It finally took Week 16 for the National Football League to flex the originally scheduled Sunday Night Football game out of primetime and replace it with a more attractive game. The NFL originally slated the San Diego Chargers-New York Jets game at the New Meadowlands for primetime, however, with both teams having losing records, the league and NBC have decided to flex that game completely out of any national windows and slot it into the 1 p.m. ET regional window.
In its place, NBC will air the NFC West Division rivalry game between San Francisco 49ers at Seattle at 8:30 p.m. ET. It means that the 49ers will get two consecutive Sunday Night Football games as this Sunday in Week 15, the Niners travel to Foxboro to take on the New England Patriots on NBC. Then the following Sunday, NBC’s SNF crew heads to the Great Northwest for the Niners-Seahawks game.
The other flex for the fourth Sunday in December involves moving the New York Football Giants at Baltimore which was to be played at 1 p.m. on Fox. That will be played at 4:25 p.m. And it gives the late windows three games.
Don’t forget that for Week 16, there won’t be a Thursday Night Football game and ESPN’s last game of the season moves to Saturday as the NFL does not want to play a game on Christmas Eve which falls on a Monday this year. Got it? Good.
Here’s the NFL press release.
WEEK 16 FLEX SCHEDULING:
49ERS-SEAHAWKS TO BE ON SUNDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL ON DEC. 23;
CHARGERS-JETS MOVES TO 1:00 PM ON CBS;
GIANTS-RAVENS MOVES TO 4:25 PM ON FOXThe Week 16 San Francisco 49ers-Seattle Seahawks game on Sunday, December 23 will be played at 8:20 PM ET on NBC’s Sunday Night Football, the NFL announced today. The San Diego Chargers-New York Jets game, originally scheduled for Sunday night, will move to 1:00 PM ET on CBS and the New York Giants-Baltimore Ravens game will move to 4:25 PM ET on FOX.
Following is the final Week 16 NFL schedule (changes bolded/italicized with asterisk):
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 22 (WEEK 16)
ATLANTA AT DETROIT 8:30 PM (ET) ESPN
SUNDAY, DECEMBER 23
OAKLAND AT CAROLINA 1:00 PM (ET)
CBS
NEW ORLEANS AT DALLAS 1:00 PM (ET)
FOX
TENNESSEE AT GREEN BAY 1:00 PM (ET)
CBS
MINNESOTA AT HOUSTON 1:00 PM (ET)
FOX
NEW ENGLAND AT JACKSONVILLE 1:00 PM (ET)
CBS
INDIANAPOLIS AT KANSAS CITY 1:00 PM (ET)
CBS
BUFFALO AT MIAMI 1:00 PM (ET)
CBS
SAN DIEGO AT N.Y. JETS* 1:00 PM (ET)
CBS
WASHINGTON AT PHILADELPHIA 1:00 PM (ET)
FOX
CINCINNATI AT PITTSBURGH 1:00 PM (ET)
CBS
ST. LOUIS AT TAMPA BAY 1:00 PM (ET)
FOX
CLEVELAND AT DENVER 4:05 PM (ET)
CBS
CHICAGO AT ARIZONA 4:25 PM (ET)
FOX
N.Y. GIANTS AT BALTIMORE* 4:25 PM (ET)
FOX
SAN FRANCISCO AT SEATTLE* 8:20 PM (ET)
NBC
That’s going to do it.
