When it was announced this week that the Kansas City Chiefs are scheduled to face the Denver Broncos on Christmas Day this year, it was another reminder that the NFL is king, even when it comes to a longstanding NBA tradition.

For much of its history, the NFL typically did not hold games on Christmas, or would usually only do so when Christmas fell on a standard football day, like a Sunday. Even then, the NFL usually pushed most of their games back to another day. For example, Christmas fell on a Sunday in both 2011 and 2016, and the NFL held no more than two games on those Christmases.

Meanwhile, the NBA has long held a special slate of games on Christmas as an annual tradition. These games often feature much-anticipated matchups, and bring in high ratings for the NBA. Since 2020 though, the NFL has annually held at least one game on Christmas Day, and have significantly topped the NBA's viewership. The NBA brought in strong ratings this past Christmas with an average 5.25 million people tuning in for each game, but they came nowhere close to the NFL, who saw over 24 million people tune in for both games.

Though the NFL is planning to hold three games on Christmas annually going forward, NBA commissioner Adam Silver is not turning away from the competition.

"There's nothing wrong with competition," Silver said on SiriusXM NBA Radio. "We don't own Christmas even though we've been playing on Christmas Day for 75 years in our league. There's this huge tradition of playing on Christmas Day. ... I think competition keeps you on your toes. The NFL sees an opportunity on Christmas. I accept that."

Silver has previously made mention of the idea of playing on Christmas Eve, but it doesn't appear that that will be happening anytime soon.

"There's been some discussion around Christmas Eve," Silver said. "I'm not sure if that makes sense. I think given Christmas has been such a tradition in our league, guys have known there's no games on Christmas Eve and that's an opportunity to be with their family."

At this point, neither the NBA or NFL are shifting away from playing on Christmas Day. For the NBA, they'll simply have to accept the challenge from the NFL jumping in on the holiday tradition.

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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Adam Silver Responds to Challenge of NFL’s Christmas Day Slate.

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