Despite the fact that the Lions, as expected, lost by 22 in Thursday’s early game and the Cowboys, as expected, won by 17, we don’t believe that these two traditional Thanksgiving hosts should lose their hammerlock on the fourth-Thursday-in-November games.
Indeed, as last night’s 26-6 log-sawer between the Giants and Broncos proved, there’s no guarantee that a rotation will result in more interesting action.
But there’s one major area in which the league can balance out the Thanksgiving (and, for that matter, the Thursday Night Football) experience.
With only three days to prepare for the Thanksgiving games, the road teams devote a chunk of those hours to travel. Though none of the three road teams played away from home on Sunday, which would have created two trips between the end of the Sunday game and the start of the Thursday contest, each of the home teams on Thanksgiving played a home game on the preceding Sunday.
So why not set up the schedule so that the teams hosting Thanksgiving games always play a road game on the prior Sunday? This would balance out the travel burden for both teams who play in a given Thanksgiving game.
We’d also extend this approach to every Thursday game, since it would impose on both teams who have to prepare quickly for another game a requirement to load up the players and the equipment and all the other stuff and move from one city to another.
But, like many of our ideas, this one probably makes too much sense to ever be taken seriously.
How about if everybody quits crying and whining about this crap ? Just play the games in Detroit and Dallas and shutup.
Florio for commish! 2012…it is in the books…
Can I be 1st toupee?
How about pushing the start of the bye weeks back and evey road team has a bye the week before they travel for the thanksgiving game.
Where’s the proposal?
It stinks they cannot use a flex scheduling solution to make sure the night game is relevant and actually guarantee a viewer worthy show.
Thursday night games are always sloppy, only Thursday games I would want to watch would be Thanksgiving, dump the rest and NFLN embarrassing broadcasts.
Keep them division games. Lions played at home and looked horrible, GB looked snappy.
Dallas looked sloppy at times, but they have all season. Only bad thing there was scheduling the Raiders. Even the Redskins would have been more interesting, and division games always have more meaning even if they lack excitement.
But, like most of my (sorry our) sentences, this one is to wrapped up in my giant ego to every get taken seriously.
Yeah stop whining… The Cowboys need that easy win over some hand-picked patsy every year just to keep up in the division.
Why is this such a big deal every year? No normal people really care. I love the NFL and football in general, but unless the Browns were playing, I would have watched about as much of a great game as I did the Lions game yesterday. Bits and pieces, here and there, whenever I dont have to talk to a relative for a few minutes. God, give it a rest already. It’s a tradition in those cities and nowhere else so let it be.
Oh yea and one more thing they could do is if one teams players is hurt, they could make the other team sit someone. Oh wait wait wait, and oh oh oh oh, if one team really sucks they could give them the points the odds-makers have decided is the spread … yep pretty stupid just like this suggestion.
So Florio what you are saying is that the home team on Thankgiving should lose 12.5% of their homefield advantage for the year. Great idea! If you really want to have something that makes sense, make the teams playing on Thanksgiving take their bye week the week before the holiday.
I don’t have a problem with Dallas and Detroit having a lock on Thanksgiving games. I just wish the NFL would schedule them to play against a team of similar talent level so the games are interesting and competitive.
The NFL gave Dallas a whipping boy in Oakland and did anyone really think Detroit had a chance against Green Bay? The games would have probably been much more competitive if Dallas would have played Green Bay and Detroit played Oakland.
Why not start the bye weeks two weeks later, and make sure at least the Thanksgiving road teams, if not all the Thanksgiving teams, have a bye the week before?
Do whatever you want with Detroit, but the vast majority of Americans want to see the Cowboys play on Thanksgiving. Even if the game is one-sided. Love the Cowboys or hate them most like to watch them. Leave the format alone.
“The vast majority of Americans want to see the Cowboys play on Thanksgiving.”
If you see a Cowboys fan in the street, beat him. He will know why.
Great call Florio — and makes perfect sense.
From revenue sharing to implementation of replay to a reasonably hard salary cap – plus everything in between, the NFL has stood out as a major professional sport that makes concerted efforts to have contests decided on LEVEL PLAYING FIELDS to the extent possible.
