Of the seven days of the week, the NFL plays games on three nights. Yet again, however, presidential debates will conflict with a pair of prime-time NFL games.
Two Thursday Night Football games will be played against presidential debates. The October 15 game between the Chiefs and the Bills and the October 22 game between the Giants and Eagles conflict with the showdowns between Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
The other presidential debate happens on Tuesday, September 29. The vice presidential debate occurs on Wednesday, October 7.
In 2016, presidential debates conflicted with a Sunday night game between the Giants and Packers, and a Monday night game between the Falcons and Saints. The ratings were not good, for either game.
As the debates hurt the ratings for the games, the games also eat into the ratings for the debates. Thus, it would have made far more sense for all debates to happen on a Tuesday or a Wednesday. Maybe by 2024 the Commission on Presidential Debates will figure this out.
Then again, if they didn’t figure it out between 2016 and 2020, they probably never will.