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The Seattle Seahawks can cross one major name off the list of potential opponents for their 2026 season opener.
The Denver Broncos and Kansas City Chiefs will play on September 14 in the first Monday Night Football game of the season, according to NFL.com. The location has not yet been finalized, but the matchup removes Kansas City from the group of possible teams that could visit Seattle for the NFL’s Wednesday night Kickoff Game.
That matters because the Seahawks’ Week 1 mystery has been narrowing by the day.
Seattle is scheduled to host the league’s opening game as the defending Super Bowl champion. The Seahawks’ full 2026 schedule will be released Thursday, May 14, but the team’s opponents are already known. Their home slate includes the Arizona Cardinals, Los Angeles Rams, San Francisco 49ers, Dallas Cowboys, New York Giants, Chiefs, Los Angeles Chargers, Chicago Bears and New England Patriots.
The Cowboys and Giants were already out of the running after the NFL announced they will meet on “Sunday Night Football” in Week 1. Now the Chiefs are also off the board, leaving Chicago as an even cleaner fit after NFL Network insider Mike Garafolo pointed to the Bears as the likely opponent on X.
The league and ESPN/ABC announce the first Monday night game of the 2026 NFL season will be Chiefs vs Broncos.
So the #Seahawks won’t be opening the league’s season vs Kansas City.
The remaining possible foes Weds, Sept 9 in Seattle:
Bears Cardinals Chargers Patriots
Kansas City made plenty of sense on paper.
The Chiefs are still one of the NFL’s biggest television draws, and a Seattle-Kansas City opener would have paired the defending Super Bowl champions against Patrick Mahomes, assuming he’s fully healthy by then. It also would have given the NFL a high-profile AFC-NFC matchup at Lumen Field.
But the Broncos-Chiefs reveal changes that completely.
NFL.com listed Chiefs-Broncos for Week 1 on September 14 at 8 p.m. ET on ABC, ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN Deportes.
The Mahomes factor also made a Chiefs opener in Seattle less certain even before the Broncos report. NFL.com noted that Mahomes’ Week 1 status remains a major storyline after he tore his ACL and LCL in Week 15 last season.
For Seattle fans, the practical takeaway is simple: the Chiefs are no longer part of the Week 1 guessing game.
Garafolo’s earlier read now looks stronger.
He listed the Seahawks’ possible home opponents still without a Week 1 assignment as the Cardinals, Chiefs, Chargers, Bears and Patriots, then wrote that he was “not feeling” an early Super Bowl rematch and that Mahomes’ uncertainty complicated Kansas City’s case. His conclusion: “Has long felt like Chicago to me.”
With Kansas City now scheduled for Monday night, the Bears stand out even more.
Chicago would give the NFL a young quarterback storyline with Caleb Williams, a large national fan base and a fresh NFC matchup that does not require burning a Super Bowl rematch in Week 1. The Patriots remain notable because they faced Seattle in the Super Bowl, but Garafolo’s point about the league possibly holding that rematch for later in the season still makes sense, especially if the Patriots continue to be plagued by off-field drama.
The Chargers are also still possible, and the Cardinals are a division rival, but neither carries quite the same combination of novelty, national appeal and clean scheduling logic that Chicago does.
The Seahawks will not have to wait long for certainty. The NFL says the full 2026 regular-season schedule will be released Thursday, May 14, at 8 p.m. ET, with broadcast partners announcing select games throughout the week.
The Broncos-Chiefs reveal was not the only major schedule development.
The NFL has already announced that the Giants will host the Cowboys on “Sunday Night Football” in Week 1 on September 13 at MetLife Stadium. The league noted that it will be the eighth time in the past 15 seasons that Dallas and New York have opened a season against each other.
The Associated Press also reported that the Bills will host the Lions on September 17 in the first regular-season game at Buffalo’s new stadium, kicking off Amazon Prime Video’s “Thursday Night Football” schedule. The Cowboys will also host the Eagles on Thanksgiving Day on Fox.
None of those games directly gives Seattle its Week 1 opponent, but together they help shape the board. Dallas, New York and Kansas City are accounted for. Buffalo and Detroit have a major Week 2 assignment. Philadelphia has its Thanksgiving showcase.
For the Seahawks, the biggest domino is Kansas City. A matchup that once looked like a possible blockbuster opener is now headed to Monday night.
That leaves Seattle waiting on the final answer, and Chicago looking harder to ignore.
Erik Anderson is an award-winning sports journalist covering the NBA, MLB and NFL for Heavy.com. He also focuses on the trading card market. His work has appeared in nationally-recognized outlets including The New York Times, Associated Press , USA Today, and ESPN. More about Erik Anderson
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