Best NFL Futures Bets for the 2026-27 Season

Tue, Jul 21, 2026
by CapperTek

With NFL Training Camps set to begin across the league in the coming days, the end of July is one of the best times of year to bet on football. Why? With NFL futures, you can predict outcomes for the upcoming season with odds that are based more on hypotheticals than real stats. While odds during the season fluctuate based on weekly trends, futures odds are largely static and can depend on less dependable information like how a player looked in minicamp without pads on.

Because of this, we’ve scanned futures markets to come up with some of our favorite NFL futures bets for the 2026-27 season. Below are our three favorite picks, and after researching every betting app in this directory of online sportsbooks, we’ve found the sportsbook with the best odds for each pick.

Here are our best NFL futures bets for the upcoming season.

Chicago Bears +108 to Make the Playoffs on FanDuel

The list of NFL quarterbacks taken first overall in the NFL Draft who struggled in their rookie season is long. The QBs on that list who went on to figure it out and thrive in the league is almost as long. John Elway, Troy Aikman, Peyton Manning, Alex Smith, Jared Goff, Baker Mayfield… you get it.

That brings us to Caleb Williams.

Williams struggled in his first season in Chicago in 2024, leading the NFL in sacks en route to a 5-12 record. Under new head coach Ben Johnson, Williams thrived in Year 2, throwing for nearly 4,000 yards and 27 TDs, leading the Bears to a division championship with an 11-15 record. So why are sportsbooks suggesting the Bears won’t even make the playoffs this season?

The answer lies in the storylines and hypotheticals we mentioned earlier. NFL analysts and pundits have anointed the Bears’ schedule as the most difficult in the entire league this year, and as a result, Chicago is slightly favored to miss the playoffs.

To us, that creates an opportunity to win a bet: FanDuel Sportsbook currently has the best odds for the Bears to make the playoffs at +108. With Caleb Williams’ glow-up in 2025 and another year working under Ben Johnson, it doesn’t matter what their schedule is or who’s in their division — look for the Bears to find a way to make it into the postseason in January.

Fernando Mendoza Over 2,325.5 Pass Yards -110 on Caesars Sportsbook

Again, let’s look to some offseason storytelling regarding a No. 1 overall pick. The Raiders drafted Fernando Mendoza to be their quarterback of the future this offseason — but not before they signed veteran QB Kirk Cousins. While many NFL fans expected Mendoza to start Week 1 and learn on the job, some reporting has suggested otherwise. NFL Network’s Ian Rappoport reported that Raiders GM John Spytek and new head coach Klint Kubiak would prefer Mendoza to not play at all in 2026-27.

But if you watch, read, and listen to Rappoport’s reporting on this, that’s not the whole story. Not at all.

“What if Mendoza hits the ground running so fast and so well that they say, ‘This guy has to play,’” Rappoport said on NFL Network last week. “It might not be game one, but it might be early in the season.”

Does that sound like a reporter telling you Mendoza won’t play much this year? And of all players, it’ll be Kirk Cousins keeping Mendoza on the bench a year after he himself was benched by the Falcons?

Let’s put it this way: Since 2020, five QBs have been taken first overall, and every single one of them has surpassed the 2,325.5 passing yards mark set by Caesars Sportsbook — even Joe Burrow, who played in just 10 games in 2020. If you have a chance to bet on Fernando Mendoza to have a rookie season on par with — not even better than! — Cam Ward in ‘25 and Bryce Young in ‘23, we’ll take that bet any day.

Bengals +166 to Miss the Playoffs on FanDuel

Our final bet comes out of the AFC North, where the Bengals are a heavy favorite to make the playoffs. Why? It’s hard to tell.

Cincinnati hasn’t made the playoffs since 2022. Joe Burrow missed significant time in two of the three seasons since then, and the Bengals’ front office hasn’t yet upgraded their offensive line to the point at which you’d feel confident they can keep him healthy. The biggest factor? They lost their best defensive player in Trey Hendrickson — to a team they’ll play twice this year in the Ravens, no less.

The argument for the Bengals making the playoffs is the same as the one against the Bears: strength of schedule. But while Cincinnati’s schedule looks easy based on last year’s records, they still have to play Baltimore and Pittsburgh twice, and it’s hard to find an opponent on their schedule that’s not capable of beating them. They’ll play the Chiefs, Bucs, Texans, Jags, and Colts in addition to up-and-comers like the Commanders, Panthers and Saints.

It’s certainly possible for Burrow to stay healthy and the Bengals’ veteran additions on defense to be enough to get them to the postseason, but at +166 on FanDuel, we really like the plus-money odds on the Bengals to miss the postseason this year.