The push for the 18-game schedule is back

[stillers4me]

If the NFLPA is going to send out an email to its members telling them to prepare for a long lockout, the league and the owners needed to make sure they made a play through the media. Enter the return of the 18-game season — or at least a report about the return of an 18-game season.

(https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2019/05/29/report-nfl-could-push-for-18-game-schedule-in-labor-talks/)

This is pretty typical of negotiations. Both sides float some information to the media and they get a feeling of how it is received by their counterparts and fans. This isn’t going to stop either..........

Read more @ https://touchdownwire.usatoday.com/2019/05/29/18-game-season-cba-nfl-nflpa/

[Fire Goodell]

I don't think they should have an 18 game season. It's already hard enough for the players to stay healthy during a 16 game season. As much as I like more football, the players' health needs to be a concern too.

[polamalubeast]

The negotiations will be very ugly in 2021 ... Worse that it was in 2011 ...

[st33lersguy]

Brought to you by the same morons who cut OT to 10 minutes in the name of "player safety"

[AtlantaDan]

Expand the regular season to 18 games and expand the number of teams in the playoffs, with the carrots for the players being Roger losing some authority to unilaterally discipline players and lesser enforcement sanctions for marijuana use

https://beta.washingtonpost.com/sports/2019/05/29/nfl-owners-want-more-games-or-playoff-teams-new-labor-deal-could-concede-marijuana/?outputType=amp

Players can smoke more pot for necessary pain management relating to a longer schedule - brilliant! :thumbsup:

[Mojouw]

The negotiations will be very ugly in 2021 ... Worse that it was in 2011 ...

Considering that the 2011 negotiations were essentially concluded by the grand old wise men of the NFL (led by Rooney) overriding the new guard owners, I have little hope for this upcoming round.

All the voices of compromise and reason are either dead or marginalized. I have no faith that Jerry Jones, Jerry Richardson, Kraft, and the other visible owners will do anything aside from insist on the most one sided deal possible.

I strongly believe they will manage to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.

[Craic]

I wouldn't mind an 18 game season provided the following happens:


Every team plays their own division three times with weeks 13-18 being division only weeks as teams vie for playoffs.


The season itself is extended to nineteen weeks with two bye weeks. Weeks 5-6 sees half the teams resting each week. The same occurs in weeks 12-13.


No more practice squad players. Everyone gets a contract to play and more players are allowed to suit up on Sunday to ease the burden. Also, the rule concerning the third QB is lifted.


An impartial committee is formed to handle all appeals, and is served by people approved both by the NFL and the NFLPA.

[fansince'76]

Considering that the 2011 negotiations were essentially concluded by the grand old wise men of the NFL (led by Rooney) overriding the new guard owners, I have little hope for this upcoming round.

All the voices of compromise and reason are either dead or marginalized. I have no faith that Jerry Jones, Jerry Richardson, Kraft, and the other visible owners will do anything aside from insist on the most one sided deal possible.

I strongly believe they will manage to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.


On the bright side, perhaps Goodell will finally be exposed once and for all for the incompetent boob that he is and won't be retained by ownership.

It would be nice to see the NFL with a competent commissioner again...

[AtlantaDan]

On the bright side, perhaps Goodell will finally be exposed once and for all for the incompetent boob that he is and won't be retained by ownership.

It would be nice to see the NFL with a competent commissioner again...

That has not occurred since Rozelle in the late 70s before the league got bogged down in litigation with Al Davis in the early 80s and two interrupted seasons due to labor disputes in 1982 and 1987

After Rozelle stepped down in the late 80s, Paul Tagliabue spent a lot of his time before Roger got the job covering up how playing football can cause brain damage (calling that "one of those pack journalism issues"). That only delayed the inevitable and made it more difficult to address a problem the league still has not figured out. Probably the big reason Tagliabue has not been voted into Canton, unlike his predecessor commissioners

http://www.espn.com/blog/nflnation/post/_/id/230146/paul-tagliabue-a-polarizing-hall-of-fame-candidate-for-some
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/03/sports/football/paul-tagliabue-hall-of-fame-concussions.html

The league office has been trying to kill the golden goose for decades and eventually will figure out how to do it

[DesertSteel]

18 games---expanded rosters---expanded playoffs---???

