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19 Dec 2011

MMQB: Chiefs Upset Tops Week 15 Storylines

In this week's Monday Morning Quarterback, Peter King writes about the Chiefs' upset win, the Lions' comeback, Drew Brees, Tony Romo, the new broadcast deals, and handicaps the Defensive Player of the Year race.

Posted by: Tom Gower on 19 Dec 2011

37 comments, Last at 20 Dec 2011, 9:08pm by Theo

Comments

1
by PatsFan :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 12:23pm

For those who find King to be tl;dr, here's one interesting bit:

NBC got the Thanksgiving night game, beginning in 2012, taking it from NFL Network. NBC got one of its Wild Card games changed to a divisional game, beginning in the 2014 postseason. NBC got the ability to add a two-hour pregame show on its new NBC Sports Network in 2014. And this under-the-radar add-on, which could come in handy. In the new contract, NBC will not only have the ability to flex-schedule games in Weeks 10 through 15. In Weeks 5 through 9, NBC will be able to flex out of a bad game; this won't be an unlimited opportunity, I'm told, and it won't be like the regular flex scheduling, when a good game can be flexed for a great one.

4
by dryheat :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:12pm

What? Wasn't it one week ago when PK informed us that the reason that Balt/SD wasn't flexed out for NE/Den was because Balt/SD, while not the premeire game, was judged to still be a good enough one to stay in prime time?

Is it shoddy writing, or a bad memory?

8
by apk3000 :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:37pm

He's pretty much just repeating whatever spin the NFL gives him, no?

25
by justanothersteve :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 8:54pm

Peter is almost an acronym of parrot if you spell both phonetically.

26
by nat :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 9:06pm

Careful there. Someone might accuse you of being acrophobic.

12
by Southern Philly :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:56pm

Considering PK's overuse of the word, nice job working "interesting" in there.

2
by andrew :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 12:32pm

The Cowboys will need help, but if they win out they host a playoff game --

How is that needing help? Is that not the exact definition of not needing help?

5
by Floyd (not verified) :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:18pm

Maybe he means in the therapeutic sense, since they do seem like a dysfunctional franchise.

7
by Joshua Northey (not verified) :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:24pm

They do need help, they need the Giants to lose when they play the...Cowboys...

10
by The Powers That Be :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:50pm

You beat me to it. And he's even more wrong. They don't need to win out - they only need to beat the Giants.

3
by RickD :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:11pm

So...Romo has won more games in his first 75 starts than Aikman did.

Of course, Aikman took over an awful team that went 1-15 his first season, including 0-11 in his starts.

I'm always suspicious when somebody brings up Aikman's W-L record without mentioning that.

6
by Thunderbolt of ... :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:20pm

Then again, by his third season Aikman enjoyed playing with the best offensive line of the 90s, the NFL's all-time leading rusher, a HOF receiver, and a good-to-great defense. Both our posts are reasons why QB W-L record is a useless stat.

9
by Dennis :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:42pm

Mark Sanchez has just as many postseason wins as Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers. Doesn't that mean he's just as good a QB as they are? :)

11
by TV_Pete (not verified) :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 1:54pm

Don't forget a great Fullback and Tight End he admitted he could trust to throw blind (i.e. sometimes could not see through the oncoming rush but had faith that Tight End would be where expected in order to pick up key first down on 3rd down).

13
by zlionsfan :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 2:00pm

"We're proud that we could keep every game on local free TV through 2022," Kraft said. "No other sport does that."

No sport does it. Games are only on local television if they don't run afoul of the blackout rules. In some areas, that's more than a few games, and occasionally that applies to areas that aren't particularly close to the stadium anyway.

14
by PatsFan :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 2:43pm

(dons weasel lawyer hat, even though IANAL :)

But blacked-out games are on local TV -- in the away market. So every game is indeed aired on local TV somewhere.

15
by turbohappy (not verified) :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 3:12pm

Unless a game like Jets-Giants got blacked out ;o)

16
by PatsFan :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 3:30pm

Ha! Hadn't thought about that one. How does that work? The "away" fans just get screwed?

17
by dryheat :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 3:34pm

Probably. I believe the key is that the blackout is in effect within a certain radius of the stadium (50 miles by rule, I think, although teams have successfully argued for larger areas in the past), and not dependent on the "home team" designation.

18
by Biebs :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 3:45pm

I assume the theory goes that if a NYJ/NYG game was in danger of being blacked out (Not ever happening, but still), the "away" fans could easily buy the tickets and go to the games, not the case with out-of-market games.

21
by DGL :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 6:46pm

I think if a NYG/NYJ game was in danger of being blacked out, the zombie hordes that overran the NY metro area wouldn't care whether they watched the game on TV or not.

