Hapless Patrick Mahomes Opposes NFL’s Thursday Night Football Controversial Decision

Patrick Mahomes is never afraid to speak his mind. Even if he has to speak up against the NFL itself. The Kansas City Chiefs QB does not like a short week of Thursday Night Football. And he made it clear enough to all after a controversial TNF decision by the league, by opposing it.

The league is pushing the Thursday night slate of games for the next season and their decision is a step in that direction. But it may see a bit of a backlash from players as it saw from Mahomes.

Patrick Mahomes doesn’t like TNF overhaul

Patrick Mahomes has indicated that he is not behind the NFL in their new Thursday Night Football decision. The league has decided to increase the number of games a team plays in the Thursday slot from next season. While earlier, each franchise had to play one game in that slot per season. Now, that limit has gone up to two.

In response to NFL insider Ari Meirov’s report, the Chiefs QB conveyed his disappointment by replying to the tweet with a ‘face palm’ emoji.

Thursday Night Football games are probably the most dreaded in the NFL. The teams playing those games get little recovery time between games. Imagine playing an NFL game on Sunday and then returning to the field on Thursday. So an increase in the number of such games is bound to create some discontent.

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The rights to broadcast the TNF slate are with Jeff Bezos’ Amazon. According to CNBC, they have an 11-year deal with the league to broadcast the Thursday games, paying $1 billion annually for the rights.

TNF in numbers

Before Amazon took over the reins last season, the Thursday Night Football games were a feature for Fox. Now instead of a TV, the games have shifted online on Amazon’s Prime Video app. But that did not go well for the NFL in terms of numbers. The games broadcast by Amazon saw a decline of 46 percent in viewership as compared to the 2021 season. The average viewership of the games stood at 9.6 million. 

Thursday night hasn’t traditionally got the appeal among the fans. Sports commentator Al Michaels compared it to selling an old car. “I mean, you just can’t oversell something. Do you want me to sell you a 20-year-old Mazda? That’s what you’re asking me to do. I can’t sell you a used car,” Michaels said in an interview with The Athletic.

Will the NFL profit from giving more games to TNF? And more importantly, will the players and the coaches be happy with the new change? Tell us in the comments below.

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