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NFL games on Thanksgiving are a tradition that dates back to the league’s first season of existence in 1920.
The NFL had six games on Thanksgiving Day that first season. As the years passed, the tradition as we know it took shape: the Detroit Lions hosted their first Thanksgiving game in 1934 as a way for the team to increase attendance, the Dallas Cowboys happily volunteered to be The league hosted a second game starting in 1966 and added a rotating third game for Thanksgiving night in 2006.
NFL football has become a holiday staple. For the three games this season, let’s compare the quality of each of the three games with a dish on the Thanksgiving table:
Turkey, stuffing and mashed potatoes: Bears in Lions
For years, there was a constant push for the Lions to be kicked out of their annual Thanksgiving venue. Detroit was terrible. Why did a terrible team ruin one of the three (or, for many years, two) Thanksgiving Day games?
That has largely changed.
This is the main dish of the day because you have the opportunity to see the best team in football. Yes, those are the Lions. Seriously, the Lions are the best team in the NFL. Once again: The Detroit Lions They are the best team in the National Football League. That’s the first time we can say that in our lives, unless you were born before 1957. That’s the last time the Lions won a championship. They are capable of winning a Super Bowl this season. They have never been to a Super Bowl in their history.
Will this be a great game? Probably not, but we saw the Packers beat the Lions on Thanksgiving last season. The Bears are not a great team, but they are interesting to watch because they have the first overall pick, Caleb Williams. Williams has had an up-and-down rookie season, but he’s still compelling. The Bears can at least give us a good show to start the day. Hopefully, because if we don’t get a good game to start the day…
That weird side dish your aunt brought: Giants vs. Cowboys
The NFL releases their schedule in April or May, and sometimes they’re out of luck with key matchups. Sometimes injuries or just bad play from a team they wanted to highlight in primetime or another standalone game will ruin the matchup unexpectedly.
We all could have predicted that Giants vs Cowboys wasn’t going to be very good.
The NFL really believes we want to see the Giants in prominent spots all the time, and that’s not the case. That’s how we got stuck with the Giants on Thanksgiving. The Cowboys being bad was not part of the plan. They struggled early and their season tanked. At least they got a good win last week against the Washington Commanders.
The Giants haven’t won since Oct. 6 and if they don’t win on Thursday, they may not win again before 2025. New York released quarterback Daniel Jones last week, Tommy DeVito started in hopes of recreating the Funny DeVito story from last season, but DeVito had a lot of problems and the Giants’ season somehow got even worse.
It’s simply a game between two bad teams. And it may not matter, in terms of viewership.
Last season’s Cowboys game on Thanksgiving drew 41.4 million viewers, the third-most viewers in NFL regular-season history. And people will watch it again this year, even though they shouldn’t. But hey, just because that garnish on the table looks a little weird and you can’t pronounce what it is, doesn’t mean it doesn’t taste good.
Pumpkin Pie: Dolphins in the Packers
You’ll want to leave room for dessert.
On paper, the Miami Dolphins (5-6) against the Green Bay Packers (8-3) isn’t the best matchup. But it should be a good game. The Dolphins got off to a bad start this season due to an injury to Tua Tagovailoa and some bad luck in close games once he returned. Miami has won three games in a row, with Tagovailoa playing like a top-five quarterback, and is desperate to keep racking up wins and reach the AFC playoff seed. The Dolphins might need a surprising win in Green Bay to stay in the race. They are a better team than their record indicates, they are desperate and that makes them dangerous against a good Packers team.
The Packers are one of the best teams in football. They have won six of seven games, with the only loss coming to an excellent Lions team. Green Bay is improving offensively with Jordan Love overcoming some injuries early in the season. It turns out that the Packers play in the toughest division in the NFL; They might be the best third place team you’ve ever seen.
It should be a nice way to end a day full of family, food and football. Even Giants-Cowboys is better than no football at all.