Football season kicks off Wednesday; the Super Bowl market is already over $50 million

MetaMask Alpha is MetaMask's market digest. Context, data, signal—not financial advice.

The 2026 NFL regular season opens Wednesday, September 9, when the Seattle Seahawks host the New England Patriots at Lumen Field, a rematch of Super Bowl LX. Sixteen more games follow over the next five days. There are already a number of active prediction markets on the season, the kickoff game, and the rest of Week 1. (For more on the other kind of football markets, check out Premier League prediction markets explained.)

The season-long number: over $50 million on who wins it all

The NFL Champion market, which resolves to whichever team wins the Super Bowl, has traded more than $50 million since it opened in February, including $1.5 million in the past week. As of September 7, the Los Angeles Rams price as the favorite at roughly 16.5%, with the Buffalo Bills (8.5%), Seattle Seahawks (7.5%), Baltimore Ravens (6.8%), Kansas City Chiefs (6.2%), and Dallas Cowboys (5%) clustered behind.

Price and volume don't move together here. The Rams contract, the current favorite, has traded $900,000. The Chiefs contract, priced lower at 6.2%, has traded $1.38 million—more than any other team's. Dallas is a similar story: priced at 5%, but its contract has moved $1.27 million. The NFC Champion ($6.3 million traded) and AFC Champion ($3.7 million traded) markets show the same pattern—Dallas's NFC contract alone has moved $917,000 while priced at just 6.7%.

The 2026 MVP market has traded $694,000, with $99,000 of that in the past week. Lamar Jackson prices as the favorite at 12.5%. Justin Herbert, priced lower at 9.5%, has the single most-traded contract in the market at $56,000.

Wednesday's kickoff: volume has nearly quadrupled in a week

The Patriots-Seahawks market has traded $52,500 total—up from $13,800 as of last Friday, with $42,000 of that arriving in the past week alone as kickoff nears. Seattle prices at 62.5% to beat New England (again) on Wednesday, September 9 at 8:20 pm ET on NBC.

New England enters banged up. The Patriots listed defensive tackle Christian Barmore, offensive lineman Ben Brown, and running back TreVeyon Henderson as non-participants in Sunday's practice, with Henderson (ankle) the most notable absence given a short week to prepare. Seattle's report is comparatively clean—only safety Ty Okada sat out entirely.

A second Week 1 opener is also seeing a volume surge: the 49ers-Rams market has traded $27,000, with $18,600 of that in the past week. It's the NFL's first regular-season game in Australia, kicking off Friday, September 11 at 10:35 am local time (Thursday, September 10 at 8:35 pm ET on Netflix) at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. The Rams, designated the home team despite playing on the other side of the world, price at 64.5% to beat San Francisco.

The rest of week 1

Five more games have each traded over $10,000 on Polymarket as of September 7: Bears at Panthers ($20,900, Bears priced at 59.5%), Bills at Texans ($19,500, essentially a coin flip at 49.5%–50.5% and up sharply this week), Dolphins at Raiders ($18,300, Raiders at 62.5%), Commanders at Eagles ($13,600, Eagles at 68.5%), and Browns at Jaguars ($10,300, Jaguars at 77.5%, the most lopsided line of the week alongside Cardinals at Chargers, where Chargers price at 81.5%).

Elsewhere, the markets asking whether Travis Kelce retires before next season and who starts week 1 at quarterback for the Chiefs—both of which drew heavy volume over the summer—have gone quiet in the past week as trading has rotated toward the actual games ahead of kickoff.

New to these markets? MetaMask's explainers cover what Polymarket is and how decentralized prediction markets work and the core terminology.