We interrupt Texans front office talk to take you to the future.
One year from today the NFL will likely be readying for the first weekend of the playoffs. This is because the league can load the schedule with 17 games for the first time ever, after owners approved the formula last month.
The 17 game slate idea led to all sorts of internal and external discussions on how to line up that extra game. Currently, everything seems so perfect and symmetrical with a tidy six game divisional schedule, and four each against an AFC and NFC division plus two more in your conference with teams that finished in the same spot in their divisions.
.500 seasons will be a thing of the past. With 17 games , it's winning season or bust, which is good. This reminds me of when there was an 11 game schedule in college. Remember 6-5 seasons? Michigan was 6-5 when they lost to BYU in the '84 National Championship.
Side Note: BYU was in the WAC then. The WAC is back as Sam Houston State and Stephen F. Austin are among the new teams. So NRG will host a WAC game for next season's Battle of the Piney Woods. Big press conference tomorrow. Pass it on.
Anyway, There will still be a bye week and that means, assuming the schedule still begins after Labor Day, that the regular season will get pushed an extra week into January. The Super Bowl will be played in mid-February.
As far as the extra game goes, teams will play a squad with the same finish in a division in the other conference. The Texans already had dates with the tough NFC West next year. They'll reportedly add a game with NFC South third place finisher Carolina to the docket.
There have been a lot of fan and media calls about making the extra NFC game against a permanent rival. While it would be great for the Texans to play the Cowboys every year, not every team has an obvious one and you run out of options pretty quickly.
For instance, should the Cardinals play the Chargers or the Broncos? Shouldn't the Rams play the Chargers. What about the Raiders. They have to play San Francisco, no? What about Seattle then? It gets dicey.
In any case, we'll get more football next year and that's a good thing.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled scrolling and surfing.
