5 agosto 2026
NFL Preseason 2026: Schedule, Hall of Fame Game and Odds
Panthers beat Cardinals 33-30 in Canton, the full preseason Week 1 schedule, three record running back deals, and how to bet the NFL with Bitcoin or USDC.
Football is back. The Hall of Fame Game was played on Thursday night in Canton and Carolina beat Arizona 33-30, decided by a rushing touchdown as the clock hit zero. Preseason Week 1 follows on 13 August, and the regular season opens on Wednesday 9 September.
What follows is the full schedule, what actually happened in Canton, the three contracts that reset the running back market inside a week, and a straight answer on what a preseason line is worth. The game itself just made that last part easier to explain.
The Hall of Fame Game: Panthers 33, Cardinals 30
Carolina won it on the final snap. Quarterback Haynes King ran it in from short range as time expired, capping a 21 of 34, 180-yard, two-touchdown passing night that also produced 39 rushing yards. It was a genuinely entertaining football game.
It was also a game almost none of the people who will decide these teams' seasons played in.
Carson Beck, Arizona's rookie third-round pick, made his professional debut and went 15 of 19 for 188 yards and a touchdown, a 125.4 passer rating. He said before the game he had no idea he was starting.
Kedon Slovis replaced him with the score level and went 9 of 10 for 106 yards and a touchdown. On the numbers he outplayed the man who started.
Kenny Pickett started for Carolina and went 8 of 11 for 62 yards before giving way to King in the second quarter.
Jalen Brooks was the game's leading receiver with three catches for 99 yards, including a 49-yard grab from Beck.
A.J. Dillon scored Carolina's first touchdown from a yard out.
Around 35 Arizona players were held out entirely. Bryce Young did not play for Carolina, nor did Jaycee Horn or Jaelan Phillips. It was Mike LaFleur's first game as an NFL head coach, and his line about it beforehand was the most honest thing anyone said all week: it is real football, and the guys playing can get hurt.
Nobody was reported injured in the game, which is the single best outcome available from a preseason opener.
What the result actually proved
A 33-30 thriller decided on the last play sounds like a game that told you something. Work through who produced it and it says the opposite.
The two most impressive quarterback performances came from a rookie who is not the starter and a backup who is fighting for a roster spot. The leading receiver is competing for a job rather than a role. The team that lost held out three dozen players. Nothing in that scoreline transfers to September, and anyone building a season-long read out of it is reading the wrong document.
That is not a knock on the game. It is exactly what the Hall of Fame Game is for: it decides employment, not seasons.
The enshrinement, and a neat coincidence
The Class of 2026 goes in on Saturday 8 August at noon ET at the same stadium: Drew Brees, Larry Fitzgerald, Luke Kuechly, Adam Vinatieri and Roger Craig. Brees and Fitzgerald went in on the first ballot. Vinatieri holds the all-time record with 599 field goals. Fitzgerald sits second all-time in receiving yards behind only Jerry Rice. Kuechly retired at 28 after eight seasons, all in Carolina.
Which makes the fixture choice tidy: Fitzgerald's Cardinals against Kuechly's Panthers, two nights before both go into the Hall.
Preseason Week 1: the full schedule
Thursday 13 August: Lions at Bengals (7:00 ET), Packers at Steelers (7:00), Colts at Patriots (7:30), Chargers at Texans (8:00), Cardinals at Raiders (8:00), Titans at 49ers (9:00).
Friday 14 August: Broncos at Falcons (7:00), Buccaneers at Jets (7:00), Dolphins at Commanders (7:00).
Saturday 15 August: Panthers at Bills (1:00), Browns at Bears (1:00), Vikings at Giants (1:00), Rams at Chiefs (4:00), Jaguars at Saints (4:00), Eagles at Ravens (7:00), Cowboys at Seahawks (8:00).
The regular season opens Wednesday 9 September, not the usual Thursday, with New England at Seattle at Lumen Field. That is a rematch of Super Bowl LX, which Seattle won 29-13.
The running back market reset three times in one week
The biggest NFL story of the last few days has nothing to do with a game.
Bijan Robinson signed a three-year extension with Atlanta worth $66.75 million in base value, rising to $75 million with incentives. That is a $22.25 million average per year, the highest of any running back in the league, and $51 million guaranteed with $37 million guaranteed at signing, the most ever given to a running back on a non-rookie deal.
