NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 19: National Football League commissioner Roger Goodell speaks during a press conference on September 19, 2014 inside the New York Hilton Midtown in New York City. Goodell took the time to address personal conduct issues in the NFL (Image: Getty)
The NBA will once again have competition on the biggest holiday of the year.
Reversing course, the NFL has now decided to schedule games on Christmas later this year. Despite Christmas in 2024 falling on a Wednesday, the league plans to have two games play on the holiday. This means there will be a doubleheader on a Wednesday for the first time in 88 years.
The last time that happened was when the Giants hosted the Cowboys in a 1949 game that was moved from a Thursday to a Wednesday due to a conflict with the Democratic National Convention. According to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, football fans should not expect a whole lot more games commencing in the middle of the week.
“It will not be a regular thing,” Goodell said during Tuesday’s news conference in Orlando following the NFL’s Annual League Meeting.
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Also during the press conference, Goodell was asked about injury concerns due to players having a short week to prepare for a mid-week game. He reiterated that the concerns he had were minimal.
“But the time period between games has been done before,” Goodell said. “We have not seen any elevation of injuries. We have had a major focus on Thursday night when you first put that, and we’ve still not seen any kind of elevation of the figures. I think we’ve got this down.”
It is no surprise the NFL is continuing to challenge the NBA in terms of Christmas Day sports programming. According to Sports Media Watch, all three NFL games last Christmas Day gathered more than 27 million viewers. The NBA meanwhile had an average of 2.85 million viewers across their five Christmas Day games.
Social media was buzzing with hot takes on the NFL’s Christmas Day decision, with some emphasizing the sheer amount of football content across college and professional during Christmas time.
It will interesting to see what the matchups will be for this year’s NFL Christmas slate. For now, football is becoming the most dominant sport to watch on December 25.
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