NFL Schedule Breakdown

As usual, the NFL announced the schedule on the Thursday before the Draft.  It's one of the days football fans look forward to the most during the offseason.  You know your opponents and where immediately after the season ends, and the teams that are going to London know well in advance, but "When?" is always the big question.  That and "When's the bye?"  And "How many primetime games do we have?"

When I look at the NFL schedule, I look for some other things.  I really don't give a crap who the Jaguars are playing in Week 4 (it's the Jets).  I obviously check out the Giants' schedule, but I also look for the little quirks that you find in the NFL schedule every year.

For example, the Cowboys' Thanksgiving game this year is against the Chargers.  There used to be an AFC team that played on Thanksgiving every year.  Since CBS and FOX both got a game, there had to be, and the AFC teams that visited Detroit/Dallas that season knew they had a 50-50 chance.  But since they started this whole "cross-flexing" thing a couple years ago, they can show NFC vs. NFC games on CBS, which has led to an absence of AFC teams on Thanksgiving.  Last year Steelers-Colts was the night game, but the year before that six NFC teams played on Thanksgiving.  Finally the AFC is allowed on the NFL's marquee regular season date again.

I was also interested to see how they'd handle Christmas.  Christmas Eve is a Sunday, but the NFL doesn't normally play a Sunday Night game on Christmas Eve.  So the solution was to put NBC's game on Saturday night, which makes complete sense.  The interesting thing, though, is that the "Thursday night" game in Week 16 is an afternoon game on Christmas...involving the Pittsburgh Steelers, who play on Christmas afternoon for the second straight year.

Last year's season opener was a Super Bowl rematch between the Panthers and Broncos, and Panthers coach Ron Rivera was not happy about it.  And, seeing as the Falcons are opening a new stadium that the NFL wants to showcase in primetime, it doesn't surprise me that the Super Bowl rematch was pushed until later in the season.  And since the Patriots didn't really have any other worthwhile home games, the Kansas City matchup makes complete sense.

That Falcons home game, meanwhile, doesn't come until Week 2, when they host the Packers in an NFC Championship Game rematch.  I figured it would be part of the Monday night doubleheader in Week 1, and I also figured it would be against New Orleans.  But instead they open in Chicago and the home game against the Saints waits until a Thursday night in Week 14 (and the NFC South division games, once again, are incredibly back-loaded).

Another team playing in a new stadium this season is the Chargers, and their move up the California coast gives the NFL three shared markets.  In the past, they always tried to avoid having the Giants and Jets or 49ers and Raiders playing at the same time.  Except Giants-Jets is easier than Raiders-49ers or Rams-Chargers because they can play at 1:00, while staggering start times for the West Coast teams (who have to play late games at home) is much harder.

Well, it looks like the solution the NFL came up with was not to worry about it.  Both LA teams are home in Week 2, and the Giants and Jets both have a 1:00 game a couple times.  And, strangely enough, the Raiders and 49ers both play an early game (obviously both on the road) in Week 8.

Before cross-flexing they also had to worry about when they played their interconference opponent (which would put the game on the opposite network), which would almost certainly either be on the other's bye or be in prime time.  Cross-flexing is something I still don't quite understand, and this season I'm willing to bet I'll be more confused than ever.  That's because in Week 5, Jets-Browns is on FOX and Giants-Chargers is on CBS.  Then again in Week 7 the two New York teams swap networks.  Jets-Dolphins is on FOX so that Giants-Seahawks can be a national game on CBS (with Jim Nantz and Tony Romo!).

We're also going to see what's hopefully the final season of Thursday Night Football, which the players hate and isn't really that good.  It starts with the Bengals hosting the Texans (which was the Christmas Eve night game last season) in Week 2, but CBS doesn't begin its simulcating until Bears-Packers in Week 4.  CBS does have five consecutive weeks, though, after which Bills-Jets is only on NFL Network in Week 9 before NBC takes over with Seattle-Arizona in Week 10, taking it thru to the end.

Our all-division Week 17 slate is on New Year's Eve, which means the entire 2017 regular season will actually take place in 2017.  And if I had to pick which one of those 16 games I think will be the one that finishes just before the ball drops, I'll tab Chiefs-Broncos and Panthers-Falcons as the early favorites.