This will conclude our “What We Know” series on the NFL TV partners. Today we focus on the NFL on Fox. Fox Sports has been the home of the National Football Conference since 1994 and will enter its 21st season of airing NFL games.
Joe Buck and Troy Aikman are once again the “A” team for Fox. Let’s go over what we know for the upcoming season for the network.
What’s New
Erin Andrews replaces Pam Oliver as sideline reporter on Fox’s “A” team. Oliver is being assigned to Fox’s “B” team of Kevin Burkhardt and John Lynch. This will mark the last season for Oliver on the sidelines for Fox before becoming a features reporter for the network.
Kenny Albert, Daryl Johnston and Tony Siragusa, once the “B” team will be the “C” team.
Fox has dropped Brian Billick from its lineup. We know that Fox had offered Mike Shanahan a position as a game analyst, but he later rejected the idea.
We don’t have the full announcing lineup as of yet. A Fox Sports spokesman says its plans have to be finalized. Expect the official announcement on the NFL on Fox announcing teams in August.
Crossover Games
Fox will have increased flexibility in its schedule. The network can air AFC games in the 4:25 p.m. ET national window if the NFL desires to move a game from the 1 p.m. or 4:05 p.m. regional windows. NFC games can also be flexed into the national window as well. This can be done twice between Weeks 5 and 10 and as many times as the NFL wants from Week 11 through 17.
The NFL can also move one of Fox’s games to NBC’s Sunday Night Football as it has in the past, but with increased flexibility, it allows Fox to air more attractive games in the 4:25 p.m. window and keep it happy.
Two crossover games are already scheduled on Fox. In Week 1, Buffalo at Chicago will air on Fox at 1 p.m. That would have been a CBS game in the past. In Week 5, Buffalo at Detroit at 1 p.m. will be on Fox.
Expect a few more AFC games on Fox down the line.
Any London games?
Yes, Fox has two and one with an interesting twist. In Week 8 (October 26), Detroit-Atlanta will kickoff in London’s Wembley Stadium at 9:30 a.m. ET (2:30 p.m. in the UK) and that will mark the earliest kickoff time in NFL history. Think of it as something similar to the English Premier League games on NBCSN which start at 7:30 a.m. and 10 a.m. ET. It will make for a nice quadrupleheader of games for fans in Week 8.
The other London game for Fox will be Dallas vs. Jacksonville. That will begin at the more traditional 1 p.m. ET (6 p.m. in the UK).
What are Fox’s doubleheader weeks?
I’m glad you asked. Fox will have the late national game at 4:25 p.m. ET in Weeks 1, 4, 6, 7, 10, 11, 14, 15 and 17.
Postseason
Fox will have its usual four postseason games, one NFC Wild Card, two Divisional playoff contests and the NFC Championship. For the 2015-16 season, it will likely lose one Divisional playoff game to NBC.
Overall, Fox is scheduled for 97 regular season games, down from over 100 in the past. The increased Thursday Night Football schedule has taken games normally scheduled for Fox.
That will conclude our series of “What We Know” for the NFL TV partners in 2014. The previous installments in this series include Thursday Night Football, Sunday Night Football, Monday Night Football and the NFL on CBS.
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