NBCs Sunday Night Football telecast, typically the most-watched program on television, pointedly bypassed airing the national anthem ahead of kickoff this week, even as the NFL highlights its Salute to Service campaign and the nation approaches Veterans Day with a game staged at Chicagos storied Soldier Field.
According to Fox News, viewers instead saw the usual booth introduction with analyst Cris Collinsworth and play-by-play announcer Noah Eagle, followed by a pregame interview with Bears quarterback Caleb Williams. Only then did cameras cut to an aerial shot of the stadium, where flag bearers were seen carrying a folded, field-sized American flag back into a tunnel, signaling that The Star-Spangled Banner had already come and gone off-air.
OutKick reached out to NBC executive vice president of communications Greg Hughes and senior vice president of communications Chris McCloskey to ask why the anthem was excluded from the broadcast. Neither executive had responded as of publication, leaving the decision unexplained even as the network found time to cover the trade of defensive tackle Jeffery Simmons to the Bears and to air the show anthem featuring Carrie Underwood.
Viewers quickly noticed the absence of the national anthem, with social media posts calling out the missing moment of patriotic observance. The choice to air or skip the anthem is not made by the NFL or individual clubs; It is a network decision, meaning this was, as the report notes, apparently an editorial decision at NBC.
This is not the first anthem-related controversy surrounding a Bears game this season, underscoring a pattern that many fans see as part of a broader cultural drift away from shared national symbols. On September 28, the Bears hosted Mariachi Herencia de Mexico on ESPN/ABCs Monday Night Football, where the Chicago-based band performed an instrumental mariachi version of The Star-Spangled Banner as part of the teams Hispanic Heritage Month Vamos Bears celebration. That rendition drew mixed reactions, but what did not was the image of injured Bears quarterback Caleb Williams pacing along the sideline while the anthem played, a visual that many viewers found disrespectful.
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