The STUPIDEST NFL Broadcasting Decision in NBC HISTORY 

This would be the most significant game between the Patriots and Seahawks that NBC would broadcast.

I agree Seattle was the better game, but the Raiders did need to win their game to clinch the #1 seed over the Dolphins.

I can't really fault NBC TOO much on this. You got to remember that in the early '80s the Raiders were to the AFC package what the Cowboys have historically been for the NFC package. As long as the team is relevant/good then they're going to go with that option. Add in the fact that they were taking on a generally entertaining team in the Chargers and it's not THAT bad of a decision. Maybe if there was flex scheduling back in those days that Seattle/NE game would've gotten better exposure.

The NFL still does this today when it involves a certain team that wears a star on its helmet. "Oh let's see, we have 49ers-Rams and it has MAJOR playoff implications for both teams. Meanwhile there's a meaningless game between the Cowboys and Giants because the Cowboys wrapped up the NFC East a month ago and the Giants suck worse than Kurt Angle. But let's go with the Cowboys-Giants game anyways because it involves America's Team".

American TV is so weird. For the AFL in Australia all the games are broadcast no matter what and that's been the case for a while now. The concept of blackouts is so weird too, it'd be hilarious with the AFL because there would never be an MCG game on TV ever again given it's a 100,000 seat stadium

Despite the fact that San Diego had a rough year in '83, the Raiders-Chargers rivalry was still perceived the best rivalry in the AFC at that time. Plus the Raiders, like the Dallas Cowboys, had an enormous national following in that era (many younger fans do not realize that, until about the mid-80s, the Raiders were the most feared team in the league; the "Raider mystique" was an actual thing). At least in those days, NOBODY outside of Seattle or the New England area cared one iota about the Seahawks or the Patsies. Also, the Raiders that season were destroying everybody, and everyone knew they'd be in the SB (the only question was whether their opponent would be Dallas or Washington). Although neither of these late games wound up being a "win-and-you're-in" situation, featuring the Raiders-Chargers game seems like the more logical choice for NBC in terms of viewer interest.

“One of the best RB’s in the league in Curt Warner” Curt Warner: … Kurt Warner: …

Remember this game very well! Obviously living in Seattle I was so happy to see the Seahawks win it and went to the playoffs for the first time! Didn't know about this until now!

I ain't gonna lie, as a 13 year old kid, I would have rather watched Marcus Allen and Lyle Alzado!! The ironic thing is that the L.A. market probably showed the Seahawks game as the Raiders only filled about half of the 90,000 seats in the L.A. coliseum until the playoffs, most likely resulting in a local blackout. I skimmed through the video so not sure if you covererd that

Couple things. #1, that year my Cards were the last team to beat the Raiders. #2, you have to remember the times. Network execs look at team popularity. Back in the early 80's the Raiders along with the Cowboys were probably 1 and 1a in national popularity. The Seahawks probably only had fans in their local market and the Patriots, while a decent team, didn't have a huge following outside of New England and were a couple of seasons away from capturing national attention. As someone said, because the Raiders had more national exposure the players were more nationally known thanks in part to winning the Super Bowl a few years prior. And the Chargers, being perennial contenders, had a pretty decent following as well with players like Dan Fouts, Chuck Muncie, Wes Chandler, Kellen Winslow among others. So this was a Monday Night matchup and contrary to what you said, the Chargers still had a slim shot at the playoffs. But the network execs opted for the more popular teams over playoff implications. It's really not stupid when you think of it in those terms.

Steve Largent, a forgotten superstar. At the time he was THE best receiver in the league.

This had to be a ratings decision. The Raiders = ratings, at the time. If given the choice between Seahawks vs Patriots and Raiders vs Chargers, give me the divisional rivalry everytime.

Technically that Chargers Raiders game did mean something because they it could have determined home field advantage in the AFC Championship Game if it was Raiders Dolphins

Lived in Michigan then and fortunately, the next door neighbor had one of those gigantic satellite dishes so I got to watch the Seahawks whip the pats.

Okay. Questionable decision. Dumbest of the season? Possibly. Nothing compares to the Heidi game, though.

