The NFL has floated the idea of an 18-game schedule around for a while now and they have met some resistance. Most notably from players concerned about their health and the toll an extra two games would take on them. Also, a from a financial stand point. Players would surely want their contracts to be bigger if they were playing an extra two games.
The biggest hurdle might be player safety.
“I think with all the concerns about the health and safety of players, it’s hard to justify,” Green Bay Packers president Mark Murphy told the Green Bay Press Gazette. “To go from 16 to 18 regular-season (games) would be a lot more wear and tear. It would be additional games for your starters.”
One idea has been to eliminate two of the meaningless preseason games that exist already, but he says that presents a couple issues.
“You’ve got loss of revenue — you don’t have much TV revenue from that, but you do have ticket revenue,” Murphy said. “And then the other big issue is being able to really evaluate and develop young players. Taking away those two game opportunities, especially since we have so many fewer practices (in training camp) … you don’t block and tackle (in practice), so the games are really important in terms of evaluating.”