NFL considered one other opponent for Chiefs in season opener, says schedule-maker

The NFL faces a balancing act when it makes its season schedule.

Thirty-two teams are looking for the best possible slate of games and five broadcast partners want to air the marquee matchups.

And Mike North, vice president of NFL broadcast planning and scheduling, acknowledged that Chiefs games are in high demand from the networks.

“When we build the schedule, you could make, arguably, the perfect television schedule, whatever that means, nothing but Dallas and Kansas City in prime time and television windows all 17 weeks of the year,” North said on “The Season with Peter Schrager” podcast. “If you’re going to do all of that over here, then your team competitive issues, you’re probably going to be a little less fair than you would hope to be.

“You can make great team schedules with every team (playing) home-away, home-away, home-away, midseason bye. You’re probably not then going to make your best television schedule. So somewhere between those two extremes, we’re looking for that middle.”

North said the league identifies some of the best matchups, then tries to make sure each network gets its fair share of those contests.

Many of the best games on the schedule involve the Chiefs.

“I’m not sure there was a consensus No. 1 (game),” North said. “That was both good and bad for the scheduling team. There’s a lot of juicy apples ... this year. So certainly Cincinnati-Kansas City’s gotta be near the top of the list. The Super Bowl rematch Philly-Kansas City’s up there.

“Obviously once (quarterback Aaron) Rodgers went to the Jets, that KC-Jets game became a monster because we never got Rodgers-Mahomes last year. So hopefully we’re gonna get Rodgers-Mahomes this year and (it’s) a good example of ‘Hey, should you wait too long to use that one (on the schedule) since we waited one week too long to use it last year?’”

North was referring to the 2021 Chiefs-Packers game, which Rodgers missed after a positive COVID test.

One of the first Chiefs games to be revealed was their AFC Championship rematch with the Bengals. It’ll be played on Dec. 31 at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium.

CBS Sports will air the game, but North acknowledged the other networks had interest.

“As you can imagine NBC and ESPN and Amazon and everybody else is like, ‘Can’t we get a bite of the Cincy-KC apple?’ So it’s a balancing act,” North said. “If CBS gets Cincy-KC, then maybe somebody else should get KC-Jets.”

Another network did get the Chiefs-Jets game: NBC. It’ll air on “Sunday Night Football” on Nov. 1.

Super Bowl rematch

The Chiefs will face the Detroit Lions in the NFL Kickoff Game on Sept. 7. But North, who was interviewed before the schedule release, said the NFL strongly considered having the Chiefs-Eagles Super Bowl rematch start the season.

Instead, that game will be played Nov. 20 and air on ESPN’s “Monday Night Football.”

“The last we saw of those two teams, they were playing an all-time great Super Bowl, and I think we all would have felt as fans, ‘Man, let’s just keep going. Let’s play another quarter,’” North said. “And we thought long and hard quite honestly about using that game as the Kickoff Game. It was the last game of last year, first game of this year. Let’s pick up right where we left off.

“But you could also see how Philly-Kansas City might be one of those games you can save until December. You’ve got to figure both of them are in the mix. And if you could put that in a national window in December with maybe a couple of one seeds on the line, what a great use of that asset. Maybe you kind of put it right in the middle of them, split the difference. Not too early, but not too late that everybody forgets it was a Super Bowl rematch and not too late where maybe one or both have clinched or eliminated or somebody’s hurt, but not too early because we want to make sure they re-establish themselves as conference superpowers.

“So every one of those games get that same conversation 272 times. What’s the best use of this game for our fans? Where would they most like to see this game? And like we said, we’ve announced Cincy-KC in Week 17. Some of us were a little hesitant, a little worried that maybe you waited too long to put that game on the schedule.”

Just how strong is the network demand for Chiefs games? They will play only two games with a noon kickoff, and one is on Christmas Day.

The Chiefs have two games on NBC’s “Sunday Night Football,” an ESPN “Monday Night Football” game, a “Thursday Night Football” contest on Amazon Prime, the NFL Kickoff Game on NBC, the Germany contest and seven late-afternoon Sunday games. Six of the latter are on CBS and one on Fox.

Putting the Chiefs on at noon isn’t good for the league, North noted.

“It’s less about maximizing viewership than it is about getting the right games to the fans,” North said. “We’re not doing our jobs if the best games are buried in 1 o’clock (Eastern) window and only available in 14% of the country. So can we spread them around?”