One of the most memorable games in Monday Night Football History took place in Week Three of the 2006 season, when the Saints beat the Falcons in their return to New Orleans for the first time since Hurricane Katrina. Twenty years later, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell wanted a Falcons-Saints Monday night game in New Orleans on the 2026 schedule.
NFL VP of broadcasting planning Mike North says the 2026 schedule has a Week Four Monday night game between the Falcons and Saints at the Superdome because Goodell himself requested that it happen around the time of the 20th anniversary.
“It’s really to the Commissioner’s credit, it was, ‘We’re gonna play Falcons at Saints on Monday night this year, fit it in in that kind of three-week window.’ So, it wasn’t a requirement it had to land in a special week, but it was a requirement, straight from the boss, that it landed on our schedule,” North said.
Some in New Orleans wanted the 2026 game played in Week Three, as the 2006 game was, but North said playing the game in Week Four proved to be a better fit for the NFL’s overall schedule.
“Relative to the exact date of the anniversary, honestly, we figured if we were within a couple of weeks, we were in good shape,” North said. “Fans remember that moment, the electricity, the excitement. If we were a week early, or closer to the day, or a week later, weren’t gonna throw away our best schedule just by being off a couple days. Plus, as you know, there’s a lot of events going on in that region. I don’t have the stadium availability off the top of my head, but relative to the Dome itself, the arena across the street, there’s concerts, there’s basketball games, there’s other things going on at times. It wasn’t a, ‘This game has to be in this week.’”
The 2006 game, remembered most for Steve Gleason’s blocked punt that was recovered by Curtis Deloatch for the Saints’ first touchdown, was a classic. The 2026 game will be an opportunity for New Orleans to celebrate that great moment in Saints history.
NFL Network lost its schedule-release show. It’s nevertheless gaining a late-season Saturday doubleheader.
In Week 16, on the day after Christmas, NFLN will televise a game at 4:30 p.m. ET and 8:00 p.m. ET.
The schedule identifies four potential games for the two slots: Buccaneers-Falcons, Bengals-Colts, Commanders-Vikings, and Panthers Steelers.
The decision as to which games will slide from Sunday to Saturday will be made during the season.
Coupled with a Thursday night game and three Christmas Day games, Week 16 will have 10 total windows — one more than Thanksgiving week. That leaves only eight games to be played on the Saturday afternoon windows.
During 19 years with the Steelers, coach Mike Tomlin worked 114 games against teams from the AFC North. In his fifth game as an analyst on NBC’s Football Night in America, Tomlin will be handling a game involving an AFC North team.
It’ll happen on October 11 in Atlanta, when the Ravens face the Falcons.
As mentioned on Thursday’s PFT Live, Tomlin’s assessment of the Ravens and quarterback Lamar Jackson promises to be must-see TV.
That opinion is based on just a few minutes of hearing Tomlin talk during an FNIA planning meeting on Monday about the challenge of defending Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson, along with other things Tomlin believes Jackson needs to do as he gets closer to his 30th birthday.
I’ll defer the details to Tomlin. But his comments riveted the room. In general, you won’t want to miss anything Tomlin says before any Sunday night game. You definitely will not want to miss what he has to say during the pregame show before Jackson and the Ravens face the Falcons in Week 5.
We don’t know if Fernando Mendoza will be starting at quarterback for the Raiders in Week 1 of the regular season, but we do know who the Raiders will be playing in the first overall pick’s potential debut.
The NFL’s schedule reveal on Thursday night shows that the Raiders will host the Dolphins at 4:25 p.m. ET on Sunday, September 13. The game will be on Fox.
Mendoza will have to get the nod over Kirk Cousins in order to start for the Raiders. Offseason addition Malik Willis is expected to make his first appearance for the Dolphins. Both teams will definitely have head coaches making their offseason debut as Las Vegas hired Klint Kubiak in February and Miami hired Jeff Hafley in January.
Sunday will also feature a pair of divisional games in the late afternoon window. The Packers will visit the Vikings while the Commanders will be in Philadelphia to renew their acquaintance with the Eagles. The NFC North matchup will be on CBS while the NFC East clash will be broadcast by Fox.
The other late game on Sunday afternoon will see the Cardinals visiting the Chargers on CBS. Arizona could have Jacoby Brissett, Gardner Minshew or rookie Carson Beck at quarterback for that contest.
The 1 p.m. ET games will send the Bills to Houston for a date with the Texans while the Browns go on the road against the Jaguars. The Colts will host the Ravens, the Saints will visit the Lions, the Buccaneers will travel to Cincinnati for Dexter Lawrence’s first game as a Bengal, and the Steelers will kick off the Mike McCarthy era — with or without Aaron Rodgers — at home against the Falcons.
Previous reports revealed that the Jets will be in Tennessee and that the Bears will head to Charlotte to face the Panthers. The Jets-Titans game will be on CBS along with the Bills-Texans, Ravens-Colts and Browns-Jaguars games. All the other 1 p.m. games will be on Fox.
The entire Week 1 slate will kick off on Wednesday, September 9 with a Patriots-Seahawks Super Bowl rematch in Seattle on NBC. Thursday will bring a Netflix game between the 49ers and Rams in the NFL’s first game in Melbourne and Sunday night will find the Cowboys at MetLife Stadium to meet the Giants on NBC’s Sunday Night Football. Those games were all announced ahead of Thursday’s full schedule reveal, which was also the case for the ESPN Monday night game between the Broncos and Chiefs in Kansas City.
The Falcons have agreed to terms with their top draft pick from this year.
Cornerback Avieon Terrell has agreed to a four-year contract with the team. The Falcons had to wait until the second round to select Terrell because they traded their first-rounder to the Rams in order to move up for edge rusher James Pearce in the 2025 first round.
Terrell joins his brother A.J. in the Falcons’ cornerback group after recording 48 tackles, 4.5 tackles for loss, three sacks, five forced fumbles and a fumble recovery in his final season at Clemson.
The Falcons also announced that they have agreed to terms with sixth-round defensive lineman Anterio Thompson. He had 30 tackles, 2.5 tackles for loss, and 1.5 sacks at Washington last season.
