Monday Night Football, Week 15: Steelers try to keep top-seed hopes alive against Bengals

This evening, the football world gets treated to a late-season divisional matchup between a two-loss team fighting for a playoff bye and a two-win team with a backup quarterback that can only hurt its chances for a top-five draft pick with a win. Yes, tonight’s game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Cincinnati Bengals is a rivalry game with plenty of bad blood between the two teams, but it seems unlikely to feature too much animosity with one team in the doldrums.

Cincinnati looks to have made an excellent call by making Joe Burrow the first overall pick in this spring’s NFL Draft. Unfortunately for them, he was lost for the season a few weeks ago with a gruesome knee injury, leaving journeyman Brandon Allen to take over as the starter. Pittsburgh, meanwhile, is back near the top of the AFC thanks to one of the NFL’s best defenses. However, they are 1.5 games back of the Chiefs for the AFC’s top seed at this point, and will need a win tonight plus some help from Kansas City down the stretch to have a shot at a playoff bye.

As an added bonus, tonight’s game broadcast on ESPN will feature the Muppets, which are part of parent company Disney’s intellectual property portfolio. Hopefully we get a few shots of Statler and Waldorf heckling a player after a fumble or a drop and characters like Beaker or the Swedish Chef doing play-by-play commentary.

WHO?

Pittsburgh Steelers (11-2) vs. Cincinnati Bengals (2-10-1)

WHEN?

Monday, December 21, 2020
8:15 PM Eastern Time

WHERE?

Paul Brown Stadium
Cincinnati, Ohio

HOW?

TV Broadcast

ESPN
Commentators: Steve Levy, Brian Griese, Louis Riddick, Lisa Salters

Online Streaming

ESPN+
NFL App
Yahoo! Sports App