The 2024 National Football League season kicks off Thursday. Sept. 5 with a game featuring the Baltimore Ravens and the Kansas City Chiefs, which is hoping to become the first NFL team to win three straight Super Bowls.
Here’s a look at the betting odds and media companies that could benefit in the first week of the 2024 NFL season.
Week 1 Betting Odds: The Chiefs are picked as the betting favorite to win Super Bowl LIX as the top NFL team for the season. Before the NFL Playoffs kick off there is the regular season with each team playing 17 games, starting with all 32 teams in action for the first week.
Here are the Week 1 matchups and the betting odds from sportsbook DraftKings Inc DKNG
- Baltimore Ravens at Kansas City Chiefs -3
- Green Bay Packers at (in Brazil) Philadelphia Eagles -3
- Arizona Cardinals at Buffalo Bills -6
- Houston Texans -2.5 at Indianapolis Colts
- Pittsburgh Steelers at Atlanta Falcons -3
- Carolina Panthers at New Orleans Saints -4
- Minnesota Vikings -1.5 at New York Giants
- Tennessee Titans at Chicago Bears -4
- New England Patriots at Cincinnati Bengals -8.5
- Jacksonville Jaguars at Miami Dolphins -3
- Denver Broncos at Seattle Seahawks -6
- Las Vegas Raiders at Los Angeles Chargers -3
- Dallas Cowboys at Cleveland Browns -2.5
- Washington Commanders at Tampa Bay Buccaneers -3
- Los Angeles Rams at Detroit Lions -3.5
- New York Jets at San Francisco 49ers -4.5
A quick look at the betting odds shows that sportsbooks are putting a lot of love on the home teams, with only two away teams favored for the first week.
NFL fans and sports bettors might do well to remember the past two seasons when looking at the bias for home teams. In the 2023 season, 10 away teams won in the opening week with only six home teams securing the early win. In the 2022 season, 9 away teams won, with six home teams winning and one tie.
At DraftKings, some of the top favorites for bettors are the away Texans -2.5 with 73% of bets according to sports betting writer Ben Fawkes. The Dolphins -3.5, Eagles -2.5, Bengals -8.5 and Cowboys +2.5 are also getting plenty of action.
At BetMGM, which is a joint venture from MGM Resorts International MGM and Entain, the Texans -2.5 are also the most bet team at 78% of bets. The Dolphins -3, Vikings -1.5 and Bengals -9 are the next most bet teams against the spread, according to BetMGM’s John Ewing.
Media Stocks on Watch: NFL games continue to rank among some of the most-watched television events of the year.
In 2023, 45 of the most watched primetime telecasts were NFL games, according to Variety. Outside of the Super Bowl and NFL playoffs, which ranked as the top five games, Comcast led with games ranked 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10.
There are multiple national television games for the first week of the NFL season listed below:
Thursday, Sept. 5, 8:20 p.m. ET: Ravens, Chiefs on NBC, a unit of Comcast Corporation CMCSA
Friday, Sept. 6, 8:15 p.m. ET: Packers, Eagles on Peacock, a unit of Comcast
Sunday, Sept. 8: 8:20 p.m. ET: Rams, Lions on NBC, a unit of Comcast
Monday, Sept. 9: 8:15 p.m. ET: Jets, 49ers on ABC, ESPN, units of Walt Disney Co DIS
The Sunday 1 p.m. ET and 4 p.m. ET games will be broadcast by Paramount Global PARAPARAA unit CBS and Fox Corporation FOXFOXA unit FOX.
While coverage will vary by location, the Browns, Cowboys game is expected to get a strong national audience with the game marking NFL legend Tom Brady’s Fox NFL regular season debut calling the game.
Comcast gets three of the four national primetime games for the first week, which could be a good opportunity for the company in the advertising department.
While they don’t have any primetime games in the first week, Amazon.com Inc AMZN and Netflix Inc NFLX could also benefit from a strong 2024 NFL season with their rights to Thursday Night Football games and two Christmas Day NFL games respectively.
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