The Dallas Cowboys are the only NFL franchise that can eke out a pair of consecutive seven-win seasons and still manage to be rewarded with a national TV appearance nearly every week. Last season, Jerry Jones’ charges went 7-9-1, with the tie coming against Green Bay in Week 4. If you squint hard enough, that string of odd numbers marked an improvement over the 2024-25 campaign, when Dallas put together a similarly meh 7-10 record.
Despite the lackluster results of the past two seasons, the Cowboys this fall will appear in as many as 11 coast-to-coast telecasts, a slate that includes six primetime games and another five dates in the marquee 4:20 p.m. ET showcase on CBS and Fox. Joining Dallas in the NFL’s luxury suite are the Kansas City Chiefs, which saw their 10-year playoff streak go up in smoke with a Dec. 14 loss to their AFC West rivals in Los Angeles. Making matters worse, Patrick Mahomes blew out his ACL during the game’s final drive.
As it so happens, the Cowboys and Chiefs were featured in last season’s biggest regular-season draw, a Thanksgiving Day showdown that averaged a record 57.3 million viewers on CBS. All told, Mahomes & Co. appeared in four of the five highest-rated games, and while the recovery time for a catastrophic knee injury varies from patient to patient, word around the campfire suggests that the 30-year-old quarterback will be under center when KC opens the season against the Broncos on Monday Night Football.
