There’s nothing like a pending $14.1 billion liability to spark an aggressive effort to increase revenue.
To the surprise of no one who has been paying attention to the situation, the NFL and NFL Players Association have begun talking about expanding the regular season from 17 to 18 games.
NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell, who has remained largely out of sight during his first year on the job, made the disclosure in a meeting with the Washington Post.
“We have talked at a very, very, very high level superficially, with a recognition . . . about, ‘Yeah, this is something that we should be talking about,’” Howell said, per the Post. “And we should really kick the tires and understand what else goes into that decision-making process. Where does the 18th game come from? I think the foregone conclusion is well, you just grab it, like, in what would otherwise be [preseason games] in August. You play it forward. But these are details that really need to be fleshed out. But, again, there are other economic, health and safety matters that also need to be clear to our members before there’s ever an agreement about an 18th game.”
Indeed there are. The effort to increase the size of the regular season becomes an opportunity for the NFLPA to score numerous potential concessions. Howell specifically mentioned issues like playing surface, offseason schedule, roster size, and practice-squad size.
Still, it all comes down to money. Even if the NFL won’t try to foist any of the pending $14.1 billion Sunday Ticket liability onto the players, changes to the out-of-market package could impact revenue in a negative way. One way to counter that is to add more games that count.
The NFL has wanted to increase to 18 games for years. The league eventually settled for 17, when it became difficult to reconcile player health and safety with more opportunities for injury to starters, who don’t play much if at all in the preseason games that would be swapped for regular-season games.
The current CBA runs through 2030. Nothing prevents the two sides from coming to a new agreement on any topic, at any time.
And it’s just a matter of time before the NFL and NFLPA agree to 18 games.
Then, 19.
Eventually, 20.