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The Green Bay Packers will travel to New Jersey to play the New York Giants in two weeks on Sunday, November 17th. Originally, that game was scheduled to be the Sunday Night Football game on NBC, with kickoff at 7:30 Central Time.
However, Adam Schefter of ESPN just tweeted out that the Chiefs and Broncos will be playing the Sunday night game in week 11. Lance Allan of WTMJ4 Milwaukee connected the dots quickly:
RT @AdamSchefter: Week 11 Chiefs at Broncos game on Sun November 17 now will be played at 8:30 PM ET on NBC>>which means @Packers got flexed
— Lance Allan (@lanceallan) November 1, 2013
Indeed, the NFL is taking advantage of its flexible scheduling rules early this year, and moving the Packers-Giants game, which features only one team likely to be in contention for a playoff spot - into the 3:25 PM time slot.
It's of course always fun to see the Packers get top billing in prime time, but from business and viewership perspectives, it's tough to argue with this move. The Broncos and Chiefs could very well have one loss combined going into that game at Mile High, and is probably the most highly-anticipated game coming up in the next few weeks. It's just a bummer that it comes at the expense of one of the Packers' prime time games.
The Packers other Sunday night game, in week 14 against the Atlanta Falcons, seems likely to be flexed back to the afternoon slot as well. The 49ers host the Seahawks that week, and it's entirely possible that the league will want to feature that game in the evening (EDIT: This might not be as likely as we first thought - FOX has protected that game, plus NBC might not want it since San Francisco played at Seattle on Sunday Night Football in Week 2 of this season.) However, Green Bay could get one of those games back as they play the Dallas Cowboys in week 15. (EDIT: Nope. FOX protected that game, and I'm sure it will be a shock when you hear Joe Buck and Troy Aikman calling that one.)
UPDATE: The league and the Packers have announced this change.
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