce has so little competition for targets, and the Chiefs are favorites, I’d be willing to play him down to +1500 if needed.
Dallas Goedert +12000
Unlike Kelce, Goedert doesn’t have the luxury of working in a pass-first offense with no clearcut WR1. One could even argue the Eagles have two legit WR1s in A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith.
Still, the presence of Smith and Brown is reflected in Goedert’s odds. He’s currently +12000 on DraftKings, whereas Brown is +3500 and Smith is +6500. What’s interesting is that despite Goedert sitting with the third-highest odds of the Eagles’ three primary receivers, he’s received the most consistent targeting over their three playoff games.
Eagles Target Share, last three games (via Fantasy Life Utilization Report)
- Goedert: 35%, 20%, 33%
- Smith: 24%, 20%, 17%
- Brown: 18%, 33%, 35%
On top of Goedert leap-frogging Smith in usage, he’s also going to have the most advantageous matchup of all the Eagles receivers. The Chiefs allowed 5.9 receptions and 66.2 receiving yards per game this season to opposing TEs, which ranked them bottom three in both areas as a defense.
Further, while he doesn’t get the fanfare that Smith and Brown do, Goedert is excellent at creating yards after the catch. He went for 10 catches and 170 yards in the Superdome vs. New Orleans in Week 3 this season, and posted 8 receptions, 117 yards, and a TD in a game vs. the Rams last year (a game also played in a dome).
Goedert would need a lot of things to break his way to win this award, but given the dome environment and the matchup vs. the Chiefs, there seems like little downside to taking him at his current line. If anything, it feels like he and Smith should at least be even, or their odds even reversed, given Goedert’s increased role this postseason.
NFL Prop Drop 🏈—Expect Smith-Schuster to be a factor
By Geoff Ulrich
JuJu Smith-Schuster o1.5 receptions (-115) bet365
JuJu Smith-Schuster 3+ receptions (+280; bet365)
JuJu Smith-Schuster 4+ receptions (+750; bet365)
Look, I didn’t go into this season expecting that I’d be putting some of my hard-earned credibility on the line with a JuJu Smith-Schuster over bet at the Super Bowl, but here we are.
Despite adding Hollywood Brown, Xavier Worthy, and DeAndre Hopkins this offseason, it was still Smith-Schuster who ended up landing the biggest receiving play of the game for Kansas City vs. the Bills.
Smith-Schuster wasn’t just a one-play wonder v.s Buffalo for KC, either. He played on 58% of the snaps and had a 63% route rate. As the Chiefs’ primary slot receiver, it’s fair to say that Smith-Schuster could also be in for a little more work vs. the Eagles given the legitimacy of their outside corners.
While he hasn’t been a huge part of the offense for most of 2024-25, JuJu's history with Kansas City includes a 7-catch, 53-yard performance vs. the Eagles in Super Bowl 57. As the saying goes, history doesn’t always repeat but sometimes it rhymes.
How to Maximize Betting Juju Props
I’m not suggesting Smith-Schuster is a lock to post 7 catches again, but I do think he’s a player who has a wide variety of outcomes in Super Bowl 59—and one of those includes drastically outperforming his current reception prop, which is set at 1.5 (-115).
I‘m happy to play the over on his regular line up to -120. However, I do think his history with Mahomes/Reid—and the matchup this week—may dictate him getting relied upon more than we’ve seen to this point in the playoffs.
I’m prone to take on more risk in this spot and ladder Smith-Schuster through 3+ and 4+ receptions. His current odds on those bigger milestones don’t seem to have any of the above-mentioned factors baked in, and with how close he operates to the line of scrimmage, those alternate lines could hit fast if the Eagles jump out in front, or completely stymie the Chiefs’ run game.