11:54 Curt Warner is only the second-best player named Kurt Warner to play in the NFL.

This isn't the only time that NBC have done this on the last day of a season in a league as they did this in 2006 during their first season of NHL coverage. Instead of showing an important game for playoff positioning between Ottawa & the NY Rangers, most of the country got a meaningless game between Tampa Bay & Washington with a rookie Alex Ovechkin. The Capitals were long since eliminated from the playoff contention & Tampa Bay had already clinched a playoff spot. What makes this situation worse is that these two games were on cable via OLN (which later became the now defunct NBCSN) and NBC wanted to experiment with regionalized coverage of games on OLN. As a result, only people in New York got to see the Rangers-Ottawa game. Luckily NBC didn't do the same thing the next night on OLN as everyone got an important game between Colorado & Edmonton in which Edmonton clinched the last playoff spot in the Western Conference with a 4-2 win.

Gotta understand couple things back in those days. 1. the NFL was not nearly as big as it grown to be. So there wasn’t as much casual fans. 2. The Raiders was a very big market team for all of America. Oppose to Seattle and NE were way down the totem poll. I’m not saying it was the right decision, but hopefully that can put things into perspective.

Not the Heidi Bowl? I suffered through that fiasco, screaming at my TV at 7pm as the final two minutes of the game were cut to show Heidi. I was pissed. And then we found out the end of the game was crazy, with the Raiders scoring twice in the last minute. The Heidi Bowl was NBC's stupidest decision.

1. The Heidi Bowl was the worst broadcast decision in NBC history. 2. This could have been a 4 minute video instead of constantly repeating yourself 3. I don't remember hearing anything about this at all back then

Today, both CBS and FOX both have doubleheader’s in Week 18 to cover more games with playoff implications. I guess that wasn’t the case with CBS and NBC in 1983. There are also doubleheaders on CBS and FOX in Week 1 so no network has more doubleheaders than the other during the regular season.

The stupidest broadcasting decision by NBC was and still is allowing Chris Collinsworth to call games. Oh and hiring his son as well to be apart of SNF

Love seeing vintage Seahawks, regardless of the topic......

This isn’t the first time Jaguar talked about a controversial move by NBC involving a season finale game between the LA Raiders and San Diego Chargers in 1983, as he also talked about how the NBC affiliate in Detroit forgot to show their Week 17 contest in the strike shortened 1982 season finale. The game they wanted to air? Chargers Raiders. Basically, the Detroit CBS affiliate decided to show Rams Niners at 4 because the Silverdome failed to sell out, as if Detroit beat Green Bay AND the Rams beat San Francisco, the Lions could sneak into the playoffs. The NBC affiliate was stupid enough to think that the stadium would sell out OR CBS would choose an early game, so they didn’t have a back up plan in case they had to air a 1 o’clock game until it was way too late.

I was 16 that 1983 season I missed the Raiders Super Bowl win because weeks before I STUPIDLY obligated myself to run a face painted booth at my Hawaiian family's charity luau. While I sat painting brat kids' faces, all the men huddled in the corner of the gymnasium watching on a portable tv. I only caught about 20 minutes of the game taking breaks but still missed every important play. At the time I thought, "Oh well, the Raiders are a great team, I'll catch their upcoming Super Bowls." 😭

WNBC-TV (channel 4) in NYC did aired the Raiders & Chargers game instead of the Patriots game. Prior to this, the New York Jets was on ABC which was WABC-TV (channel 7).

They still do this. The amount of football games that are loaded into the front vs. middle window is absolutely insane most weeks. How do 10 games at 1pm EST and 2 games at 4 pm EST make any sense from a scheduling standpoint?

here in milwaukee wisconsin back in the 80's, with NBC, the affiliate here got quite a few times, Denver games, Seattle games, raider games and chargers games.did at times get alot Browns games ,steelers games and chiefs games in the early window

I immediately knew it was because LA-SD featured more "glamorous" teams.

