As CBS preps its upcoming broadcast of eight Thursday night football games, NBC's lead NFL analyst Al Michaels addressed the overexposure question.
"That's been talked about for years," said Michaels, addressing reporters at the Sunday Night Football session at the Television Critics Association press tour on Monday. "The thing about Thursday night that's important to remember is Thursday Night Football has been on the air for a lot of years. You're basically just changing the carrier."
NFL Network has been airing the Thursday night games since 2006. The CBS deal gives the network several early season games and a Saturday double-header in December. All of the CBS games will be simulcast on the NFL Network.
"It's the case in every sport," continued Michaels. "How much is too much? Right now, it's not too much. Yes, it will have to get to that point someday but I don't think we're there yet."
NBC Sports Group chairman Mark Lazarus added that CBS' Thursday night games adds less than 3 percent to the NFL ratings pool, and added, if the NFL adds an additional night of football "down the line" then the overexposure question is a "legitimate" one.
I cannot believe that we haven't reached the saturation level yet. But it's al consuming," added Michaels play-by-play partner Cris Collinsworth, who added that the NFL is a year-round process with free agency and the draft.
But NBC is not resting on its laurels in the face of some primetime NFL competition from CBS. Sunday Night Football has been the No. 1 show on TV since 2011, when it first passed Fox's declining American Idol. The network will pull out all the promotional stops for promote Sunday Night Football in 19,000 movie theaters beginning July 25. They will also simulcast five regular season games and February's Super Bowl on young-skewing bilingual network mun2.
