WHY'D THE NETWORKS STIFF SEATTLE? From Mike of Providence: "How is it that Seattle got jilted out of playing in any of the four prime-time games on the opening weekend in 2006? Beginning in 2004, the Super Bowl winner has played on Thursday and the loser on Monday night. What happened this year?"
Excellent question. And if I were Seattle, I wouldn't be very pleased about it. But there were two factors at play here. One is that Seattle was not scheduled to play at Pittsburgh this year, which eliminated the opportunity for the NFL to stage a Super Bowl rematch. Second, there is no question that the single most attractive regular-season game at this point is Manning vs. Manning. So you knew that NBC, returning to televised football after a long hiatus, was going to press hard to get a game of that magnitude for its opener on Sunday night. Seattle just doesn't have a game as compelling as that one on its schedule.
Now, as for the Monday-night doubleheader, that's where I figured Seattle would land. But keep one thing in mind: Each team is allowed one Monday-night appearance this year, so if ESPN wanted to use Seattle's appearance on its first Monday night, when the promotion throughout the offseason was already going to be heavy, the network would have blown its chance to use the Seahawks later in the season. That's what I think happened.