The History Thanksgiving Day Games

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work marketplace. Empower your business and hire the world's most in demand developers, designers, project managers and more at www. Dot up work dot com. Play here and Sanches gets hit, the ball is loose and It's alive and then going into the inch on to Steve's Gregory, I have never seen this before in my life. Watch this Vince Wilford is gonna throw Brandon Moore back into his quarterback He's

gonna fumble of football. Mark Sanchez not expecting it, and it was the backside of Brandon Moore to knock the ball out of Wow. Yeah, the backside of Brandon More Sanchez. I can close my eyes and still picture one of the weirdest moments. I didn't necessarily shake the tail feather there,

but it is the butt fumble adity. That's one of those moments that just lives in Thanksgiving football lore well, and especially because it did indeed happen on Thanksgiving, Mike, so everybody was watching it, and that, of course is the topic of this episode of NFL Explained, not but Fumbles Thanksgiving Football. I'm a Jedy Kinkabwala joined us always

by Mike. Yeah, you just gave our entire team a great idea for a podcast down the road the weirdest types of fumbles, and the butt one would certainly be very high on the list. But you know, it's crazy to me because you know, obviously it's Thanksgiving, people are thinking about the family traditions, and it's hard for me to not associate NFL football with Thanksgiving. I mean they

really do go completely hand in handed. Well, of course, whether you're cooking or you're waiting for the food to be put on the table, or you're just taking a break between meal one and meal two. Of course it's football that's on. You have the parade on in the morning, and then it's all day of football, and we really can't do Turkey Day without that celebratory Turkey leg at

the end of of course, the Lions game. But you know that does actually beg the question as we get started here, Mike, why is it the Lions and the Cowboys who always play on Thanksgiving? Well, the rivalry games, you actually have to it's not an NFL thing. It was actually a high school and a college situation going well back into the early nineteen hundreds. Because the league started back in nineteen twenty, they just sort of followed suit.

And you asked the question about the Lions and the Cowboys, and I think starting with the Lions is probably really important. Portsmith, Ohio, nineteen thirty four. The legend goes you had a group led by a radio station owner in George Richards, who actually purchased the NFL's Ports Smith Spartans and actually moved the franchise to Detroit and rename them the lines. If it sounds familiar, it should because you are a loyal listener of the NFL Explained podcast when we went through

some of those names. But at the time Adity and I think this might have been your team that you had discussed. Major League Baseball had their Detroit Tigers and they were kind of the main attraction in the city. Remember, back in the day, baseball was the national pastime at that point. But Richards try to get a little bit

of a splashy draw for fans. Other NFL teams they had played eat on Thanksgiving before ninety four, but the Lions had a little bit of an edge, and for a younger audience that's used to consuming a lot of content on their phones and streaming services and multiple channels, that wasn't necessarily the case. Back in the early nineteen thirties. Richards actually owned a radio station and made a deal with NBC to broadcast the Thanksgiving game on ninety four

stations across the country. And here we go a d D. Now, all of a sudden, we got a new tradition that just continued to last for a significantly long period of time, which by the way, still goes on to this day. And a part of launching that tradition is probably that

that first game was so amazing, Mike. The Lions sold out their stadium, they turned people away at the gates, and part of it is because the Lions were ten and one and they were hosting the eleven and oh Chicago Bears, and so that was a matchup that to this day features the most combined wins by two teams heading into a Thanksgiving Day game. The Bears ultimately were

the ones that won. They stayed undefeated, and they did win nineteen sixteen, and the Lines have played on Thanksgiving every single year since then except for from nineteen thirty nine to nineteen forty four. And part of that is because there were no Thanksgiving Day games during World War Two, which was nineteen one to nineteen. But do you know this you talked about radio. The very first televised Thanksgiving

game was broadcast in nineteen fifty three. Originally it was the Dumont Television Network and then three years later CBS took over the broadcasts. You just mentioned Dumont Television Network, which, by the way, I did not know existed at any point. I actually grew up in Dumont, New Jersey, So if we're talking about Thanksgiving Day traditions, I do have a little bit of a flashback. Now it's becoming a little bit of a full circle conversation as we're discussing this

