Wells Fargo Asset Management’s Analytic Investors LLC, the Los Angeles-based quant shop that’s beaten the point spread in 10 of the last 14 Super Bowls, advises gamblers to take the New England Patriots over the Philadelphia Eagles.

Analytic Investors applies its predictive quant models to the game and it shows that the Patriots will beat the Eagles by at least five points, since the point spread on the game is 4 1/2 points. 

“I know it’ll tick off a few of my Philly fan friends,” said Chris Lardieri, one of the study’s authors. “But the numbers don’t lie.”

Analytic predicted last season that the Falcons would beat the Patriots, which looked like a good forecast when the score was 28-3.

“The Falcons just had to run the clock out,” Lardieri said.“You can’t account for human error and questionable decisions.”

Nick Foles admitted he nearly retired before the 2016 season before his release by the Rams and rejoining Andy Reid with the Chiefs.

“In my heart at that time, I was probably going to step away from the game,” Foles said Tuesday. “But I also knew that being in that situation that I had to take a few days just to let all of the emotions settle.”

Foles is now set to start the Super Bowl in place of Carson Wentz.

“It had nothing to do with starting,” Foles said. “I really had to go with my heart in that situation. Getting the opportunity to step away, I went on a fly fishing/camping trip with my brother-in-law, Ryan, and coming back and just asking my wife Tori about it, I still didn’t have a clear decision about what I wanted to do.

“But that’s when I really prayed and really asked God for guidance. There wasn’t a sure path. I really just took a step on faith. I knew that I’d have more growth as a person going back to the game.”

Philadelphia police won't grease light poles with Crisco to keep fans from climbing light poles if the Eagles win the Super Bowl.

Workers applied shortening to light poles before the NFC Championship Game, but it failed to stop some fans from climbing after the Eagles' victory.

Richard Ross, the Philadelphia police commissioner, is keeping his plan secret.

He promised that whatever police do, "it will be safe ... but it will be effective."

Carson Wentz admitted for the first time on Monday that it's been hard to stand on the sidelines and watch the Philadelphia Eagles march towards the Super Bowl.

Wentz suffered a season-ending knee injury in Week 14. At the time, the quarterback was an MVP candidate. The Eagles have gone 4-1 with Nick Foles under center.

"It'll definitely be mixed emotions right away on Sunday. It'll be mixed, right away," Wentz said. "But, I've been saying it all week that once the team and our offense takes the field, it will hit me a little bit. But, once I get those emotions out of the way, and I'm around the guys and we're preparing, it's back to normal. It's all good. It's just a different feeling, for sure."

The Eagles have rallied around Foles, but Wentz remains involved.

"I tell Carson all the time, his spirit is still with us," Brent Celek said. "We love having him around and he gets us all going. But he's also doing everything he can to make sure Foles is ready for Sunday in the way that he can. And that's special because that's not always the case, man."

Jeffrey Lurie is very happy with the financial investment the Philadelphia Eagles made in backup quarterback Nick Foles.

Foles has led the Eagles to the Super Bowl in the wake of Carson Wentz's season-ending injury in Week 14.

"Obviously, it's a huge game in Los Angeles, Carson played really, really well, Nick [Foles] came in and won the game for us, we had the best record in football, and you think, 'Oh my gosh, we're not going to be going forward with our great young quarterback,'" the owner said.

Five games later, the Eagles are 4-1 with Foles under center. The Eagles cut Chase Daniel despite still owing him $5 million for 2017 and signed Foles for a $7 million deal.

"Our priority, as you've seen, is to make sure we have the very best possible other starting quarterback," Lurie said. "I won't even call [Foles] a backup, because we had him evaluated as a very strong quarterback. He's been 18-5 for us over the last 23 games when Nick has started a game and finished. His quarterback rating in the postseason -- he's a big-time, big-game player. That's Nick.

"And we utilized about $12 million to have a second quarterback. And it may have seemed irrational, but I remember the phone call when it was [executive vice president of football operations] Howie [Roseman] and I talking, and we said, 'We have an opportunity to do this. Do you have any reservations of using this $12 million this way versus other positions?' And we both agreed this was absolutely the right thing to do. We never knew it would come to this, but we knew that Nick could win big games for us."

Carson Wentz revealed he tore his LCL while also tearing his ACL in December.

Wentz does not anticipate the additional damage will significantly impact his length of rehab.

Wentz is aiming to return for the start of the 2018 season.

"My goal is to be out there Week 1. The timetable stuff, I wish I knew just as much as you guys wish you knew," he said Friday. "It's just such a fluid process, and we'll just see what happens."

The NFL's ratings for the Conference Championships were down more than eight percent compared to lat year.

This year's divisional championship round had seen a 16 percent dip in audience size.

The Patriots' win over the Jaguars reached 44.1 million viewers, while Philadelphia's blow out of Minnesota reached 42.3 million.

The Conference Championships only featured one household name at quarterback in Tom Brady.

Bob Costas has been left off NBC's coverage of the Super Bowl.

“The decision was mutually agreeable, and not only do I not have a problem with it, I am actually happy about it,” he told THE DAILY via email. “I have long had ambivalent feelings about football, so at this point, it’s better to leave the hosting to those who are more enthusiastic about it.”

Dan Patrick and Liam McHugh will host NBC's pregame show.

Costas dismissed the idea that his November comments in which he offered a bleak assessment of football's future played a role in keeping him off the telecast.

Costas: “I have been making the same points for several years, often on NBC. In halftime commentaries, interviews with Roger Goodell and other prominent NFL figures, appearances on CNN and elsewhere, I have addressed the issue of football and its undeniable connection to brain trauma many times. Why? Because the evidence is overwhelming and the effects are often devastating. It’s the elephant in the stadium at every game whether others choose to acknowledge it or not. And it’s not going away. So the idea that I am only now finding my voice on this, or that NBC was taken aback by what I said at Maryland is just wrong. It’s all simple and straightforward.”

Chris Long says that he and others around the league, including Philadelphia Eagles teammate Malcolm Jenkins, have shown that players can be active in social issues off the field without hurting their play on the field.

"Somebody asked me, Does this prove you can worry about your off-field engagements and effectively do your job on the field? I think it's a great example of how players can manage time so well," Long said. "I mentioned, after a Monday night game, we hopped on a train in the early morning to go to Harrisburg."

Jenkins, Long and Torrey Smith took a trip to Harrisburg to champion for criminal justice reform hours after their Monday Night Football Game against the Washington Redskins in October.

The Super Bowl-bound Eagles have been among the most active on the social justice front. Jenkins is the co-founder of the Players Coalition, which joined a partnership with the NFL to create a platform for social activism prior to Week 13.

The Philadelphia Eagles will wear their home green uniforms in Super Bowl LII while the New England Patriots will wear their road whites. The Patriots had the choice of uniform color as the home team.

The team winning the Super Bowl has worn white jerseys in 12 of the previous 13 games.

The Patriots also wore white in last season's Super Bowl against the Falcons and during their win against the Seahawks.

New England lost both Super Bowls to the Giants while wearing their home blues.