What we don’t need is to become like MLB.
Baseball is not just a boring sport — I could stay awake longer if I was shot with a dozen of those tranquilizer darts they use on rhinos that have escaped from the zoo.
But baseball is also ridiculous because it lets teams like the Yankees and Red Sox remain amongst the elite by having all the skill it takes to cut a check for multiple proven superstars. Wow – that must be quite a challenge.
On this year’s “championship” roster alone, the Yankees alone have exercised exactly ZERO SKILL WHATSOEVER to land Burnett, Chamberlain, A-Rod, Damon, Sabathia, Teixeira, Matsui and others. Just cut about 10 fat checks and win a world “championship” – that’s all it takes.
Nice work, MLB — hard to even grasp why the Yankees are proud with the cards stacked in their favor like that.
Keep the NFL legit – not like the farce that is MLB.
And yes, Florio’s take here is spot on — level the playing field in every way possible.
Your travel proposal makes sense, but I’m like most of the others–just let Dallas and Detroit have the day. As a female pro football nut who hosts the family for Thanksgiving, I’m in the kitchen most of the day and only catch snipets of the games. I can DVR, but I’d hate to miss live broadcast of an important contest.
As for the night game, the NFL Network may not be able to guarantee a good contest, but they could afford to hire competent announcers. Come on!
I think it’s a great idea, Florio.
2 games are enough on Thanksgiving..unless you are fans of the two teams playing the late game..you are too stuffed to stay up and watch the game anyway..why not make a Fri after Thanks giving game..I am dying for some profootball today, alot of people are off work and it would be something to look forward to..but THIS definitely makes too much sense for anyone to do
The majority of Americans want to see the Cowboys? Stop being such a fan boy. The majority of fans want to see elite teams. There were none playing on Thursday. Make the Thanksgiving games a flex game or something. I’m tired of watching crap every year. The Thanksgiving games have been crap since Emmitt Smith and Barry Sanders left.
Here’s a proposal I think everyone(almost everyone) willagree with…..”Hey Florio……….STFU!!!!!”
“Yeah stop whining… The Cowboys need that easy win over some hand-picked patsy every year just to keep up in the division.”
Every NFCE plays every AFCW team this year. You have no idea how NFL scheduling works, do you?
keep the thanksgiving games just the way they are, instead of thursday night football, switch it to tuesdays so it is the last game of the week, and hopefully put it on a network, if you want crappy broadcasts, i would suggest CBS, all the incompetence of NFLN, but with a larger audience.
Wonder if they would even take the offer after ABC moved monday nights to ESPN in order to push programming. (losers)
It goes back to the original point. Captive audience. Doesn’t matter if the games aren’t competitive so long as everybody watches. If the Cowboys are playing, people are going to watch, not so much for the Raiders so Raider fans across the nation got a gift of visibility in return for an almost assured ghetto beatdown. But yeah it was a turd of a game from a general entertainment standpoint. The Lions game is always a turd.
As one of the “vast majority”, I don’t care to see the self imposed America’s team every Thanksgiving or the Lions for that matter. Cowboys fans are the most egotistical and self righteous fans I have ever met.
Seriously, get over yourself and maybe…I don’t know…win a playoff once every TEN YEARS!!!
Considering that the schedule is set well before the season not sure the NFL could guarantee non snoozer games. Never now who’s gonona get hot, hit the right draft pick, bring in new coaches/schemes that work, etc. If travel is a big issue then best suggestion I’ve heard so far is assure Dalls/Detroit play road games on the Sunday prior and their opponents play home games (which is pretty much what I thjink Florio suggested). The bye week suggestion made here by several is a plausible idea also.
Than again, so is shudupandfuggedaboudid.
Most people want the Cowboys on Thanksgiving because they are America’s Team and have the biggest following, and the others don’t want the Cowboys on Thanksgiving because they are America’s Team and they have the biggest following.
Agreed with Florio. I don’t think Green Bay/Detroit is an egregious example of short week scheduling since it’s such a short trip, but Oakland/Dallas and NY/Denver are definite examples of an unfair advantage to the home team.
Home team advantage is great, it’s part of the game – but it’s particularly unfair to those road teams that are hard hit by Thursday night games. In a league where every game can have a big impact on playoff chances, giving a handful of teams this exacerbated disadvantage is huge.
