In an amazing, unprecedented move, the NFL Network has agreed to allow this Saturday’s Week 17 matchup between the New England Patriots and the New York Giants to be broadcast not only on their own network, but also CBS and NBC.
The Patriots have a historic opportunity to go 16-0 for the first time since the Miami Dolphins did it back 1972, although they only went 14-0 since that’s how many games the NFL used to play back then in a regular season.
The NFL Network only reaches 40 million homes with cable/satellite and pressure from a bunch of U.S. Senators and Representatives who have publicly given the NFL Network “crap” over their plans to show it only to a few Americans caused them to cave in and allow the entire nation to tune in.
You can read more about the politics behind this move by checking out Variety.
Being a Direct TV subscriber, I already get the NFL Network, (in high definition as well), but I know a ton of people do not and it’s ridiculous that the NFL Network is now showing two games a week (Thursday and Saturday) that most of the country cannot see.
Not to mention how crappy their booth teams are, especially Bryant Gumbel. You can read more about my hatred for his style in a blog post I wrote a month ago.
Good PR move by the NFL, although it does not matter much to me since I already get DirecTV and the NFL Network comes with it. But it will be interesting to bounce around from channel to channel to see each networks take on the game.
The Trousered Ape’s last blog post..What Hope Does He Bring?
I’m not sure we’ll get different announcers for each, I think we’re likely to see the NFL Network’s people.
Oh – so the different networks will just carry the NFL feed – gotcha.
Yeah – I haven’t seen any activity at my work on CBS’s end to crew the show for production this weekend – so that is probably what will happen.
Shawn
The Trousered Ape’s last blog post..What Hope Does He Bring?
[...] this post, but there is still some time left before tomorrow night’s big game between the New England Patriots and the New York Giants, so here it is [...]