Why The Browns Are The Favorite Team To Win The AFC North In Vegas
Elijah King
Published Mar 28, 2026
Despite the last two embarrassing seasons of the Cleveland Browns where they held a record of 1-31 – winning their last game on Dece. 1, 2016, this year the renewed squad is the favorite team to win the AFC North after 29 years.
A Caesars Palace sportsbook manager said to ESPN that “there are more bets on the Browns to win AFC North than the other three teams combined. The public likes the Browns, and I'm not sure why." In the same article, they added that Cleveland is listed at 60-1 to win the Super Bowl at MGM. Higher odds than teams such as the Atlanta Falcons, Kansas City Chiefs, and Jacksonville Jaguars, franchises who did win a game last season and even made the playoffs.
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Nonetheless, it's not surprising that the Browns became such a popular franchise overnight. There are various reasons why a lot of people like the new Ohio team and believe they may win the division title.
First of all, they drafted one of the most charismatic and polarizing quarterbacks the NCAA had in a while in Baker Mayfield. Now in the NFL, he has earned the fans’ attention with things like recreating the famous Brett Favre draft call photo or making a secret quarterback clubhouse in the Brown’s training camp; not to mention the tremendous talent that the Oklahoma product has. During his last season in College, he scored 43 touchdowns with only six interceptions and completed more than 70 percent of his passes. Even though it is uncertain if the rookie phenomenon will start any game this season, there are great expectations regarding what this guy can do.
Another big reason for why there’s a lot of people who suddenly believe the Browns may have a much better season this year is Hard Knocks —the HBO series featuring the Cleveland Browns this year, showcasing a behind-the-scenes look at their training camps. It's sound logic for the NFL fans to feel more attached to a team if they are watching everything that’s going on prior to the season. This seems to be a Hard Knocks effect in which the teams are overrated due to the show. Last year, the team featured in the T.V. show was the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and during the preseason they were projected to win 8.5 games. They won five. The year before, the HBO cameras recorded what happened in the L.A. Rams training camps. They only won four games out of the seven expected wins before the start of the season. Hard Knocks tends to maximize teams’ potentials.
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Moreover, everyone wants to see a team that is fun to watch winning, and this new Cleveland squad is full of entertaining and captivating personalities, which inevitably draws the attention of football fans and wins their hearts. Besides Mayfield, players like Jarvis Landry, Josh Gordon, and even the Head Coach Hue Jackson and the Defensive Coordinator Gregg Williams have really charismatic personalities, which makes it easier for people to be fond of the new team. Landry has said that they could win the Super Bowl this year and that he could be the new Cleveland face, now that Lebron James is gone. Perhaps confidence inspires more confidence.
Lastly, it’s evident that the new backfield the Browns assembled for this season inspires confidence amongst the gambling community. Their running game is expected to vastly improve with the arrival of the former 49er Carlos Hyde and the second-round pick Nick Chubb. Johnson—who has been in Cleveland for the last three years—and Hyde are both listed in the top-32 running backs of the NFL. In addition, the already mentioned Pro-Bowl receivers duo—Landry and Gordon—will definitely make things easier to whoever commands the offense this season, Taylor or Mayfield. Last time Gordon played a complete season before he was out with addiction problems, he led the NFL with 1,646 yards receiving. This much talent in the backfield must motivate anyone to bet on this franchise, despite their last season's record.
Although it sounds quite difficult for the Cleveland Browns to win the AFC North title this year—still they need to find the right chemistry and be better than the Steelers—there are understandable reasons for people to feel persuaded to think this could happen.
