For generations, Thanksgiving was synonymous with family and football while Black Friday was all about shopping, but there will now be an intersection between the two as the New York Jets and Miami Dolphins take the field on Friday, Nov. 24 in the first-ever Black Friday football game.
The Jets will be hosting the Dolphins at MetLife Stadium for a 3 p.m. game with massive playoff implications for the Jets, whose season is hanging on by a thread. The Dolphins, on the other hand, are safely sitting atop the AFC East standings.
The game will be broadcasting exclusively on Prime Video, so anyone with an Amazon account is able to watch the game. This serves as even more exposure for the e-commerce company on one of their busiest days of the year. Last year, over $1 billion in sales were done on Amazon over Thanksgiving weekend and this year they are hoping the game will increase traffic to their site and consequently generate more money.
Last year, the NFL’s three Thanksgiving games averaged 33.5 million viewers and their three Christmas Day games averaged 22.9 million viewers. Now, the league is hoping to capitalize off of another holiday to boost their ratings. The Jets have appeared in some of the most-watched games of the NFL seasons in their matchups against teams such as the Eagles, Chiefs and Bills. With the first Black Friday football game, they are looking to add yet another team to that list.