The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
NFL approves limited flexible scheduling for Thursday games
EAGAN, Minn. — Thursday nights in the NFL have long been the most drastic feature of its made-for-TV schedule, a prime-time slot that raised concerns about player safety and produced plenty of competitive duds before it moved to a streaming-only platform.
Now the league will have the power, albeit limited, to change the matchups.
NFL owners approved Monday a flexible scheduling policy for Thursday night games on Amazon Prime Video, for Weeks 1317 only and with at least 28 days’ notice given to the affected teams. The league could push a Thursday night matchup in that range to Sunday afternoon if there’s a more desirable game, a mechanism currently in place for Sunday night and Monday night games.
No team would be required to play more than twice on Thursday night in a season. The rule is just for 2023, for now. Any game during Weeks 13-17 could be selected for the move to Thursday night, but the league said the bar for such a shuffle would be high.
“We’re incredibly judicious and incredibly sensitive to flexing a game and all the dynamics that go into that,” said Hans Schroeder, executive vice president and chief operating officer of NFL Media. “We’re also trying to balance how we get the best games in the best windows for our fans.”
In addition to the primetime allowances for flexing games, the NFL also now puts the entire Week 18 schedule up for grabs until the week of so it can show two games with playoff implications on Saturday.
Also approved Monday at the NFL’s spring meetings was a rule that allows teams to play an emergency quarterback from the inactive list if the first two are injured during a game, a decision that stems from San Francisco’s depthchart challenge in the NFC championship game.
The bylaw was initially proposed by the Detroit Lions. The third quarterback designation will not count against the limit of active players — either 47 or 48 — that is determined 90 minutes before kickoff.
The emergency activation can only occur after injury or disqualification, not for a performance-related decision or other conduct. If either of the first two quarterbacks are cleared by the team’s medical staff to return to play, the third must be removed from the game and can only return as a quarterback if an injury scenario arises again.
Owners were also updated on the pending sale of the Washington Commanders from Dan Snyder’s family to Josh Harris’ group, a prominent if not pressing issue. No vote on the record $6.05 billion transaction will occur this week.
NFL expects kickoff return reduction with trial of fair catch rule inside 25
The NFL has pushed the kickoff return further toward irrelevance with a priority on player safety.
League owners voted Tuesday for a one-year trial of an enhanced touchback rule that will give the receiving team the ball at its own 25 with a fair catch of a kickoff anywhere behind that yard line.
The proposal passed despite an expression of distaste for it from coaches and players across the league.
They argued the rule change will create uglier plays with squib and corner kicks that are impossible for fair catches.
The NFL said its statistical models predict the return rate for kickoffs in 2023, under the new rule, will drop from 38% to 31% and that the rate of concussions on the sport’s most dangerous play will be reduced by 15%. Concussions on kickoffs occur more than twice as often as on plays from scrimmage, and that rate has risen significantly over the last two years.
The NFL essentially copied a rule that was already in place in college football.
49ers awarded Super Bowl 60
EAGAN, Minn. — The Super Bowl will return to the Bay Area in 2026 at the home of the San Francisco 49ers, following a vote of approval by NFL owners on Monday at their spring meetings.
This will be the third time for the big game in the Bay Area. Levi’s Stadium, which opened in Santa Clara, California, in 2014, hosted Super Bowl 50 when Denver beat Carolina. The 49ers won Super Bowl 19 at Stanford Stadium in Palo Alto when they beat Miami after the 1984 season. The 2026 game will be Super Bowl 60.
The next Super Bowl is scheduled for Feb. 11, 2024, at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. Super Bowl 59 will be played at the Superdome in New Orleans in 2025.