I.e., the NFC East is really coming down to the wire, as are the conference wild-card spots. By giving the Giants that schedule, it tipped the balance just a little more in favor of teams that don’t have such a scheduling issue. What the NFL should really do is try to create the most level playing field across the board in terms of what they can control – scheduling, etc.
@JIM …
Don’t expect an NFL game on Friday. The Friday after Thanksgiving is traditionally a big college football day and the pros aren’t likely to screw with that. Overall, I prefer pro to college. But thanks to the NCAA’s maneuvering, the Iron Bowl (Alabama vs. Auburn) is back on Friday so today was good for me (at least by the time the final whistle blew).
Well, I guess if you are a Cowboy fan you might want to see the Cowboys play every Turkey Day but as far as the majority of Americans… not so sure about that. I have to believe that the majority of Americans (who give a crap about football) would rather see a competitive game as opposed to the same’ol teams. I had no interest in seeing the Cowboys play when Campo was coach and they were winning 5 games a year, just as I have no interest in seeing the present day Lions. Personally, I would just like to see the league do what it can to schedule games that have a little more potential to be good ones.
WellDisciplinedVC….its a good thing your login name isnt WellEducatedVC, otherwise you’d know that the Cowboys didnt give themselves the name Americas Team. NFL Films gave them that nickname, and past(not recent) success helped them stay recognized by that name. Say what you want about them, its a popular team that generates interest. If it were up to Florio he wouldnt post anything about them, since its clear that he hates them. But it draws people to the site, same goes for ESPN, or networks showing Thanksgiving games. The interest is there, regardless of the teams success.
Lott42, the other teams that have potential to be good, shouldve thought about that when they DIDNT volunteer to play the annual game. Blame your team for that.
The Cowboys are America’s team? Fine. Schedule them against the Colts or the Patriots on Thanksgiving. Then America can watch them get beat down. They had a following when they were good. Now they are just Dallas’ team. They are mediocre at best. No one wants to watch a mediocre team destroy a terrible one. That’s what the first two games were. Garbage football.
1/2 the people here did not even read the proposal. It has nothing to do with Dallas and Detriot giving up the games or if the match ups are exciting.
It has to do with if a team is at a disadvantage based on travel.
And yes the homes teams do especially if they are home the prior Sunday and the opponent is not.
So make every Home Thursday team play away the week before.
Dont have a team play on MNF after their bye week. (unless next suggestion applies)
Why not even have teams with the same bye week face each other the week after their bye?
Injuries are things all teams have to deal with equally. But except for the luck of the draw caused by the rotating schedule (and maybe having a more difficult shot at a wild card berth) any scheduling quirk that causes people to say “just shut up and deal with it” should be fixed.
Teams should not have to deal with things the league can reasonably control.
First,the 6 teams playing on Thanksgiving should have their bye week the Sunday before. I don’t why this is hard for the NFL to pull off.
Second…have games involving historic,traditional rivals that are almost guaranteed to be interesting regardless of records.
Have Green Bay play Minnesota at 11:30. Have them flip who hosts every year.
Have Dallas play Philadelphia in the afternoon. Rotate home site.
Skip the 3rd game that only 3% of the nation can see anyway. Heck,had I been able to see it I still wouldn’t have watched it.
If NFL network wants to air games so bad let them replay the early games at 2am while people are up eating cold turkey and egg nog because they have Fri. off.
If they must air a 3rd then have it be Pittsburgh-Cleveland.
Green Bay,Pittsburgh and Dallas are Americas 3 favorite teams so they should be involved.
Heck,GB plays on TG every 3rd year anyway…rotation my a-s.
“….the road teams devote a chunk of those hours to travel”
Do you think they drive to these games Lord Florio?? Hop in the ‘ol VW Bus and start a road trip? At most a team is in a plane for 4 hours, in and out of each airport another 3 tops. That is 7 hours total yet you consider that to be a chunk? Come on……..
The Cowboys are big in their own minds. This haughty self righteous franchise is on over kill time.
This team sucks, and will get beat in the first round.
