NFL odds for MVP and other top awards: A tight field led by Lamar Jackson heading into Week 1

Lamar Jackson is back on top. Of the MVP odds, that is. The Baltimore Ravens signal-caller and two-time MVP was second in voting for 2025’s award, edged out by the Buffalo Bills’ Josh Allen over just 26 votes.

Jackson is now at +500 on BetMGM, which implies a 17 percent probability that he’ll win his third MVP. Reigning MVP Allen and the Cincinnati Bengals’ Joe Burrow are a hair’s breadth behind him at +600, or 6-to-1 odds, with Patrick Mahomes rounding out the top four at +650. After that, the odds drop off slightly to last year’s breakout star on the Washington Commanders, Jayden Daniels, at +900, and then another gap to reigning Super Bowl champ Jalen Hurts at +1800.

Among the lower contenders for MVP are some of the favorites for other top awards like Offensive Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year.

Saquon Barkley leads in OPOY odds at +550, followed by Ja’Marr Chase (+900) and Jahmyr Gibbs (+1000). Barkley and Chase are always in the MVP conversation, but it’s been over a decade since a non-QB won it. (More on that later.)

Micah Parsons shot up to the favorite spot for DPOY after his trade to Green Bay. Parsons is +550 to win the award, just ahead of Detroit Lions DE Aidan Hutchinson (+700). Parsons was behind Hutchinson before the deal at +750. His high-profile move to Green Bay put him on a team with higher expectations for this season and on a defense that already was solid last year.

Hutchinson is perhaps a surprise contender after he suffered a season-ending leg injury last year. At the time of the injury, he was on pace to set a new NFL single-season record for sacks. As long as Hutchinson continues looking strong and healthy, he should remain in the discussion.

Coach of the Year is a crazy thing to be betting on, but here we go: The Chicago Bears’ Ben Johnson leads the odds at +650, which predicts a world in which Chicago finally wipes away their tears and maybe, just maybe, Caleb Williams breaks the 4,000-yard curse? (Sorry, not trying to jinx anybody!) After that, we’ve got New England’s Mike Vrabel (+700), who is guiding QB Drake Maye beyond expectations so far.

Finally, it’s Offensive and Defensive Rookie of the Year, where the biggest names are Ashton Jeanty (+260) and Cam Ward (+350) on the offensive side. Former Nittany Lion Abdul Carter is a bigger favorite on defense at +225, followed by former Georgia Bulldog Jalon Walker at +900.

Here are the odds for each award, with a longer breakdown of the MVP category.

NFL MVP odds

Last year, Mahomes opened as the betting favorite to win MVP, with the eventual winner Allen in second place and Burrow in third. Jackson started last season barely in the top 10 on betting boards. Though that may have been more due to the fact that he was already a two-time winner, and oddsmakers suspected the voters might want to give someone else some shine? Jackson is starting the season off with some injury questions, though coach John Harbaugh says he is “going to be good.” He finished last year’s regular season with 4,172 yards passing and 915 rushing, 41 touchdowns and just four interceptions and a team record of 12-5.

Of course, when it comes to MVP, those team records really matter. The last 37 MVPs have come from teams with good odds to win the Super Bowl. The leading Super Bowl favorites this year are the Ravens (+700), Bills (+700), Eagles (+700), Chiefs (+800) and Lions (+1000).

That makes Joe Burrow, second in the MVP odds, a bit of a daring choice, with the Bengals at +2000 odds to win the Super Bowl (they went 9-8 last year and missed the playoffs). But could it finally be his year? His lack of an MVP award is no fault of his own (last year he threw for 4,918 yards, 43 touchdowns and just nine interceptions) and more a result of a shoddy defense. The Bengals have a revamped defense this year under Al Golden, so they’re a team to watch early on.

How about non-quarterbacks? Since the inception of the award in 1957, 48 of the winners have been quarterbacks. Adrian Peterson was the last non-QB to snag it in 2012 with a 2,097-yard rushing year with the Minnesota Vikings. In the last several seasons, non-QBs have finished in the top 10 of voting often enough (names like Ja’Marr Chase, Christian McCaffrey, Justin Jefferson, A.J. Brown), but never got enough votes to clinch it. If you need any proof of how tough it is to win the voting if you’re not the signal-caller, just look at Saquon Barkley last year, who had a headline-dazzling, 2,005-yard regular season on the way to a Super Bowl win.

The first non-quarterback on this year’s odds list is, predictably, Barkley. But you’ll have to scroll past 18 quarterbacks to get to his name at +5000 odds, which is 50-to-1 or an implied chance of less than 2 percent.

Offensive Player of the Year odds

Defensive Player of the Year odds

Offensive Rookie of the Year odds

Defensive Rookie of the Year odds

Coach of the Year odds

(Photo by Greg Fiume / Getty Images)