BUFFALO, N.Y. — Normally, you wouldn't have to worry about planning to watch a Bills game on a Wednesday. But for one week this season, that could be the case.
It just so happens to be Christmas week. Christmas Day, to be exact.
The NFL announced during its annual meeting in Orlando, Fla., this week that there will be two Christmas games this season. While that's normally not an issue, the holiday falls on a Wednesday this year, meaning that the league needed to get creative on how it plans to present this Christmas gift to fans.
So while the Bills might not play in Brazil or London, or on Thanksgiving, there is a chance fans might have to make holiday plans around a regular season game. The NFL is expected to release the full 2024 schedule in May.
Christmas Day games didn't always happen. The first such game happened in 1971, and it took another 18 years before the NFL played another game on the holiday. They did become more frequent after that.
Since 2020, however, it's been a regular thing. The NFL had one Christmas game in 2020, then two in 2021, and three in each of the past two seasons.
Hans Schroeder, the NFL executive vice president of media distribution, recently explained why the decision was made.
"When we saw the viewership from this past year, really our fans spoke," he said. "We certainly saw and believe that they are very much enjoying and wanting NFL football on Christmas."
Schroeder said the league would likely have a couple games "on Saturday of Week 16, and then come back and play a couple of games on Christmas Day on Wednesday."