(RADIO.COM Sports) The NFL may finally get its expanded schedule in 2021.
A 17-game schedule is “highly likely” with the league scheduler and television partners working under the assumption there will be 17 games in 2021, according to Peter King of NBC Sports. The addition of an extra game wouldn't include an extra bye — a proposal that has been discussed in the past — which would make the regular season 17 games in 18 weeks.
The NFL also doesn't want to start the season Labor Day Weekend, meaning that the extra week will be added at the end of the season, pushing the playoffs back a week. That would mean that Super Bowl LVI in Los Angeles will likely be played on Feb. 13, 2022 — the latest day for the game in league history. The current Super Bowl date — Feb. 6, 2022 — is still scheduled to hold the game as of Monday, and the league has yet to say anything about a potential move to officials in Los Angeles.
Among other changes that could be coming to the schedule also includes the possibility of a wild-card game on a Monday night. King estimates that likelihood as “somewhere between 50-50 and very likely” because the NFL’s wild-card weekend wouldn't precede the college football national championship game if pushed back a week.
The national title game is scheduled for Jan. 10, 2022 and if the NFL moves to a 17-game schedule, its opening slate of playoff games would begin Jan. 16. King suggested the league would play two games Saturday, three games Sunday and the sixth wild-card game on Monday night. The Monday night winner then wouldn't play until the Sunday of the divisional round.
Other scheduling items of note include the league possibly playing two games on Christmas in 2021. The holiday falls on a Saturday this year, and after the success the league had with the Saints-Vikings game on Christmas Day in 2020, the NFL is looking to expand to two games this year.
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