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Speaker 1: Goals twenty four from five. This is ESPN fifteen to thirty. Moeger,

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Speaker 1: thanks for listening.

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Speaker 2: You know.

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Speaker 1: One of the cool things about Thursday Night, Yes, the

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Speaker 1: Bengals win, but the Bengals won in front of a

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Speaker 1: massive audience. That game Baltimore hosting Cincinnati. Thanksgiving Night average

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Speaker 1: twenty eight point four million viewers. The Thanksgiving triple ahead

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Speaker 1: of the NFL had was massive. Most watched Thanksgiving Day

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Speaker 1: average on record forty four point seven million average viewers

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Speaker 1: for the three games, and huge matchups too, obviously Green Bay, Detroit, Casey,

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Speaker 1: Dallas and the most important game of course, Cincinnati on

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Speaker 1: the road against Baltimore. Here to talk about that for

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Speaker 1: a few minutes is a Cincinnati native. He is the

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Speaker 1: NFL EVP of Media Distribution, Hans Schroeder. I believe your

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Speaker 1: second time on the show, Hans. Thank you for joining us.

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Speaker 3: How are you.

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Speaker 4: Well?

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Speaker 2: Great to talk to you. I think yeah.

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Speaker 5: I think we connected back.

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Speaker 4: In twenty two on that on super Bowl week and

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Speaker 4: on to the Super Bowl for the Bengals. So it's

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Speaker 4: been a bit but it's great to connect.

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Speaker 2: Thanks for having me.

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Speaker 3: I appreciate you doing this.

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Speaker 1: I think you kind of had the perfect storm on

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Speaker 1: Thanksgiving night, right, It's it's a divisional rivalry, it's a

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Speaker 1: lot of familiarity, it's a former to a two time MVP,

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Speaker 1: and Lamar Jackson. I also think like Joe Burrow brings eyeballs,

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Speaker 1: Joe Burrow's return, though, is a little bit different.

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Speaker 3: I think that helped.

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Speaker 4: Look it all helped, you know, coach Coach Madden would

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Speaker 4: always say about Thanksgiving. You know, it's about two great

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Speaker 4: things coming together, which is football, fa and family and

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Speaker 4: probably add food into that one coach. And so you know,

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Speaker 4: you've seen that we've seen our viewership grow now four

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Speaker 4: years in a row on Thanksgiving and it's really just

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Speaker 4: becoming this unique high point of the season for our fans.

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Speaker 4: And certainly as we look to this year, you know,

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Speaker 4: we thought there was an opportunity to even put some

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Speaker 4: of our bigger matchups into and onto Thanksgiving and and

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Speaker 4: continue that growth. And by the way, I should, I

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Speaker 4: should hit it head on what we I know that

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Speaker 4: the Cincinnati fans feel like they're in Baltimore a lot on.

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Speaker 3: The road in primetime on Thursday.

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Speaker 4: I could tell everybody there. We looked really long and

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Speaker 4: hard and deep into the scheduling process. We actually saw

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Speaker 4: a lot of times where Baltimore was in Cincinnati on primetime,

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Speaker 4: but it just in the final the final schedule that

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Speaker 4: we sort of liked the most about. Uh, it ended

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Speaker 4: up the other way. But look, that was the culmination

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Speaker 4: with what is now one of the best divisional rivalries

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Speaker 4: the last couple of years is from the Bengals of

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Speaker 4: getting the Ravens together. We thought a great way to

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Speaker 4: end up after you know, Detroit and Green Bay and

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Speaker 4: and Tacy and Dallas and and and a great way

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Speaker 4: to end Thanksgiving in a really special way.

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Speaker 2: And and then we had Joe's.

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Speaker 4: Return, as you said, which which all sort of made

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Speaker 4: it even that much greater.

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Speaker 1: This this might be a stupid question, but obviously on

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Speaker 1: Thanksgiving you're going to have Detroit in Dallas. You now

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Speaker 1: have had the primetime game for for years. The Bengals

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Speaker 1: played in one way back in twenty ten, So you

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Speaker 1: have four different teams minus obviously Detroit and Dallas. Do

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Speaker 1: do teams request do they ask to play on Thanksgiving?

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Speaker 1: Because Burrow talked about it after the game about you

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Speaker 1: know how cool it would be to play Thanksgiving night.

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Speaker 1: Is this something that teams ask if they can be

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Speaker 1: a part of.

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Speaker 5: Yeah.

