The NFL has been the most-watched sports league in the US since 1972. Last year, it nearly tripled the second most-watched sports league, the MLB, garnering a total of 975 billion minutes watched between Nov. 2022 and Nov. 2023, according to statista.com. However, for the past few years, conspiracies about rigged matches have been floating around this league. A poll conducted in March 2023 shows that about one in every six fans believe the NFL is scripted.
If the NFL tried to blatantly fix their games, they would face serious legal consequences. Additionally, football requires too much skill to rely upon players to flawlessly execute a script. For example, if a game is nearing its end, and a team needs a kicker to make a long field goal to win the game, it would be difficult for the kicker to match the script. And finally, there have been close to 30,000 players in the history of the NFL. It is highly unlikely that none of them would snitch about the games being predetermined.
However, if it was an individual team or player trying to rig the game instead of the NFL, this would result in multiple punishments from the league, and players involved could face removal from the league altogether. They could also face the Sports Bribery Act of 1964 to hold match fixers legally accountable.
This being said, there is a way that the NFL could technically rig their games. In the 2024 NFL playoffs that happened in February, fans were quick to point out that the referees missed a few calls against the Kansas City Chiefs. These include numerous holding and pass interference calls that seem to have been overlooked by the referees. The epitome of this was during the AFC Championship with the Chiefs facing against the Baltimore Ravens. During this game, the referees had the usual missed calls, but when Chiefs player Travis Kelce got into an argument with two Ravens players, the referees only threw a flag on the Ravens. This led many to believe that the NFL was rigging their games to favor the Chiefs. This is just one example of referees being somewhat biased. If the NFL wanted to fix a game, they could use certain officials to favor a team. By only using a couple of select officials, it mostly eliminates the risk of tattlers. Although this is a possibility, it is still highly unlikely that the NFL is rigged. If the NFL was caught, the people involved and the commissioner would all face legal backlash.
