Should the NFL Go to an 18-Game Season?

Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones brought up an idea that has floated around for some time: an 18-game NFL regular season. Two preseason games would be cut and replaced with two regular season games. A bright idea by the NFL's most iconic owner, right?

After all, it would generate more revenue for the NFL, especially the owners. More people would come to the games that actually mattered. You would get more people attending NFL games, spending more on concessions and apparel. There's a bit more incentive for teams to contend for the postseason. Nothing can go wrong, right?

While all this sounds good, there are a few caveats to extending the NFL regular season. One issue involves the boogeyman known as CTE, which doesn't appear to be going away any time soon. The NFL hasn't proposed any way to making the game safer while keeping the fun of the game. No advanced helmet technology, idiotic rule changes. Player safety would be further compromised with the NFL's stars. Roger Goodell and crew haven't thought of a way to change the game for the better despite sitting on more than a billion dollar enterprise.

Another issue that resides with an 18-game season is the extra two games themselves. The current NFL scheduling format is perfect, consisting of the following for the average NFL team:

• Two regular season games against each division rival
• Two road games against specific interconference teams from one division (NFC North vs. NFC South)
• Two home games against interconference teams from that same division
• Two road games against teams from a specific division in the opposing conference (NFC East vs. AFC East)
  
• Two home games against teams from the opposing conference in that same division
  
• One home game against a team from an interconference division not mentioned in the above criteria
  
• One road game against a team from an interconference division not mentioned in the above criteria
  

Why would the NFL want to tinker with that? Where would the other two games come from? One way would be an extra pair of games between two select division rivals (i.e. Dallas and Washington). These two would play games against each other, one in Dallas and one in Washington. That's the best solution and perhaps the only viable solution.

If the NFL is to expand the regular season by two games, it has to solve many problems it has at the moment. That starts with the issue of CTE and player safety, getting the solution to the issue correct without detracting the factor of excitement from the game. Otherwise, it's just two extra chances at risking a regular NFL player's health.

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