I'm in!

[polamalubeast]

1136229444777996293

[teegre]

Eliminate two of the preseason games and make them “real” games. The players play those two games anyways (kind of); so, just pay them to do what they already do (kind of).

[86WARD]

Eliminate two of the preseason games and make them “real” games. The players play those two games anyways (kind of); so, just pay them to do what they already do (kind of).

So then you lose the evaluation on the roster bubble players?

[AtlantaDan]

Eliminate two of the preseason games and make them “real” games. The players play those two games anyways (kind of); so, just pay them to do what they already do (kind of).

It’s all about the Benjamins and the NFL probably needs to offer more product to get more TV $ rather than just get more $ for the same schedule

First two games of the regular season already are poorly played since starters play so little in preseason - only difference will be the lousy games will be weeks 1 and 2 of an 18 game rather than 16 game regular season

Probably hard to argue this has anything to do with safety being so important to the league but it’s a business and running the Super Bowl into late February is not going to conflict with anything significant other than the Winter Olympics once every 4 years

[Fire Goodell]

18 games---expanded rosters---expanded playoffs---???

I'm in!

Playoffs?! Don't talk about playoffs, you kiddin me, playoffs??!!! I just hope they can play 18 games! :chuckle:

[steelreserve]

An 18-game season is something you announce the year before the negotiations, with no intention of actually doing it, so that you can act like you were "giving a concession to the players" when you drop it. Foster was dead-on, it's just a fake negotiating tactic.

This CBA negotiation is likely to be a HUGE shitfuck including a strike and/or lockout, but it will be over guaranteed contracts. When your lead negotiator is a Goodell, it's not a real strong start; that the owners are almost all jerk real estate developers, or people who started and sold unrelated businesses for a couple billion dollars, that helps things even less ... the fact that their counterparts at the NFLPA seem to be better at putting on an angry front than doing anything that makes business sense is the nail in the coffin ... the tension will be even more ramped up now because race and politics have been dragged front-and-center in sports now and every move is made out to have some grand significance about social justice ... I can guarantee that racism and slavery will be brought up ... and next summer we will be hearing about how Trump being president makes the negotiations harder because it's about more than just money, it's about fairness and the direction of our country, etc., etc. ... and really I can't see any way that it ends up without making everyone watching it want to throw up, no matter what their own personal views are ... and Goodell will be in the middle of it all, button-mashing as usual as a knee-jerk to the latest perceived outrage that the media brings up, and making the problems even worse ... and this could finally be the big hit that turns a lot of people off from the NFL. Or at least the hardcore football fans. The "casual fans" who are used to all the bitching about the rules being a central part of the game, and who LOVE politics being center stage in their sports and entertainment - or in other words, the ones who grew up on Lawyerball, and are now more Lawyerball fans than football fans - will eat that shit up.

[teegre]

So then you lose the evaluation on the roster bubble players?

Well, the players already play 20 games. You’re simply not going to convince them to play 2 more. But, you could convince them to get paid to play in two of those games.

As far as the evaluation process goes: that’s where having more players on the active roster and/or on the practice squad is important. It’d cost the owners more money to carry 55 and 15, but with the revenues from two more “real” games, it suddenly becomes very doable.

- - - Updated - - -


It’s all about the Benjamins and the NFL probably needs to offer more product to get more TV $ rather than just get more $ for the same schedule

First two games of the regular season already are poorly played since starters play so little in preseason - only difference will be the lousy games will be weeks 1 and 2 of an 18 game rather than 16 game regular season

Probably hard to argue this has anything to do with safety being so important to the league but it’s a business and running the Super Bowl into late February is not going to conflict with anything significant other than the Winter Olympics once every 4 years

Oh... it has nothing to do with player safety.

“Greed, for lack of a better word, is good.”

[Born2Steel]

Make the SuperBowl a best of 3 event.