Football fans in Green Bay and Indianapolis can rest easy. You will be able to watch your football team on television this weekend.

It’s hard to believe that Sunday’s Green Bay Packer’s game against the San Francisco 49ers was not sold out as of Thursday night. In fact, three of the four Wild Card weekend NFL games still had seats available. The only game completely sold out was the Eagles/Saints game in Philadelphia. Frigid weather conditions and the comforts of home kept fans from buying round one tickets for the Colts/Chiefs game in Indy (they actually can’t blame the weather since they play indoors) and the Bengals/Chargers game in Cincinnati.

According to a very old arcane NFL rule that was established to make sure that football stadiums sold tickets, if a game was not sold out 72 hours before kickoff, local television markets would be required to blackout the game. The FCC fought that rule yesterday when Hurricane Hercules dumped snow throughout several areas of the country and an expected extreme cold front made even the most diehard fans reconsider taking a trip to the stadium.

Fans were given an extra day to snatch up remaining tickets to avoid blackout. Colt’s Corporate Sponsor, Meijer, took care of the game in Indianapolis by buying up the remaining 1,200 seats for Saturday afternoon’s matchup. In an act of goodwill, the company has donated the seats to the Indiana National Guard, Wish for Our Heroes. Meanwhile, the Packers organization sold off their remaining tickets to various corporate partners.

The word is still out for Cincy fans who have until 4 pm ET today to sell off their remaining tickets and avoid a blackout. Corporate sponsor Kroger has reportedly bought a chunk of tickets that they intend to donate to families of the military.

Tell us what you think of the NFL blackout rule. Is it time to make a change?

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