Danny Parkins Picks Bengals to Win Super Bowl LXI, Projects 12-5 Finish

Q: Why did a prominent analyst accidentally predict an impossible playoff bracket while crowning Cincinnati the 2026 NFL champions?

He did it because he briefly misapplied the NFL’s playoff format while making rapid-fire season picks on air. Danny Parkins correctly named seven NFC playoff teams in his final field — Seahawks, Buccaneers, Vikings, Cowboys, Eagles, Rams and 49ers — but during the segment he initially created confusion by effectively trying to fit too many teams into the NFC bracket before correcting himself. Nick Wright immediately joked that the NFL does not allow eight playoff teams from one conference, and Parkins acknowledged the mistake. The larger issue was bracket construction. The NFL sends seven teams from each conference, with four division winners and three wild cards, and the postseason is reseeded after the wild-card round. That means not every attractive matchup can coexist in a valid bracket. Parkins’ picks of Cowboys vs. Rams in the NFC Championship and Bengals vs. Bills in the AFC title game, followed by Bengals over Cowboys in Super Bowl LXI, reflected his intended finalists, but his path to get there was muddled by the seeding confusion that became part of the show’s banter. So the “impossible bracket” was not really about his Super Bowl winner. It was the result of an on-air playoff-format slip — one his cohosts turned into a joke — even though his headline pick remained Cincinnati beating Dallas for the championship.

1 articles · Updated · Fox News · Sep 13

Super Bowl LXI goes to Cincinnati in Danny Parkins’ 2026 NFL forecast, with the Bengals beating the Cowboys after a projected AFC title-game win over the Bills.
12-5 records for the Bengals and Bills set up Parkins’ AFC bracket, while he has the Broncos at 13-4 winning the West and the Texans at 11-6 taking the South.
13-4 Seattle leads his NFC projections, ahead of 12-5 Dallas and 11-6 Los Angeles, with the Rams still reaching the NFC Championship despite an opening loss to San Francisco.
Week 1 also features Parkins’ spotlight games—Giants-Cowboys, Steelers-Falcons and Bears-Panthers—as the regular season opens with a full Sunday slate before Broncos-Chiefs on Monday night.