Thanksgiving Classic
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- The Canadian Football League also holds a Thanksgiving Day Classic on Canadian Thanksgiving.
The National Football League's Thanksgiving Classic is a series of games played during the Thanksgiving holiday in the United States. The games are usually hosted each year at the home stadiums of the Detroit Lions and the Dallas Cowboys, although starting in the 2006 season, the NFL Network also hosts one Thanksgiving game per season.
The Detroit Lions have hosted a game each year since 1934 (excluding the years 1939-1944 due to World War II), and the Dallas Cowboys have hosted a game each year since 1966 (excluding 1975 and 1977 when the St. Louis Cardinals hosted a game instead). It is widely rumored that the Cowboys sought a guarantee that they would regularly host Thanksgiving games as a condition of their very first one (since games on days other than Sunday were uncommon at the time and thus high attendance was not a certainty).
From 2001 to 2004, teams playing on Thanksgiving wore throwback uniforms to celebrate the team's glory years. Detroit and Dallas were the most notable. Detroit always wore uniforms based on those of their early years. Therefore, they had to remove all decals from their helmets to reflect the absence of helmets in that earlier era. From 2001-2003, Dallas chose to represent the 1990s Cowboys dynasty who won three Super Bowls in a three year span by wearing the navy "Double-Star" jersey not seen since the 1995 season. In 2004, the team went even more throwback by wearing uniforms not seen since the team's inception in 1960.
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[edit] Game results
[edit] 1920-1959
* Non NFL team games between league teams and non league teams counted in the 1920 standings.
- ^ Played at Canton, Ohio
- ^ Played at Hartford, Connecticut
- ^ Played at Akron, Ohio
[edit] 1960-1969
- Note: The rival American Football League also played Thanksgiving Day games during this decade, and the Dallas Cowboys started playing their series in 1966.
[edit] 1970-Present
- Note: Since 1970, each year, three NFC teams play on Thanksgiving, as opposed to one AFC team. In 2006, Kansas City hosted a prime time Thanksgiving game. The game marked a new "Thanksgiving Tripleheader" tradition. The Denver/Kansas City game marked the first time more than two games were played on Thanksgiving since the AFL-NFL Merger in 1970.
- The two daytime games, held at Detroit (12:30 p.m. Eastern) and Dallas (4:15 p.m. Eastern), respectively (because a 12:30 Eastern kick-off in Dallas would be 11:30 AM local time), rotate annually as intra-conference and inter-conference games. This is largely due to the format of the television contract with CBS and FOX. Since both Detroit and Dallas are NFC teams, in order for CBS to televise one of the games, one game must be against an AFC opponent, as inter-conference AFC away games are televised on CBS. For fairness between both networks and markets, the two games to rotate annually between the two networks.
- Since 2006, three contests have been played on Thanksgiving. In addition to the traditional Detroit and Dallas home games, the NFL Network televises a contest in primetime.
- Dallas was replaced by St. Louis as a host team in 1975 and 1977.
[edit] Thanksgiving Day standings
Current NFL franchises highlighted in ██ gold. This included American Football League games.
| Team | Wins | Losses | Ties | Win Pct. | Other names appeared under |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| San Diego Chargers | 3 | 0 | 1.000 | ||
| Frankford Yellow Jackets | 2 | 0 | 1.000 | Defunct (1931) | |
| Pottsville Maroons | 2 | 0 | 1.000 | Defunct (1928) | |
| Atlanta Falcons | 1 | 0 | 1.000 | ||
| Boston Yanks | 1 | 0 | 1.000 | Defunct (1948) | |
| Dallas Texans | 1 | 0 | 1.000 | Defunct (1952) | |
| Los Angeles Buccaneers | 1 | 0 | 1.000 | Defunct (1926) | |
| Oorang Indians | 1 | 0 | 1.000 | Defunct (1923) | |
| Rock Island Independents | 1 | 0 | 1.000 | Defunct (1925) | |
| Minnesota Vikings | 5 | 1 | .833 | ||
| Miami Dolphins | 5 | 1 | .833 | ||
| St. Louis Rams | 3 | 1 | .750 | Cleveland Rams (1937-45), Los Angeles Rams (1946-94) | |
