Wednesday’s “First Call” shows us some remarkable television ratings for the Steelers-Bills game and the rest of the NFL.
The Vegas Raiders get bad news on the injury front as they prepare to face the Steelers Sunday at Heinz Field.
Penn State coach James Franklin makes a poor attempt to quell rumors about USC having an interest in him.
And the Baltimore Ravens make an interesting contract move.
Bad news on Good
The Las Vegas Raiders have suffered a significant loss heading into their game against the Steelers Sunday at Heinz Field. Starting right guard Denzelle Good tore his ACL Monday night according to ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler. So that means he’ll be lost for the season.
Raiders starting guard Denzelle Good suffered a torn ACL in the Monday night game vs. the Ravens and will be out for the season, per source. Tough deal for an emerging player.
— Jeremy Fowler (@JFowlerESPN) September 14, 2021
Via RaidersWire.com, “The Raiders were already fielding a backup at left guard with John Simpson replacing Richie Incognito who was out Monday night with a calf injury. The Raiders are hoping Incognito will be back soon, but he has not practiced in a month, so there’s little indication he is close to returning.”
Good was replaced at right guard by one-time Baltimore Raven Jermaine Eluemunor. Vegas is his third team (Miami Dolphins, Jackson Jaguars) since June 14.
He’ll have a tough assignment trying to deal with the likes of T.J. Watt and Tyson Alualu on that side of the field.
Raging ratings
CBS is boasting about some pretty big television ratings for Week 1 of NFL football.
The network claims that “The NFL on CBS” delivered its “second most-watched Week 1 audience since 1998.” CBS states that its combined average viewership for Sunday’s doubleheader windows totaled 33.472 million viewers, pacing only behind Week 1 of 2015 (38.172 million viewers).
That’s according to Nielsen national ratings.
Viewership of the Steelers-Bills game at 1 p.m. ET helped get the ball rolling. The regional game window averaged 13.933 million viewers. Sunday’s doubleheader averaged 16.586 million viewers. That’s up 21% versus last year’s 13.674 million viewers for opening weekend.
However, the 4:25 p.m. ET national window — highlighted by the game between the Cleveland Browns and Kansas City Chiefs — stole the show. It was the most-watched Sunday telecast on any network, averaging 19.539 million viewers.
On the list
The Athletic has tabbed Penn State football coach James Franklin as one of the coaches who may be interested in the suddenly open USC head coaching job.
Clay Helton was relieved of his duties from that position Monday. He has been with the University since 2010 and has been the head coach since November 2015.
Even though Franklin has a coveted coaching job with the Nittany Lions, The Athletic’s Bruce Feldman thinks that Franklin may have an interest in heading west for this gig.
“He’s recruited very well, and has the kind of presence that would resonate well in Los Angeles,” Feldman said. “He knows he’s got a very good job in Happy Valley, not too far from where he grew up. Still, he’s now been there a long time and won a ton of games, but jobs like USC don’t come open often. This is probably one of the few situations in college football to which I think he would have a hard time saying no. Franklin has a buyout now, but at $4 million, and for USC that’s manageable for a top-tier coach.”
Franklin commented on the rumors during his weekly press conference Tuesday.
James Franklin answers the reports of him being linked to the USC coaching jobs#PennState @NittanyLionWire pic.twitter.com/DngfKUZfmW
— David Malandra Jr (@DaveMReports) September 14, 2021
Did you hear the words “no” or “not interested” or “I’m staying” in there? Because I didn’t.
A penny saved
In the wake of the Baltimore Ravens’ Week 1 loss to the Las Vegas Raiders, the franchise restructured the contract of Pro Bowl cornerback Marlon Humphrey.
ESPN’s Field Yates reports that Baltimore converted $2.254 million of Humphrey‘s base salary into a signing bonus. That created about $1.8 million in cap space.
On Saturday, the Eagles converted $13.925M of DT Fletcher Cox’s base salary into a signing bonus, creating about $11.14M in cap space.
The Ravens did the same with $2.254M of CB Marlon Humphrey’s base salary, creating about $1.8M in cap space.
— Field Yates (@FieldYates) September 14, 2021
Maybe a little of that extra money can go toward signing a better right tackle than Alejandro Villanueva? Is that possible?
Via ProFootballTalk.com, Humphrey signed a five-year, $98.75 million contract extension last October. He was scheduled to make $3.224 million in base salary this season.
Tim Benz is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Tim at tbenz@triblive.com or via Twitter. All tweets could be reposted. All emails are subject to publication unless specified otherwise.