Go away Cowboys, the Country is sick of you and expecially fat toothless Texans who think they are superior.
This is Satans team. It has all his qualities(arrogance, haughty, proud)
Nice job with the jumbo-tron over the field. I hope it doesn’t come crashing down like Cowboy fans egos.
America is rejecting your ways.
there are too many real bad teams in the league, to be sure that you’ll have entertaining games on Thanksgiving, when you can make an arguement that 8 of your 32 teams suck, it’s hard to plan a schedule in April that will give you entertaing games in November. putting the Browns on MNF against the Ravens was another example of bad football. ESPN paid the most in broadcast rights, and the NFL screwed them w/that crappy game, MNF was a big deal back in the 1970′s, talk about killing a prominent part of what the NFL once was…
@Favreception …
Would rather keep my Steelers out of the Thanksgiving lineup and have them where they are now–Sunday night primetime. Guess it would be okay if they were the NFL Network’s Thanksgiving night game. But if they wind up as the early game, there will be some unhappy people at my house taking turns at the microwave with Swanson turkey dinners … because the hostess will be glued to the game.
Dallas on Thanksgiving is a tradition dating back to 1979. It’s an important game now, as it is usually the last big game of the year that the Cowboys win.
Personally, I think college football, college and pro basketball, and Hockey should start offering some alternatives. Maybe then the NFL will evaluate their formula of hoe they schedule these games.
the cowboys, packers, and broncos won this year, they should host next year. and the winners of those games host the next, so on, etc, what have you. that way it means a little extra for the teams, and the fans of the winners have something to look forward to next year (thxgiving in the corner of the endzone)
Well, has anyone else noticed that the Lions always have to play a playoff contender and the Cowboys always get some bottom feeder. How about next year letting the Lions play Kansas City and the Cowboys play the Patriots or the Vikings or Saints. Why do they always get a cake game?
Next years Lions game is going to be NYJ@DET or NE@DET. The fact that both teams are in the same conference severely limits the amount of matchups that can occur.
Love Football, hate these games. You have a lot of causal fans watching, why not give them teams that they recognize, like the ones they saw play the Superbowl. For two games take the two Conference Champs if they play in the regular season the team who they played in the Conference Championship game that is the game. If they do not have them home the schedule, how about the Divisional Game or the Wildcard game. Three strikes? If they were #1 in their division have them play # 2. If they were #2 or #3 have them play #1. On the third game figure which of the 28 teams left have not played on Thanksgiving in the past five years. Pick from that. Next year make it 6 years. Keep going until you only get 2-3 teams and they do not play each other and select one. When everyone has played, reset the list. Everyone gets to play at least every 16 years. The home team playing away the prior week is a good idea too.
@zygizag …
Who the heck cares about catering to casual fans?!? It’s bad enough that the championship has been turned into more lolapalooza spectacle than football game in order to attract millions of people who don’t know a first down from a safety! They spend that game partying. Do you think they’re going to suddenly become football aficionados if they get to see the Super Bowl contenders rematch on Thanksgiving? They’re not going to pay anymore attention to the reigning champs than they do to Detroit.
dallas has played good teams and bad teams through the years ps nation 86 isnt it time you stoped sleeping with your fat mother
With all this whining about the Thanksgiving formula, How about coaching the Ravens?
@ Farveception
All I want to know is when did Packers, Cowboys, and Steelers become Americas favorite teams?
Cowboys–only because of money made.
Steelers–understandable!
Packers?, the Packers, REALLY? The Packers?
Dam I think I through up a little in my mouth, after laughing so hard:
Yeah right, Farveception
Packers 2-3 next five, mark it down.
Skol!!
Bigsky -
No, he’s right… every couple of years there’s a major poll taken to see who the favorite teams are.
The Cowboys, Packers, Bears, and Steelers are all consistently in the top 5. I believe GB was #1 two years ago.
I wouldn’t expect the average Viking fan (true definition of a bandwagon jumper) to know this type of info since they only follow thier team every 10 years when they are good. I only knew 2 or 3 Viking fans where I live prior to this year, all of a sudden, there are Viking jackets and liscense plates everywhere… pathetic.
“Packers 2-3 next five, mark it down.” – I’ll take that wager.