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NFL Shifts Pittsburgh-Baltimore Thanksgiving Primetime Game To Sunday Due To Ravens’ Covid-19 Outbreak – Update

UPDATED with Sunday game details: After the Baltimore Ravens had at least 10 positive Covid-19 tests, the NFL postponed the team’s primetime Thanksgiving matchup against the unbeaten Pittsburgh Steelers to Sunday.

NBC had been scheduled to carry the game and had been airing heavy promotions of its three notable Thanksgiving events, with the game preceded by the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade and the National Dog Show.

The network will now air the game from Pittsburgh on Sunday starting at 1:15 p.m. ET. Later in the day the regularly scheduled Sunday Night Football matchup on NBC pits the Chicago Bears against the Green Bay Packers.

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The decision to push from Thursday to Sunday “was made out of an abundance of caution to ensure the health and safety of players, coaches and game day personnel, and in consultation with medical experts,” the NFL said in a statement.

With the primetime matchup of two longtime rivals wiped out, the Thanksgiving football tradition will come down to a less-than-scintillating doubleheader, at least on paper. The first game will see the Detroit Lions face the Houston Texans on CBS, and the second will feature the Dallas Cowboys and the Washington Football Team on Fox. All four teams have sub-.500 records, though the latter game’s outcome will at least have some impact on the playoff picture because all the teams in the NFC East — including Dallas and Washington — have dismal records.

NBC said it had replaced the football game with a repeat of the dog show from 8-10 p.m. ET and then a repeat of game show The Wall.

NBA, NHL, MLB Commissioners On COVID-19, TV Ratings, Fans In Stands & More

The NFL has managed to play the most conventional season of any of the major U.S. professional sports leagues despite Covid-19, though infection rates have risen significantly since the season began in early September. All but a handful of teams have played in front of no fans. Without the kind of “bubble” setups deployed by the NBA and NHL, teams have had more than 200 positive tests of players, coaches and other personnel. The scale of the sport, with large rosters and the league’s traditional “next man up” philosophy due to frequent injuries, the plan has been to play straight through to Super Bowl LV on February 7.

Steelers players Chase Claypool and JuJu Smith-Schuster expressed their irritation on today’s movie on Twitter.

“What a joke,” Claypool tweeted succinctly. “First the NFL takes away our bye week because another team can’t get their Covid situation together,” Smith-Schuster wrote, “now they take away our Thanksgiving primetime game for the same reason. Smh.”

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