Good news: The NFL schedule will be released Wednesday.
At last, America can start planning its fall calendar. Time to determine which weddings, reunions and bar mitzvahs you can attend — and which ones you can mark with “Regrets.”
The NFL schedule does more, though, than establish travel itineraries. It provides a window into the national perception of your favorite team.
Through the prism of the schedule and, in particular, its slate of national prime-time games, NFL teams — and by extension, their fans — learn what America thinks of them. Or at least what network TV executives think of them.
Each year, the league’s network TV partners submit a list of their 50 preferred games to the league. From there, the league formulates the schedule, divvying up gifts from each network’s wish list to fill the featured prime-time slots — or in the case of Fox Sports, their prized America’s Game of the Week showcase at 3:25 p.m. Sunday afternoon.
The criteria used to rank the matchups is similar for each network: brand identity; projected success; star power, especially at quarterback; and market size. Of those, brand is by far the most important.
I’ve long contended that of the many great things Sean Payton and Drew Brees accomplished during their storied 16-year run in New Orleans, changing the Saints’ brand from also-rans to front-runners is the most impressive. It’s certainly the most lasting.
During the Payton-Brees era, the Saints’ free-wheeling, high-scoring offense vaulted the club into the league’s upper class. They became must-see TV. In 2020, their final season together, they played 11 of their 16 games in either prime time or Fox’s nationally televised 3:25 p.m. Sunday slot.
“When we first got here, the schedule came out and you looked down and every game was starting at 1 p.m. or 12 noon,” Payton said a few years back. “We had the one Monday night game to open up the Superdome (in 2006), but outside of that, everything was at 12 noon or 1 p.m., until later when they flexed some games.
"If that’s the case, you probably weren’t winning a lot of games the year prior. When you start to have success, part of what comes with it are the Thursday nights, the Thanksgiving Days, the Monday nights, the Monday nights on the road. It’s really where you want to be.”
Since Payton and Brees left town, the Saints have seen their national appearances decline each year, from nine in 2021 to four in 2022 to three last season. Meanwhile, their noon games have steadily increased, from four to eight to 12 to 14 a year ago.
It'll be interesting to see how many nationally televised games the Saints land this year. They’re certainly not trending in the right direction.
I spoke to a network TV executive last week to try to gauge where the Saints stand in the eyes of America's broadcast overlords, and he said that despite their recent string of mediocre seasons, they remain "a slightly above-average brand leaguewide."
“They’re still the strongest brand in the (NFC South division), but that might be setting a low bar,” he said.
The executive, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said he expects the Saints to play their share of nationally televised and prime-time games this season simply because of their improved schedule, which features games against the powerful NFC East and AFC West divisions.
“The Saints are still going to have their appearances at 4:25 p.m. (Eastern) and in prime time, but the difference is, now (those games) are going to be dictated more by who they’re playing than their own brand,” the executive said, citing games against the Chiefs, Cowboys, Eagles and Packers as potential options. “Even the Rams and Browns games wouldn’t be crazy for prime time.”
Still, if you were hoping for a Saints’ Thanksgiving Day appearance against the Cowboys, don’t hold your breath. The executive said the Saints were not among the teams considered for that traditional holiday showcase, which speaks volumes about where the Saints’ Q Rating stands in comparison to the Cowboys’ other nondivisional home opponents this season: the Bengals, Bucs, Lions, Ravens and Texans.
From 2010-18, the Saints played the Cowboys four times in Dallas. Of those games, three were featured in prime time, including a 2010 Thanksgiving Day game.
Those days are over. The Saints, at least for now, are back to being Not Ready for Prime Time Players. Their brand, NFL schedule-makers are telling us, simply ain’t dere no more.