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Rams vs. Bengals: Who would win in a fight to the death?
Rams in winter. (Photo by L-N/Shutterstock)
Ryan Murphy
February 1st, 2022
There’s no shortage of ways of picking winners in the NFL. Some bettors lean on paid services, while others spend years developing and refining their own advanced algorithms. There's also another sizeable subset who pore obsessively over film and carefully deconstruct each and every play.
And then there’s the way my nine year old daughter, Shea, picks winners. After being bribed with a Fruit by the Foot and a grape juice box, she thoughtfully examines the mascots for each franchise and chooses the one she thinks will win in an actual fight to the death.
It’s not perfect, of course. Shea still chooses the Bears far too often, but this year alone she was right 70% of the time. That’s an extraordinary hit rate, especially for someone who still giggles every time she hears the words "tight end."
With Super Bowl LVI just around the corner, I decided to put Shea's remarkable powers of prognostication to the test once more by asking her to pick the league's next champion.
Sun, February 13 2022, 11:30 PM
CIN Bengals
Moneyline
+160
Spread
+4
Total
O 48.5
LA Rams
Moneyline
-195
Spread
-4
Total
U 48.5
Before we dive into Shea's pick, we need to size up our two furry combatants.
Rams
A type of wild sheep, rams and are instantly recognizable by their super-sized spiral horns, which wrap around their heads like a pair of old fashioned telephones. These big bruisers live high up in the Canadian Rockies, where they split their time peacefully grazing on grass and knocking the bejesus out of rival males with their gargantuan heads.
A Bengal tiger watches attentively in the forest. (Photo by dangdumrong/Shutterstock)
Tigers
The biggest of all the wild cats still roaming the earth, the Bengal tiger is a hulking 450-550 lb. killing machine with razor sharp fangs and a jaw that's twice as powerful as that of a lion. As if that wasn't terrifying enough, the tiger is also one of the few cats that actually enjoys the water, meaning it's just as likely to tear you apart limb-from-limb on land as it is in the sea.
Fun fact: A full-grown male tiger can eat 88 lbs. of meat in one sitting. Then again, so can Aaron Donald.
Ram vs. Tiger tale of the tape
| Ram | vs. | Tiger |
|---|
5-6 ft. | Size | 8-10 ft. |
260-280 lbs. | Weight | 450-650 lbs. |
40 mph | Speed | 35-40 mph |
Mountains | Habitat | Tropical forests |
Herbivore | Diet | Carnivore |
Shea weighs in
After considering the strengths and weaknesses of each animal (and eating some prehistoric-looking Cheerios she found wedged in the couch), Shea delivered her verdict. "I think the tiger will win because it can go super duper fast and is way bigger and weighs more than the ram," she explained. "It also probably wants to eat the ram, but the ram wouldn't want to eat it because it's a herbivore."
Shea envisioned the fight being swift and brutal. "The fight would begin with the ram butting the tiger with its horns, but then the tiger would use its speed and hunting skills to do a sneak attack and bring down the ram," she said. "It would last for five minutes and there would be like a ton of blood."
There you have it. Shea is bucking the odds and choosing the underdog on Super Bowl Sunday. She won't actually watch the game - she considers football beneath her - but I've promised to play Barbies for an extra hour on Sunday night if her pick comes in.
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