Well considering the FACT that the New England Patriots AND the Seattle Seahawks COMBINED with NBC are STILL WAY WORSE than a 39.6 and should SPIKE the football into the ground on EVERY single OFFENSIVE play no WONDER NBC screwed this UP.

I lived in Northern Ca for a few years. 5 minutes from Oregon. CBS showed 49er games in my region while NBC showed Seattle games. And the only time i could see the Raiders is if they played on prime time or vs the Seahawks or 49ers. Well Seattle had a prime game. Which meant the NBC slot was open. But not only did the NBC station in Oregon not show the Raiders game, they put on infomercials!! I called the station and was told that only one other person from my area complained. Turned out that other person was my future brother in law who although is a 49ers fan, wanted to watch football on Sunday, not paid commercials.

I'd always thought the local stations could pick the game that they would air.

1:00 The Jan. 2022 Panthers/Buccaneers game was NOT meaningless. The NFL pushed that game's kickoff time back to 4:25 p.m. EST to run concurrently with the 49ers/Rams game due to the Rams and the Bucs battling for the No. 2 seed in the NFC. Just because the Packers had the NFC's top spot on lock doesn't automatically mean that the battles for the other top-4 spots are meaningless.

I was living in Cleveland at the time and the browns needed Seattle to lose in order to get a playoff spot. A good part of Cleveland and Akron could get wfmj in Youngstown. The Youngstown station aired the raiders chargers game. People were not happy

Love these stories

I would have gotten Seattle/NE because I live in Mass.

Subscribe and get a new vid EVERY SINGLE DAY telling you about the dumbest move ever made by the NFL, or the NCAA, or the broadcasters, or the team owners, or the coaches, or the refs, or the fans, or the players. New content every day????? How does Jaguargator do it? No problem! Football has a bottomless reservoir of dumb from which he can draw.

We didn't get the second game at all. I didn't understand the policy at time, but the first game was a local home game (Browns vs Steelers).

This unofficial Official Jaguar Gator 9 historian will remind everyone you made two other videos about broadcast decisions regarding Chargers-Raiders games, one in 1975 and the other in 2013. For that matter, you talked about another one in your first “Heidi Game” video.

Hey, NBC had such engaging new shows in it's fall 2003 schedule such as Jennifer Slept Here, Manimal, Mr. Smith, Bay City Blues, For Love and Honor, and The Rousters. Definitely MUST SEE TV!!!

Are you going to do a video on the kicker who got cut by the Jaguars after a missed kick hit one of the assistants?

Me: Endlessly amused by the fact there was a player named Kurt Warner that season. XD

Networks program for great ratings not great interest. The Raiders and Chargers were marquee teams in the early 80's and very few people outside of the Northwest cared at all about the Seahawks. The decision made very good sense if the goal was good ratings. This video is quite naive about the business of TV and NFL football.

I bet many younger fans never knew Kurt Warner played RB....let alone for the Seahawks....

Some footnotes on these games. NBC had their number 3 announce team of Charlie Jones and Bob Griese on the call of Seahawks/Patriots. For the Raiders/Chargers the network paired their number 2 game announcer Marv Albert with Reggie Rucker. (This was Rucker’s rookie season at NBC the year before is his gaffe). John Brodie who normally worked with Albert, called the Bills/Falcons game with Don Criqui.

Sometimes, it's about market share. At 10:39 it says, one affiliate asked to be switched from the Seahawks game to the Raiders/Chargers game. Seems to me that despite the Raiders game being meaningless, the Seahawks game was more relevant to football fans, while the Raiders game was more relevant to casual fans, and that despite the playoff implications, the Raiders game would outperform Seahawks with respect to ratings. The ones who wanted to switch to Seahawks was probably media markets with playoff implications like Cleveland, but the fact that one affiliate wanted out of the Seahawks game tells an even bigger story.

Week 18. That sounds like too many games.

the last week of this past season,game times were changed. bills jets were flipped flopped from 1 to 425 just like the 2 other games on CBS were .here in wisconsin that day, we got the tampa game.

NBC screwed up so bad that 4 regions demanded Seattle (and somehow) 1 wanted LA instead. YES LA/SD had more “national players” and California. But who cares! Because at the end of the season you air POTENTIAL PLAYOFF games!!

