Aaron Rodgers Winning NFL MVP Saturday Will Be Old News on West Coast

Former Cal star Aaron Rodgers is expected to be named the NFL MVP on Saturday, but by the time we on the West Coast learn that the honor is official, most of the world will already know.

The CBS awards show that will announce the winners of a number of NFL honors, including MVP, is scheduled to begin at 9 p.m. Eastern time. But, according to San Francisco Bay Area TV listings, CBS will not televise the show until 9 p.m. Pacific time out here.

East Coast viewers will have a three-hour head start on the news. No fair, we say, like so many other sports-related news items that have the so-called East Coast bias.

Californians can probably get around that by finding a way to stream the awards show when it starts on the East Coast, which would be 6 p.m. West Coast time.

Yes, that will give you a three-hour head start on West Coast viewers using traditional television. But CBS released another bit of information Friday:

This year, that means if you want to know who's going to win MVP, you'll need to tune in to the show, which will be airing on Saturday at 9 p.m. ET on CBS. The show is actually pre-recorded, so you might see a few of the awards leak out before you're able to watch the event on television. During the two-hour ceremony, which will be hosted by Steve Harvey, the NFL will be unveiling the winner of every award from MVP to Comeback Player of the Year to Offensive and Defensive Rookies of the Year.

Yep, even the East Coast television viewers won't be getting the live announcements. The MVP award will have been presented before the televised East Coast version of the awards show provides the information.

Knowing how information travels in this internet and social-media age, some, if not all, of the award winners probably will be leaked and will be available somewhere before East Coast TV viewers get the news.

So, here on the West Coast, television viewers will get a delayed version of a delayed version. That's what the TV audience in Rodgers' hometown of Chico, Calif., will get, although you can bet that those interested in the results will find a way to get the news well before 11 p.m., which is when the NFL awards show ends in California and about the time the NFL MVP is likely to be announced on the show out here.

When the awards show begins on the East Coast, we in the San Francisco Bay Area will get local and national news, followed by a couple of half-hour infomercials. CBS TV listings are similar in Los Angeles and Seattle, where the NFL awards show also is scheduled to start at 9 p.m. Pacific time.

Well, it's a good thing Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers seems like a shoo-in to win the MVP award for the third time, minimizing the drama involved.

Rodgers received 46 of 50 votes for the quarterback position on the All-Pro team selected by the Associated Press, which is the same group that picks the MVP. Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen received two votes each on the All-Pro team.

Those AP voters then vote for one MVP, with no second or third choices.

You may wonder whether Rodgers' loss in the NFC Championship game might have hurt his MVP chances. It did not. The MVP voting concluded before the postseason began.

Rodgers' league-leading passer rating of 121.5 (the second-best in NFL history) to go along with his 48 touchdown passes with just five interceptions in the regular season for a team that went 13-3 are numbers that should assure him the MVP.

The lingering uncertainty regarding the 37-year-old Rodgers is whether he'll be with the Packers next year, which has been debated despite assurances from Packers' management that he is not going anywhere.

Cover photo of Aaron Rodgers by Dan Powers, USA TODAY NETWORK-Wis via Imagn Content Services, LLC

Follow Jake Curtis of Cal Sports Report on Twitter: @jakecurtis53

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