The NFL made a bit of a splash in the lottery industry last May when it announced plans for a multistate game that would launch in the fall of 2025.
As part of a partnership between the Multi-State Lottery Association (MUSL) and the National Football League, plans called to use the intellectual property of the professional league for a new nationwide lottery game.
Those plans were announced during La Fleur’s 2024 Raleigh Conference.
On Monday, an update was provided during the North American Association of State & Provincial Lotteries (NASPL) 2024 Conference in Kansas City.
Colorado Lottery Director Tom Seaver detailed the update during his state’s commission meeting on Wednesday.
There’s plenty of new information about what this addition to retail and online lottery games could look like.
Tic-tac-toe gameplay suggested for lottery title involving NFL
Seaver spelled out some of the information of the game to his commissioners in Colorado.
It was proposed as a tic-tac-toe grid that would feature the icons of all 32 NFL teams.
“It is essentially a tic-tac-toe format game where instead of X’s and O’s, the logos of the 32 NFL teams will fall into those squares, and there’ll be a free square in the middle, which will have the NFL logo. Prizes will be based on how many of those eight spots are matched.”
Seaver didn’t specify if the matching of the grid has to be matching logos of a specific team, or if there will be a drawing to place a logo in each spot. The ticket could need to match the drawn grid, similar to matching numbers of Mega Millions or Powerball.
In May, Oklahoma Lottery Executive Director Jay Finks said the title was likely going to be a draw game. During his La Fleur’s presentation with the NFL, Finks said the following:
“I think you’ll see a draw game. It’ll leverage some of the assets that the lottery can bring into game development. It can leverage some of those assets that the NFL can bring with some of their marks.”
A prize grid wasn’t detailed by Seaver. However, he did note that the payout for the game was expected to be 55% of sales.
Is 2025 kickoff too soon of a timeline to debut?
Seaver noted that MUSL and the NFL are going to try and get the game adopted by as many different state lotteries as possible. This is in hopes to be ready for the start of the 2025 season.
However, he felt that in order to have everything ready and regulated, the 2026 season may be more of a reasonable target:
“Because so many states are going to want to test this, including (Colorado), there will be rule making that will be necessary. There will be research that will be necessary. I think there’s a decent chance that this proposed launch will roll out an additional year, and they will want to target fall of 2026.”
Seaver also commented that just because the NFL and MUSL are putting together a game, doesn’t mean Colorado will automatically carry it. The same could be said for other lotteries, for that matter.
“We’re going to huddle up and talk about what type of research we’re going to want to do to try to evaluate that game, to see if it’s a good fit for the Colorado Lottery. We’re certainly not going to be pressured by any timelines. We measure twice and cut once, and we’re not going to vary from that for this proposed game.”
What else we know about national NFL lottery game
During last May’s presentation, some other key details were thrown out. Seaver didn’t confirm any of these previous plans. More information about the game should be released in the months ahead.
- Considered for a Sunday draw to coincide with NFL game days and differ from Powerball or Mega Millions.
- Price point could vary from other games, possibly even a $7 ticket.
- Prizes and second-chance drawings that would include tickets to regular season games, playoff games, and the Super Bowl. They would also offer NFL Draft experiences and team merchandise.
- Making the game simple to play and understand so it appeals beyond avid NFL fans.
MUSL and the NFL would like this game to be incorporated by all US retail lotteries. It would also likely be an option for all states with online lotteries to offer, as well.
Photo by Mike McCarn / AP
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