Take the NFL’s two biggest TV draws. Add in the league’s red-hot viewership this season. Throw in a Tush Push from Nielsen’s Big Data + Panel, which is boosting ratings across sports. Put it all together and CBS’s telecast of Chiefs vs. Cowboys on Thanksgiving Day could be the first regular-season game in history to average 50 million viewers or more.

That’s the prediction from several industry experts about Thursday’s marquee matchup between Kansas City and Dallas at AT&T Stadium. Average viewership of 50 million or more would blow away the record 42.1 million viewers for Cowboys-Giants on Thanksgiving Day 2022. Before that, the longstanding record was 41.5 million for the 1990 Monday Night Football matchup between the Giants and 49ers. Fox’s February telecast of Super Bowl LIX is the most-watched TV event of all time at 127.7 million viewers.

“Chiefs-Cowboys is the perfect storm,” says one rival sports TV executive envious of CBS. “You’ve got Patrick Mahomes vs. Dak Prescott. You’ve got the old America’s Team vs. the new America’s Team. All of it at Jerry’s World.”

Gary Myers, author of “Once a Giant: A Story of Victory, Tragedy, and Life After Football,” predicts 50.1 million viewers. 

“Could the NFL have planned the Thanksgiving late-afternoon window any better as it tries to scale the Mount Everest of regular-season TV ratings—a seemingly unattainable 50 million viewers?” asks Myers. “The Cowboys are the No. 1 ratings magnet in the country. The Chiefs, perhaps the second-biggest draw in the league, are trying to extend their dynasty with Patrick Mahomes. The matchup was already going to be an embarrassment of riches for CBS, but with the Chiefs and Cowboys on desperate playoff runs, this could force holiday dinners to pregame or postgame.”

Sunday’s dramatic Week 12 helped set the stage for a pigskin bonanza on Thursday. Tens of millions of viewers watched the Chiefs and Cowboys stage desperate comebacks to keep their playoff hopes alive. 

Stephen Battaglio, TV and media writer for the Los Angeles Times, is predicting a monster 55 million viewers.

“Sunday’s results clearly make this matchup a much bigger deal than it looked like on paper. The Cowboys are energized, and the Chiefs are still living on the edge to remain in playoff contention,” Battaglio says. “Combine that element with overall strength of NFL ratings this season, and a record Super Bowl, I can see 55 million viewers.” 

We won’t know for sure until the league and networks release Thanksgiving numbers next week. But heading into Thursday, sports TV experts say you can throw out the Chiefs’ and Cowboys’ respective 6–5 and 5-5-1 records. They’re still the NFL’s biggest TV attractions. 

Kansas City has played in four of the five most-watched game telecasts this season, including the most-watched game season to date: Fox’s telecast of Chiefs-Eagles that drew 33.8 million viewers in Week 2. The only non-Chiefs game to crack the top 5 was NBC Sports’s coverage of Cowboys-Eagles in Week 1, which pulled 28.3 million viewers.

Plus, the NFL has been on a heater, pacing for its most-watched season across TV/digital since 2015. Through Week 11, the league averaged 17.7 million viewers per game, up 6% from the same point last season. NFL games generated 60 of the top 65 shows on TV since kickoff of the new season. Sports had been undercounted for years. As the icing on the cake, Nielsen’s new Big Data measurement may be boosting viewership numbers for live sports by 5% to 10% this season. 

The NFL will stage a Turkey Day tripleheader on Thursday. Fox will show Packers-Lions at 1 p.m. ET, followed by Chiefs-Cowboys on CBS at 4:30 p.m. ET and NBC’s primetime telecast of Bengals-Ravens at 8:20 p.m. ET.  

Last year’s late-afternoon Thanksgiving game between the Cowboys and Giants averaged 38.8 million viewers, making it the fifth-most-watched regular-season game in the NFL’s 105-year history. The early game between the Bears and Lions also generated boffo numbers, averaging 37.5 million viewers.

Notes Myers: “It’s going to take a lot of eyeballs to shatter the record of 42.1 million for Giants-Cowboys on Thanksgiving 2022. But a competitive game between two compelling teams could do it. And just imagine if Taylor Swift shows up in Jerry Jones’s suite.”

There is optimism around ESPN that DraftKings will be a better fit as a gambling partner. 

Earlier this month, ESPN and Penn Entertainment ended their 10-year, $2 billion contract for ESPN Bet after just two years. Instead, ESPN has entered into a multiyear partnership with DraftKings to be its official betting partner. On Dec. 1, Penn’s ESPN Bet app will rebrand as theScore Bet (named after the Canadian brand Penn acquired in 2021).

“This is absolutely the best next step for us in the betting space,” ESPN VP of betting and fantasy Mike Morrison told Front Office Sports. “We want to be with a partner that’s scaled, that puts an emphasis on innovation, that has similar ways of operating as ESPN does.”

