It was a happy holiday indeed for the NFL after their successful double-header on Christmas Day. They drew 65 million viewers in the U.S. alone from the holiday special fixtures. However, legendarily surly former NFL coach Bill Belichick is telling everyone to hold their horses with all of this mixing of hard-nosed football and holiday cheer.
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Belichick, who recently signed on to be the head coach of the University of North Carolina’s football team, dug into the mental mechanics of getting guys jacked up for a hard-hitting NFL matchup when they’re surrounded by soft and loving feelings surrounding Christmas and other December holidays.
“Football is such a tough, physical, competitive game. And you kind of work all week to get your team into that mindset. And then you go out for pregame warmup and go out for the game and it’s jingle bells and silent night and all that. It’s in the spirit, but it’s not really football music that you hear at NFL films. That’s football music. And kind of gotta get out of the jingle bells and into the NFL mindset,” he said on The Coach Show
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Co-host Matt Patricia mentioned that even the jerseys players wore during this year’s Christmas doubleheader had candy cane patches. Michael Lombardi, for his part, pointed out that there is a lot on a player’s mind apart from football around that period. As Lombardi noted, new NFL partner Amazon could probably help the players out in terms of ensuring they get their gifts on time.
Belichick also revealed that the Patriots used to designate their draft war room as a gift-wrapping station during the holiday season. Players would bring their gifts in and give New England’s support staff instructions. They would then have them wrapped and ready by the time the players were ready to head home.
This wouldn’t be the first time someone listened to Bill Belichick and found him a bit grouchy or Grinchy. But he does have something of a point. Football is a violent and aggressive game, and switching your mindset from lovey-dovey family Christmas activities to trying to outmuscle a 250-pound linebacker is probably pretty tough.
Though the Christmas games were a massive success for Netflix and the NFL in terms of revenue and viewership, the quality of the football was clearly lacking, as Belichick hinted. What exacerbated things was that all four teams had just three days to prepare for the game.
The first game was a 19-point win for the Kansas City Chiefs while the second half of the doubleheader was a snoozer of a 31-2 win for the Baltimore Ravens.
Luckily, Christmas falls on a normal NFL football day in 2025: a Thursday. So, the short week shouldn’t be a problem next year. Not that it would matter, as this Christmas success for the league is sure to lead to more Christmas games in the coming years. Sorry, Coach Belichick.
