NFL 18-Game Regular Season Will Greatly Influence Dallas Cowboys
[picappgallerysingle id="9580850"]There are a lot of people really happy and there many not so happy about the NFL moving to an 18-game regular season in 2012. At the NFL owners’ meeting on Wednesday, a unanimous group voted in favor of increasing the regular season from 16 to 18 games and reducing the preseason from 4 to 2 exhibitions. Cowboys’ owner Jerry Jones is among that undivided bunch, but he has his doubts just like everyone else. Decreasing the number of preseason games would affect the Cowboys’ traditional way of conducting training camp. Even though all the owners are in agreement on extending the regular season, the players’ stance on the issue is quite divided.
Just like these past few weeks, the Cowboys have split training camp between San Antonio and Oxnard, California for several years now. Jones loves the marketing angle of that tradition and would like to continue splitting camp between Texas and California. However, shortening the preseason would throw a wrinkle in that plan. If the preseason was shortened, the Cowboys would have to either pick one location to hold the entirety of camp or cut each stay in San Antonio and Oxnard in half. The Cowboys are contractually obligated to return to San Antonio next season, but have no contract agreements past that. “We need a full-day interview to get through that,” Jones said. “I haven’t got my hands around all of the areas that it’s going to impact.”
[picappgallerysingle id="9548130"]Dallas head coach Wade Phillips did not offer too much of an opinion on the matter, but he said he would be fine with the change. Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo gave a more detailed attitude toward the proposal. “From a quarterback’s side of it, it’s unbelievably awesome, [but i]t depends on which player,” Romo said. “From a quarterback’s perspective, we have no problem playing more football games. You ask some of these guys, some of these running backs; that might not be a huge benefit to continue to take hits. That’s part of it.”
The NFL Players Association would have to approve the change before it would become official, but NFL commissioner Roger Goodell is firm in his authority. At Wednesday’s meeting, Goodell indicated that the league has the right to extend the regular season to 18 games and keep the preseason at 4 under the current collective bargaining agreement. However, the change would not take effect until 2012 and the current agreement expires at the end of the upcoming season. A lockout is already a possibility in 2011, and the length of the season will also be a central issue in the upcoming negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement.
[picappgallerysingle id="9550342"]Goodell and others have also expressed the fans’ desire to shorten the preseason. For years, fans like myself have complained about paying full price for preseason tickets, parking and other stadium fees. Many fans would be fine with shortening the regular season to 2 games and keeping the regular season just like it is, but the owners are adamant about keeping the entire season at 20 weeks. More regular season games mean more regular season tickets, which is a financial benefit for the league. Two additional games would increase ticket sales and create two additional opportunities for fans to attend games. I would love to see the Cowboys play two additional times each year. However, I would be kicking myself if a guy like Romo suffered a serious injury because of the extension.
The Cowboys’ quarterback alluded to the injury issue of lengthening the regular season, and that’s the primary concern for the proposal. The injury issue is only reason why reducing the preseason and extending the regular season would be a bad idea. Take a team like the Colts; last year, they gave up on going undefeated to keep their star players from getting injured. If you add two more games, that’s two more times that regular season games would turn into preseason games because teams would play their backups to rest their starters for the playoffs. So basically, you would take two preseason games and move them from the beginning of the season to the end. Regardless, the 18-game schedule is going to happen sooner or later, but the risks might outweigh the gains. Food for thought.
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