22
by Tom Gower :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 7:28pm

If I remember The506 message boards right, there was a LA Rams-LA Raiders game during the 80s that was blacked out and was shown in something like two cities outside the normal 75mi blackout radius, maybe Bakersfield and Fresno, and nowhere else.

19
by GlennW :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 4:36pm

It's kind of an empty boast independent of the blackout situation. It's easy to be proud when the broadcast networks pay you gazillions of dollars for the games (not to mention that such an arrangement would be impossible for the other leagues regardless of cost or fan interest, with their 82-162 game schedules). If the NFL-TV network financial dynamic were ever to change rest assured that the NFL would adapt accordingly, as they did with their exclusive deal with DirecTV which effectively limits national exposure to the games. Not that I'm complaining...

20
by SFC B (not verified) :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 5:55pm

Are the Colts actually "suddenly interesting"? They got a bunch of scores in garbage time against a Patriots team that was playing guys signed off the streets, and they beat the Titans to improve their record to 1-13. I'm a Texans homer, fairly biased in my perception, and a bit worried that the they laid an egg Sunday, but has two weeks of Dan Orelovsy actually changed anything about the Colts?

23
by markus (not verified) :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 7:54pm

I'd argue that winning made them considerably less interesting. The prospect of going winless was a topic for conversation. There's little reason to mention the Colts at all now that they've finally picked up a win.

36
by Kurt :: Tue, 12/20/2011 - 5:30pm

Well there'a the whole Luck/Manning thing, but that's hardly "sudden".

24
by akn :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 8:43pm

It amazes me how much advertising money networks have to toss at partners like the NFL (6 billion/yr!). I bought into the idea that TV ads (especially free networks) were declining in effectiveness due to a combination of dvrs, expanding online/alternative media, etc. In fact, I always imagined that ads themselves were asymptotically leveling off in effectiveness, and that clients would be less willing to pay for TV time.

27
by SFC B (not verified) :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 9:21pm

It makes perfect sense to me that TV networks would be going after sports with a passion in an era when other TV advertising is declining. Live events are probably one of the areas where the DVR isn't as useful.

I'm surprised we haven't seen more of the "Awesome Movie Night: Sponsored by Suchandsuch Co." return. I'll skip past 4 minutes of commercials featuring 6 different products. I'm more likely leave the DVR untouched if I know that I'm just going to have to sit through a 45 second "intermission" in an otherwise uninterrupted 25 minute block of programming.

29
by markus (not verified) :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 11:44pm

Soccer is a sport where that sort of sponsorship is prevalent because they don't take commercial breaks. You'll have sponsors everywhere from the digital boards surrounding the field to the team's jerseys, to sponsoring the game itself, but other than halftime there won't be any commercials. Personally, I have to believe those sorts of sponsorships have to be at least as effective as the millions that get spent sponsoring the first down line or the halftime show.

Most bizarre of all to me are cases where the event will have a title sponsor yet somebody will still jump in to sponsor some small segment, so you'll end up with the "Acme ABC Bowl Halftime Show sponsored by Brand X." I just don't think those secondary sponsorships do much for a company.

31
by dryheat :: Tue, 12/20/2011 - 8:41am

Probably not. But I can't imagine people drink more Bud Light or eat more Papa John's or use more Pennzoil in their cars because they're the "Official ________ of the NFL", yet companies pay for those titles.

32
by Raiderjoe :: Tue, 12/20/2011 - 8:56am

Never boughtbanything myself if have sentencdd on it thst sauOffivisl ----- of the NFL

33
by White Rose Duelist :: Tue, 12/20/2011 - 9:54am

But I think Sierra Nevada is the official beer of FOMB.

34
by Raiderjoe :: Tue, 12/20/2011 - 11:00am

It should be offical beer heer

35
by tuluse :: Tue, 12/20/2011 - 12:26pm

It's not really about directly selling things to people, but rather just keeping the product or company in the public consciousness. Coke tried not advertising, it was the only time in history Pepsi outsold Coke (at least to that point). By constantly bombarding people with their company name and imagery, they do sell more things.

37
by Theo :: Tue, 12/20/2011 - 9:08pm

Yet you are able to name them and associate them with the NFL.

28
by tuluse :: Mon, 12/19/2011 - 9:24pm

Football games (and other sports to a lesser extent), are about the only thing still pulling high ratings.

"I always imagined that ads themselves were asymptotically leveling off in effectiveness, and that clients would be less willing to pay for TV time."

Even if they are, the economy is generally growing larger, so paying less can still mean a bigger number. However, this is really one of the few places where ad sellers can still expect a really high number of viewers. So it's driving the price up.

30
by Jerry :: Tue, 12/20/2011 - 6:48am

Not just pulling high ratings, but bringing in a demographic (young men) that advertisers have a hard time finding.