Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

NFL reels in a record $1.8 billion in sponsorship revenue

EvkjqQFuHWcc
Mike Florio and Chris Simms pick out which non-QBs will be the most important this weekend in the AFC and NFC Championships.

Sponsorship deals literally generate money for nothing. Nothing beyond letting a name be tied to a product.

For the NFL, allowing others to invoke Big Shield has generated more money than ever. Via CNBC, the league brought in more than $1.8 billion in sponsorship revenue in the 2021 season.

The bulk of it comes from the ongoing spike in gambling money, with a goofy (but lucrative) “tri-exclusive” (i.e., not exclusive at all) partnership with DraftKings, FanDuel, and Caesers, along with so-called “secondary deals” with BetMGM, WynnBet, FoxBet, and PointsBet.

Most of the money comes from Microsoft, which pays roughly $100 million per year to push its non-iPad product. The gambling deals come in second, with the league’s beer-and-booze sponsorships landing third.

Still to come? Agreements with wine and champagne companies and the crypto pyramid schemers.

It currently works out to more than $56 million per team. Which is a nice chunk of change, for doing absolutely nothing at all.