Fun Fact: The Color Commentator CBS assigned to the Panthers-Buccaneers game last year was Tony Romo.

Just goes to show that the NFL has always hated Seattle

This remains to this day the last game the New England Patriots ever played wearing their best, iconic, classic, awesome uniforms in which they established themselves as legitimate championship contenders in the modern era of American professional football.

Subtle zinger on Reggie Rucker

I remember this game I was watching back then as a kid this was our first good season and the Seahawks were Rodney Dangerfield to everyone outside of their fans, No RESPECT at all.

(That Guy Alert) The Seahawks were actually below .500 after their first game in Kansas City. This unofficial Official Jaguar Gator 9 historian will remind everyone you made a video about that game. Speaking of, your Dave Krieg link didn’t activate.

Kreig was underrated.

Maybe it's because the Bills and the Patriots are in the same AFC East division; WGRZ aired the Pats-Seahawks game to Buffalo/WNY viewers.

Question that means nothing other than to satisfy my curiosity: Who would have made the playoffs had Seattle lost? It sounds like the Browns and Pats were already eliminated by the start of this game.

The Raiders hiring Brent Mussberger to do the play by play and unloading Greg Pappa

There should be 200+ affiliates of FOX, NBC, ABC, CBS, as well as PBS, MyNetworkTV, The CW

I was 5 months old at the time and I could probably have made a better decision lol

YOU !! know let me tell as a hawks kid i saw this game !! i am 54 back then we were hoping for SEATTLE !!! MY home team ! Dave crieg has small hands it is what fucked him !! LARGENT IS THE MAN !

Is it still as bad as the 2021 finale discussed in the prologue?

Till this day. I feel like the NFL shows too much of the Dallas Cowboys being broadcasted. There are so many teams that would be on national television. Especially with teams with their season being on the line!.. but nope let’s see a Cowboys game against the Washington Commanders!.. Which is meaningless

Split screen of 1 and 2 would be the best

In a way it's kinda like that still today. With the fans rooting for a specific player rather then a team and sometimes the network would show that game regardless. However, if there's a game that an playoff birth or division is on the line, definitely show that game instead of an big named player or team especially if they have nothing left to prove at that point. Other then maybe trying to win all of the regular season games or going for an specific record. Again on both maybe.

Hey look the NFL has been rigging games and schedules based on popularity($$$) since at least 1983.

It’s all about the money and corruption.

AFL had Thanksgiving games before the merger. After the merger, 1 of 4 teams on Thanksgiving either at Detroit or Dallas. Why not put Dallas in prime time every other year on NBC and have an all AFL matchup at 4:30 or any matchup that matters at 4:30 cross flexed or flexed into that time slot on Thanksgiving. By the way, why not have a game in London on Thanksgiving at 9:30 am on NFL Network or Amazon Prime? Also a game in Tokyo at 6 am then London at 9:30 then Detroit then Dallas then NBC game. It’s already tomorrow evening in Tokyo when it’s morning on East Coast and it’s late afternoon in London at morning in US. More football = more happiness

A truly stupid decision. My first thought was that maybe it was because the NFL was not as big of a deal in 83, but on second thought it absolutely was. This was a big time in football and the 49ers had already became a Cinderella team on the way to a dynasty.

In the 80s The Raiders were a huge team across America

I watched the Raiders/Chargers, and preferred watching the Raiders anytime

While NBC got a lot of bad reviews for their decision, it turned out ok for them in the end because the Raiders went on to win the Super Bowl. So, while it was a stupid decision at the time, it was overlooked because the Raiders winning the Super Bowl. So a lot is forgiven because of that reason. Today, it wouldn't be forgiven, but who knows what's going to happen when that much money is involved nowadays.

It’s not that serious. IT’S JUST A GAME!

The Seahawks lost their opener at Kansas City so they were below .500

Raiders brought in Ratings back than

HaHa. It's almost as if you think the suits watch football. Your silly. I wonder if the Kingdome was loud that Sunday?

Something topping the Heidi Bowl?

