The first look at the trailer of the much anticipated HBO’s ‘Hard Knocks: In Season with the AFC North’ was released on Tuesday afternoon. For the first time ever, Hard Knocks will provide a behind-the-scenes look at the playoff chase with the AFC North. Episodes of the show will air on HBO on Tuesdays, starting on Dec. 3 at 9 p.m. and continuing through the NFL postseason. It will also be available on streaming through Max.
The Pittsburgh Steelers currently sit atop of the AFC North at 8-2, followed by the Baltimore Ravens (7-4), Cincinnati Bengals (4-7) and Cleveland Browns (2-8). The Steelers play an AFC North opponent in five of their remaining seven games.
For the first time ever, Hard Knocks is taking you behind-the-scenes of the playoff chase with the AFC North.
The HBO Original Series #HardKnocks In Season with the #AFCNorth, featuring the Ravens, Bengals, Browns, and Steelers premieres December 3 on Max. pic.twitter.com/Id3UA1Z4oY
— Max (@StreamOnMax) November 19, 2024
Hard Knocks has been airing on HBO and Max since 2001, traditionally covering a team’s journey through training camp using all-access, behind-the-scenes footage and exclusive reality TV-style interviews. Beginning with the 2021 season, an in-season version of the show has also been produced.
Before the 2024 season, the NFL allowed teams that had a playoff appearance over the last two seasons to refuse to participate in Hard Knocks. Those rules were amended this spring so that the league can force each team to participate once every eight seasons. The rules were changed after some contentious battles over the last few years, with few teams wanting to volunteer to take part in the show.
“Last season the AFC North became the first division ever to have all four teams finish with a winning record, making it the perfect place to launch this new approach to ‘Hard Knocks,’” NFL Films vice president Keith Cossrow said in a press release in June. “We thank the Bengals, Browns, Ravens and Steelers for the opportunity to showcase some of the greatest rivalries in football and present the intensity of a playoff chase from all four corners of this incredibly competitive division.”
This will be the first time that the Steelers will be featured on Hard Knocks. Head coach Mike Tomlin, who known to be an ultimate motivator and wordsmith, will be one of the main features on the 18-time Emmy®-winning series.
Pittsburgh Steelers All-Pro defensive tackle Cam Heyward isn’t looking forward to being on the in-season AFC North Hard Knocks series. It’s something that he actually hates.
“I hated it, I don’t wanna be on this,” Cam Heyward said on his Not Just Football podcast in June. “The locker room is the locker room, and I just don’t want that getting messed up. There’s so many inside jokes. There’s so many people, like, you would assume everybody’s a jerk if you heard everything. But it comes from a loving place, and it comes from a caring place. We all wanna be better and we joke a lot. We poke and prod at each other, but it doesn’t come off that way always. And so that’s the only thing I really worry about.”
Steelers long snapper Christian Kuntz also dreads being on Hard Knocks.
“I agree that people could get misinterpreted or other people could be misguided on how they feel about somebody based on what they hear on TV,” Kuntz told Heyward. “Where it could be just a joke, where it a hundred percent is just a joke or an inside joke, it’s just, a locker room’s like a safe place. That facility is like a safe place and you’re gonna have cameras everywhere. It’s in the middle of like Week 8, heat of the battle with division games and stuff.”