There are only eight teams remaining in the hunt for the Super Bowl, and by proxy of that, there are only eight fanbases remaining. I’m not particularly concerned with who is the best team or who will win, but want to explore another question: Who should win?

I’ve done some very precise scientific calculations about the remaining teams’ fanbases, and come up with the order in which they deserve the Super Bowl. This is objectively correct.

8. New England

I grew up in New England and I don’t even think New England fans deserve this. I’ll be happy for them if the Patriots win again, but Bostonians are the spoiled rich kids of the sporting world. They don’t even just want the Patriots to win anymore, they want them to win with style. They demand routs. They get them, often, because their team is the best, but that doesn’t mean they deserve anything.

7. Kansas City

You just got the World Series. Sorry fam. Love your food, think your city is underrated. But a World Series and an appearance in MLS Cup final in the last year doesn’t mean you guys are exactly desperate for big moments.

6. Seattle

Coming a year off a heartbreaking loss in the Super Bowl to the Patriots, it’d be tempting to root for the people of Seattle. Then you remember that this would be the third trip to the Super Bowl in three years and the Cardinals franchise hasn’t won an NFL title since before McCarthyism and realize maybe it’s time to let someone else have a go.

5. Pittsburgh

Pittsburgh fans like to play up their recent misery as proof that they’re some kind of long-suffering franchise, which is ridiculous. They’ve won two Super Bowls in the last decade. If we want to branch out to other sports, the Penguins won a Stanley Cup in 2009 and have two of the ten best players alive. The Pirates are fine. You guys aren’t Cleveland, so quit it.

4. Green Bay

Good people. Salt of the earth people. I’d have them ranked higher if they hadn’t won the Super Bowl back in 2010. It would be fun to see the Packers win, though, if only because the narrative around this team has been that they are actually terrible and not the same Packers team we’ve known … right up until they ran Washington out of the building in the second half of their wild-card game.

3. Denver

Denver hasn’t won a Super Bowl since 1999, and while Brock Osweiler has potential, I know the Broncos players and fans would like to win one before Peyton Manning retires and joins the cast of Saturday Night Live. Denver is a wonderful town, too, so I’m giving them points for that.

2. Arizona

I know the Cardinals have been in Arizona for what feels like 45 minutes, but the good people of Phoenix have earned the right to win a Lombardi Trophy. This team hasn’t won a Super Bowl while located in Arizona, and Cardinals fans are due.

All of this isn’t to mention that the Cardinals have been spectacular all season and all anyone has talked about in the NFC is Cam Newton and his dance moves. Carson Palmer is great, Phoenix is an OK city I guess, and the Cardinals fans deserve this.

1. Carolina

The Panthers have appeared in one Super Bowl and lost, to the Patriots in 2004. Their team just put together one of the great regular seasons of all time and they’ve had to deal with sportswriting jamokes like me downplay how good Cam Newton is because of the advanced stats, or deal with sportswriting jamokes not like me complain about his dance moves.

North Carolina is maybe the prettiest state, they have fantastic barbecue, and it’s time they had a big moment in professional sports. It’s been a minute since the Hurricanes’ Stanley Cup win a decade ago, and I’m not sure anyone in the area even knows that happened.

(Correction: The post originally stated that the Cardinals franchise hasn’t won a Super Bowl since 1947. That should have read “NFL Championship.”)