Lions team. But it's interesting. Marketing once again a major theme when it comes to pushing the NFL even its early stages as a league, and certainly on Thanksgiving Day. But while we covered the Lions, I think there's still some questions about the Cowboys, America's team right, sort of fitting that they would be playing on Thanksgiving Day. But in nineteen sixty six, the general manager Tech Tram actually

saw an opportunity once again national spotlight to play on Thanksgiving. Yes, the Lions had filled their stadiums, but for Dallas kind of wondering like, hey, are you gonna be able to do the same thing in the sixties. So Tram actually signed the Cowboys up, saying, you know what, we'll roll the dice will figure this thing out, and hopefully the fans will show up a d D no surprise to any of us, Yes they did. The team actually broke

it's attendance record over eighty thousand people. Cotton Bowl. Here we go, Cowboys. They took out the Browns to four team and then all of a sudden, you get a second Thanksgiving tradition that is born. So since nineteen sixty six, the Cowboys they've missed hosting Thanksgiving games only twice. That was in nineteen seventy seven the NFL. They chose the Louis Cardinals as the second host. That didn't necessarily go well.

They got taken out by Buffalo in v five and then in seventy six they faced the Cowboys and Dallas they lost that one again, so in seven it was sort of a rap. At that point, Dallas was able to continue to host the Cardinals. By the way, they all had six touchdown passes to Dolphin's quarterback Bob Greasy in a loss. Greasy's six scores are matched only by Peyton Manning, who's pretty good. Last time I checked, tied

the Thanksgiving record in two thousand four. By the way, as I'm mentioning Greasy's name, I'm starting to think about his son who's now calling Monday night games, and thinking back to our Monday night football episode the history of that game, So if you've missed that on NFL Explained, feel free to go back and check that one out. Still one of my favorite episodes that we've done so far, but those six touchdowns certainly impressed it by Greasy matched

by Manning. And while that was happening in the mid seventies, a guy named O. J. Simpson actually broke the NFL single game rushing record against the Lion in nineteen seventy six. And if you don't necessarily believe this, trust me that this is true. Buffalo actually lost that game to fourteen

quarterback Gary Moran. She actually went four for one with twenty nine passing yards, a d D. That is not going to get it done if you want to win a football game, Crazy Mike, because you'd sort of think that O. J. Simpson's two hundred and seventy three yards could have gotten a ton in any case. From nineteen seventy to two thousand five, three NFC teams and one

a f C team played every single Thanksgiving. Detroit has always played the early game, followed by Dallas in the late afternoon, and the Lions get the only game because of course of time zones, a twelve thirty pm Eastern kickoff time would be eleven thirty in Dallas, and you don't want to kick off before noon on a holiday

in Dallas. And the first game starts at that special time of twelve thirty instead of the usual one pm, just because it gives an extra thirty minutes to prevent any sort of overlap into the late game in case there is indeed overtime. I love, from a TV perspective, how we plan accordingly, but we are just getting underway here a d D on the NFL Explained podcast. In fact, when you think about traditions, yeah, football on Thanksgiving is

certainly a part of that. But there's some voices and some moments that I think resonate for all of us who have watched these games over the years. We relive some of those moments coming up next. Build the team that will build your business. With Upwork, you can find top developers, designers, project managers and more who can start today so your business can succeed tomorrow higher at home or in a hundred and eighty countries around the world.

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We got we've got a fan back there, but we got today right yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. This is a tur ducan right here where we got you know what a tur ducan is a tur ducan? This thing here is a dbone duck stuffed in a debone chicken stuffed in a debone turkey we're stuffing now you're talking. And that has eight legs. Sam, you just kind of cut this right down in the middle and then you cut sideways and you get a little turkey and a little chicken and a little duck. Now that's there. That that's

tur ducan. Then over there we have the turkeys. You know, here's a turkey. We got one leg, two legs, three legs, four legs, five leg six legs, so six of these legs are one of these legs are two of these six legs are going to be given to someone. I mean, whoever you want to give them to. What do you want?

It's a voice that every football fan knows very well, John Madden giving us some of those lighthearted moments as a broadcaster a d D. I am thinking back to that episode about Monday Night Football, and you would ask me a question about the big time broadcasters and who

you think about. Madden for me is still sort of the football soundtrack for me as a kid, and I still think about some of those moments he had on Thanksgiving Day and and really just sort of the fun that they had even after games because in nine d D and you probably remember this really well, just like I do. You just kind of watching this thing unfold over the years. But Madam actually awarded the first Turkey Leg Award for the game's most valuable player. It was

an actual cook turkey leg. Um. These dudes are big guys, man. I remember Eagles defensive end Reggie White. He won the award and just was kind of a start about it, like just chopping away at these massive legs. Is just an image that I think every football fan thinks about when it comes to Turkey Day football. Well, I can tell you this. Every Thanksgiving Day game I've done, there have indeed been turkey legs. And I'll tell you this twice.

