{"id":646804,"date":"2026-05-16T14:07:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-16T14:07:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/646804\/"},"modified":"2026-05-16T14:07:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-16T14:07:13","slug":"why-saints-falcons-mnf-misses-exact-domecoming-anniversary-saints","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/646804\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Saints-Falcons MNF misses exact Domecoming anniversary | Saints"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The NFL recognized the 20th anniversary of the New Orleans Saints\u2019 first game back in the Superdome after Hurricane Katrina by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nola.com\/tncms\/asset\/editorial\/50ea886c-8317-4e20-ab4c-0f73ac703541\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">scheduling the black and gold<\/a> against the Atlanta Falcons in prime time on \u201cMonday Night Football.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But in an odd twist, the game will be 10 days removed from the actual \u201cDomecoming\u201d date: Steve Gleason\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nola.com\/sports\/saints\/the-story-behind-steve-gleasons-blocked-punt-as-told-by-its-key-players\/article_bccc2dfd-5aca-5504-8f5e-917783036ea1.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">famous blocked punt<\/a> against the Falcons took place on Sept. 25, 2006. And the Saints won\u2019t play the Falcons this year until Oct. 5 \u2014 in Week 4 of the NFL season, even though New Orleans has a home game in Week 3.<\/p>\n<p>Why the delay?<\/p>\n<p>According to an NFL executive, the league wanted to make sure the game had its moment, but was flexible with the date as long as it was close enough.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cRelative to the exact date of the anniversary, honestly, we figured if we were within a couple of weeks, we were in good shape,\u201d said Mike North, the NFL vice president of broadcast planning. \u201cFans remember that moment, the electricity, the excitement.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf we were a week early or close to the day or a week later, we weren\u2019t going to throw away our best schedule just by being off a couple of days.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>North said the NFL has to be mindful of other events in the region, though he noted he didn\u2019t have the stadium&#8217;s availability memorized. The NFL opted to have the Philadelphia Eagles play the Chicago Bears on \u201cMonday Night Football\u201d in Week 3.<\/p>\n<p>Still, North said having the Saints take the Falcons on in prime time was a priority for the league \u2014 starting at the very top.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was, and it\u2019s really to the commissioner\u2019s credit, it was, \u2018We\u2019re gonna play Falcons at Saints on Monday night this year. Fit it in that kind of 3-week window,\u2019\u2019 North said, referring to commissioner Roger Goodell. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t a requirement it had to land in a special week, but it was a requirement straight from the boss that it landed on our schedule.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The NFL recognized the 20th anniversary of the New Orleans Saints\u2019 first game back in the Superdome after&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":646805,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[8803,349,99],"class_list":["post-646804","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-hardwall","tag-nfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=646804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646804\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/646805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=646804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=646804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=646804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}