One of the games everyone looked for when the NFL schedule was released last week was when Tom Brady will return to Gillette Stadium to take on the Patriots?
It will be Week 4, Oct. 3, on Sunday Night Football.
Speaking to Peter King for his Football Morning in America column, NFL vice president of broadcast planning Mike North further explained the decision to have the game in Week 4 and so early in the season.
“[Week 4] is less about whether these teams are fighting for division races, playoff implications, less likely to have an injury, less likely to have weather. The story can be about Brady’s return," he said. "It would be different if Tom’s standing on the 50-yard line watching a tribute video in November in six inches of snow. Or, the later in the season we go, the more likely somebody’s injured. Getting in early, having that story told, made some sense.”
NFL senior vice president of broadcasting Howard Katz predictably told King that every network lobbied to get the game.
Ultimately, it went to NBC.
“The only one we’ve ever done that I could compare it to was our first game—the Manning Bowl,” Fred Gaudelli, the executive producer of Sunday Night Football, told King. “Such tremendous interest in that game. And this year, Tampa Bay-New England will be a story that transcends sports for the week before the game. It’s the game of the year, certainly. It might be the game of many, many years.”
