The San Francisco 49ers will not be appearing on HBO’s “Hard Knocks” this year, leaving just four teams that both meet the league criteria and remain in consideration.
The New York Giants, who have never before appeared on the docuseries, are one of those four teams.
In addition to the Giants, the Oakland Raiders, Washington Redskins and Detroit Lions are all possibilities to appear on the show, with the Raiders looking like the ideal target for the league.
NBC’s Peter King explains:
NFL Films … seems to be a little bit behind in the team selection, in part because of all the programming associated with the league’s 100th season in 2019. … No franchise wants the NFL Films intrusion. My feeling is that, far and away, the most attractive team this year is Oakland, because Jon Gruden is a TV star, and the specter of Antonio Brown in camp will be TV-worthy, and because, well, because the Raiders are inherently so interesting. But we’ll see. If I had to guess right now, I’d say it’d be the Raiders — but that’s simply a guess.
As a reminder, here are the criteria the league requires to appear on “Hard Knocks”:
- The team does not have a first-year head coach.
- The team has not made the playoffs in either of the previous two years.
- The team has not appeared on “Hard Knocks” over the previous 10 seasons.
Giants co-owner John Mara previously made waves by saying Big Blue would only appear on “Hard Knocks” over his dead body, so don’t expect them to open the door to HBO cameras willingly.
