Fooch's Note: Here's the FULL 49ERS SCHEDULE
Fooch's Note: There's a rumor out there that the 49ers will face the Bears on Monday Night Football during Week 11. I'm only seeing random tweets, but the rumor is out there. UPDATE: Found the original rumor from an ESPN Radio guy.
The NFL will officially release the 2012 schedule at 4:00 p.m. PT, but in the meantime, plenty of rumors are circulating about the slate of games. For the 49ers, their reported opening week matchup with the Packers has been further confirmed by a Packers beat writer. The game is reported to be a 1:15pm PT start, and as previously mentioned, will likely be the FOX Game of the Week for week one. This provides a strong early challenge, and gets the 49ers on the radar early in the season. A win would go a long towards building on last season's strong momentum.
The 49ers also reportedly will face the New York Giants in week six, although we don't have a day/time for that. The schedule was reportedly leaked to Mike Garofalo of the Newark Star-Ledger. We will get official confirmation at 4:00 p.m. PT. If the 49ers get the maximum five primetime games, I would suspect this game will be in prime time.
In non-49ers news, but still mildly related, there were some rumors related to New Orleans Saints game dates. There was a tweet with their home dates, which included Monday November 5. The tweet did not include teams, but 49ers-Saints would seem like a logical choice for a primetime game. I could see how the NFL might have wanted to keep New Orleans off the radar of primetime early in the season while bounty stuff might be fresh.
Feel free to post any schedule rumors in here, and I'll add in updates to this post, barring anything significant requiring a new post. We'll have a post with the full schedule shortly after it is released at 4:00 p.m. PT on NFL Network and NFL.com.