2025 NFL season prediction and best bets: Double delight for Ravens and Lamar

The 2025 NFL season gets underway on Thursday, with the Philadelphia Eagles, reigning Super Bowl champions, hoping to pick up where they left off against the Dallas Cowboys.

American football remains the most popular sport across the USA, with an average of 127.7 million viewers tuning in to watch the Eagles obliterate the Kansas City Chiefs in the Super Bowl last February.

Philly were a best price of 16/1 on betting sites to win their second championship a year ago, but you won’t get anywhere near that kind of price in 2025 with the Eagles the favourites in the NFC Conference, ahead of the Detroit Lions and Green Bay Packers.

Meanwhile, there could be a tense battle between the three top teams in the AFC. Super Bowl runners-up Kansas City are expected to go again as they chase a fourth Super Bowl win in seven years, while the Baltimore Ravens and Buffalo Bills should put up a fight driven by 2023 MVP Lamar Jackson and 2024 MVP Josh Allen respectively.

We’ve put together a selection of outright NFL bets for 2025 ahead of the new season from NFL betting sites with a lean towards the Ravens outperforming their NFL odds this season.

The Ravens come into 2025 looking to convert regular season performances into play-off success, with the two-time Super Bowl winners desperate to put a series of disappointing post-season defeats in recent years behind them.

Many pundits believe the Ravens have the best roster ahead of the 2025 season, with two-time MVP Lamar Jackson leading the charge at quarterback. He’s joined by an excellent offensive supporting cast including running back Derrick Henry, wide receiver Zay Flowers and tight end Mark Andrews. The offensive line is solid, and this is a unit certainly among the top three in the league.

And while their defensive unit doesn’t rank as highly, it is still among the top five or so in the NFL. The main stars include safety Kyle Hamilton, cornerback Marlon Humphrey, linebacker Roquan Smith and defensive tackle Nnamdi Madubuike, with all of these players knitted together by a top head coach in John Harbaugh.

While teams like the Eagles are equally as frightening on offence, their defences have more holes than Baltimore’s, particularly in the secondary in Philly’s case, and the Ravens look to have the most well-rounded roster of any team.

It is never as simple as ‘just’ having the best squad, but the Ravens appear capable of at least matching anyone across an entire game on paper, and with the dual-threat of Jackson alongside several talented supporting options, it will be difficult to keep that offence quiet.

With many strengths and very few weaknesses – combined with a mix of talent, youth and experience – it seems like now might be the time for the Ravens to get over the play-off hump and dethrone the Chiefs as the best side in the AFC before going on to Super Bowl glory.

NFL prediction 1: Baltimore Ravens to win Super Bowl LX - 7/1 Virgin Bet

The arrival of defensive star Micah Parsons to the Green Bay Packers via a trade with the Dallas Cowboys has seen the Pack become favourites to win the NFC North on some betting apps. But to justify the price collapse, Green Bay will need to finish above the Detroit Lions, who have won two straight NFC North titles and come into 2025 off the back of a 15-2 record last season.

Despite losing offensive coordinator Ben Johnson and defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn to head coaching roles, the Lions roster remains impressive, with quarterback Jared Goff coming off his most accurate season as a professional. Detroit also boast a two-headed monster at runnning-back in Jahmyr Gibbs and David Montgomery, who are perhaps the league’s best pairing at the position.

The offensive line doesn’t look as strong as it did last season and Johnson’s offensive mind will be tough to replace, but the regression may not be as big as some are forecasting.

On the other side of the ball, the Lions were in the top 10 in points per game allowed and turnovers forced, and that will only be boosted by the return of Aidan Hutchinson from a leg injury suffered just five games into last season. He had eight sacks and 45 pressures in those five contests, so if he can produce similar stats for an entire regular season, the Lions have a player who can rival Parsons as the best defensive talent in the NFL.

In short, the Lions were one of the best teams in the entire league last season and punters may be able to profit from what seems like an overreaction to Parsons’ move to Green Bay.

NFL prediction 2: Detroit Lions to win NFC North - 2/1 QuinnBet

The NFL MVP Award remains the outstanding individual honour a player can win in the regular season. It’s a prize that’s traditionally been dominated by quarterbacks – with QBs winning all but four MVP awards so far this century – and the betting suggests that will be the case again.

The Ravens’ Lamar Jackson, who won the award in 2023 and 2019, is the favourite entering the season, but there’s a queue of talented QBs waiting behind him in the form of Bengals’ Joe Burrow, reigning MVP Josh Allen and the Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes.

Nevertheless, while Mahomes and Burrows are interesting candidates, it is difficult to look past Allen and Jackson in 2025.

2024 MVP Allen broke a number of records last season and has accounted for at least 40 touchdowns (passing or rushing) in five straight seasons, which is the longest streak in NFL history.

Nevertheless, the MVP award is heavily tied to a team’s overall fortunes, and though the Bills are priced at the same odds as the Ravens to win the Super Bowl, a raft of defensive changes in the Bills’ squad mean there is more of a question mark over Buffalo’s chances. Additionally, only four players in the Super Bowl era have ever pulled off back-to-back MVP awards.

With that in mind, Jackson seems to be the ‘best’ pick as the other standout candidate ahead of the new season. The league’s best dual-threat QB is the only one with multiple MVP awards not to appear in a Super Bowl, and while Jackson and Allen will look to turn individual performances into play-off success this season, it may be that Jackson is best positioned to do so.

Jackson led the NFL in yards per pass attempt (8.8) and yards per carry (6.6) last season while posting career-best stats in passing TDs (41) and passing yards (4,172) – as well as 915 rushing yards – which contributed to a team record of 12-5.

NFL prediction 3: Lamar Jackson to win MVP Award - 11/2 Virgin Bet

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