| Philadelphia Eagles | 3 | 1 | .750 | ||
| San Francisco 49ers | 2 | 1 | .667 | ||
| Dallas Cowboys | 25 | 14 | .641 | ||
| Akron Pros | 3 | 1 | 1 | .600 | Defunct (1926) |
| New York Jets | 3 | 2 | .600 | New York Titans (1960-62) | |
| Oakland Raiders | 3 | 2 | .600 | ||
| New York Giants | 7 | 6 | .538 | ||
| Detroit Lions | 35 | 31 | .530 | ||
| Chicago Bears | 16 | 14 | 2 | .500 | Decatur Staleys (1920), Chicago Staleys (1921) |
| Kansas City Chiefs | 5 | 5 | .500 | Dallas Texans (1960-62) | |
| Tennessee Titans | 3 | 3 | .500 | Houston Oilers (1960-96), Tennessee Oilers (1997-98) | |
| Buffalo Bisons | 1 | 1 | .500 | Buffalo All-Americans (1920-23), Defunct (1929) | |
| Cleveland Bulldogs | 1 | 1 | .500 | Defunct (1927) | |
| Dayton Triangles | 1 | 1 | .500 | Defunct (1929) | |
| Indianapolis Colts | 1 | 1 | .500 | Baltimore Colts (1953-83) | |
| Kansas City Cowboys | 1 | 1 | .500 | Kansas City Blues (1924), Defunct (1926) | |
| Milwaukee Badgers | 1 | 1 | .500 | Defunct (1926) | |
| Seattle Seahawks | 1 | 1 | .500 | ||
| Buffalo Bills | 3 | 5 | .375 | ||
| Green Bay Packers | 11 | 20 | .355 | ||
| Pittsburgh Steelers | 2 | 4 | .333 | ||
| Canton Bulldogs | 1 | 1 | 1 | .333 | Defunct (1926) |
| New England Patriots | 1 | 2 | .333 | ||
| Arizona Cardinals | 6 | 14 | 2 | .273 | Chicago Cardinals (1920-59), St. Louis Cardinals (1960-87), Phoenix Cardinals (1988-93) |
| Denver Broncos | 2 | 8 | .200 | ||
| Washington Redskins | 1 | 6 | .143 | ||
| Tampa Bay Buccaneers | 0 | 1 | .000 | ||
| Brooklyn Lions | 0 | 1 | .000 | Defunct (1926) | |
| Chicago Tigers | 0 | 1 | .000 | Defunct (1920) | |
| Detroit Heralds | 0 | 1 | .000 | Defunct (1920) | |
| New York Yanks | 0 | 1 | .000 | Defunct (1950) | |
| Providence Steam Roller | 0 | 1 | .000 | Defunct (1931) | |
| Racine Legion | 0 | 1 | .000 | Defunct (1926) | |
| Toledo Maroons | 0 | 1 | .000 | Defunct (1923) | |
| Columbus Panhandles | 0 | 2 | .000 | Defunct (1926) | |
| Cleveland Browns | 0 | 2 | .000 | ||
| Detroit Panthers | 0 | 2 | .000 | Defunct (1926) | |
| Hammond Pros | 0 | 2 | .000 | Defunct (1926) | |
| Rochester Jeffersons | 0 | 2 | .000 | Defunct (1925) |
The current active franchises that have never played on Thanksgiving through 2007 include:
- Baltimore Ravens
- Carolina Panthers
- Cincinnati Bengals
- Houston Texans
- Jacksonville Jaguars
- New Orleans Saints
[edit] Game MVPs
In 1989, John Madden of CBS awarded the first "Turkey Leg Award," for the game's most valuable player. Reggie White of the Philadelphia Eagles was the first recipient. The gesture was seen mostly as a humorous gimmick relating to Madden's famous multi-legged turkeys served on Thanksgiving. Since then, however, the award has gained subtle notoriety, and currently, each year an MVP has been chosen for both the CBS and FOX games. Madden brought the award to FOX in 1994, but it was abandoned and replaced with the "Galloping Gobbler" -- a running silver turkey wearing a football helmet -- when Madden left for ABC in 2002. When CBS returned to the NFL in 1998, they introduced their own award, the "All-Iron Award", which is, suitably enough, a small silver iron.
Turkey Leg Award (CBS 1989-1993, FOX 1994-2001)
- 1989- Reggie White (Eagles vs. Cowboys)
- 1993- Richard Dent (Lions vs. Bears)
- 1995- Herman Moore, Brett Perriman, & Johnnie Morton (Lions vs. Vikings)
- 1997- Luther Ellis (Lions vs. Bears)
- 2001- Ahman Green & Brett Favre (Packers vs. Lions)
Galloping Gobbler Award (FOX, since 2002)
- 2002- Emmitt Smith (Cowboys vs. Redskins)
- 2003- Dré Bly (Lions vs. Packers)
- 2004- Julius Jones (Cowboys vs. Bears)
- 2005- Michael Vick (Falcons vs. Lions)
- 2006- Tony Romo (Cowboys vs. Buccaneers)
All-Iron Award (CBS, since 1998)
- 1999- Dexter Coakley (Dolphins vs. Cowboys)
- 2005- Ron Dayne (Broncos vs. Cowboys)
- 2006- Joey Harrington (Dolphins vs. Lions)
[edit] References
- Defunct NFL franchises (for defunct years)
- 2003 NFL Record and Fact Book (ISBN 0-7611-3148-5) (for game results through 2002)
- Detroit Lions 2003, 2004 and 2005 game schedules (for game results 2003 to 2005)
- Dallas Cowboys 2003, 2004 and 2005 game schedules (for game results 2003 to 2005)
- Thanksgiving Day 2007 Games
