JOE REEDY 
A defensive coordinator trying to put together a game plan to stop Justin Herbert or Patrick Mahomes has an easier task than the NFL trying to put together the schedule for Thursday Night Football.
There’s trying to put together intriguing matchups, only four teams can play multiple Thursday games, and there are the considerations of who and where teams are playing the week before because of the short turnaround.
Add into it a new television partner paying $1.2 billion a season to carry those games for 11 years, and the pressure is ratcheted up even more.
Yet, despite all the hurdles. Amazon Prime Video is pleased about its slate of games for its first season as the exclusive carrier of “Thursday Night Football.” The Los Angeles Chargers-Kansas City Chiefs matchup on Sept. 15 was announced two weeks ago, while the remaining 14 games were unveiled on Thursday as part of the full rollout of the NFL regular-season schedule.
ADVERTISEMENT
“We’re very excited. We think we have some can’t-miss games. A lot of these are all about the matchup,” said Marie Donoghue, Amazon’s vice president of Global Sports Video.
Donoghue said Amazon made their first formal pitch to the league’s broadcasting department the week before the Super Bowl to let them know about their focus and priorities. As with all of the networks, discussions continued up until the final schedule was set.
Even though Amazon is the league’s first new broadcast partner since Fox in 1994, Donoghue is familiar with the process as a senior VP at ESPN for 19 years. Jeffrey Kaiser, Amazon’s head of US Sports Programming, was with NFL Network for five years.
Hans Schroeder, the executive vice president of NFL Media, also noted there was a little bit of a familiarity process with Amazon because they had partnered with CBS, Fox and NFL Network on a tri-cast model for Thursday night games for five seasons.
Still, there was a little bit of a “getting to know you” period for both sides.
“There’s a lot that everyone was going through for the first time, but there was great collaboration and cooperation between the teams,” he said. “I think we’ve put ourselves in a really good position for a strong launch of TNF.”
The package gets off to a strong start. After Chargers-Chiefs, Pittsburgh goes to Cleveland on Sept. 22 which could be a matchup between Steelers’ first-round pick Kenny Pickett and the Browns’ DeShaun Watson, who was acquired in a mega-trade with Houston.
On Sept. 29, it’s a matchup of 2020 first-round quarterback draft selections when Miami and Tua Tagovailoa head to Cincinnati to face the defending AFC champion Bengals and Joe Burrow. The following week has two signal callers in new places with Indianapolis’ Matt Ryan visiting Denver and Russell Wilson.
“You’ve really got a long and strong runway of great games, hopefully, that help build that behavior and customer awareness that Thursdays are now on Amazon,” Schroeder said.
The headline game on the schedule is Oct. 27 and the second matchup between Baltimore’s Lamar Jackson and Tampa Bay’s Tom Brady. Other games of note are Tennessee at Green Bay (Nov. 17), Buffalo at New England (Dec. 1), Las Vegas at Los Angeles Rams (Dec. 8) and Dallas at Tennessee (Dec. 29).
ADVERTISEMENT
“I was really pleasantly surprised. I think there’s some real major attractions on this schedule,” executive producer Fred Gaudelli said. “The quarterback matchup is so critical because good quarterback play usually means good competitive football. I did Brady against Jackson when Brady was with New England a few years back (on Sunday Night Football). That’s a great quarterback matchup just because of the contrasting styles.”
Every team will play on Thursday, but the New York Giants, Minnesota and Detroit will not appear on the Amazon package. All three are playing on Thanksgiving. Buffalo and New England are also playing on Thanksgiving before meeting each other the next week.
As with every league partner, Amazon also will have a preseason game when San Francisco faces Houston on Aug. 25.
Donohue and Schroeder said that there will be plenty of opportunities to notify people where and how to tune into the games. They will also be available on stations in the participating teams’ markets, which is the same practice when they are on ESPN and NFL Network.
ADVERTISEMENT
While Al Michaels and Kirk Herbstreit have been announced as the broadcasting team, along with Tony Gonzalez as an analyst on its pregame, halftime and postgame shows, the process of putting together the rest of the team is proceeding. Gaudelli said they are in the process of finalizing who will be the sideline reporter.
Gaudelli spent a couple days earlier this month meeting with Amazon executives in Los Angeles, and said getting everything together continues to progress, even though the first game is three months away.
“I can tell you, people are going to have options and enhancements that they haven’t had with NFL games. And, for someone like me that’s been at this for a while, it’s just been a great jolt of energy,” he said.
___
Follow Joe Reedy on Twitter at https://twitter.com/joereedy
___
More AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl and https://apnews.com/hub/pro-32 and https://twitter.com/AP_NFL
Related News & Content
-
How to optimize ‘select found_rows()’ query? Several ‘high load average’ alerts daily
How to optimize 'select found_rows()' query? Several 'high load average' alerts daily,I have 5,000 regular posts, 6,000 posts in one post type and 2,000 posts in another post type. Needless to say, that has made the wp_posts table quite large. Not to mention, I have custom taxonomie... -
How to Use JSON With AJAX?
How to Use JSON With AJAX?,I've defined a PHP callback function to handle the communication between server-side and client-side: function json_render_modal_body() { check_ajax_referer( THEME_PREFIX . '-modals', 'nonce'... -
Filtering context for render_block function
Filtering context for render_block function,I am trying to use render_block within a function called from the WP admin via AJAX The render_block returns null/empty however if I run my function using the wp hook returns the rendered HTML for ... -
How do I hide submenus from the top menu bar?