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Speaker 4: Look, I think teams love playing in national windows and

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Speaker 4: whether that's four twenty five on Sunday or prime time,

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Speaker 4: and then Thanksgiving sort of reaching another level. Obviously, it's

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Speaker 4: it's a Thursday, so it's a shorter week, and we

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Speaker 4: have some considerations, you know, obviously with how we play

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Speaker 4: teams on Thursdays and shorter weeks.

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Speaker 2: I think teams love playing on home. It's at home on.

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Speaker 4: Thursdays, especially those short weeks. But I think the stage

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Speaker 4: and the profile in the audience now is making it

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Speaker 4: a little bit different. But it's really team to team,

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Speaker 4: you know, and and player to player. I think how

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Speaker 4: they think about it. But you know, when you start

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Speaker 4: seeing these audiences number that number in Dallas, rival I

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Speaker 4: think it's rivaled last year's AFC Championship game. It's our

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Speaker 4: fourth highest few game outside of a super Bowl. You know,

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Speaker 4: it's reaching levels that I think players love to play

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Speaker 4: on big stages, and there's no bigger stage for us

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Speaker 4: in the regular season now than Thanksgiving.

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Speaker 1: Chiefs Cowboys averaged on CBS fifty seven point two million viewers.

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Speaker 1: So you know who's gonna play each other, right, It's

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Speaker 1: a matter of sloting the games. Did it take you

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Speaker 1: less than five seconds to put the Chiefs on Thanksgiving afternoon?

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Speaker 5: It's a great question.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, it's actually you know, when we've looked at it

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Speaker 4: and sort of looked over the past few years, and

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Speaker 4: we try to look at what our fans are telling us,

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Speaker 4: and you know when when more and more people are

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Speaker 4: tuning in on Thanksgiving and it's we hit big numbers

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Speaker 4: or fortunate on Sunday afternoon or Sunday night, But what

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Speaker 4: we really see is a few windows separating themselves and

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Speaker 4: kick offs one of them and Thanksgiving to another one.

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Speaker 4: And so you know, we put some really good games

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Speaker 4: on those days, but we thought there was an opportunity

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Speaker 4: to put even some of our bigger matchups. You know,

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Speaker 4: this year had a we have a great schedule and

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Speaker 4: a great set of games every year, but there were

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Speaker 4: some fun ones with the AFC North playing the NFC

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Speaker 4: North and NFC East, you know playing the NFC North.

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Speaker 2: We've just had a.

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Speaker 4: Lot of really fun, interesting, big matchups and it really

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Speaker 4: gave us an opportunity to put some of our bigger

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Speaker 4: matchups on Thanksgiving and see how high up.

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Speaker 2: Up could be.

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Speaker 4: And it ended up being really high and frilled with

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Speaker 4: it and hopefully the winner is ultimately our fans and

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Speaker 4: our partners.

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Speaker 2: When you see those type results.

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Speaker 1: You mentioned, you know, the Bengals Ravens thing in primetime

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Speaker 1: on a Thursday, and like, I won't lie, we've griped

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Speaker 1: about it here.

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Speaker 3: They have to go there in a short week every year.

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Speaker 3: This year they won.

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Speaker 1: And look both the two games the Ravens and Bengals

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Speaker 1: played last year, we're both awesome. One was in primetime.

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Speaker 1: Obviously you want those games in big windows. But is

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Speaker 1: there you know, people go all conspiracy when they see

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Speaker 1: the schedule come out. What is the biggest misconception that

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Speaker 1: fans have about how either the schedule comes out when

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Speaker 1: it comes out in April or may are how it

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Speaker 1: unfolds once you start getting into two flex scheduling, especially

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Speaker 1: this time of year.

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Speaker 4: Look, I think the biggest the biggest misconception that would

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Speaker 4: be there's any conspiracy because we spent so much time

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Speaker 4: and effort. It is a five month marathon of trying

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Speaker 4: to figure out how we make thirty two teams happy,

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Speaker 4: all our media partners happy, you know, all our you know,

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Speaker 4: the travel, the competitive aspect now with more international games.

