Thursday Night Football and its affect on syndicated programming

[ssetta]

As a lot of you know, CBS is starting Thursday Night Football this season. This means that any syndicated programs airing in the 7:30 time slot will be pre-empted. I only hope the affiliate will do something to air the programs at another time slot or another channel. How did it work back when ABC aired Monday Night Football?

 

[Charles35080]

The only time zone that was affected when ABC aired MNF would have been the Pacific time zone, since all games kicked off at 9:00 PM eastern. The primary impact was upon stations in the eastern and central time zones who had to delay their late local news until 12-ish or 11-ish.

 

[umfan]

MNF ran too late which led to its demise. There is a big tradeoff, as a 8PM game start makes it awfully early on the West Coast, but the earlier start is better I think. It's for six weeks, one night a week. Better this than having these games locked up on the NFL Network.

 

[Mario500]

I doubt WKRG-TV in the Mobile, Alabama-Pensacola, Florida TV market would broadcast "The Andy Griffith Show" at a different time on Thursday or very early on Friday due to CBS' plan to start providing football programming during the time period in which it was usually broadcast from Monday through Friday (6:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. in the Central time zone).

 

[nathannah]

WDJT in Milwaukee has "Wheel" at 6:30pm and "Jeopardy!" at 6:00pm. Thankfully they've always scheduled a half-hour game show on their sister indie WMLW in the 7-8 block, so it's a simple matter of bumping Wheel to 7pm to WMLW, pre-empting a "Millionaire" repeat and keeping everyone happy. WFRV in Green Bay has news at 6:30pm, so they have nothing to worry about. Madison's WISC has "ET" in the slot, but an already-existing 1:35am repeat (in most markets, this is always the case) which takes care of that.

As for MNF, in the Mountain/Pacific time zones, it was mainly a flip-flop situation; the local syndicated programming aired after the game/local news rather than before, and in most cases the Pacific stations filled the time themselves with 'special edition' newscasts, sports analysis programming and other sydicated shows since they had 2-2 1/2 hours to fill out without a regular network primetime schedule.

 

[anotherguyTN]

From what I could see on the schedule for 9-11, CBS's first regular Thursday night game, the pre-game show starts at 7:30 PM ET, which would pre-empt Entertainment Tonight on WREG 3 in Memphis and the second half hour of local news for WBBJ 7.3 in Jackson, TN, which would be no big loss in either case for me. Even on a rerun of Andy Griffith, which I would love to see, missing one night wouldn't hurt.

Is this the regular start time for the game every Thursday night, or just for this week? It looks like 7 PM ET would be the best time for the pre-game show and 7:30 for the game would make more sense, although it would push local news, Letterman, etc. back a little further. When ABC had the Monday night games starting at 9 PM ET that seemed like that was pushing it too far back, especially for the East coast. Even now starting at 8 PM ET for Saturday college games on ABC and 7 PM for Sunday night NFL games on NBC makes more sense.

Also, why is the first Thursday night game that is the season opener on NBC instead of CBS?

 

[ShawnHill1]

Also, why is the first Thursday night game that is the season opener on NBC instead of CBS?

The NBC Thursday season opener is considered part of their Sunday Night package (along with the Thanksgiving night game, which moved from NFL Network a couple years ago); the Thursday Night package that CBS is sharing with NFL Network has always started with the second Thursday since 2012.

Looking at KCBS' (Los Angeles) schedule for September 11th (the first CBS TNF game), it'll be regularly-scheduled airings of Dr. Phil at 3, Judge Judy at 4, pre-game at 4:30, the game at 5:25, post-game appoximately at 8:15 (titled "The Fifth Quarter"), OK! TV at 9 (which reguarly airs midnight weeknights on sister KCAL), the CBS Fall Preview Show at 9:30, ET at 10, and The Insider at 10:30. The CBS Evening News is bumped altogether in L.A., with KCAL airing its regularly-scheduled programming. I would have thought that KCBS would have bumped Dr. Phil to overnights (or Judge Judy for that matter), and have the Evening News air live at 3:30 or even at 4, but probably contractual obligations would have may it impossible for such a move.

 

[anotherguyTN]

I made one mistake on my earlier post. I meant to say that I thought 8PM ET for the pre-game show and 8:30 for the game would be better. Sorry about that.

Also, another question: Why didn't CBS go for an entire season of Thursday night games (with the possible exception of the season opener and Thanksgiving games on NBC) instead of just 6 weeks?

 

[nathannah]

It's a trial run by NFL Network to see if the Thursday package is viable on another network with better scheduling and matchups, and CBS provides a much better tech and presentation than the NFLN has done with their coverage over the last few years. CBS would have gone for all 16 weeks if they could, but the NFL only offered up eight weeks for this year; it can expand if it works out next year.

 

[davidgheller47]

It's a trial run by NFL Network to see if the Thursday package is viable on another network with better scheduling and matchups, and CBS provides a much better tech and presentation than the NFLN has done with their coverage over the last few years. CBS would have gone for all 16 weeks if they could, but the NFL only offered up eight weeks for this year; it can expand if it works out next year.

