Jaxson Dart and ESPN's Stanford Steve.
Credit: Kevin R. Wexler-NorthJersey.com, SVPod
Football is back.
This weekend is the first of the season to feature a full slate of both college and NFL football, and fans across the country are set to settle in for a long stay on the couch and let the games pour over them.
But at least one football fan — ESPN’s “Stanford” Steve Coughlin — will apparently be leaving his couch a bit early.
Speaking with Scott Van Pelt on the SVPod, Coughlin expressed utter disappointment in the fact that the first Sunday Night Football game of the year was going to the New York Giants and Dallas Cowboys.
“I just can’t believe we’ve got to watch Dallas and the Giants on the first Sunday night,” he said. “I’m just so tired of that game. What have those teams done?”
After SVP noted that the matchup was more about the markets the game could bring in than the competitiveness of the teams on the field, Coughlin urged fans on the west coast to bump their viewership numbers up.
“I have zero interest in watching that game. Just seeing those two teams. Giants are going to wear dark jerseys, the Cowboys are going to wear the whites, no matter where the game is. They could be playing in Australia and that’s what the uniforms are going to be.”
.@StanfordSteve82 has ZERO interest in Cowboys-Giants being Sunday Night Football in Week 1 pic.twitter.com/WUUmFzUIPR
— SVPod (@_SVPod) September 10, 2026
Looking at the numbers, Stanford Steve has plenty of evidence on his side of the case. Since NBC took over the Sunday Night Football package in 2006, the Giants and Cowboys have met in the slot a whopping 14 times, and this Sunday will be the 15th. It’s the second most common SNF matchup, with only the Cowboys and Eagles meeting on NBC more often.
Further, neither team has had much success of late, with the two sides combining for just three postseason wins over the past decade. When you realize we have a matchup of AFC powerhouses in Bills-Texans playing in the 1 p.m. ET window on Sunday, Giants-Cowboys feels like a pretty mediocre offering.
If Stanford Steve is hoping for some better offerings from SNF, he won’t have to wait too long, with the Colts and Chiefs facing off in Week 2 and what should be a stellar Broncos-Rams game in Week 3. But for this Sunday night, Steve can probably just consider himself free to prep for the night’s SportsCenter.