Monday Night Football
Monday Night Football is the branding used for broadcasts of National Football League games that air on Monday nights. It originally ran on ABC from 1970 to 2005, before moving exclusively to sister network ESPN from 2006 to 2019. While still airing on ESPN, MNF returned to ABC in 2020 beginning with select simulcasts, later expanding to select exclusive telecasts in 2022, and the bulk of games in simulcast with ESPN since 2023. In addition, ESPN2 features the Manningcast alternate telecast of select games, which was established in 2020, and since 2021, ESPN+ has served as the American streaming home of MNF.
During its initial run on ABC, MNF became one of the longest-running American television series, as well as one of the highest-rated, particularly among male viewers. Since 1993, it has been preceded by the ESPN pregame show Monday Night Countdown. Per an NFL broadcasting policy intended to allow those who do not subscribe to cable or satellite television to see local games televised by a pay television network, the ESPN-exclusive games are also made available on an over-the-air station in each participating team's local market.
MNF is broadcast in Canada on TSN and RDS, in most of Australia on ESPN Australia, in Portugal on Eleven Sports, on TV 2 Sport in Denmark, on Sky Sports/DAZN in the United Kingdom, and in some other regions of the world outside the U.S. on ESPN International. A Spanish-language version airs on ESPN Deportes in the U.S. and on ESPN International in Latin America, while a Portuguese version airs on ESPN Brasil.
Overview
History
During the early 1960s, NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle envisioned the possibility of playing at least one game weekly during prime time that could be viewed by a greater television audience. An early bid by the league in 1964 to play on Friday nights was soundly defeated, with critics charging that such telecasts would damage the attendance at high school football games, and in any event had been prohibited by the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961 for that very reason alongside Saturday games to protect college football. Two years later, Rozelle would build on this success as the NFL began a four-year experiment of playing on Monday night, scheduling one game in prime time on CBS during the 1966 and 1967 seasons, and two contests during each of the next two years. NBC followed suit in 1968 and 1969 with games involving American Football League teams.During negotiations on a new television contract that would begin in 1970, Rozelle concentrated on signing a weekly Monday night deal with one of the three major networks. However, both NBC and CBS were reluctant to disturb their regular programming schedules. On the other hand, ABC was a distant third in prime time ratings and more willing to take any perceived risk, moreover, ABC's existing Monday night prime time lineup was a particular weak spot. As a result, Rozelle made a deal with ABC.
Despite high ratings, ABC lost millions of dollars on televising the games during the late 1990s and 2000s. The NFL also indicated that it wanted Sunday night to be the new night for its marquee game, because more people tend to watch television on Sundays, and games held on that night would be more conducive to flexible scheduling, a method by which some of the NFL's best games could be moved from the afternoon to the evening on Sunday on short notice. Given these factors, as well as the rise of ABC's ratings on Sunday night, and the network's wish of protecting its television series Desperate Housewives on that night, on April 18, 2005, ABC and the NFL announced the end of their 36-year partnership, with the Monday Night Football broadcasts being moved to ESPN starting with the 2006 season.
In 2011, ESPN extended its MNF contract for an additional eight seasons, giving it rights to the broadcasts until 2021. The deal, valued around 15 billion, also gave ESPN rights to expanded highlights, international, and streaming rights. A new deal signed in 2021 sees ESPN retain these rights through 2033. Included with the new contract are the rights to two Super Bowls in 2027 and 2031, the introduction of flexible scheduling, three doubleheaders during the season with exclusive games on ABC, one divisional playoff game, and one exclusive game on ESPN+.
Simulcasts on ABC
Beginning with the 2020 season, select Monday Night Football games have been simulcast on ABC. In the 2020 season, three games were simulcast. In the 2021 season, three Monday Night Football games and the new Week 18 Saturday doubleheader were simulcast. After ESPN renewed its Monday Night Football contract, it was revealed that these simulcasts would expand starting with the 2022 season. To accommodate the expanded simulcasts, ABC announced that Dancing with the Stars would move to Disney+ for its 31st season only. ABC later announced that Dancing with the Stars would return to ABC and be simulcast on Disney+ after one year and moved to Tuesdays permanently.On September 18, 2023, amid the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes, ABC announced that it would simulcast Monday Night Football during each week of the 2023 NFL season. The decision was made while the season was already underway, and therefore upset the league's other broadcasters. The move gave ABC an immediate financial benefit since ABC could now charge higher commercial fees during those additional weeks since NFL games generally have higher ratings than most other programming. The simulcast came at a cost for Disney's cable partners, who would lose revenue from local insertion advertising as viewers gravitated towards their local ABC station to watch the game instead, rather than the ESPN networks.
