It's not chicken little stuff, I just don't understand the difficulty in saying the Pats are the better team and should win this game. If the Eagles had Wentz, then that's a whole different ballgame, and of course Philly has the horses to keep it close, or even to pull off an upset, but that's what it would be: an upset.
The Pats are rightly the favorites. Best player in the game, who has proven it so many times on this stage, even when the chips have been down. For Philly to win, they're going to have to drive a stake in Brady and bury him for good.
But the thing is, and I keep coming back to this, is that it's just ONE game. The 2007 Patriots beat the Giants 8 out of 10 times. But all it takes is one. And clearly, the Eagles' defense COULD wreak all sorts of havoc. We can all envision them dominating the Pats' OL, and giving Brady a terrible beating. We can all picture a Brady pick and a strip sack. We can all picture some big plays to their tight ends or even a big run or two from Ajayi or Blount (even one or two big runs could swing a game). We can all picture a big PI penalty on Gilmore or Butler. It's just not hard to envision these things in a one game situation.
This wouldn't be an upset along the lines of Cleveland beating the Patriots, where literally everything would have to go right for Cleveland and everything would have to go wrong for New England. In this case, Philly is the second best team in the NFL, and fully capable of beating the Patriots even with Foles at QB, as their destruction of Minnesota demonstrated. That was an epic beatdown in every way.
So not everything would have to go right for Philly to win. Maybe just a fortunate bounce of the ball or a bad call going their way. Maybe all they really need is one break and in football games, one break seems to happen a lot.
All that said, I picture a higher scoring game than people typically suspect. I picture a close game because, well, they are ALWAYS close with the TB/BB Patriots. I see a 3-4 point game with the Patriots winning. They are the favorite after all. But I wouldn't at all be surprised if Philly wins.