Joe Burrow Starts A Conversation After Voicing Frustration With NFL Ahead Of 2025 Season

Joe Burrow is voicing what many Cincinnati Bengals fans have likely been thinking. The NFL schedule is starting to feel a bit too familiar.

The Bengals quarterback didn’t hold back when asked about his team's 2025 slate, which includes a Thanksgiving night road game against the Baltimore Ravens.

This will be the fourth straight year Joe Burrow and the Bengals will face Baltimore in prime time, and the second time they’ll do it on Thanksgiving.

“Playing in Baltimore for the fourth straight prime-time year isn’t ideal,” Burrow said, per the NFL. “Maybe we can get one of those in Cincinnati next year. Please.”

Burrow’s comments didn’t go unheard.

Mike North, the NFL's vice president of broadcast planning and scheduling, addressed the criticism directly, telling the Bengals, "It's fair. It's not a one or two years sort of a league where you fix every problem every other year or every two years."

He added, "Once you start getting to the same thing three years in a row, four, or five years in a row, whether it's a short week Thursday on the road or opening on the road. ... When trends like that emerge, we probably have to adjust at some point."

For Cincinnati, the Thanksgiving matchup isn’t just about routine.

The Bengals have lost their last three contests against the Ravens, including last season’s heartbreaking 35-34 defeat. And while the league says the scheduling isn’t an exact science, North acknowledged the frustration.

“It just ended up as we got down the stretch here, that this was our best schedule, and fully acknowledging that, I’m sure the Bengals fans are a little surprised and probably a little disappointed,” he said. “Which puts them in the same category as all 31 other teams. Everybody is just a little disappointed in the schedule makers.”

In the end, the league prioritized making sure the Bengals-Ravens matchup landed in a prime-time slot, and Thanksgiving night offered the perfect spotlight. The Bengals currently have four prime-time games on their schedule, with three set to be played on the road.

"They deserve it. You've played your way into these windows," North said. "An MVP-quality quarterback and superstar wide receivers, and we play exciting games. Both Ravens-Bengals games last year were spectacular. We wanted to make sure that we ended up with at least one of them in prime time this year. We got it."

He added, "One way to ensure a little extra mustard on those is to make them division games. And you see how big we went on Thanksgiving this year. When you start the day with Green Bay-Detroit, and you come back with K.C.-Dallas in the middle, you needed something for NBC Thursday night to kind of fit with that motif, if you will. And that's how we ended up with Bengals-Ravens."

Despite the scheduling frustration, Bengals head coach Zac Taylor is choosing to focus on the upside.

“Playing on Thanksgiving night in a stand-alone game with the whole world watching, sitting on their couch, is really exciting,” Taylor said. “It’s why you’re in this business.”

The Cincinnati Bengals’ 2025 regular season schedule is packed with high-stakes showdowns, AFC North rivalries, and multiple prime-time appearances, including a nationally televised Thanksgiving night game against the Baltimore Ravens.

Kicking things off on the road, the Bengals will open their season against the Cleveland Browns on September 7 before returning home to face the Jacksonville Jaguars in Week 2. The team will face a mix of non-conference and AFC contenders throughout the fall, including matchups with the Vikings, Packers, and Bills.

Prime-time action begins in Week 4 when Cincinnati visits Denver for a "Monday Night Football" showdown on September 29. Just a few weeks later, the Bengals host the Pittsburgh Steelers on "Thursday Night Football" in Week 7, followed by the much-discussed Thanksgiving night game in Baltimore in Week 13.

Cincinnati also returns to the national spotlight in Week 16 with a Sunday night matchup against the Miami Dolphins, a game that could carry serious playoff implications.