Far less often than the odds board implies. Across our sample, the player who finished the season as his team's leading touchdown scorer got the game's first touchdown just 30.3% of the time. Even the top three scorers combined only account for 60.4%, meaning roughly 4 in 10 first touchdowns come from somewhere further down the depth chart.
That diffuseness is exactly why first-TD markets carry roughly 19% vigorish, about four times a normal point-spread bet. Books can afford to be generous-looking on 30 names when no single name clears 25% true probability in a typical game.
The lesson isn't to avoid the market, it's to stop paying favorite prices for star names and start pricing roles. Scoring opportunity (goal-line carries, red-zone targets, early-drive usage) beats talent as a predictor, and the gap between the two is where the value lives.
Source: 1,087 regular-season NFL games, 2022–2025, official play-by-play. Full method on the methodology page.