Super Bowl 2026: Would Matthew Stafford retire if

CHICAGO — We’ve seen these motion pictures before, or at least most of them.

With the NFL’s convention championship video games set — the Rams at Seattle following New England at Denver — three of the 4 potential Super Bowl permutations are rematches.

Rams-Patriots? There have been two of those, at the end of the 2001 and 2018 seasons.

And Seattle has performed both mixtures, beating the Broncos in the 2013 season and dropping to the Patriots a yr later.

Of the 4 potentialities, the only one that hasn’t occurred is Rams-Broncos.

There are strong possession ties binding those two franchises. Among his many sports activities holdings, Rams proprietor Stan Kroenke also owns the Denver Nuggets and Colorado Avalanche. Although he constructed his empire with real estate and as a developer, he’s married to Ann Walton Kroenke — of the Walmart household — who is a first cousin of Rob Walton, who led the group that bought the Broncos in 2022.

The Broncos last gained the Super Bowl 10 years in the past, weeks after the Rams have been authorized to transfer back to Los Angeles, and it occurred at Levi’s Stadium, web site of this yr’s sport. That was when Peyton Manning gained his second ring, with his second franchise, then called it a profession.

There’s a risk that Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford might comply with that blueprint. He’s on his second crew, having spent the first half of his profession with Detroit, and he already has one ring. But whereas Manning was clearly in the sundown of his storied profession, Stafford stays at the top of his sport, and seemingly can be this season’s NFL Most Valuable Player.

Still, Stafford will flip 38 the day before the Super Bowl, and it wouldn’t be a lot of a curveball if that have been his last sport, particularly if the Rams have been to win.

Rams tight end Terrance Ferguson is from Littleton, Colo., a suburb of Denver, and Broncos common supervisor George Paton is from La Cañada and performed soccer at Loyola High and UCLA.

If the Seahawks have been to win the NFC — and oddsmakers have them as 2½-point favorites — they might look to repeat against Denver or atone for that painful loss to New England.

It was at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey, keep in mind, that Seattle rolled over Manning and the Broncos, 43-8, behind a smothering protection. Pete Carroll’s crew seemed unbeatable.

A yr later in Arizona, one of the most excruciating moments in Seattle sports activities historical past.

With 20 seconds left and the Seahawks a yard away from the go-ahead landing, Patriots rookie Malcom Butler picked off a goal-line cross by Russell Wilson. Seattle inexplicably determined to throw instead of handing off to battering ram Marshawn Lynch, who was all but automated in short-yardage conditions.