NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has faced down many problems over the last few months.
He’ll be staring another one in the next few weeks as helps decide if the NFL will expand its playoffs to a 14-team tournament.
The idea of adding two teams has gained traction in recent months. It’s a good idea in a couple of ways of thinking. It adds more value to the league’s television contract by adding another pair of playoff games. And it makes good sense from a competition standpoint because it places extra value in the No. 1 seed in both conferences, theoretically making for more regular-season interest among fans as teams vie for the top seed.
The devil for Goodell and the NFL will be in finding a place to stage these extra playoff games.
One idea for “Wild Card Weekend” would be for two of the playoff games to be played on Saturday, three on Sunday and the final one on Monday night.
The only problem would be that Wildcard weekend, at least in some years, would take place around the College Football Playoff championship game. That game has been scheduled to be played on Monday night for the remainder of its 12-year contract with ESPN.
An expanded NFL playoff wouldn’t have any impact played after a game capping the 2014 season, or in the upcoming season, when the CFP title game is slated for Jan. 11. But it does have potential to effect title games after the 2016 and 2018 seasons.
Goodell told Sports Illustrated reporter Peter King in his “Monday Morning Quarterback” column this week that he intends to be “respectful” of the college game before setting the playoff schedule.
When asked about playing a playoff game on Monday night, Goodell said it could be a possibility.
“You could,” Goodell said. “Potential conflict that comes there is the national championship game, because that would interfere in some years with that. We’re respectful of college football.”
Of course, it makes great sense for Goodell to say that, considering that college football functions as a no-cost farm system for the NFL. With almost all future NFL players matriculating in college football, it might be hard to see Goodell and the NFL biting the hand that in essence has fed it quite nicely over the years.
Goodell told King that having a Monday night playoff game makes the most sense in the league’s future playoff planning if more games are added, although he stopped short of giving a blanket endorsement to the idea.
“Sure. But again you have to consider college football, which is important to us,” Goodell said.
Of course, the easiest solution might be for the CFP people to slide their game to Tuesday night. But the CFP has been adamant about the dates for its games, insisting on playing on New Year’s Eve next year despite strong reaction against it from ESPN.
It will be interesting to see who blinks. The addition more playoff teams and games is a virtual certainty for the NFL, as is the interest of ESPN in broadcasting them. Monday night makes the most sense, adding to value to one of the network’s most valuable properties.
Despite Goodell’s claims to the contrary, college football and the CFP is destined to be squeezed out when the NFL and its television partners become involved.
