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Carmakers' Super Bowl LVII: Ford vs. Toyota

It’s Super Bowl Week, finally! The food tastes better, the air feels fresher, and the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles are about to lock horns in what is by far the most anticipated yearly sporting event this country has to offer.
Super Bowl LVII cover 17 photos
Photo: autoevolution Graphic Art department
Ford F-150Ford ExplorerFord EscapeFord BroncoFord Bronco SportFord TransitFord EdgeToyota RAV4Toyota CamryToyota HighlanderToyota CorollaToyota TacomaToyota 4RunnerToyota TundraPatrick MahomesJalen Hurts
If you don’t live in the U.S., you might think that’s an exaggeration. A lot of sports fans watch the NBA Finals, the World Series, or the Stanley Cup, but Football is different. Roughly ten times more people watch the Super Bowl than any other single game pertaining to basketball, baseball, or hockey. Not even the World Cup Final in soccer can compare, viewership-wise.

So, who you got? Never mind if you’re from Kansas City or Philly. This isn’t about loyalty. I’m genuinely asking, who do you think (not hope) will win on Sunday?

On one hand, both teams feature genuine MVP candidates at the quarterback position, with Patrick Mahomes coming off what is arguably his best season yet, and Jalen Hurts, who may not be on Mahomes’ level, but is still one of the top passers in the game today – and is surrounded by top-level talent.

The case could be made the Eagles are the better team, on paper. Their offensive line is better, and some would argue that Hurts' teammates, such as receivers AJ Brown and DeVonta Smith, are better as well. What the Eagles don’t have is Mahomes, who can absolutely win you a game all by himself. Same goes for Travis Kelce, who’s a better and more accomplished offensive player than anyone currently on Philly’s roster.

Can we get this party started already?

Super Bowl LVII is set to kick off Sunday, February 12, 6:30 pm ET at State Farm Stadium in Arizona – home of the Arizona Cardinals.

Patrick Mahomes
Photo: Patrick Mahomes / Instagram
Now, since this is obviously a massive week in sports, it got us thinking about an interesting type of mental exercise. It’s always fun, and often not hard, to associate certain cars or carmakers with sports teams, based either on their success or their history. However, the question we're trying to answer here is which carmakers would face off against each other in a grand finale of sorts, based only on their performance in 2022 and January of 2023?

You’re probably thinking that we just looked at their sales figures and grabbed the two best-selling carmakers, right? Wrong. If we had done that, it would have simply been Toyota versus the Volkswagen Group. And yes, Toyota did make the cut, but not for those reasons alone.

In order to extract Super Bowl finalists, we needed to apply similar principles one would apply to the game of football. For example, only sales within the United States were considered, seen as how the NFL is strictly an American sports league. Had this been about the NBA or NHL, we would have considered Canadian sales figures too.

The nitty-gritty

Here’s where things got interesting though. During preseason, each NFL team is required to cut their roster size down to 53 players for the regular season, meaning 53 players are always responsible for helping a team get into the playoffs. We looked at the top 53 best-selling models in the U.S. for 2022 and January 2023, from which we extrapolated the two brands that featured the most models on said list.

Chevrolet almost made the cut, with six models in the top 53. Alas, the two carmakers with the most amount of metal in that top 53 were Ford and Toyota – both with seven cars apiece.

Toyota Highlander
Photo: Toyota
But wait, there’s more! We took things even further in order to figure out which of the two we would associate with the Kansas City Chiefs and which was more of a Philadelphia Eagle. The car brand that would best represent the Chiefs is, of course, Ford. Why? Well, because the Chiefs have the best player in the game in Patrick Mahomes and Ford has the best-selling automobile in the industry in the F-Series.

Overall, the Eagles appear to be the better, or at least a more complete team, which resonates with the fact that Toyota sold a higher number of units overall. Again, we’re not counting past no. 53 here. Furthermore, Toyota features three cars in the top 10, whereas Ford only has the F-Series. That’s a pretty darn good representation of how the Eagles and Chiefs stack up, if you ask me.

Ford: 1. F-Series (653,957 units); 14. Explorer (207,763 units); 24. Escape (137,370 units); 29. Bronco (117.057 units); 37. Bronco Sport (99,547 units); 38. Transit (99.382 units); 49. Edge (85,465 units)

Toyota: 4. RAV4 (366,741 units); 5. Camry (295,201 units); 10. Highlander (222,805 units); 11. Corolla (222,216 units); 12. Tacoma (215,853 units); 27. 4Runner (121,023 units); 43. Tundra (94,429 units)

Ford Explorer
Photo: Ford
As for the two cars we chose to represent each brand, we went with two direct rivals featuring comparable sales figures and nearly identical MSRPs in the Ford Explorer and Toyota Highlander. Both are perfect family cars, and if you don’t mind me saying, perfect for a tailgate party out there at State Farm Stadium.

For the record, the 2023 Ford Explorer costs upwards of $36,760, while the 2023 Toyota Highlander has a starting MSRP of $36,420. An easy choice? I think not. Much like having to choose between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles this Sunday.
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About the author: Sergiu Tudose
Sergiu Tudose profile photo

Sergiu got to experience both American and European car "scenes" at an early age (his father drove a Ford Fiesta XR2 supermini in the 80s). After spending over 15 years at local and international auto publications, he's starting to appreciate comfort behind the wheel more than raw power and acceleration.
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