The NFL CBA-deal was officially approved on Sunday and most fans will love what the changes will bring to the league.
17-game regular season
Rejoice NFL fans, more football is on the way! The NFL will be changing their format for the regular season – but just not quite yet.
The 2020 season will remain the status quo in terms of the preseason and regular season.
The four preseason games, 16 regular-season game format will not change just yet. What will change in 2020 is the addition of more playoff teams – and that is something everyone will love.
As reported by NFL guru Adam Schefter, the new CBA is a 10-year deal for the players, and while the full changes to the deal won’t kick in until 2021, some of the changes will take place immediately – with additional playoff teams being the number one plus for players and fans alike.
Sources to ESPN: NFL players voted to approve the proposed CBA, giving the NFL 10 more years of labor peace, players an increased share of revenue, former players added benefits, and the league 17-game regular seasons along with an expanded playoff field.
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) March 15, 2020
The league will add a wild-card team to each conference this season, meaning there will be two extra games on Wild Card Weekend.
The other change will see only the top seed in each conference getting a first-round bye. The second seed will play the No. 7 seed in the first round, No. 3 will face No. 6 and the No. 4 seed will face the No. 5 seed.
As for that 17th regular-season game, that will officially begin in 2021.
Rosters sizes will increase
Not only is the schedule getting bigger, but so are the rosters for each team.
NFL.com is reporting that the active roster on game day will go from 46 to 48 players, and one of the extra players has to be an offensive lineman.
Not only will the roster expand, so will each teams’ practice squad.
That number will jump to 12 in 2020 and 2021, then be bumped up to 14 starting in 2022.
The increase in the practice squads will give NFL teams more of an option to bring in extra players to help with the wear and tear players may incur from the addition of a 17th game.
If you are wondering along with so many others as to how the NFL will work out an odd number of games now that they will be adding No. 17 in 2021, well, so are they.
Who gets the home field in game 17 – and why?
As indicated by NFL insiders “That still has to be figured out. The likeliest solution right now seems to be having one conference receive the 17th game as a home game one season, and the other conference getting the additional home game the next season.”
Right now who cares about the details, it’s more football for fans to watch!
Joseph Karbousky
Joseph Karbousky has been freelance writing since 2010 and enjoys covering a wide variety of topics, with his main focus on college and professional sports. From the NFL to MLB and everything in between, he loves sharing and hearing others’ opinions on all sports. That includes video games like Madden and MLB The Show. Joseph's hobbies include jogging, reading, playing guitar and attending as many sporting events he can every year.