Saturday NFL Rocks This Time of Year – December 23

Saturday NFL games and a full slate of college bowl matchups are the perfect football lover’s present on the eve of Christmas Eve. There are two Saturday NFL matchups, both featuring at least one team that has playoff aspirations. Today’s college football games feature two teams from Utah and two that will face each other with interim head coaches. 

Saturday NFL football has been around for some time. In fact, every single NFL season since 1970 – with the exception of 2013 – has had Saturday games scheduled. Saturday NFL games only occur in the waning weeks of the season. There’s a reason why and that is the reason why the league chooses to play Saturday NFL games.

Why Saturday NFL Games Exist

The Sports Broadcasting Act was passed in 1961. The law was passed by Congress because the government felt the league was violating antitrust laws. Anyway, there’s much more to that bill, but hidden deep inside of it was a clause related to NFL football on Fridays and Saturdays.

Think about the football season. When it starts in August, there are games all weekend long. It all starts with the Friday night lights – high school football. Saturdays are full of college football and Sundays are the traditional day for the NFL. The Sports Broadcasting Act would not allow the NFL to broadcast games on Fridays or Saturdays during the high school and college regular seasons. 

In most states, high school football regular seasons are done by November. The same is true for college football, which ends its regular season the final week of November. Once the college football regular season is over, there can then be Saturday NFL games. That’s why Saturday NFL games are always in December.

Saturday NFL Games – The Matchups

The first Saturday NFL game pits Cincinnati at their AFC North rival Pittsburgh. The Bengals are 8-6 and currently own the No. 6 seed in the conference playoff standings. The two teams played back on Nov. 26. Pittsburgh’s offense piled up 421 yards in its first game after firing former offensive coordinator Matt Canada and managed a 16-10 victory. The Steelers have won the last two games at Cincinnati. The Bengals have won the last two in Pittsburgh. This Saturday NFL game will go a long way in determining the AFC playoff race.

The second Saturday NFL game pits the red-hot Buffalo Bills against the bottom-feeding Los Angeles Chargers. The Bolts fired head coach Brandon Staley and lost starting QB Justin Herbert for the rest of the season. The Chargers have lost five of the last six games and have scored a total of 44 points in their last four games. 

Buffalo, on the other hand, has won two straight over Kansas City and Dallas. The Bills have scored 30-plus points in three of their last four games. It’s no surprise that Buffalo won three of its last four. Last week, the Bills rushed for 266 yards against Dallas and won easily 31-10. At 8-6, the Bills are on the wild card bubble but still have an opportunity to win the AFC East over the next three weeks.

Another Sports Hub Sweep

One, two, and three. Once again, the top-3 spots on the SportsHub handicapper daily leaderboard were all taken by Sports Hub experts. Al Grant was the top dog, hitting all three of his picks yesterday. Will it be more of the same today? Probably and there are dozens of picks already in the database. You can check them all out with a Sports Hub membership.

Here’s what yesterday’s leaderboard looked like.

• Leader of the pack: Al Grant put three picks in the system yesterday and went 3-0. He earned a total of $300 for his efforts. Over the last three days, All has made 10 total picks. He’s 9-1 and has earned $785. All of those picks were basketball picks, by the way.
• Everybody loves free picks: Sports Hub FREE PICKS also went 3-0 yesterday and is also tearing it up over the last three days. Yesterday, of course, produced winnings of $300 which added to SH FREE PICKS seven-day total of $505. SH FREE PICKS is 16-10 over the last seven days.
• Tied for third: We had a three-way tie for third on the board yesterday. Sports Investors went 2-0 along with Sports Hub experts Patrick Doyle and Kyle Buchman. All three won $200. It’s also worth mentioning that another expert, Bill Blatt, went 3-1 and won $190 yesterday. Bill is No. 2 on the 7-day leaderboard ($1035) and No. 2 on the 14-day leaderboard ($1513) as well.

Saturday NFL & Bowl Games

Does it get any better than this? Two Saturday NFL games and seven CFB bowl games. Today, football fans will be living the dream. To get yourself prepared for both the Saturday NFL and today’s college football bowls, Sports Hub has you covered. Visit our Week 16 NFL picks page to help navigate today’s Saturday NFL games. 

College football fans can gather a ton of information about this year’s bowl games on our college football bowl picks page. You’ll find all sorts of great content as well as some of the best picks to make on a number of bowl games. You can then check our database for picks for all of today’s games throughout the day.

Let’s look at today’s schedule.

1. Saturday NFL: It’s Cincinnati at Pittsburgh and Buffalo at the Los Angeles Chargers in Saturday NFL action today.

2. Bowl games: There are seven bowl games on tap today. It all starts with the 76 Birmingham Bowl where Troy plays Duke. Kickoff is set for 12:00 p.m. ET. The day ends with the EasyPost Hawai’i Bowl featuring Coastal Carolina and San Jose State. 
3. NBA: Almost the entire league plays today. There are 13 NBA games on the Saturday schedule. The Detroit Pistons try to end their 25-game losing streak at Brooklyn. The Nets lost 122-117 to Denver just last night.
4. NHL: It’s the same for the NHL where almost the entire league is in action today. There are 14 games on the schedule. It starts with Dallas and Nashville at 2:00 p.m. ET and ends with Calgary at Los Angeles and San Jose at Vancouver at 10:00 p.m. ET. The NHL will then be off for the next three days.
5. College basketball: There are only 17 games on the CBB schedule, but there is a big one at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. No. 4 Arizona will take on No. 14 Florida Atlantic. No. 5 UConn plays another Big East game tonight and No. 23 Memphis hosts Vanderbilt.
6. Soccer: The international soccer schedule is massive today. The English Premier League and Italian Serie A have multiple matches. There is one match in La Liga and numerous professional leagues around the world are all in action on this Saturday.

NFL QB Situation, MLB Rules & Streaks

Knowledge is power. At least, that’s what they say. It’s very true when it comes to sports betting. The more you know, the better off you are when it comes time to make a betting decision. Sometimes, the most obscure event will have a ripple effect that can lead to a better betting choice. Take the current Saturday NFL quarterback situation.

Let’s take a look.

• NFL QBs out: One Saturday NFL game will be minus a starting quarterback. Pittsburgh’s Kenny Pickett will not play today which means Mitch Trubisky will start for the Steelers. Pickett isn’t the only QB out this weekend. C.J. Stroud has been ruled out for tomorrow due to his concussion. 
• NFL QB in: Geno Smith, who missed the last two Seattle games, will start for the Seahawks tomorrow when they face the Tennessee Titans. Seattle is still alive in the NFC playoff race.
• MLB rules: MLB decided to play with the pitch clock, reducing the time allotted between pitches from 20 seconds to 18 seconds when a runner is on base. The league also decided to widen the runner’s lane to first base.

• Will it end?: The Detroit Pistons will take on the Brooklyn Nets tonight. As mentioned, the Pistons will try to end their 25-game losing streak. Will it end?

Enjoy the Saturday NFL games and all the bowl games. It should be a great day. If you want to get a leg up on the competition – and your sportsbook – visit our picks database and get on the right side of winning. Day after day, I show you how our Sports Hub experts keep winning. Why not jump on that train yourself? Have a great day and we’ll see you back here tomorrow.