{"id":27702,"date":"2026-05-12T14:02:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T14:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/27702\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T14:02:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T14:02:09","slug":"mnf-opener-pits-division-champion-broncos-against-chiefs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/27702\/","title":{"rendered":"MNF opener pits division champion Broncos against Chiefs"},"content":{"rendered":"

May 12, 2026, 08:18 AM ET<\/p>\n

The Denver Broncos<\/a> and Kansas City Chiefs<\/a> will square off Sept. 14 in the first “Monday Night Football” game of the coming season.<\/p>\n

The Broncos wrested the AFC West title from the Chiefs last season, ending Kansas City’s nine-year streak atop the division.<\/p>\n

The site of the game will be known when the NFL unveils the complete 2026 regular-season schedule Thursday.<\/p>\n

Editor’s Picks<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n

1 Related<\/p>\n

Another unknown is whether Chiefs star quarterback Patrick Mahomes<\/a> will be available for the game. The two-time NFL MVP tore the ACL and LCL in his left knee on Dec. 14 in the final minutes of a loss to the Los Angeles Chargers<\/a>. He has stated his goal is to be ready for Kansas City’s 2026 season opener.<\/p>\n

Broncos quarterback Bo Nix<\/a> is expected to be ready for training camp after breaking a bone in his right ankle on Jan. 18 during the AFC playoffs. Nix did not play in Denver’s season-ending loss to the New England Patriots<\/a> in the AFC Championship Game.<\/p>\n

A trio of games announced Monday came as NBC, Fox and Prime Video made their upfront presentations to advertisers. More matchups will be revealed in the coming days.<\/p>\n

The Dallas Cowboys<\/a> were part of two of the unveilings Monday — both against NFC East rivals. The Cowboys will visit the New York Giants<\/a> in the first NBC “Sunday Night Football” game of the season on Sept. 13, and they will host the Philadelphia Eagles<\/a> on Thanksgiving (Nov. 26) on Fox.<\/p>\n

The Buffalo Bills<\/a>‘ first regular-season game in their new stadium will be against the Detroit Lions<\/a> on Sept. 17 and will kick off Amazon Prime Video’s “Thursday Night Football” schedule.<\/p>\n

The Denver-Kansas City and Dallas-New York Week 1 matchups also mean none of those teams will be the visitor at Seattle on Wednesday, Sept. 9, when the defending champion Seahawks<\/a> unveil their Super Bowl banner and kick off the season. Chicago, Arizona, the Chargers or a title-game rematch against New England are the remaining possibilities.<\/p>\n

The Associated Press contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"May 12, 2026, 08:18 AM ET The Denver Broncos and Kansas City Chiefs will square off Sept. 14…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27703,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[8,9,7],"class_list":{"0":"post-27702","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-top-stories","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-stories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@news\/116561978540861381","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27702"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27702\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}