The NFL released its schedule on Wednesday night, and confirmed what we all knew was coming: NFL regular season games will go head-to-head with College Football Playoff first-round games this December and, presumably, each December moving forward.
The NFL has long held games on the third Saturday of December -- which falls outside the purview of the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961, which prevents the NFL from airing games on Fridays or Saturdays from the second weekend of September through the second weekend of December -- but those games have historically aired on NFL Network.
That's not the case this year.
On Saturday, Dec. 21, the Kansas City Chiefs will host the Houston Texans in a game televised by NBC, and the Baltimore Ravens will host the Pittsburgh Steelers in a game aired on Fox.
The silver lining, such that there is one: the games aren't in prime time. Texans-Chiefs kicks at 1 p.m. ET, and Steelers-Ravens follows at 4:30.
In the inaugural version of the 12-team format, the CFP will hold one first-round game on Friday, Dec. 20, and three on Saturday, Dec. 21. Those games will be played on campus, at sites to be announced on Sunday, Dec. 8.
Times have not been announced, but presumably the Saturday games will kick at 1 p.m. ET, 4:30, and 8, or close enough. If the games remain on ESPN, perhaps the network and the CFP work to stagger start times with a 2:30, 6 and 9:30 ET kick in the event a West Coast team wins the right to host. But, again, no one will know hosting locations until Selection Sunday. In his mailbag, Stewart Mandel theorized ESPN could sublicense first-round games to NBC and/or Fox, allowing those networks to turn Conflict Saturday into a football-palooza double- or triple-header.
It bears mentioning that the NFL doesn't have to do this. The league could just as easily play Texans-Chiefs and Steelers-Ravens on Sunday, just as it would in Weeks 1-15*, as a show of good faith to its free minor league system. But good partnership is not in the NFL's vocabulary. Increasingly, the league's driving mission is to metastasized from the most popular North American sports league to the only North American sports league.
* - For what it's worth, the NFL is not holding games on Saturday, Dec. 28, when there is no CFP conflict.
So, the NFL is competing head-to-head with the CFP for viewership on Saturday, Dec. 21. What is college football to do about it? One option is to not worry about it; the NFL will draw lots of viewers as it always does, but so will college football. Both can coexist on that day and the world will keep spinning. Then there is the other option: to begin a grassroots social campaign to bully, ostracize and otherwise threaten anyone who would dare choose two NFL regular season games over the first College Football Playoff game held on campus.
The second option sounds more fun, so allow me to begin: Anyone outside of Houston, Kansas City, Pittsburgh and Baltimore who watches the NFL on Saturday, Dec. 21, is wrong, has always been wrong, and should be shunned from society from that day forward until they repent.
As always, stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.