Three Things to Look For When the Vikings' Schedule Drops on Thursday Night

What should we pay attention to when the NFL releases its 2020 regular season schedule on Thursday?

The NFL is set to release its 2020 regular season schedule with a three-hour show on NFL Network and NFL.com beginning at 7 p.m. central on Thursday night. We don't yet know if fans will be able to attend games this season because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, but we'll at least know the timing of each matchup and get to begin analyzing the full slate.

We already know who the Vikings will play in 2020 and where those games will take place. Outside of the divisional games, the Vikings will host the Titans, Cowboys, Falcons, Jaguars, and Panthers, and they'll travel to play the Saints, Seahawks, Texans, Buccaneers, and Colts. We're about to find out the order of those games and whether they'll begin at noon, mid-afternoon, or in primetime.

Here are a few things to pay attention to when the schedule comes out.

How will the season start?

"I think everybody gets anxious on ‘who’s the opener?'" said Vikings GM Rick Spielman on Tuesday when asked about the schedule release. "Are you going to be on the road, are you going to be at home, who you’re going to be playing against. That’s probably the most unpredictable game, not that any are predictable, because you just don’t know, that’s the first time you’re going out there when it counts. I always look forward to who we’re opening with."

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After dominating the Falcons with their running game to kick off the 2019 season, the Vikings have won four straight season openers and five of six during the Mike Zimmer era. The lone loss came in 2015, when they opened with a late Monday night game against the 49ers and could do nothing to stop Carlos Hyde.

It will be interesting to see if the Vikings head back on the road after three straight years with a Week 1 game at U.S. Bank Stadium. Also, will the layout of the schedule be affected by COVID-19? There's been some speculation that the league could push important divisional and conference games to the back half of the season in case it happens to get delayed or shortened up front.

Assuming they'll be on the road, it might be nice for the Vikings to catch a team like the Buccaneers or Colts in Week 1, since those squads are breaking in new quarterbacks in Tom Brady and Philip Rivers.

Where will the primetime games be?

The other thing that eyes are immediately drawn to are the primetime games on Thursday, Sunday, and Monday nights. The Vikings had four such games last year and won two of them. They were scheduled to have five, but a late-season game against the Chargers was flexed out of Sunday Night Football. They had five primetime games in 2018 and went just 1-4, which was a big reason why they failed to reach the playoffs that year. Even if it's a fairly pointless narrative, there's no doubt Kirk Cousins' primetime record will be brought up again this year.

The Viking are 10-11 in primetime in the Zimmer era, although they went 6-2 across 2016 and 2017. Spielman's primary concern is the location of the primetime games. 

"[You look at] some of the critical matchups we’re going to have versus some opponents, and are we going to be on the road, away on primetime again like most of the time we are, are we going to have some home primetime games I’m hoping," Spielman said.

It's not as lopsided as Spielman may think, but the Vikings have traveled for night games more than half of the time of late. Five of their nine primetime games since 2018 have been on the road, and 12 of 21 during the Zimmer era.

The opponents that jump out as strong possibilities for SNF or MNF games are the Packers, Cowboys, Saints, Seahawks, and Buccaneers. It would be pretty funny if the Vikings played on Monday Night Football in Seattle for a third consecutive year. The Thursday night game could be a fairly random matchup like it was with the Redskins last season. I'd expect the Vikings to get at least four, maybe five primetime games considering their status as a playoff team in 2019.

Other scheduling quirks

Spielman pointed out a couple other interesting things that he looks for in addition to the opener and the primetime games.

"It’s kind of interesting to see who’s going to be your back-to-back, like you’ve got a Sunday and then who’s going to be your Thursday game," he said. "You look at a bunch of different ways on how it’s laid out, are we going to have to go out on the west coast for two weeks in a row, just different things like that."

I can answer one of those questions: no, the Vikings won't play on the west coast for two weeks in a row, because their only western opponent is the Seahawks. But maybe they'll have consecutive road games in the south, with trips to Tampa Bay, Houston, and New Orleans all on the schedule.

The short week will also be noteworthy; the Vikings will be hoping to face an easier opponent for their Thursday night game.

Lastly, will they host the Bears in Week 17 for a fifth straight season?

It'll all be revealed soon enough. InsideTheVikings will bring you the full schedule as soon as it comes out on Thursday night, plus plenty of analysis in the following days.

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