chongli

Some thoughts from Peter King's new FMIA column: "1. I think a few points should be made about the NFL’s decision to play a 2024 regular-season game in Sao Paolo, Brazil: The NFL is considering playing the Sao Paolo game in week one. Kickoff weekend is early this year—Sept. 5-9—because Labor Day is Sept. 2. Because the restrictions on interfering with Friday-night high-school games and Saturday college-football games don’t take effect until the second full weekend of September, the NFL could schedule a game on Friday night, Sept. 6, or Saturday the 7th. So it won’t be a surprise if the Sao Paolo game becomes part of a Thursday doubleheader, or a Thursday, Friday or Saturday standalone game—with the Super Bowl champ opening the season at home on Sunday night. It’s happened before. It’s a hike to get to Sao Paolo. The game is likely to feature an NFC home team, because NFC teams have nine home games in 2024. Say the home team is Dallas. It’s a 10-hour, 10-minute flight from Dallas to Sao Paolo, which means a team likely would want to spend either a week there or most of a week before playing a game. Miami is the only team that currently has made Brazil an international home marketing area, part of the NFL programs to increase individual teams’ profiles in foreign countries. So it would be logical to think the Dolphins would be one of the teams in Sao Paolo—except that the team flew nine hours to Frankfurt to play Kansas City this year. The league may want to showcase other teams in Brazil, and it’s likely that Miami would have to volunteer to go given it just went to Germany. If Miami is one of the teams, the Dolphins have three road games against NFC teams in 2024: Rams, Seahawks, and the parallel finisher in the NFC North. So maybe that team is Detroit. Why Sao Paolo instead of other places? It’s the biggest city in South America (not just Brazil), with a metro-area population of 21.7 million. (New York City has 18.8 million people.) The stadium, Arena Corinthians, hosted the opener of 2014 World Cup and is nine years old. It has 89 suites and natural ryegrass. The city’s not a natural beauty, but NFL metrics pointed to a huge Brazilian fan base as a big reason why it was chosen for a 2024 game over Spain. That plus there was more enthusiasm inside the league to go somewhere new and intensely interested rather than choosing another site in western Europe. This broadens the league’s international footprint. One last point about logistics: Say the game is played on Thursday of week one. The two teams would likely land back in their home cities sometime around mid-day on Friday. Players theoretically would have Friday night, Saturday, Sunday (and maybe Monday) to fix body clocks before beginning prep work for week two. It’s not too onerous. 2. I think my gut feeling is the NFL would be happy with Dolphins-Lions sometime on kickoff weekend in Brazil."

Mike Tirico said during SNF that the Bills/Chargers game will have fewer commercials, especially later in the game.

And now number 3 in the current power rankings from Vikings-USA Today: https://vikingswire.usatoday.com/lists/nfl-power-rankings-week-16-vikings-tumble-bills-vault-top-3-seahawks-eagles-lions-bengals-steelers-49ers/

Is that Leon Seals? Also, had no idea Butch is a body builder now:

Not sure if posted:

There is a chance the SNF team could play on Monday the following week in the final WC game. The ABC games are on that Saturday, TBD. Networks can't protect a game in Week 18. Super WC Weekend schedule is this (despite what ESPN says on its website): Saturday afternoon: NBC Saturday primetime: Peacock Sunday early: TBD (FOX or CBS) Sunday late: TBD (FOX or CBS) Sunday primetime: NBC Monday primetime: ESPN/ABC

Brazilians know football:

The final game of the season on SNF in Week 18 is called "Game 272" (17 weeks x 16 games/per week = 272). There are also two unknown Saturday games that week on ABC/ESPN. This final game is reserved for games having playoff implications and national interest and ratings. The NFL tries not to give any team an advantage by scheduling this final game, but that isn't guaranteed, like last year when Detroit played at Green Bay. By virtue of Seattle's win earlier, Detroit was eliminated and had no reason to be motivated against Green Bay. But the NFL scheduled the game anyway, and, lo and behold, Detroit won, this eliminating Green Bay. Below are all the games for 2023 Week 18. Remember, one will be chosen for SNF and two will go to Saturday, all on six days' notice. I have commented which ones I think have a chance for Game 272. Green means very much in contention. Yellow means maybe, but less likely. Red means no way, or highly unlikely at best. CBS: PIT @ BAL - possibly, if WC or no. 1 seed implications CLE @ CIN - WC win or go home HOU @ IND - WC win or go home BUF @ MIA - if it's for the division NYJ @ NE JAX @ TN KC @ LAC DEN @ LV - possibly, if it's for a WC, but not really because Las Vegas still sucks, despite winning big over the Chargers. FOX: TB @ CAR MIN @ DET - if it's for the division CHI @ GB ATL @ NO - possibly, if it's for the division, but both teams suck, so not really PHI @ NYG maybe if implications for the NFC no. 1 seed SEA @ AZ LAR @ SF - maybe if implications for the NFC no. 1 seed DAL @ WSH - maybe if implications for the NFC no. 1 seed As for the Saturday games, that screams ATL-NO if it's for the division, just like TN-JAX last year. Good game, but not good enough for SNF. TRIVIA: Game 272 used to be called "Game 254" when there were only 16 games in a season. Last year, of course, there were only 271 games. In 2017, the NFL deemed no game compelling enough, so there was no SNF for the final week, Week 17. Sucked for NBC.

FOX Early: Green Bay at Carolina (F) Chris Myers, Robert Smith, Jen Hale [Chris Myers twitter:] FOX Late: Arizona at Chicago Kevin Kugler, Mark Sanchez, Laura Okmin [by process of elimination]

UPDATE 4: [for posterity] FOX Early: A small CBS affiliate in Hazard KY (WYMT (FOX/57)), which is owned by and usually runs the same programming as the Lexington station in the DMA, is showing TB-GB instead of HOU-TN. This change is not reflected in the maps.

New York Giants at Philadelphia (B) Joe Davis, Darly Johnston, Pam Oliver [confirmed by Davis during game KC-NE 12/17] Detroit at Minnesota Kenny Albert, Jonathan Vilma, Shannon Spake [confirmed by Albert during NYG-NO game 12/17] Kathryn Tappen as side line reporter for CIN-PIT confirmed by NBC press release.

Today we have two notable games: 1. The battle of the Bays 2. Houston vs. Houston

Rich Eisen confirmed Kurt Warner as his partner for NE-DEN on Christmas Eve during Game Day View this morning (12/17) on NFL Network. Make sure to cancel only after the Saturday evening Peacock WC game.

For those in Australia and New Zealand who don't know, the NFL Network feed on the ESPN a is showing the Saturday games live.

It's on NFL+!

Good question. You will get it as long as you get WGRZ. They can't stop their signal at the Monroe County line or whatever. The same goes if you get WGRZ over the air. It actually seems from asking around that it will be on NFL+, as they have all the games and showed the ESPN+ game this season as well as all Amazon games.

UPDATE 3: CBS Single: Lexington KY: NYJ-MIA to HOU-TN (Fri) They are cowtowning for Will Levis, lol. Map has been changed.

With the way there Chargers just played, there will less incentive for the nation to purchase a Peacock subscription. That being said, there might be increased curiosity though with Chargers' new head coach and to see if the team rallies around him. Regardless, most people not in Buffalo or LA will need a subscription (free or otherwise) to see the WC game. Better to get it before Saturday to see both games in one month before they cancel. Unless they go to a sports bar.

UPDATE 2: FOX Early: Marquette MI: KC-NE to CHI-CLE (Fri) Map has been changed.

Just delete the post.

Also on KNBC (NBC/4) Los Angeles.