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 Green Bay is playing at Detroit at 12:30 in the afternoon. Doesn't that just sound riveting?
Wait, it gets better. At 4:15, the Bruce Gradkowski-led Oakland Raiders are playing the Dalls Cowboys in the brand new Jerry Jones stadium. This keeps getting better and better.
To top both of those games off, the Giants get to travel to Mile High Stadium to play the slumping Broncos. And I am sure to some people, that last game doesn't seem that bad. But at the beginning of the season, most people didn't think the Broncos could win six games all season, myself included. So if the Broncos are in fact "who we thought they were," then this game is just another Thanksgiving dud.
The Thanksgiving football tradition, or as I like to call, the "Thanksgiving-Football-on-the-Couch-All-Day" tradition, has been diminishing for quite some time now.
The games that have been scheduled on Thanksgiving for the past four years have been horrible.
The NFL needs to start scheduling games on this wonderful holiday that football fans can actually get interested in.
Last season, the three games scheduled on the best Thursday of the year were:
- Tennessee vs. Detroit
- Dallas vs. Seattle
- Philadelphia vs. Arizona
The smallest margin of victory out of those three excruciating games was 25 (Dallas 34, Seattle 9).
The last descent game to be played on Thanksgiving was between Denver and Kansas City in 2006 when the Chiefs topped the Broncos 19-10. That particular game had some good story lines as well. It was a divisional game. Both teams were in the hunt for the playoffs. After the game, both teams were 7-4. Larry Johnson was one of the best running backs in the league.
So why can't the NFL schedule more games like this for the best Thursday of the year?
Why does the NFL insist on letting Detroit, a team that went winless in 2008, keep playing on Thanksgiving?
I understand that the Detroit Lions playing on Thanksgiving is a tradition. But it's simple: They are one of the worst teams in all of sports. That tradition should be terminated. Doesn't the tradition of entertaining NFL fans on Thanksgiving drastically outweigh Detroit playing?
Lets see some more divisional games outside of the NFC North. Lets see some more teams with winning records. Lets see some games that have playoff implications.
Why do you think the NBA schedules games between high-quality teams with plenty of star power on Christmas? (Celtics vs. Magic AND Cavs vs. Lakers play on Christmas this year).
The NBA does that because those are two of the best and entertaining matchups in the league.
The NFL can learn a thing or two from the NBA about how to schedule and maximize the entertainment for the average NFL fan.
So to all of the NFL fans out there - I wish you a happy Thanksgiving and despite the poor quality of football scheduled for Thursday, try to keep the Thanksgiving-Football-on-the-Couch-All-Day tradition alive. - Michael Klopman
Michael, a Penn State Graduate writes for XtraPointFootball.com, is a contributor to the Bleacher Report and works on the sports page at the Huffington Post.
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