On the face of it, NFL’s playoff of a single game deciding forward progress seems more high variance, rather than a best of x series.
Football also seems more high variance just due to the explosive, physical nature of the game.
I wonder what the stats say about lower seeds winning the tournament for MLB vs NFL playoffs.
Why it’s so much harder to predict winners in hockey than basketball
Meanwhile the best regular season team of my lifetime, the '01 Seattle Mariners, still only win maybe 75% to 80% of the time vs. the historically terrible 2024 White Sox.
Now put the '85 Bears against a historically inept team instead of one of the other best teams in the league that year. I'm not sure the '76 Buccaneers win 1 game out of 100.
It's just not possible to physically dominate a game in baseball the way it is in football.