Who will the road team be in the 2007 Opening Game (1 Viewer)

[The_Man]

Starting with the 2004 season, the defending Super Bowl champion opens the NFL season by hosting a Week 1 Thursday night game. Just for fun, I tried to guess who might be the road team in the 2007 Kickoff game.

Here are the Kickoff games the NFL has had with this format:

2006 – Miami @ Pittsburgh

2005- Oakland @ New England

2004 – Indy @ New England

Interesting that they’ve never had a divisional game as the Kickoff game. I’m imagining the NFL has some reason for doing that. Also, they’ve never had an inter-conference game. Maybe because Fox only gets to show the AFC champion (i.e., the Super Bowl champion) twice during a season, the NFL doesn’t want to take one of those games away from the network.

So, if the Kickoff game can’t feature a divisional or an inter-conference game, here are the options for next year:

For Indy:

Denver, Kansas City, New England

For Chicago:

Dallas, N.Y. Giants, New Orleans

If the Colts win, your initial reaction is that they would host the Patriots. The NFL is insatiable for this matchup, and it’s the one they went with after the last time these two teams played in the AFC Championship. I’m not sure why they didn’t have Pittsburgh host Denver this year in the Kickoff game; maybe they don’t want it to be an automatic championship game rematch. Indy-Denver would be great also.

If the Bears win, you again have the Championship game rematch scenario. But I think the NFL would go with Dallas. As we’ve seen above, they don’t automatically like to do the rematch. Dallas brings a new coach, TO, and the chance to maximize TV ratings. Giants would be a boring choice, and the talk of Eli trying to gain Peyton’s revenge would be horrible.

 

[428143]

The re-match(es) seem to be a good bet. Do the coaches get any say in the matter?

 

[SuperJohn96]

Those are all decent matchups, except for maybe the Giants...

Though I guess it would be interesting FF-wise if Brandon Jacobs is the starter and seeing how he does against a Championship Bears' defense...

 

[kupcho1]

Those are all decent matchups, except for maybe the Giants...

Actually, from a major market standpoint, that's the no-brainer.New York Giants @ Chicago to start the season if the Bears win

 

[Deranged Hermit]

Dallas for sure when the Bears win. The networks love them Cowboys.

If the Bears team plane goes down in flames, than NE will play Indy.

 

[code]

If those are my choices I'm taking:

DEN @ IND

DAL @ CHI

 

[BassNBrew]

Those are all decent matchups, except for maybe the Giants...

Actually, from a major market standpoint, that's the no-brainer.New York Giants @ Chicago to start the season if the Bears win

I don't see them burning a major market game when every football fan will be watching this game regardless.

 

[RoarinSonoran]

They'll mix things up and go with AZ@DET.

"Yeah boss, I just have this feeling about these two teams, they'll light up the board!"

 

[The Shizzle]

SD @ IND

or

PHI @ CHI

 

[djcolts]

SD @ Indy?

Indy will play @ SD next season. And @ Balt next season.

 

[Deranged Hermit]

SD @ INDor PHI @ CHI

I think Chicago plays at Philly next year.

 

[culdeus]

Sort of think the Denver or Dallas provide the best matchups at the time. Denver after getting Cutler a full offseason and Dallas with a new coach.

Save the rematches for later in the season and when the ratings would be sagging anyways.

 

[culdeus]

Oh, and god bless :mansion: