SANTA CLARA, Calif. – The NFL must have faith that PG&E fixed the Candlestick Park glitches that led to two blackouts during a nationally televised game last season.
The 49ers’ 2012 schedule includes five prime-time games — the maximum a team can receive — including three in San Francisco. The first comes in Week 2 against visiting Detroit, a rematch of a 2011 game that ended in a last-minute 49ers victory and a testy postgame incident between coaches Jim Harbaugh and Jim Schwartz.
In Oakland, the Raiders will host the last of four prime-time games in Week 1 when they play San Diego on “Monday Night Football” at 7:15 p.m. Sept. 10.
The NFL will begin the season on an unusual day, Wednesday, Sept. 5, with Dallas visiting the Super Bowl champion New York Giants. That’s to avoid competing with the Democratic National Convention the following night.
First-year coach Dennis Allen and his Raiders have one more game in the spotlight, a Thursday night home contest against Peyton Manning and Denver on Dec. 6. That game is the second of a three-game home stretch for Oakland that also includes games against Cleveland and Kansas City.
The Raiders close the season with road games against Carolina and San Diego.
The 49ers, meanwhile, will face the five quarterbacks who threw for the most yards in 2011.
That challenge begins in Week 1 when they face Aaron Rodgers in Green Bay. The 49ers last beat the Packers in a 1998 wild-card game. They have lost the eight meetings since. It will be only the second time San Francisco has opened a season at Lambeau Field. The 49ers won 26-14 there in 1976.
The other four prolific quarterbacks are Detroit’s Matthew Stafford (Week 2), the Giants’ Eli Manning (Week 6), New Orleans’ Drew Brees (Week 12) and New England’s Tom Brady (Week 15).
The game against Brady and the Patriots also will be in prime time (5:20 p.m. Dec. 16) and appears to be one of several tough stretches for the 49ers. The week after that trip to Foxborough, Mass. – only a trip to Miami would be longer – the 49ers visit Seattle before finishing the season at home against Arizona.
The 49ers also visit New Orleans following a Monday night game against Chicago at Candlestick. That trip to New Orleans, during which the bounty allegations against the Saints are sure to be a hot topic, is followed by a trip to St. Louis.
Three of San Francisco’s first four games are on the road, including a Week 3 game against Minnesota and a Week 4 game against the New York Jets.
Last year, the 49ers’ Week 3 and Week 4 games were in Cincinnati and Philadelphia. The 49ers chose to stay in the team owners’ hometown, Youngstown, Ohio, between the games, and they won both contests. A stopover in Youngstown appears a possibility again this year.
