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Spaceman Spiff

NFL Considers 2 MNF Games

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From ESPN.com

 

NEW YORK -- NFL owners may be asked to consider the possibility of two Monday night games each week to avoid the recurring problem of meaningless late-season games in the league's showcase telecast.

 

Commissioner Paul Tagliabue floated the idea in the second of a two-part interview aired Thursday night on HBO's "Inside the NFL."

 

"We'd like to look to see if we could put more than one game in the prime-time window," he said. "The one that is more attractive would be telecast nationally; the other could be telecast regionally."

 

The Monday night schedule is released in early spring. Teams with winning records the previous year normally play in the majority of the prime-time games.

 

But salary-cap induced parity has led to drastic annual fluctuations. If this season ended now, nine of last season's 12 playoff teams would miss the postseason, including the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Oakland Raiders, who played in the Super Bowl.

 

So, ABC has been asking the league for the flexibility to switch a Sunday game to Monday late in a season to avoid a meaningless matchup. Fox and CBS, which have the contracts for Sunday games, have resisted, suggesting that they would lose viewers if there was a late switch that took an attractive matchup from their schedule.

 

Tagliabue said a late switch also would inconvenience fans with tickets for a game. His alternative would be the two games.

 

That would have to be approved by the networks and the owners, perhaps at league meetings in March. He did not say what financial arrangements would be involved, although ABC would have to make a financial concession to the network that loses a Sunday game.

 

Last year, the owners discussed the possibility of switching Sunday and Monday night games. Because of opposition from Fox and CBS, no vote was taken.

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This would just serve to piss off people seeing the "regional" game when there's a huge matchup on that everyone would want to see.

 

Maybe if ABC did a better job predicting who was going to be contending late (c'mon, even I could've seen a Cleveland game in December would be a nothing game), they wouldn't have this problem.

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This would just serve to piss off people seeing the "regional" game when there's a huge matchup on that everyone would want to see.

 

Most people like to watch their home team play.

 

The only question I have is if the team can't sell out and their game is blacked out, would they then show the other game?

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Guest Bottled Black

I don't see the sense in scheduling 2 games. But I think that swapping a Sunday game for a Monday game wouldn't be a bad idea. You can make the decision up to 2 weeks in advance. Chances are a team isn't going to take such a drastic dive in 2 weeks, that no one would want to see them on Monday night.

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I've been going after ESPN for being cowards in the Rasheed Wallace thread. Should ABC, which is in the same Disney family, be any different?

 

Nut up and take the games that are on your schedule...

Are you saying they should just keep what they have and if they game sucks still air it? I myself could care less about their ratings and such, but I like a good Monday night football game and if each week I knew that I was going to get to see a game with 2 good teams, I'm all for it. As it stands now, I only watch about half the games due to the suck factor.

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The problem is you don't know what games are going to be good or not. Just take the luck of the draw like all the other networks -- sure CBS and FOX have other games to choose from, but that's not always the case.

 

Guess what I had to watch last week, which had several first-place v. second-place match-ups, and a number of GREAT games on tap?

 

Raiders @ Steelers...

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I don't see the sense in scheduling 2 games. But I think that swapping a Sunday game for a Monday game wouldn't be a bad idea. You can make the decision up to 2 weeks in advance. Chances are a team isn't going to take such a drastic dive in 2 weeks, that no one would want to see them on Monday night.

They bounced that idea around a couple years back (MNF swaps out a potential stinker for a game between two good teams), but it was determined that would go nowhere because there was no way in hell Fox or CBS would trade away games like that

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The problem is you don't know what games are going to be good or not. Just take the luck of the draw like all the other networks -- sure CBS and FOX have other games to choose from, but that's not always the case.

 

Guess what I had to watch last week, which had several first-place v. second-place match-ups, and a number of GREAT games on tap?

 

Raiders @ Steelers...

Oh, puhleeze...

 

I had to watch Jets vs. Bills, I think that's far worse.

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Oh, puhleeze...

 

I had to watch Jets vs. Bills, I think that's far worse.

 

You think that's bad? I was getting all pumped up for the Bengals vs. the Ravens, and then came the game for the week...

 

wait for it...

 

Lions vs. Chargers!

 

How the hell that game was NOT blacked out is beyond me?!?

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