And if they do that, plus CBS keeps it, then you would have to ship the AFC rights somewhere else, and the only option might be either NBC or ABC, if the AFC package goes back to NBC, then NBC can move their 7 NASCAR races to NBCSN. They can air their games on Sundays, and ABC would pick up Sunday Night Football if that's the case I see in the 2023 NFL TV contract that the AFC package would move from CBS to NBC, Sunday Night Football moves from NBC to ABC, CBS keeps it's 16 game Thursday Night Football package, and ESPN keeps it's Monday Night Package, plus when ABC televises the Super Bowl in 2025 it'll mark the first time that all of the big four major broadcast TV networks, has broadcasted the Super Bowl. History in the making potentially if that happens

 

[Unregistered]

And if they do that, plus CBS keeps it, then you would have to ship the AFC rights somewhere else, and the only option might be either NBC or ABC, if the AFC package goes back to NBC, then NBC can move their 7 NASCAR races to NBCSN. They can air their games on Sundays, and ABC would pick up Sunday Night Football if that's the case I see in the 2023 NFL TV contract that the AFC package would move from CBS to NBC, Sunday Night Football moves from NBC to ABC, CBS keeps it's 16 game Thursday Night Football package, and ESPN keeps it's Monday Night Package, plus when ABC televises the Super Bowl in 2025 it'll mark the first time that all of the big four major broadcast TV networks, has broadcasted the Super Bowl. History in the making potentially if that happens

CBS isn't going to drop the AFC package voluntarily just to carry the TNF package.

 

[JayR]

It's a trial run by NFL Network to see if the Thursday package is viable on another network with better scheduling and matchups, and CBS provides a much better tech and presentation than the NFLN has done with their coverage over the last few years. CBS would have gone for all 16 weeks if they could, but the NFL only offered up eight weeks for this year; it can expand if it works out next year.

And if they do that, plus CBS keeps it, then you would have to ship the AFC rights somewhere else...

Ugh...we'll get stuck with CBS Sports Spectacular on Sundays if that were to occur.

 

[anotherguyTN]

Just don't turn the time over to local stations. Too many of them like WREG in Memphis would fill it with infomercials.

 

[umfan]

I don't think CBS would HAVE to give up the AFC rights, they'd just have to pay more to the NFL for the Thursday night rights. I have no doubt the NFL would let ESPN, NBC and CBS fight over this bone, but the only thing that really keeps people clamoring for the NFL Network on their cable systems are these Thursday Night games. Seriously, what else do they have that ESPN does not? THe NFL may already have locked up, in reasonably long term deals, what they think they're going to from cable, largely because they restricted these games to NFLN.

Now since that's done, they get more revenue by devaluing the reason so many systems carry that net by selling the rights to these games to CBS and getting basically double revenue for the same product.

A great short term business strategy but no one likely to endear them to the big cable companies. It doesn't matter though. As long as the NFL remains as popular as it is, they'll be able to call the shots like this.

My cable company, a small one, just caved to the NFL to carry the network. This was after the CBS announcement. I suspect they were able to use this to make the rate somewhat less stratospheric.

I'm frankly sick of all these different sports networks. ESPN was enough with the broadcast nets carrying the rest.

 

[davidgheller47]

Ugh...we'll get stuck with CBS Sports Spectacular on Sundays if that were to occur.

If CBS keeps Thursday night football, and pays more for those rights I'm sorry but they're going to have to lose the AFC package because CBS would be paying more for Thursday Night Football

 

[KML0224]

I checked the listings for WFSB-TV (CBS) channel 3 of Hartford at TitanTV and the station website. They will still run Inside Edition at 7 PM ET like always. Normally they run Entertainment Tonight at 7:30 PM ET and replay it once Late Show With David Letterman finishes at 12:37 AM ET. It looks like the replay would still run in that pattern, just delayed. I don't see that show getting bumped to Eyewitness News NOW on WFSB-TV 3-3.

 

[ShawnHill1]

The current NFL partner networks are now in the first year of their TV deals, and they're running for at least eight years (ESPN has Monday Night Football locked up for nine years). CBS paid $300 million for this one year of Thursday Night Football, in addition to the $1 billion a year they're currently paying for their Sunday afternoon package. More than likely, I think the experiment will be only an one-time thing, and like umfan pretty much alluded to, this is nothing more but to boost the profile of NFL Network.

 

[AMFMRadFan]

Okay. When I first heard that CBS was going to be the broadcast network home of NFL Thursday Night Football, I was very disappointed. Of course, this is to accommodate those who cannot afford cable. Plus, I hear it's supposed to bring in more advertising dollars. What next? Will the NFL start cannibalizing the week by implementing football on Tuesday nights and Wednesday nights? Will high school football wind up being televised everywhere in the nation on Friday nights? Don't misunderstand me. I like football. I particularly like college football, but 7 nights a week is way too much. We have lives, people! There are people who can't stay up late to watch the games and then tune in for the late night newscasts. The people who can't stay up late are typically those who have to get up early and go to work the next day. No, I do not have a job, but I am speaking on behalf of those who are employed and have jobs. Oh! What a night it will be when Elementary premieres its new season on Thursday night 10/30/2014, Halloween Eve! Anyway, that is all.

 

[umfan]

If they thought it would work they might, but I think they're about done with different nights for the regular season. Sunday, Monday and Thursday. They won't go to Friday because that's for HS Football, Saturday is for college. Three nights is about right.

 

[mvcg66b3r]

Sorry to bump this thread, but with CBS and NBC splitting the Thursday Night package this year, what effect would this have on syndicated programming on NBC affiliates?