The Best Actor race at the 98th Academy Awards just flipped. Michael B. Jordan has surged to become the front-runner for the Oscar following his stunning upset at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, where he defeated previously unbeaten Timothée Chalamet. With the ceremony set for Sunday at Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre, what looked like a coronation has become a genuine cliffhanger.
Jordan’s win at the Actor Awards on March 1 sent shockwaves through awards season. Playing twin brothers Smoke and Stack in Ryan Coogler’s vampire thriller Sinners, Jordan bested a field that included Chalamet (Marty Supreme), Leonardo DiCaprio (One Battle After Another), Ethan Hawke (Blue Moon), and Jesse Plemons (Bugonia).
“I wasn’t expecting this at all,” Jordan said from the stage, visibly stunned. The moment carried extra weight because SAG voters represent the largest voting bloc within the Academy, actors. Their choice often predicts the Oscar outcome.
Before the SAG Awards, prediction markets told a clear story. Chalamet sat at a commanding 79% probability after his Golden Globe and Critics’ Choice wins. Jordan languished at just 6.9%. Today, the landscape looks radically different.
According to betting markets and prediction models, Jordan now holds a 37% to 40% chance of winning, with Chalamet dropping to around 46% to 51%. The gap has closed so dramatically that bookmakers consider it a true toss-up.
The Hindustan Times prediction model, which aggregates precursor awards and bookmaker odds, gives Jordan a 40% probability, with Chalamet close behind at 35%.
Jordan’s performance in Sinners has become the story of the season. The film itself made history with 16 Oscar nominations, the most ever for a single picture, breaking records held by Titanic, La La Land, and All About Eve. The supernatural thriller, set in 1930s Mississippi, follows twin brothers returning home to open a juke joint, only to face a vampire invasion.
Playing dual roles required Jordan to build two distinct characters from shared trauma. “One smiled (and) talked his way through it, convinced himself that it wasn’t that bad,” Jordan explained. “And the other one had probably more of an exact memory of what really happened and came from a more responsible place. Two survival instincts but just approached differently”.
He framed the brothers as mythic figures: “These dudes were vampires before vampires were even introduced in the movie. They’re immortal. They don’t die”.
Chalamet’s path looked unstoppable just weeks ago. His performance in Marty Supreme as an eccentric Ping-Pong prodigy earned him Golden Globe and Critics’ Choice awards. But two consecutive losses, first to virtually unknown Robert Aramayo at the BAFTAs, then to Jordan at SAG, have shaken confidence in his inevitability.
Jordan’s awards season surge extended beyond the acting prizes. At the NAACP Image Awards, he won Entertainer of the Year and Best Actor for Sinners, dedicating the latter to his late Black Panther co-star Chadwick Boseman.
His SAG speech captured the journey. “That kid from North Jersey is standing here right now,” he said, thanking his mother for “driving me back and forth to New York when we didn’t have enough money to go through the Holland Tunnel”.
Sunday night will decide whether Jordan’s late surge carries him to the podium. The category remains volatile, with some analysts even eyeing Brazilian actor Wagner Moura (The Secret Agent) as a potential long-shot spoiler.
For Jordan, the moment represents something larger than a trophy. As he told the SAG audience: “This ride has been unbelievable. Thank you for welcoming me in and making me feel seen”.
