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Message: <blockquote data-quote="kenobi65" data-source="post: 3172778" data-attributes="member: 1515">Well, at the beginning of the year, it probably looked like a good matchup.  Most prognosticators had at least one of these two teams in the playoffs, and a lot of people picked Carolina to go to the Super Bowl.It's been the problem that MNF has had for years, really ever since the current free agency / salary cap era began in the early 90s.  The year-to-year variation in team performance has increased dramatically.  MNF has always had the luxury of picking and choosing who they feature, and they always try to get teams and matchups that look good on paper...but they have to choose months before the season starts.What ABC wanted for years, and never managed to get, was the ability to switch out MNF games late in the year, when a particular game winds up looking like a stinker.  When NBC did the Sunday night contract this year, they managed to get that "flexible scheduling", much to the annoyance of Fox and CBS (who feel that their best games are being poached).  Last night's Bears/Giants game wasn't originally supposed to be a night game, for example, and Fox was plenty peeved that they lost a matchup between the top two teams in the NFC (and two of the top 3 TV markets).</blockquote>