CBS made special request to the NFL about the Chiefs’ game against the Bills

If things go really well for the Chiefs this weekend, they could have a stranglehold on the top seed for the playoffs by Monday.

The Chiefs, 9-0, have a two-game lead on the 8-2 Bills and 7-2 Steelers. Pittsburgh plays host to the Baltimore Ravens, 7-3, this Sunday, while the Chiefs will face the Bills in Buffalo.

If the Chiefs and Ravens win, that would give the Chiefs a three-game lead with seven games left. Of course, it won’t be easy this weekend.

The Bills have won five straight games, and they’ve got revenge on their minds for the 27-24 loss to the Chiefs in last season’s AFC Divisional playoff game at Highmark Stadium.

This will be the eighth time in five years the teams will meet. There have been five regular-season games in that span and three playoff matchups.

The most memorable game in the series was the Chiefs’ 42-36 overtime victory in an AFC Divisional playoff game in 2021. When the NFL schedule was released for the following season, fans were surprised to see a Chiefs-Bills rematch wasn’t slated for prime time.

It was a late-afternoon Sunday game on CBS Sports in 2022. A year ago, the Chiefs’ 20-17 loss to the Bills at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium also was a late-afternoon Sunday game on CBS.

This Sunday’s game is a rematch of the Chiefs’ 27-24 playoff win at Buffalo, and once again, it’ll be broadcast on CBS in the late-afternoon window.

CBS Sports CEO David Berson told the Associated Press that when the NFL was making the 2024 schedule, his network’s “top request” was this week’s Chiefs-Bills game.

“We felt like as the home of the AFC, we should continue to tell that story,” Berson told the AP.

The league granted CBS Sports’ petition. But Mike North, the NFL’s vice president for broadcasting, was on the Its Always Gameday in Buffalo podcast earlier this year and said networks can’t lock-in certain games.

However, North added that CBS is ensured to have a minimum number of Chiefs games each year (ditto for the Bills), and that’s a big factor when deciding when to have the KC-Buffalo game start.

“That plays into some of what the league is thinking about when they’re building the schedule,” North said. “You can kill two birds with one stone if you put a big Kansas City 4:25 (Eastern) game against Buffalo on CBS in Week 9.”

North added: “You put a Bills-Chiefs game on CBS, that checks two boxes for us, knowing we’ve got to get to our minimums for Buffalo and Kansas City. If we decide to take the Buffalo-Kansas City game and put it on Sunday night, now you have a hole in your CBS schedule for Kansas City and a hole in your CBS schedule for Buffalo, and how do you end up filling those holes? And maybe it’s two games, and maybe those two games combined don’t equal the value to CBS of the one Buffalo-Kansas City game.

“But we’re not doing our jobs if we’re not looking at hundreds, thousands of schedules: We should look at Buffalo-Kansas City on Sunday night. We should look at Buffalo-Kansas City as a CBS doubleheader. It should be in the mix for a Fox doubleheader. It should be in the mix for ‘Monday Night Football.’ It should be in the mix for ‘Thursday Night Football.’ What’s the best use of all 272 games, not just the best use of the Buffalo-Kansas City?”

It seems fair to say Chiefs-Bills is arguably the biggest game of the 2024 regular season in the eyes of the NFL. And it’s no wonder CBS wanted it.

Networks covet the Chiefs

Of the 272 NFL games each season, the networks keep a close eye on 17 in particular.

CBS, Fox, NBC, ESPN, Amazon and now Netflix all want as many Chiefs games as possible. An Athletic story noted that heading into Week 10, six of the nine highest-rated televised NFL games this season have involved the Chiefs.

While talking with ESPN’s Adam Schefter earlier this year, North acknowledged the Chiefs are the league’s “bell cow” when making the schedule.

“They’re kind of used to carrying our water for some of these kind of unique opportunities here,” North said. “You think about that Peacock playoff game last year. If you want to make Peacock a destination for an NFL playoff game, well, put a Chiefs game there. If Amazon wants to continue to try to build Black Friday into an event ... put a Chiefs game there.

“You want to make Christmas on Netflix a thing? Put a Chiefs game there. You can’t go to that well over and over again. There are only so many Chiefs games and, obviously, a lot of other really good teams and good stars and storylines in this league. But the Chiefs definitely were not surprised by their national television and some of the windows we decided to use them.”