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Speaker 4: There's so many different things and sort of making sure

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Speaker 4: we're delivering for our fans that we try to look

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Speaker 4: through all that and try to figure out how all

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Speaker 4: those pieces of the puzzle for every one of the

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Speaker 4: two hundred and seventy two games we have to schedule,

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Speaker 4: how do we make it the best possible schedule that

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Speaker 4: we can. And look, we do look at trends, We

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Speaker 4: look at things. We went into this year. We were

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Speaker 4: pretty conscious of Cincinnati as an example, being on the

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Speaker 4: road a lot in recent years, particularly in time, and

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Speaker 4: you know that that was something we wanted to make

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Speaker 4: sure we were equitable. Your friend Paul Dayers and Jay

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Speaker 4: have a lot of stats about being on the road

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Speaker 4: in the division on Thursday nights and otherwise, you know,

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Speaker 4: like even you know, we try to keep track of

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Speaker 4: all those data points and so you know, certainly it

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Speaker 4: was an important you saw that come to life with

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Speaker 4: the Pittsburgh game and being in Cincinnati. So look, we

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Speaker 4: look at all that. You know, it's an impossible job

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Speaker 4: to make, you know, to talk fully solve for everything

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Speaker 4: in a maximum way that we could, but we try

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Speaker 4: to get as close as we can, and I think

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Speaker 4: this year we're up six percent going into Thanksgiving weekend.

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Speaker 4: That should be the biggest you know, your weekend in

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Speaker 4: our history.

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Speaker 2: As a league.

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Speaker 4: So that number is giving them go up. So I

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Speaker 4: think we're doing something right. But we're always trying to

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Speaker 4: be smarter, always trying to learn, always trying to figure

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Speaker 4: out how we can get better. And again I would

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Speaker 4: just stress, you know, we really try to think about

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Speaker 4: all the different considerations and really be as fair and

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Speaker 4: equitable as we can be.

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Speaker 1: All Right, I root for myself the Black Friday game?

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Speaker 1: Can I get that next year?

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Speaker 4: Look, I tell you, like another thing Coach Madden would

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Speaker 4: say with you know and Howard Katz who ran the

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Speaker 4: scheduling process before me for many years. You know, it's

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Speaker 4: say it sounds like a football game, and you know

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Speaker 4: that that Bears Eagles sounds like a football on Black Friday.

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Speaker 2: But you know, Bengals.

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Speaker 4: Steelers and Bengals Ravens, there's a lot of there's a

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Speaker 4: lot of Bengals games in Ohio and being from there

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Speaker 4: and knowing how special football is and intertwined and by

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Speaker 4: the way, and seeing that game, what was it a couple.

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Speaker 2: Of Fridays ago? Was it? Was it?

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Speaker 4: Ex An Elder that was playing and in the stadium

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Speaker 4: and twenty plus thousand people there, and we know what

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Speaker 4: a and bad weather, We know what a big football

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Speaker 4: town you know there is in in in what Cincinnati,

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Speaker 4: in the state of Ohio is.

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Speaker 2: So look, we like.

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Speaker 4: One of the things we like about adding Thanksgiving Night

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Speaker 4: and Black Friday is that adding the ability for more

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Speaker 4: teams over Thanksgiving weekend to play on that big stage.

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Speaker 2: So again, I think we'll look at it.

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Speaker 4: We'll look at it continuing to build Black Friday and

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Speaker 4: and certainly you know Ohio and cincinnati'd be a great

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Speaker 4: home for a Black Friday game one day.

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Speaker 1: Well, when you're when you're jotting down next year, just

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Speaker 1: keep me in the back of your mind, because I

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Speaker 1: at home game. I want to I want to go

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Speaker 1: to pay Corps on on Black Friday. That'd be a

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Speaker 1: lot of fun. Congrats on an awesome Thanksgiving. You have

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Speaker 1: like such a fascinating job. I could talk to you

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Speaker 1: for hours, So maybe one day I'll ask you to

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Speaker 1: do that. But I can't thank you enough, and we'll

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Speaker 1: catch up down the road. Hans, thanks so.

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Speaker 5: Much, well, thank you.

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Speaker 4: I got to get at some point I got to

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Speaker 4: hear about how you did a show on a concussion.

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Speaker 5: I think I heard that in a podcast recently and

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Speaker 5: I got to give a shout out to a good

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Speaker 5: friend of mine, Louis from Lachland back in Cincinnati. So anyways,

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Speaker 5: I'm happy to join any time. Would love to talk

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Speaker 5: to you, and uh, you know, take care and hope it.

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Speaker 5: H You know, we got a big one, I know

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Speaker 5: for the Bengals and Bill on Sunday, so you know,

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Speaker 5: hopefully that's you know, that's an exciting game as well.

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Speaker 5: So reach out anytime, great to connect you.

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Speaker 3: Got it, Hans, We definitely will. Thanks so much.

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Speaker 2: Thank you.

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Speaker 1: That's uh, Hans Schroeder, NFL e VP Media Distribution. That's

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Speaker 1: collect dude has just an awesome job. And uh, at

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Speaker 1: least he acknowledges we're tired of the Bengals having to

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Speaker 1: go to Baltimore in a short week.

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Speaker 3: Dan Klaskin's next