ABC's planned simulcast schedule for the 2024 NFL season had reverted back to four games, before Disney confirmed the simulcasts would continue until the end of the season on October 11, 2024, bringing the ESPN/ABC simulcast total from the originally planned four to ten.
In 2025, ABC announced that Monday Night Football will become a permanent part of its fall schedule with the network at least airing ten games.
Scheduling problems
To avoid unfairness due to a Monday Night Football game where, just before the first playoff game, a team may have five days off and others six, and also to allow the league to have games with mutual playoff implications played at the same time, most games during the final week of the regular season are played on Sunday. Consequently, there is no Monday night game that week. From 2003 to 2005, one game was played on Thursday and another on Monday under the Monday Night Football banner. Starting in 2006, when the series moved to cable, two games are played on the opening Monday night to capitalize on fan interest during "NFL Kickoff weekend".Before 2023, the MNF schedule was set during each Spring before the regular season, which could not be changed. Thus, the league and network cannot guarantee that each late-season MNF matchup would have any significance or would be highly anticipated. The problem of having a national spotlight game which during the season's most critical weeks late in the year probably would not show the most important game of the week was long known by the league and network. As a result of this, the NFL wished to move the "Game of the Week" idea to Sunday nights to make flex scheduling possible, and they had long stated that it was only interested in having flex scheduling on Sundays, and not Mondays since it is easier logistically on relatively short notice to move kickoff times by hours instead of days. This became one of the major factors leading to the 2006 end of MNF on ABC, and NBC instead agreeing to air the "Game of the Week" with flex scheduling on Sunday Night Football. The NFL finally agreed to expand flex scheduling to MNF beginning in the 2023 season. That same season, in Week 15, the originally scheduled game between the Kansas City Chiefs and New England Patriots became the first game to be flexed out of the MNF spot; it was replaced with a matchup between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Seattle Seahawks. 2023 was also the first NFL season New Year's Day fell on a Monday in the penultimate week of the regular season, consequently to avoid a conflict with the College Football Playoff there were no Monday games scheduled for the final two weeks of the regular season.
Franchises with the most appearances
The franchise with the most Monday night appearances is the Dallas Cowboys, with 85. The Pittsburgh Steelers secured the all-time lead with most wins on November 28, 2022, at 52.The most common Monday Night Football pairings are Broncos vs. Raiders and Redskins vs. Cowboys.
The defunct Candlestick Park in San Francisco holds the record for hosting the most Monday Night Football games, including its 36th and final Monday night game on December 23, 2013. Among the active stadiums following the conclusion of the 2017 season, Miami Gardens, Florida's Hard Rock Stadium had hosted the most games with 36.
Eight new NFL stadiums have made their regular season debuts on Monday Night Football. Most recently, Allegiant Stadium in Paradise, Nevada, hosted its first NFL game on September 21, 2020, when the Las Vegas Raiders defeated the New Orleans Saints 34–24 on Monday Night Football.
As entertainment
Monday Night Football has continued to provide entertainment as sports throughout its run. In addition to the extra cameras, the program has also pioneered technological broadcast innovations, such as the use of enhanced slow motion replays and computerized graphics.Celebrity guests – such as former Vice President Spiro Agnew, singers Plácido Domingo and former Beatle John Lennon, former President Bill Clinton, and even Kermit the Frog – were often featured during the game to "liven up" the broadcast. The December 9, contest featured a rare instance of two celebrities entering the booth, with Lennon being interviewed by Howard Cosell and California governor Ronald Reagan speaking with Frank Gifford, with Reagan explaining the rules of American football to Lennon as the game went along. However, the late 1990s and early 2000s saw an even more increased reliance on the entertainment factor. Some halftime shows, featuring popular music stars, were broadcast in their entirety rather than being ignored in favor of analysis of the game by the commentators, as in previous seasons.
On December 8, 1980, one of the most memorable moments of MNF occurred when Cosell announced in a news flash that John Lennon had been shot and killed in New York City. Monday Night Football was the first national broadcast to announce his death.
An ABC advertisement for MNF featuring Nicollette Sheridan of Desperate Housewives dropping her towel in front of Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver Terrell Owens created some controversy, including at least 1,997 complaints being sent to the FCC and outrage from FCC chairman Michael Powell.
The Walt Disney Company, owner of ABC and the majority owner of ESPN, has used Monday Night Football to promote its other properties, releasing a trailer for the 2015 film Star Wars: The Force Awakens during one broadcast and incorporating The Muppets into another trailer.