Cris Collinsworth made a notable, bluntly honest quip last year about NFL broadcast scheduling that got a lot of attention.
“If NBC had their choice, we would do 17 Dallas Cowboys games,” the NBC “Sunday Night Football” analyst told “The Dan Patrick Show.” “I’m not kidding. It doesn’t even matter what their record is. They could be 4-6, we would take them. ‘You guys can take any game you want this week.’ ‘OK, we’ll take the Dallas Cowboys.’ It’s insanity, but it’s true. They draw the ratings.”
Historically, this is unquestionably true. The Cowboys have been the NFL’s viewership bell cow for decades, and there’s a reason every network lobbies the league’s broadcasting department for as many Cowboys games as possible. Take this year’s schedule: The Cowboys have six prime-time slots for 2o24 as well as five weeks where they anchor Fox’s late-afternoon Sunday window, a late-afternoon Thanksgiving Day game (against the New York Giants) on Fox, and a game coming Sunday against the Philadelphia Eagles that anchors CBS’ late-afternoon window.
But the Cowboys are struggling, with a middling 3-5 record and starting quarterback Dak Prescott looking at multiple weeks on the sidelines. They are hardly a compelling watch at the moment outside of seeing how long the slide continues.
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