Jonathan Taylor followed with a two-year extension in Indianapolis worth $44 million, up to $47 million with incentives, $39 million guaranteed, at a $22.0 million average. It was reported as the largest third contract ever given to an NFL running back, and Taylor did not hold out to get it.
The previous high at the position was Saquon Barkley at $20.6 million a year. Two players cleared it inside 48 hours, and Jahmyr Gibbs is still holding out in Detroit waiting for his.
Here is the honest part: none of this is bettable. There is no contract market on our board, no over-under on guaranteed money, no market on who signs next. It is the most consequential football news of the week and it carries no price anywhere. Anyone building a betting angle out of a contract story is building it out of nothing.
What it does change is the season ahead. Three teams have just told you what they think their offence runs through, and that shows up later in rushing props, touchdown markets and team totals.
The other moves worth knowing
Stefon Diggs is signing with Washington on a one-year deal worth up to $12 million. He is 32, was released by New England in March, and caught 99 passes for 1,123 yards and five touchdowns across 21 games last season including their run to Super Bowl LX. He joins Terry McLaurin and Jayden Daniels.
Aaron Donald worked out for the Rams on 5 August. It is on the league's official transaction log and he wore a helmet and pads. What it is not is a signing. Per a source cited at the time, the workout was for Donald to evaluate how he felt rather than for the Rams to evaluate him, and he would need to pass a physical before any contract existed. He retired in March 2024 and turned 35 in May.
Jalon Walker tore his ACL. Atlanta's 2025 first-round pick was carted off a non-padded practice on 4 August and imaging confirmed the tear the next day. He is out for the season. The Falcons paid Robinson and lost Walker inside about 24 hours.
What a preseason line is actually worth
Measured off our own displayed prices, a preseason two-way market close to a coin toss runs about 106.4 per cent once you convert both prices to implied probabilities and add them. A regular-season baseball moneyline on the same board runs about 105.2 per cent. Preseason costs you more than a real baseball game does.
And it tells you less. A regular-season line is a question about which team is better. A preseason line is a question about coaching decisions you are not in the room for: how long the ones play, whether they play at all, who gets the second half. Thursday night was that in its purest form, a three-point game between two teams whose actual rosters were mostly standing on the sideline.
Higher cost, lower information. That is the whole argument.
What preseason genuinely decides
The cut from 90 to 53. For most players on the field in Canton this was the audition.
The backup quarterback job. Thursday was literally that, twice over, and Slovis made a real case.
Kickers. Chad Ryland went three from three for Arizona and Ryan Fitzgerald two from two for Carolina. It is the one position where preseason kicking genuinely moves a depth chart.
Injuries. Jalon Walker went down in a practice with no pads on. That risk runs entirely against you.
All of that is a reason to watch. None of it is a reason to bet.
NFL betting with Bitcoin
One thing specific to NFL betting in August is about time rather than football.
Season futures placed now do not settle until February. A Super Bowl ticket bought this week is held for six months, and over those six months you carry two positions rather than one: the bet you meant to take, and the currency you took it in. If you stake a futures ticket in Bitcoin and the coin moves 30 per cent while your team goes 11-6, your return was decided by two things and only one of them was football.
Stablecoins remove the second position. Stake a long-hold futures ticket in USDT or USDC and what comes back is decided by the result. For a single preseason game settling in three hours none of this matters and you can use whatever crypto you like, Bitcoin included. It is specifically the futures market where the coin choice becomes part of the bet.
Jacks Club takes deposits in BTC, ETH, LTC, USDT, USDC, XRP, TRON, TON and SOL, and the current deposit bonus and ongoing promotions cover sportsbook play.
Where to find the markets
NFL Preseason is carried as its own competition on the American football board, alongside the regular-season NFL, CFL, NCAA and draft markets. Every market on it can be backed with Bitcoin or a stablecoin.
For the mechanics rather than the schedule, the NFL betting guide covers the point spread, the key numbers, player props and futures. If you just want the dates, when the NFL season starts answers it in one line. And for the same margin arithmetic on a three-way market instead of a two-way one, the Leagues Cup guide works through it on soccer, where the numbers run about a point higher.
We will update this page once Week 1 is under way on 13 August.