By JOE REEDY (AP Sports Writer)
It isn’t a stretch to say the Black Friday sport between the Miami Dolphins and New York Jets is Amazon’s Super Bowl.
Not solely does it imply a further sport on Prime Video that Amazon hopes to make right into a yearly custom, but it surely comes on the busiest purchasing day of the 12 months.
“When we talked with the NFL, this is a perfect marriage. Black Friday is a huge event for us every year. We’re really putting everything behind this,” Prime Video Vice President Jay Marine mentioned.
Hans Schroeder, the chief vp of NFL Media, mentioned the league had been exploring the opportunity of including a sport on Black Friday for some time. The Thanksgiving Day tripleheader has been among the many most-watched video games throughout the common season for the previous two years.
Adding a Black Friday sport offers the NFL one other day to take over. Combine it with it airing on Amazon, and it was a match made in soccer and commerce heaven.
“It’s an opportunity for us to continue to innovate with Amazon. I think some of what they’ve done this year on Prime Vision is exciting with seeing that intersection of data and AI predictability and taking fans deeper inside of X’s and O’s,” Schroeder mentioned. “I think the viewing experience will feel a little bit different and unique for that day and appropriately. We’re excited about that.”
Even although Amazon will spotlight some offers and promotions all through the day, it is not going to really feel like Home Shopping Network meets a soccer sport.
Marine mentioned a number of the Black Friday offers will probably be highlighted throughout commercials, and there will probably be a QR code to scan and store throughout the sport.
There will probably be one main promotion per quarter and different offers throughout the pregame, postgame and halftime reveals.
The sport will probably be out there for all followers to stream without cost. According to Nielsen, the most-viewed Amazon sport got here in Week 2 this season when the Philadelphia Eagles hosted the Minnesota Vikings.
NFL video games are averaging 17.1 million viewers by 11 weeks, which is a 6% enhance over final season. The league stays on monitor for its highest viewership since 2015.
Amazon additionally will air a live performance by Garth Brooks following the sport.
“I’m fascinated to see how it plays out in terms of the Amazon component because they’ve taken it out from behind the paywall. So you can watch the game, and if you want to do additional Christmas shopping alongside the game, you will be able to do that. So this is kind of a brand new frontier,” mentioned Al Michaels, who will name the sport with Kirk Herbstreit and Kaylee Hartung. “I’m curious to find out how this works. I mean, there’s a chance in my mind that this could be spectacular.”
With three video games on Thanksgiving, a Black Friday matchup, three home windows on Sunday and a Monday night time sport, half of the week’s 16 matchups want nationwide enchantment.
During Christmas final 12 months, the league confirmed it may schedule video games on 4 days and unfold the wealth with matchups throughout all of its media companions.
All 32 groups are taking part in this week, with 10 of the 16 video games being a matchup between groups in the identical division.
While school soccer has taken heart stage prior to now on the day after Thanksgiving, the three p.m. Eastern kickoff nonetheless offers faculties an early window and prime time. More of the school rivalry video games on Thanksgiving weekend have been on Saturday.
Even although it is going to be Tim Boyle at quarterback for the Jets as a substitute of Aaron Rodgers, the AFC East-leading Dolphins have ascended to nationwide prominence with quarterback Tua Tagovailoa and large receiver Tyreek Hill main the offense.
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AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl
Source: www.bostonherald.com”