The NFL wanted to include 18 more games in their upcoming schedule as part of the collective bargaining agreement, but many of the players, coaches, and general managers see that as a major problem. And as such, no new games will be added.

So what’s wrong with giving fans even more games to cheer on, and giving the owners more revenue from those games? It’s just not possible, especially in states where the climate gets very cold come mid-January, and players and fans are outside for hours at a time. In states such as New York, Pittsburgh, Chicago, and Buffalo, by the time January rolls around, there’s already plenty of snow on the field and temperatures are just far too low for anyone to be out there for any length of time.

So, one of the two or three proposed weeks would need to come at the beginning of the season, which would make that one week fall in line with Labor Day weekend. The problem with that is that the NFL mandated in 2001 that no football is to start that weekend, as too many fans use that weekend as vacation time before heading back to school and work.

The other problem, says some teams, are the short careers of football players. With the average player playing only three or four years before they must exit the league due to injury, adding 18 games is a major risk. During that time, good players who are already getting injured during the regular season could become even more severely injured, shortening their time in the league to just two years, or perhaps even just one! That risk, is just one that doesn’t need to be taken.

As it stands, the NFL is currently hoping to still extend the football season to President’s Day weekend. But that’s not going to happen this year and, as some executives have made it clear, they’re hoping to stop that from ever happening.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 18th, 2011 at 1:57 pm and is filed under NFL. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.