🦃 What We Can All Be Thankful For This Thanksgiving

Sports are back on a steadier, typical, regular footing, and there is some comfort to be had in that. [View in browser]( [FOX SPORTS INSIDER WITH MARTIN ROGERS]( In today’s FOX Sports Insider with Martin Rogers: Games look and feel like games again, with crowds having largely returned ... we take a look at five factors that will determine the NBA’s Western Conference champs ... and we are treated to a hilarious clip from Tom Brady. This is a Thanksgiving column and it’s shorter than the typical daily one because you’ve got football games to watch, hopefully loved ones to spend time with, and we’ve both got a heck of a lot of eating to get to. Let’s start with a story that reassures us that, as restraint, common sense and promises-to-self go out the window at the dining table, we’re not the only ones who will be guzzling away and then regret it later. Even Bill Belichick, possibly the last person in sports you’d expect to share a cute little tale of festive gluttony, rather charmingly told a Boston radio station this week of his obsession with the humble potato. “Oh boy,” Belichick told the Greg Hill Show, when quizzed about his favorite side dish. “It would be hard for me to turn down any type of potatoes. I’ll go with whatever — mashed potatoes, scalloped, baked. Load ‘em up. Throw some butter on there. Starch me up.” [STORY IMAGE 1] There is a lot to take away here, given that the New England Patriots head coach just gave more insight on a Thanksgiving menu than he typically reveals about a standard National Football League game, or simply how a 69-year-old man just used the phrase ‘starch me up,’ which surely has to already be on a T-shirt somewhere. Anyway, tater-themed merriment out of the way, let’s get on with things. Yesterday, this column was about unpredictability in the NFL and how the wondrousness of the unexpected has lit up this season like few before it. Here’s something else that’s a bit of a curveball, then. Just a day later, we’re going to celebrate the opposite. [STORY IMAGE 2] Predictability in sports is never a particularly good thing except for when it comes to the actual sports themselves, and the mere fact that we can assume with confidence that they are going to take place. And, as 2021 rolls closer to its conclusion and it is time to give thanks for what we’re grateful for, that might be the best part of right now. Aside from those strained few months in the spring of 2020, sports never really went away, but they were a shadow of their usual selves for a good while. We weren’t sure what was going to happen, if certain things were going to happen, and what they might actually look like. Now, with the world having adapted to all these changes, fans can get back to being nervous about whether their favorite team or player is going to perform well, not about whether they’ll be able to perform at all. In between giant helpings of turkey and innumerable fixings, that’s perhaps the thing those who love sports, whose lives beat to its year-round rhythms, can be most cheered about. [STORY IMAGE 3]( It’s wrong to say sports are back, they were back a long, long time ago. But they’re back on a steadier, typical, regular footing, and there is some comfort to be had in that. The adjustments made to the schedule due to the ravages of COVID – such as the 2020 Olympics and the 2020 European soccer championships being held in 2021 – have mostly worked themselves out. Games look and feel like games again, with crowds having largely returned and no more Tuesday and Wednesday NFL fixtures to throw your fantasy planning for an unworkable loop. [STORY IMAGE 4] The problems of the sports fan’s calendar were, of course, trivial compared to everything that happened throughout the testing times of the last 20 months, and that should not be forgotten. Yet it is OK to enjoy what we enjoy as well, and to be grateful that sports again resembles its former iteration, in most ways at least. Now where’s those potatoes? [STORY IMAGE 5]( The Gift That Keeps on Giving sponsored content Gift the [Roborock S7]( this holiday season and your friends and family will never stress about cleaning again. Gone will be their days of scrubbing their floors and vacuuming their carpets for hours -- the [Roborock S7]( can do it all for them. With its sonic mopping power that has 580g of pressure and its powerful suction technology that effortlessly lifts dirt and debris from deep within their carpets, the [Roborock S7]( is a holiday gift whose impact will be the gift that keeps on giving. Now is the time to order the Roborock S7 in time for the holidays, with the [S7 30% off]( now through 11/29! [IN OTHER WORDS] - In the debut of his NBA Starting Five column, [FOX Sports NBA Writer Yaron Weitzman looks at the five factors that will determine the West champ](. - Whether blitzing or in coverage, at corner or safety, Charles Woodson made plays all over the field. [Joe Posnanski has the story](. - Star rookie. Sophomore slump. Now, after a reinvention, Tyler Herro could be the Sixth Man of the Year, [FOX Sports NBA Writer Meliisa Rohlin writes](. [THE INTERNET IS UNDEFEATED] [THE INTERNET IS UNDEFEATED]( Tom Brady is an incredible football player and a pretty funny individual as well. Check out this tweet, which shows a reporter asking Brady about his 10-yard run in the Buccaneers’ impressive 30-10 win over the New York Giants on Monday night. “Eleven-yard run,” Brady said to an eruption of laughter. “They don’t happen very often, so I do remember how far they go.” Well said Tom. Well said! [VIEWER'S GUIDE] Chicago Bears at Detroit Lions (FOX, 12:30 p.m. ET) Andy Dalton and the Chicago Bears take on D’Andre Swift and the Detroit Lions on Thanksgiving Day. Las Vegas Raiders at Dallas Cowboys (CBS, 4:30 p.m. ET) Derek Carr and the Las Vegas Raiders go up against Dak Prescott and the Dallas Cowboys. Buffalo Bills at New Orleans Saints (NBC, 8:20 p.m. ET) Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills battle Alvin Kamara and the New Orleans Saints. [BET OF THE DAY] [BET OF THE DAY] Odds provided by [FOX Bet]( Philadelphia Eagles at New York Giants: Eagles -3.5 From FOX Sports’ Colin Cowherd: Philadelphia is the play for me here. They're playing with a purpose and with more confidence in their quarterback. Jalen Hurts is a handful the first time you face him and he presents problems.“ From FOX Sports Betting Analyst Jason McIntyre: I like the Eagles, too. If you like the Eagles, you better get on it now at -3, because this line is on the move (the line moved to -4 Tuesday). This is a team that professionals have been betting on all season. They have been backing the Eagles weekly. [WHAT THEY SAID] “Obstacles are what you see when you take your eye off the goal." - Vince Lombardi [FOLLOW FOX SPORTS] [Twitter]( [Facebook]( [YouTube]( [Instagram]( Download FOX Sports App: [Fire TV]( [Roku]( [Google Play]( [App Store]( [Fire TV]( [Roku]( [App Store]( [Google Play]( Also available on these devices: [fireTV | AppleTV | ROKU | Google Chromecast | XBOX ONE | SAMSUNG Smart TV] [fireTV | AppleTV | ROKU | Google Chromecast | XBOX ONE | SAMSUNG Smart TV] Trademark & Copyright Notice: ™ and © 2021 Fox Media LLC and FOX Sports Interactive Media, LLC. All rights reserved. Please do not reply to this message. If you do not wish to receive emails like this in the future, please [unsubscribe](. FOX Sports respects your privacy. Click [here]( to view our Privacy Policy. Fox.com Business & Legal Affairs - Manager Digital Media P.O. Box 900 Beverly Hills, California 90213-0900