How do I hide submenus from the top menu bar?,My website is wiki-style and has a lot of pages that should only be reached through links on other pages. Having these all accessible from the top menu bar under their respective headings leads you... -
Register users without confirmation
Register users without confirmation,I'm looking to register users without requiring confirmation of their emails (and even better, no password when they register). Basically, I want them to subscribe their mails using wp registration -
How to use AJAX in wordpress front end?
How to use AJAX in wordpress front end?,I have two inputs in an HTML Widget block on a post. What I need to do: send the inputs (from the html widget) value to AJAX, construct and execute a query, render a table with the results back on ... -
Display posts from Custom Post Type, group by term, arrange term groups and arrange items within groups by menu order
Display posts from Custom Post Type, group by term, arrange term groups and arrange items within groups by menu order,I have a Custom Post Type 'my_cpt' and a custom taxonomy 'types' which has several terms, all of which have posts. I want to do is be able to control both the order of the groups (terms from my cus... -
How do I know if the custom theme is a child theme or a full-custom theme?
How do I know if the custom theme is a child theme or a full-custom theme?,Inherited a custom built WordPress site. How do I know if the theme it uses is a child theme or a full-custom theme? I would like to delete the unused themes for security and to free up space, but ... -
getEntityRecords/useEntityRecords: How to use CPT metadata?
getEntityRecords/useEntityRecords: How to use CPT metadata?,I use getEntityRecords as described in the official data API tutorial (https://learn.wordpress.org/lesson/retrieving-wordpress-data-records/). I.e.: const [searchTerm, setSearchTerm] = useState... -
Travis Barker gets custom ‘Rocky’ sneakers in nod to son after dad is slammed for ‘ditching’ wife Kourtney Kardashian
Travis Barker gets custom ‘Rocky’ sneakers in nod to son after dad is slammed for ‘ditching’ wife Kourtney Kardashian,TRAVIS Barker has showed off a pair of personalized sneakers with his baby son’s name on them. The 48-year-old rocker, who welcomed son Rocky with Kourtney Kardashian in November, has been ac… -
Carol Kirkwood stuns in figure-hugging dress amid BBC Breakfast technical chaos
Carol Kirkwood stuns in figure-hugging dress amid BBC Breakfast technical chaos,CAROL Kirkwood stunned in a figure-hugging dress amid a technical blunder. BBC Breakfast was flung into chaos this morning after a string of sound issues. However Carol, 61, was all smiles as she p… -
Families ‘to sue prison’ where loud inmates ‘terrorise kids’ with screaming
Families 'to sue prison' where loud inmates 'terrorise kids' with screaming,Residents living next door to a new prison who say their kids have to sleep wearing headphones and some leave during weekends due to the racket are threatening to sue the prison service -
Doctor Strange’s Secret Wars Role May Be More Important Than You Thought – Looper
Doctor Strange's Secret Wars Role May Be More Important Than You Thought - Looper,According to entertainment leaker Alex Perez, Doctor Strange will find himself confronting his inner struggles as he headlines "Avengers: Secret Wars." -
I’m a clown for not trying Korean beauty secret for glowy skin sooner – don’t worry, I’m not putting cheese on my face
I’m a clown for not trying Korean beauty secret for glowy skin sooner – don’t worry, I’m not putting cheese on my face,A BEAUTY influencer has regrets about not trying out Korean beauty advice for glowy skin sooner. Although the trick can look a little strange at first, she assured viewers that she was not putting … -
“Not every artist deserves to be rich”: Avenged Sevenfold’s M. Shadows on Spotify revenue and why Web3 is the future
“Not every artist deserves to be rich”: Avenged Sevenfold’s M. Shadows on Spotify revenue and why Web3 is the future,Avenged Sevenfold’s M. Shadows has shared his opinion on the difficulty of making money through streaming platforms as an artist, arguing that “not every artist deserves to be rich”. -
‘We are at risk’ – health expert in urgent warning for Irish people over Easter
‘We are at risk’ - health expert in urgent warning for Irish people over Easter,AN URGENT warning has been released to those jetting off over the Easter break. With measles already on the rise, there is an increased risk of a more widespread outbreak in the coming weeks. Trave… -
Black Holes Are Even Weirder Than You Imagined
Black Holes Are Even Weirder Than You Imagined,It’s now thought that they could illuminate fundamental questions in physics, settle questions about Einstein’s theories, and even help explain the universe. -
The odd history of on-hold music
The odd history of on-hold music,We've all been put on hold when we've tried to reach someone. Have you ever thought about the music that plays while you wait? -
‘What Jennifer Did’: Netflix doc explores shocking Ont. murder-for-hire case
'What Jennifer Did': Netflix doc explores shocking Ont. murder-for-hire case,Most of Jennifer Pan's entire life was made up of lies. When her parents began to catch on, she decided to bring in hired hitmen. -
TV and film extras fear generative AI will copy their faces and bodies to take their jobs
TV and film extras fear generative AI will copy their faces and bodies to take their jobs,Plus: Apple has spent $22.1B on research for generative AI, and Kickstarter introduces new AI policies -
MultiVersus battle pass and everything to know about it
MultiVersus battle pass and everything to know about it,Curious about what there is to know about the MultiVersus battle pass? Here is how it works and what you can expect from each new one added to the game
