Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid is always respectful of his opponents, especially when it’s an organization that’s been as consistent as the Buffalo Bills in recent seasons.

Having said that, rarely does Reid ever acknowledge that his team might not be the favorite going into a matchup, and that goes double for a home game after a 15-2 campaign and two straight Super Bowl titles.

“Well, the fact that we’re at home is a real positive,” Reid noted on January 20, when asked about the upcoming rematch with the Bills. “We’ve got to play well… Whether we’re favored or not favored, I don’t know — I presume they’ll probably be favored but that’s alright. We do our thing as we go into this, and we don’t worry about all that noise.”

To be clear, Buffalo is not currently favored on FanDuel Sportsbook. The AFC Championship has a line of “Chiefs -1.5” and moneyline odds of -126 for Kansas City as of January 20 at 2 p.m. (EST).

And yet, Reid just admitted that this Bills team might actually deserve to enter as the favorites at Arrowhead Stadium.

It’s the highest form of flattery Reid can give — better than any compliment-filled opening statement or praise. Perhaps, it was an uncommon slip of the tongue from the veteran HC, or maybe he was attempting to motivate his own team — but that’s not really Reid’s style.

The Bills were the only team to defeat the Chiefs’ starters in 2024, but they did so in Buffalo. KC has also had this team’s number in the postseason under the tenures of Reid and opposing head coach Sean McDermott, winning each of their three recent playoff matchups.

“It’s a high level of football,” Reid explained, regarding Chiefs-Bills. “And you’ve got to handle it that way.”

No matter who’s technically the “favorite,” this has the look of a razor-thin face-off between two AFC franchises that know each other very well.

Pro Football Network’s NFL Playoff Predictor tool actually has the Bills getting the slight advantage, as Reid presumed. Buffalo has a 50.7% chance of upsetting the Chiefs and moving on to the Super Bowl, according to PFN’s tool, while Kansas City only has a 49.3% chance.

By comparison, the other championship game is much more heavily slanted in favor of the home team as the Philadelphia Eagles were given a 61.8% chance of defeating the Washington Commanders.