DraftKings cofounder and CEO Jason Robins met ESPN’s betting team in person last week. In an interview with CNBC earlier this month, Robins mentioned the deal with ESPN as well as partnerships with NBC and Amazon, saying that one goal was to increase share in the NBA betting space. “NBA is a sport that, relative to NFL, we’ve had lower share in,” Robins said. “Part of it was for years our chief competitor [FanDuel] had the Turner deal, and we had nothing.” Now DraftKings has a slew of big media partnerships to match. 

After Penn switched its partner from Barstool Sports to ESPN in 2023, Penn projected ESPN Bet would have a 20% market share by 2027; instead, it has hovered around 5%. 

Nevertheless, Morrison said the way in which ESPN directed its flywheel of content and administrative buy-in around gambling promotion stood out to Robins and DraftKings as the new deal was formalized.

“If I look at our efforts over the last several years, and certainly the last two, we began to really get all of the company—on the content side, the product side, technology, marketing, responsible gaming, sales—really aligned that this betting initiative is a really big thing,” Morrison said. “We began to pull a lot of resources in the company and effort around storytelling and framing in ways that we hadn’t yet done. … I think Jason and DraftKings saw that, and by their own admission, they were both impressed and at times surprised. They said, ‘We didn’t think you would develop everything that you did.’”

With Penn, ESPN (and Barstool before it) had to be the primary marketing driver of awareness and account sign-ups. DraftKings is already a behemoth, neck and neck each quarter with Flutter’s FanDuel as the top two betting apps by market share in the United States. (Hard Rock, through its partnership with the Seminole Tribe, has a monopoly in Florida, where betting numbers aren’t publicly released.) 

As of the fourth quarter of last year, DraftKings had 4.8 million average monthly paying customers. Therefore, besides trying to draw in new customers, ESPN will also be marketing to a large cohort of existing customers. 

While DraftKings has had sponsorship deals with ESPN before, now will be the first time it is the official odds provider, meaning that any time they talk about gambling implications on-air the DraftKings numbers will be mentioned.

Asked whether ESPN personalities such as Stephen A. Smith and Mike Greenberg will appear in commercials for DraftKings as they did for ESPN Bet, Morrison said, “It’s definitely something that DraftKings is very interested in, but we’re going to take our time there and figure out what makes sense.”

He’s been called the “most interesting man in baseball.” Joey Votto’s unique personality is one big reason why the retired Reds legend is now the target of MLB media partners seeking new TV talent, sources tell Front Office Sports.

The 2010 National League MVP retired in 2024 after 17 seasons in the big leagues. Votto was known to be one of the most engaging stars in sports. The free agent is drawing interest from several members of MLB’s new lineup of media partners, sources say. That expanded lineup now includes NBC Sports, Netflix, ESPN, Fox Sports, TBS, and MLB Network. 

“Joey Votto is, in my opinion, a no-brainer,” says one sports TV producer, who declined to be named. “He’s an MVP. He has a national name. He’s a natural in front of the camera.” Added another media source: “If NBC wants to make a splash with Sunday Night Baseball, Joey would be perfect.”

The six-time All-Star liked to get his feet wet in sportscasting during his playing career. During 2022 Opening Day, he donned a mic for ESPN during a Reds-Braves game. It made for great TV. While the ball was in play, Votto talked defense, hitting mechanics, and dabbled in play-by-play. When Ozzie Albies of the Braves reached first base, Votto asked him, “Hey Ozzie, what do you think about me getting a gold tooth?” As theScore wrote on X/Twitter: “Need Joey Votto mic’d up every game this year.”

While rehabbing an injury later that season, Votto put on the headset and called several Reds game telecasts with play-by-play announcer John Sadak and game analyst Barry Larkin on Fox Sports Ohio. 

With his career winding down in 2024, the Canadian star dressed up as a Mountie for an interview with MLB Network’s Chris Rose and Kevin Millar. The interview came off like a Saturday Night Live sketch. Votto talked about the Red Serge, his horse Nibbles, and eating donuts at Tim Hortons. “It’s a-boot the time for us to finish this interview,” said Votto, showing off his accent.

No wonder The Athletic called the quirky, chess-playing Votto the “most interesting man in baseball” back in 2021. Awful Announcing wrote last year that Fox could “revolutionize” its baseball coverage by making Votto the “next Tom Brady.” Even if that means dumping John Smoltz as its lead game analyst in favor of Votto.

The Reds legend could not be reached for this story. But while he was still looking for one last team in March 2024, Votto discussed a possible media career with Dan Patrick.

“Funny enough, I’ve had 10 times the analyst jobs over this offseason than I have had any baseball offers,” he said. 

Earlier this week, my FOS colleague Ryan Glasspiegel and I compiled a scouting report on newly retired players who could go into TV, ranging from Clayton Kershaw to Anthony Rizzo. 

Like Kershaw, we don’t know whether Votto wants to join the media as soon as next season. But if he does, I would put him right at the top of that list. Don’t be surprised to see him draw multiple offers before Opening Day of 2026.