Week 10 of the NFL season brings us to the Green Bay Packers’ bye. Not a big fan of the bye week, but I know the players love any chance to “get healthy,” or a little bit healthier since by the season’s halfway point everybody could be on the injury list in some way. So, Sunday is a day that you can get out there in the yard and take care of those leaves, or perhaps watch some football that is not stressful. Below are the TV maps for Week 10, showing which games will be on in your area:
More on NFL Bye Weeks
Each NFL team has one "bye week" during a normal season; this is placed on the team's schedule, usually falling between Week 4 and Week 12 inclusive.
During the 1960 and 1966 seasons, the league had an odd number of teams due to expansion. Each week during those seasons, one team had a bye, including one team each in the first and last week of the season: thus, because they had to play all their games with no break in the middle, those two teams effectively had no byes. The American Football League (which at the time was a completely separate league, but later became the American Football Conference) also had an odd number of teams in 1966 and 1967 following the addition of the Miami Dolphins, leaving each team with two bye weeks.
The NFL returned to the use of the bye week in 1990 so as to extend the 16-game regular season schedule to span 17 weeks to increase the number of viewable games for television contracts. The 1993 season spanned 18 weeks with each team having two bye weeks; it went back to 17 weeks with a bye week the next season through 2020. Since 2021, the season is 18 weeks long with a bye week and an additional 17th game.
Between 1999 and 2001, the NFL had an odd number of teams (31) as a result of the Cleveland Browns re-entering the league. Each week during these three seasons featured at least one team with its bye week, but the 2001 season also added an additional impromptu league-wide bye the weekend after the September 11 attacks. The league returned to having an even number of teams (32) in 2002 with the addition of the Houston Texans, and implemented the current bye week system.
In the rare case of a game postponement that cannot be made up within the same week, the NFL may revise bye weeks assignments in order to reschedule the delayed game, making the postponement week those teams' new “bye week”:
• Due to Hurricane Ike in 2008, the Baltimore Ravens' and the Houston Texans' Week 2 matchup in Houston was postponed, which also impacted the Cincinnati Bengals' schedule. The Bengals-Texans game was moved to Week 8, which was the originally scheduled bye week for both of those teams. This allowed the Ravens–Texans game (and the Bengals' bye week) to be rescheduled in Week 10, the Ravens' original bye Week.
• Due to Hurricane Irma in 2017, the Miami Dolphins and Tampa Bay Buccaneers Week 1 game was rescheduled to Week 11, the originally scheduled bye week for both teams.
• Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, several postponements occurred during 2020. The first one that saw the league move games during bye weeks involved the Week 4 matchup between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Tennessee Titans, which also impacted the Baltimore Ravens' schedule. The Steelers-Titans game was moved to Week 7 (the Titans' original bye week) due to a rash of COVID-19 cases among the Titans organization. The Steelers matchup with the Ravens (their original Week 7 opponent) was moved to Week 8 when they both had scheduled byes and would allow the Steelers and Titans to make up their matchup; the Ravens bye week was moved to Week 7. Ravens head coach John Harbaugh, when asked about the schedule change, referenced the aforementioned changes with the Texans and Bengals in 2008 (his first year as Ravens head coach) and did not expect the changes to affect his team's planning.
• The media may also sarcastically refer to a team having a “bye week” or a " “second bye” if that team is playing an especially poor team, and is all but assured of a win.
• Ever since the NFL started Thursday Night Football, teams who play on a Thursday night are sometimes referred to having a “mini-bye” until their next game, usually being about 10-11 days away.
