Why Rich Is NOT a Fan of the Patriots/Seahawks Super Bowl Rematch Being Scheduled for Week 1

The NFL chose Patriots at Seahawks for Sunday Night Football to open the 2026 season. Rich, who had spent weeks publicly predicting Bears at Seahawks for the slot, was not impressed.

"I'm not a fan of the first game on opening night," Rich said.

His pitch had been simple. The Bears at Seattle is an NFC Championship Game preview that almost was. The Patriots at Seahawks is a Super Bowl rematch from a game Rich described as not particularly compelling the first time around.

"To be honest, it wasn't like last year," Rich said. "Last year all we talked about leading up into that game was the previous time they played." This year's rematch carries less heat. Rich was at the Super Bowl in question. The most memorable part of the night, he confessed, was the Bad Bunny halftime show, not the football game itself.

Rich went through which recent Super Bowls would have been worth running back as a season opener. Eagles versus Chiefs, after the famous defensive penalty that let Kansas City run out the clock. 49ers versus Chiefs, after the overtime ending. Either Bengals-Rams game. Those are the matchups, in Rich's read, with unfinished business worth reigniting in Week 1. This past Super Bowl, in his view, did not have that energy.

The Bears, the room agreed, are the more interesting offering for a national opener. Caleb Williams enters the season as a popular MVP pick. Ben Johnson's offense, in its second year, is the thing every football fan wants to study live. The Bears would have delivered the curiosity factor that an opener should produce.

The Patriots, by contrast, come with complications. There is the open AJ Brown situation, which could resolve either direction. There is offensive line work still ahead. There is what one cast member called "all this weird drama with the head coach," a reference to swirling tabloid coverage that the room declined to relitigate on the air.

"Why do you want to put that on full display week one in front of the whole country?" Chris asked.

The case Rich kept returning to is structural. The first night of any season is its own animal. Banner raisings. Weather delays. Strange moments like CeeDee Lamb losing the ball in the lights against Philadelphia to open last year's broadcast. The league should have leaned into the simplest, cleanest narrative available.

That was Bears at Seattle.

That game will happen instead in Week 8 on Monday Night Football. The first month of the Patriots schedule, Rich noted, is brutal. At Seattle, home for Pittsburgh, at Jacksonville, at Buffalo. Three of the first four are on the road. All four are against playoff teams. Whatever the Patriots' identity is in 2026 will not be visible to anyone for a while.

The Bears, by Week 8, will already have been studied for two months.

Rich, by then, will be over it. He just is not going to like it on opening night.