Detroit Lions expecting to still be primetime darlings in 2026

Phoenix — The Detroit Lions have been television darlings over the last three seasons, a stark contrast to the early days of coach Dan Campbell's tenure, when the Lions were relegated to the early afternoon time slot with regularity. Last season, Detroit had four games in the primetime window, plus back-to-back Thursday games coming off Thanksgiving for the second year in a row and a road game against the Minnesota Vikings on Christmas Day. According to team president Rod Wood, the Lions’ 9-8 season has not slowed interest from schedule makers.

“Based upon my discussions with (NFL vice president of broadcast planning) Mike North, I think so, yeah,” Wood said when asked if he expects the Lions to be consistently put in primetime windows once again. “Because he was pushing back on a lot of my (schedule) requests. … I think that there's still a lot of interest in the Lions, despite last year's little disappointment.

And I think there's probably an expectation that we're going to bounce back and be really competitive next year. So I would assume, yes. ” After the Lions’ post-Thanksgiving appearances on Thursday Night Football crushed the ratings — the 44-30 win over the Dallas Cowboys last season was the most-watched “TNF” game in four seasons of Amazon Prime Video’s broadcasts — it seems likely that the schedule makers will continue putting Detroit in prominent windows next season.

Wood said one of his main requests for the 2026 schedule is to avoid playing the back-to-back Thursday games in late November. He’s hoping that Detroit's international game in Germany, projected for early November based on past games in the country, will help avoid the double-dip. And with the NFL no longer guaranteeing bye weeks after international games, there’s an opportunity for the schedule to crunch the Lions during an important time of year.