3 Football Games to Watch on Thanksgiving Day

Thanksgiving is upon us, and that means football will be on the screens.

Week 13 of the NFL season will begin on Nov. 27 with three games.

The Green Bay Packers will face off at 1 p.m. ET on Fox against the Detroit Lions, who have played at home every Thanksgiving since 1934 (between 1939 and 1944 there were no games due to World War II).

The Packers and Lions are both coming off wins last Sunday.

The two teams are close in terms of their record and standing. The Packers are 7-3-1, while the Lions are 7-4, good for second and third place in the division, respectively, with the Chicago Bears leading the NFC North.

A couple of months ago, the Packers defeated the Lions in Green Bay, 27-13, in the first week of the regular season. Packers quarterback Jordan Love was 16 for 22 and threw for 188 yards and two touchdowns.

“Obviously I think a big goal for us was to be able to come in here and start the season off fast and start the season on the right note,” Love said after the game. “To come in here Week 1 at home and get a dominant win like that is amazing and exactly what we’d been working for.”

At the time, Lions head coach Dan Campbell said his team did not play its best.

“They came out and played outstanding, and we didn’t play good enough,” he said. “We didn’t coach good enough, including me, and we didn’t play good enough. Like I told the team, it’s tough to go in and not certainly play close to your best game. You hate starting the season off with a loss, and as bad as that is, it’s not what it appears to be.”

The Thanksgiving game could come down to which defense plays best. The Lions and Packers defenses rank in the top 10 in the NFL, with the Packers ranking higher than the Lions.

To be fair, the Lions and Packers also have top-13 offenses, with the Lions ranking higher than the Packers in total offense. But it is mostly defense that wins games.

Following the Packers-Lions game is the Kansas City Chiefs versus the Dallas Cowboys at 4:30 p.m. ET on CBS.  Both teams are coming off a game-winning field goal in their respective games last Sunday.

The Chiefs have had a disappointing season with a 6–5 record following dominating seasons and a dynasty consisting of three Super Bowl titles in the last six years. The Cowboys, who have played on Thanksgiving almost every year since 1966, have a 5-5-1 record. The Chiefs are the odds-on favorite.

Finally, the Cincinnati Bengals (3–8) face off against the Baltimore Ravens (6–5) at 8:20 p.m. ET on NBC. Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow is expected to return from injury after being out for a few weeks. Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson hopes to keep the Ravens’ momentum going as his team has been on a five-game win streak, with Jackson playing the last four weeks after returning from injury.

You might want to watch the games while eating turducken, a dish popularized by the late NFL icon John Madden. It consists of a turkey stuffed with a duck that is stuffed with a chicken.

And if you didn’t get enough football on Thanksgiving, don’t worry. The Chicago Bears (8–3) take on the Super Bowl reigning champion Philadelphia Eagles (8–3) on Amazon Prime on Friday at 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.