I covered the third Thanksgiving Day game that was introduced in two thousand six and it is still played today. Initially, it was our very own NFL network that aired those primetime games. They did so from two thousand six to two thousand eleven, but NBC bought the rights to the third game of the day beginning in two thousand and twelve. That was just in time for about thirty million people to see Mark Sanchez run into his teammates. But that

same year, but fumble. Now, having said that, Mike, there's only one team that's never played on Thanksgiving, Go ahead, give it a guess. I'm gonna say it's probably a team that's played a whole lot of international games, just kind of you looked at Chancer, Mike, cheating, cheating, cheating. Yes, that is correct, it's the Jaguars that have never played

on Thanksgiving. Hey, since you've covered a lot of these games on Thanksgiving Day, what's the vibe with some of these players, Because we take for granted we're spending time with our families watching these games, and here it is they're preparing for their actual work and working on a holiday. Do the players themselves sort of enjoy the eyeballs on on their games and knowing it's a holiday game, or do you think that they would rather kind of be

at home just watching. I think football season is so unusual in the sense that you have to sort of fake days all the time. You know, when Christmas falls on a Sunday, or for instance, this year, Christmas is a Saturday, so half the teams will be traveling on Christmas Day or busy in meetings. You do Christmas on Friday, or you do Christmas on Monday, something like that. So I think it's a bigger deal to play in front

of everybody. It's just like everybody told us in our Monday Night Football episode, right Mike, that all of the eyeballs in the country are on you, your peers, your colleagues, your competitors, and there's is, indeed something special in that, and those games definitely have a different energy. It's almost like a playoff feel, simply because not everybody's playing at the same time. You know, we started the show hearing the call for the butt fumble, we heard John Madden.

Anything that resonates for you, these moments, these big time epic moments on Thanksgiving Day that sort of stand out to you over the years. Well, of course, the leon let goof. I mean, doesn't that have to actually be number one? Fifteen seconds left, the Cowboys lead when the Dolphins kicker lines up for a forty one yard field goal and it's blocked. Leon Lett thought that he needed to recover the ball, so he goes chasing after it.

He slips, he falls into it. He makes it a live ball, and then Miami ends up recovering it on the one yard line. The Dolphins get another chance at a field goal. This time it works. The Dolphins win, the Cowboys lose, and Mike Thanksgiving history is made. The whole What the Cowboys wind about a world of a collage player touched the ball and the dwindle and recovered it. It's on the one yard line. It's not in the end zone. It's in the one yard line. They're gonna

and there's three seconds left on the car ninety two. Joel, We're Getcher's hand up in the air optab seven. J Jones somewhat touches a football here. What's what happens? It's Leon left no who was haunted by a Super bowls play? What Leon let down? Wamp wamp just like the butt fumble, Mike,

a very very memorable moment. And Mike, part of why they are going so crazy is because just ten or eleven months before, in January, in the Super Bowl, Leon Lett had recovered a fumble on the Dallas thirty five yard line. He ran it all the way back towards the end zone. When he reached the ten yard line, he slowed down, he started showboating, and Don Biby knocked the ball out. It was basically one of the biggest gaffs in the Super Bowl, and so here he was

having another their moment just like that. Yeah, the fans certainly getting on him a little bit. They did win the Super Bowl, so I guess all ends well and what could have been a disastrous moment. But for as much as that's kind of a low light, I think there's been some highlights that we can focus in on from Thanksgiving days well. And if we're going to talk highlights,

then we definitely have to talk Randy Moss. In the revenge game, right, Cowboys showing glitz Minnesota, Randy Moss recks a tackle and Randy Moss races down the sideline and Randy Boss just outruns everybody into the end zone. It is incredible. Randy Moss has three catches today and three touchdowns. I'm happy Thanksgiving spectacular. Randy Moss was a highlight every time he touched that ball. And that actually was his

rookie season. Are you kidding me? On a Thanksgiving Day to be able to put up a performance like that? Three catches a buck sixty three, the three scores that you heard John Madden make reference to against a Dallas team who, by the way, passed on him in the draft a DD There was a buzz surrounding Randy Moss around the draft about some off field issues and the

