Super Bowl Odds 2012: Are Green Bay Packers Guaranteed to Repeat?

Like every season, the winner of last year's Super Bowl entered into the following season as favorites to win yet again. Unlike every season, it seems very possible that a repeat champion is in the cards.

The Green Bay Packers plowed their way through the NFC playoffs in the 2010 season to make it all the way to the Super Bowl, where they convincingly defeated the heavily-favored Pittsburgh Steelers.

Now the Packers have found themselves as heavy favorites to repeat that success this year, and it's hard to dispute it.

They've lost a single regular season game, bested opponents both great and small, overcome injuries and put up more points and yards on offense than any team in the league this year, save one.

But the Packers aren't invincible and they're not unbeatable for reasons that can be best illustrated by what that single loss has indicated about the team.

The Kansas City Chiefs put together quite the comprehensive blueprint for how to stop the Packers' explosive offense when they handed the team their sole loss in Week 15. They sacked quarterback Aaron Rodgers four times, hit him five more times and held them to just six third-down conversions in 14 attempts.

All of the pressure on Rodgers resulted in him throwing for only 213 yards and a single touchdown and held his completion percentage to 50 percent, thus resulting in his worst performance on the season.

This left the Packers defense, which has struggled all year, more exposed than ever. The Packers are giving up 411.6 yards per game this year, nearly 300 of those yards coming from the air.

If Rodgers faces significant pressure from a team that is also well-equipped to dominate the Packers defense, then it's going to be extremely hard for Green Bay to repeat as Super Bowl champions this year.

There are two teams in the NFC capable of pulling this off—the New Orleans Saints and San Francisco 49ers.

While the Saints defense has been allowing nearly as many yards per game as the Packers (368.4, to be exact), if they can muster up enough of a pass-rush to hold Rodgers and his offense down in a similar manner as the Chiefs managed, they're locks to beat Green Bay.

Only the Saints have a higher-scoring, bigger-production passing game than the Packers, and, unlike the Packers, are also in the top 10 in average per-game rushing yardage. They can find ways to exploit Green Bay's leaky defense and build a big enough lead to defeat the favored Packers handily.

The San Francisco 49ers have a less productive offense, but it's still efficient, and it's better than the one fielded by the Chiefs when they defeated Green Bay.

But what the Niners have is the very best defense in the NFC, and they're the only defensively-minded team in the conference's playoffs this season.

The kind of pressure they are able to put on opposing quarterbacks is of the caliber that Rodgers hasn't seen this season, and the fact that they lead the league in forced turnovers doesn't help the Packers offense much either.

If they can contain Rodgers—not impossible, considering all the quarterbacks they've been able to hold down this year—while continuing to be successful with their moderate, slow-and-steady offensive strategy, the unlikely playoff contenders could best the Super Bowl favorites.

While the Packers have a lot going for them this year and deserve to be considered the team to beat when it comes to the Super Bowl, repeating as champions is extremely difficult. The Packers still have a long way to go—and strong teams to beat—if they are to do so.