There was a time the NFL didn’t play on Christmas Day.
Times are changing. The NFL has a tripleheader scheduled for Christmas Day but the matchups aren’t very good.
Green Bay plays at Miami on Fox at 1 p.m. while Denver is at the Rams at 4:30 on CBS and the Bucs are at Arizona on NBC Sunday night.
Three of those teams – Denver, the Rams and Arizona –have been eliminated and Green Bay has a slim wild card spot at 6-8 so the games aren’t compelling.
The Christmas Eve late game Saturday night has the Raiders at Pittsburgh the day after the 50th anniversary of the Immaculate Reception on the NFL network.
It will now be a tribute to Franco Harris, who snared the ball inches off the ground and ran for the touchdown. He died Wednesday. The Steelers had already planned to retire his number 32 at the game.
The Thursday night Amazon Prime game is features the struggling Jets against the surging Jaguars, who can win the division if they win their final three games.
The Monday night game pits the Chargers against the Colts, who have benched Matt Ryan a second time and will start Nick Foles.
CBS main single game Sunday is Cincinnati at New England. In the other CBS early games, Buffalo, which needs a win to stay on top in the battle for the top seed, goes to Chicago, Houston goes to Tennessee, which will start rookie Willis Malik because Ryan Tannenhill is injured, and New Orleans is at Cleveland.
In the late game, Washington is at San Francisco. Washington is fighting for a wild card spot while the 49ershave clinched their division.
The Fox leading early game has Seattle, trying for a wild card spot, going to Kansas City, which is still trying to get the top seed. The other three are the Giants at Baltimore and Detroit at Carolina.
Their only late game has Philadelphia going to Dallas, a game that has lost much of its significance since Philadelphia needs to win only one of its late three to get the top seed and Dallas has clinched a wild card spot.