I just stream RedZone on Sundays.

As a Raiders fan I was very happy NBC showed the Raiders game! I can recall decorating the Christmas tree as the game was on TV and we whipped the Chargers! !

These 2 games were no lower than the 2nd and 3rd worst decisions by broadcast executives. The worst was made in November 17, 1968. Look it up

Hey the Heidi game was also bad on the part of NBC.

Jags are going down brother 💀☠️🏴‍☠️🏉Go Raiders

Only thing is it could have been Tom Brady last regular season game

Your wrong, the Raiders needed that game to get home field advantage in the playoffs, so it was a very important game.

Can you say Heidi Bowl?

Being from Maine I saw the patriotism game, but the NFL was correct that more people liked the Raiders and the Chargers. The Seahawks always sucked and the Patriots were not a popular team either.

I’m looking at the 1983 Week 16 slate Abbreviations are based on what they would’ve been in 1983. LA = Rams as they were there first MNF on Fri: NYJ at MIA SAT: Both networks lead teams were calling these games NYG at WSH CIN at MN SUN NBC EARLY DH HOU at BAL BUF at ATL PIT at CLE DEN at KC CBS REGIONAL 1PM PHI at STL GB at CHI TB at DET LA at NO NBC DH LATE SD at LAR NE at SEA MNF: DAL at SF Tank Bowls: 1 (HOU-BAL)… maybe 2 if you include PHI-STL CIN-MN is more of a Disappointment Bowl as well as Bud Grant’s curtain call (that is until he returns in 1985). It’s why the Saturday window is pretty weak compared to the other ones The AFC-1 is in play on Friday & NBC DH Late with the Dolphins and Raiders. Even if the Steelers, Raiders, and Dolphins all end up 11-5, the Steelers would be the AFC-3 based on Common Games tiebreaker (I think that’s what it was at the time…) Both WSH & DAL are already in. The NFCE champ will be the NFC-1, runner-up gets the NFC-4. The NFCE & NFC-1 are in play starting on Saturday with NYG at WSH. WSH wins, then the defending champs don’t have to leave RFK until it’s time to go to Tampa for SB XVIII. If the Giants play spoiler, the Cowboys have a chance to makeup for “No Danny No!” on MNF Who & where DEN plays in the AFCWC happens across both NBC windows on Sunday. The Broncos are already in because they will have a better AFC record (stands at 9-4) even if they lose ATL-BUF, PIT-CLE, & NE-SEA are linked together. The Bills’ and Patriots’ fates are tied to what happens in Cleveland. BUF & CLE need to win their respective games in the early windows to keep their playoff aspirations alive before they turn their attention to Seattle where the other AFCWC will be determined. 3 NFC spots (which division champs claim the NFC-2 & NFC-3 and the NFC-5) are in play on Sunday with GB-CHI, TB-DET, & LA-NO as well what is the 49ers’ objective on MNF will be. The Packers need a win as well as scoreboard watching with what is happening in Detroit (NFCC) & New Orleans (NFC-5) Overall I don’t blame NBC for going with SD-LAR as their national late DH game given that the AFC-1 was still up for grabs due to the Dolphins winning on Friday. But NE-SEA was still a game that determined a lot regarding the AFC playoff picture. Even though CLE knocked out NE before that game started and the Broncos were nursing an ass kicking they got from the Chiefs, both DEN & CLE had an interest as that game determined where the AFCWC would be played AFCWC outcomes based on NE-SEA results SEA W: DEN at SEA SEA L/T: CLE at DEN

The NFL is sports entertainment.

So

Don't forget HeidiGate.

You would pick oakland everybody LOVE them

Fox always pick Carolina here

Sports is just big business and I choose not to support it

And with that, it was time for NBC to (sh×t the bed)

Hahahaha love it Go Raiders!

The NFL has always hated Seattle.

i wanted to see brady

Dumbest and stupidest are basically the same thing,so is it this video or the chargers @ raiders video that's the worst? They can't both be. A tie means neither is the dumbest/stupidest.

This decision was made by someone who doesn't give a damn about sports.