Cowboys that you know what, let's pump the brakes. We're not going to go in draft Moss, and at least on Thanksgiving Day, that ended up being not the best situation, clearly not you know what else was not a great situation on Thanksgiving Day. The very first Thanksgiving Day game that I ever covered two thousand thirteen a f C

North rivals Pittsburgh at Baltimore Standard. Incredibly close game, all sorts of intrigue, especially when Baltimore kick returner Jacoby Jones gets the kick, seemingly has a pass to the end zone and Mike Tomlins slides just a lit little too close to the sideline, es its drift at the goal one by Jones. Coby Jones gets by season and taken down at the twenty seven yard line only courked Is Alan stood between Jones and the goal line touched a

saving tackle. Well, here we go. Here's tom went over here. Obviously, Kobe Jones there and Tomlin is essentially on the field here and you just wonder he's trying to get out of the way there. But did that force Jacobe Jones the lean back into the tackle by Cortes Alan. I don't want to in any way say that was something intentional, but if he had picked off the official on that play or touched the player either way, that's a big penalty.

You can see he kind of did forced Jacoby Jones back into the field a little mission accomplished almost and Mike Tomlin did indeed get fined for that. He claimed he was just looking at the video board, but um, you know you can see the video. Que it up. Uh, go to YouTube to check that one out. Really nice to kind of go down memory lane. There is one

other moment that sort of stands out to me. Tom Brady, for all the things that he's been able to accomplish, a perfect passer rating is something that he's done multiple times, in fact, just two times in his career, but one of those actually happened on a Thanksgiving Day was twenty one yards and four touchdowns, a one fifty eight point three Patriots win. That was the rating of Patriots win over the Lions. And when I think about numbers like that a d D, I start thinking about records that

have occurred on a Thanksgiving Day game. They're sub that are just so spectacular, so eye opening. We have to share them with you. That's coming up next on the NFL Explained podcast. This podcast is sponsored by Kindrel. Kindrel Designs builds, manages, and modernizes the mission critical technology systems that the world depends on every day. We're side by side with their customers. They imagine things differently by forging

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Working side by side with their customers, they imagine things differently by forging new strategic partnerships, they unlock new possibilities, creating a world power by healthy digital systems, alive with opportunity, oxygen to innovation, and energy to change the world. Kindrel the heart of progress. Mike cam In and d D kick Kawala with you. We heard some of the memorable moments that happened on Thanksgiving Day. There were some records

that to me stood out. Earning Nevers is one of the guys that accumulated just some ridiculous numbers and act in one game in particular, nineteen forty nine, I think this is a record that's never gonna get touched again. He accounted for all forty points in a Chicago Cardinals victory over the Chicago Bears. Forty points. The dude scored six touchdowns and kicked four p e t s And at this point it is still a record that I think is just insanely impressive. What happened to the other

two p s. It's a good call. I don't know what happened, um right, I know, I was just gonna say, like, why was the two to count for forty points? It's the most points ever scored by one player in a team's victory in a single game. To me, that just sort of stands out. We won't have to talk about some of those other p e T s that he missed. Uh. We mentioned Randy Moss and we heard the calls and the fact that he had a buck sixty three and three touchdowns for the Vikings. Troy Aikman, it was in

that game for the Cowboys. He actually threw for the most passing yards on a Thanksgiving Day game, four hundred and fifty five. His Cowboys lost that matchup, and the most receiving guards on a Thanksgiving Day game. Just in case you're wondering, Jim Benton three hundred and three against the lines as a member of the Rams. Add you've mentioned this a couple of times in this podcast. You've

talked about covering some of these Thanksgiving Day games. Any memory that stands out the most, Well, the first one, I'll go back to that the we talked about it in terms of Mike Tomlin and Jacobe Jones. That was two thirteen. It was my first Thanksgiving as a married woman, and the Baltimore Ravens, unbelievably generously of them credentialed my husband, who became a tech on our crew. So Lisa Edwards, our producer, did indeed put my husband Matt to work.

But the backstory here, Mike, is that Matt is a lifelong Steelers fan. He put himself on the season ticket waitlist when he was eleven years old, sat on that wait list for twenty one years. You know, he's the guy who goes sits in a dark corner when the Steelers is whatever, and now here it is Steelers at Ravens,

unbelievably close game. At the very end of the game, he is on the field with our cameraman and our audio person and our producer pulling cable doing whatever it is a tech does, which are of course valuable things, but helping out. And the Steelers are down eight. They need a touchdown and they need a two point conversion. So Ben Roethlisberger leads the Steelers down in a drive. They've got a you know, I think at that point it was like a second intent. Maybe I think it

was second town on the Baltimore twenty. And Ben Roethlisberger hits Heath Miller for what everybody thinks is a touchdown, and Matt's like, oh my gosh. Remember he's a fan, but he's supposed to be a member of the working press, so he's not allowed to be excited. Only that Heath Miller touchdown was deemed not a touchdown. So the Steelers have a first and goal at the Baltimore one. Levy on Bell runs, he doesn't get in. Levy on Bell runs again he seemingly does score, but then the replay

assistant reverses it. Then on third down, Ben Roethlisberger throws the past two I believe the fullback that fall short. Then Ben Roethlisberger on fourth and goal from the Baltimore one down eight hits Jericho Cotchery for a touchdown. And it's a classic Raven Steelers game where it didn't matter anything that happened before you knew. It was like a basketball game. It was going to come down to the last few minutes and then ultimately the Steelers didn't get

the two point conversion. But it was just this insane end to a game. And like I said, my husband got to be a part of the crew and be on the field for that, and it was kind of a very very neat, professional, personal, amazing game, great energy Thanksgiving night, and also personal. My husband got to experience that and see what my job is like. And one other little footnote to that Jacoby Jones was my postgame interview.

He had been handed a turkey leg by the NBC crew and he offered me a bite, and I'm a vegetarian, so I recoiled and I said no, thank you. And someone from the Associated Press got a photo of that of me making a nasty face at the turkey leg that Jacoby Jones was devouring. I did see the photo.

It is spectacular, and I'm glad you were able to weave in the personal with the professional because earlier in this episode, I had asked you what the players think about playing on Thanksgiving when all of us are with our families, and you said, hey, you know a lot of buyeballs on the game, and they certainly know that

it's really big. And you had said something that really struck me, and it reminds me of some of the Thanksgivings that I've had when you are fortunate enough to have family members that are caring and understand the schedules that come with working in sports, and sometimes you don't do Thanksgiving on Thanksgiving Day, you don't do Christmas sometimes

on Christmas Day. And for all those years that I had worked at ESPM, I'm a studio guy, like you're an ACE reporter, You're always out in the field, you're covering these games. I was always sort of chained to the desk in the studio and I always work Thanksgiving, And it's like having two different families because my my family like family, we would always do Thanksgiving on a day when I was working at ESPAN that was just

not Thanksgiving. Wherever it kind of fit in. It might be earlier, it might be a day or two late, but we would always have Thanksgiving at the office with our studio crew together. So those moments always resonate with me. But you know, we relived some of those moments from my childhood, like games in the eighties and the early nineties, like I wasn't working at the time, and I do think back. My mom is a casual sports fan or on the baseball side. My dad is not a sports fan,

but my grandfather was a die hard sports fan. So I can remember all of these games. We mentioned, some of the records, We talked about some of the you know, the John Madden and the turkey legs and the extra legs that were on that turkey, which I was thought was kind of freaky. When I was a kid watching them being rolled out. But I do think about some

of those moments with my family, specifically my grandfather. I was a huge sports fan, and I think on a Thanksgiving episode, I think anyone who's listening that is a football fan, hopefully you're going to have some of those same experiences a d D that you and I have been able to have over the course of our lives,

and hopefully a lot more of those as well. But it's always awesome to kind of weave in sports with family because a sports fans, we obviously appreciate some of that, and I think if you're listening to this podcast you probably do as well. It's been a fun one, Mike, I have to say, it's fun to think about Thanksgiving, right. You can a d D for you who doesn't eat turkey, You can never go wrong with a whole lot of ams. Just letting you know, Oh you've been waiting all episode

for that one. Everybody, thank you so much for joining us. Find us wherever you find your podcast, rate review, send us messages on what else you'd like us to hit, and Mike, that is Thanksgiving Football explained. America's most reliable network is going ultra with the rise in five G ultra wide man and more and more more places with up to ten times faster speeds. You can download a

movie in mere minutes. What Yes, Verizon is going ultra so you can to five G ultra wide ban available and select areas most reliable Based on rankings from the Root Metrics us ROOTS Score report dated first half excluding c ban and not specific to five G networks, Your results may vary. Not an endorsement speed comparison to median Verizon four G LTE speeds, downloads vary based on network

conditions and five G content optimization. Brought to you by upwork, where you can build the team that will build your business. Learn more at upwork dot com.