What could European NFL expansion look like?
By: Nibir Sarma
Tags: Sports, Europe, Football, NFL

Photo by Larry Bridges on Unsplash

By its very nature, having two conferences with 16 teams each and one with only four means the season schedule will look very different from the European teams compared to the American ones. Luckily for us, the NFL recently added a 17th game to the season, which will be extremely helpful. Let’s look at my proposed schedule for American teams first.

Each American team will play:

Six (6) games against division rivals, home-and-home Four (4) games against a division within the same conference on a three-year rotating basis, two home and two away Four (4) games against a division from the opposite American conference on a four-year rotating basis, two home and two away Two (2) games against teams in the same conference that finished in the equivalent position within their respective divisions in the previous season, one home and one away One (1) game against the European team that finished in the equivalent position within its respective division in the previous season, home/away based on conference on a two-year rotating basis

The fifth category is the only real change from the existing 16-game schedule that is being used as of 2020 — and this is where having that 17th game really helps us in this thought exercise. The only real detail left to iron out is where the games would be played (home vs. away). The most logical solution would be to have a two-year rotation between the AFC and NFC. For example, in odd-numbered years, the NFC hosts European teams, and the AFC packs their suitcases (and vice versa for even-numbered years).

This would mean that in an odd-numbered year, AFC teams would play eight home games, while NFC teams would play nine. Is this unfair? My logic is that it’s more important to iron out disparities within the conference than between the two conferences, since teams primarily compete for playoff berths against teams from the same conference (we’ll get to playoffs in a minute). Might it affect inter-conference games between AFC and NFC teams? Yeah, maybe. But once again, every other team from the same conference would be in the same situation. Plus, any difference between the two conferences stemming from international travel would end up summing to zero in the long term because of the two-year rotation. Look at it this way: each of the NFL’s 32 American teams would have one European trip every two years, and that trip would happen during the same year as the other teams in its conference.

More relevant would probably be the timing of American-European games within the season. I would imagine that most fans of American teams would not want their team to have to travel to Europe the week before a Week 18 playoff-clinching game against a division rival. Similarly, I don’t think European fans would be very happy to watch the lower quality of play that would come from their team having to fly to the US every other week.

Here’s the best solution I can think of. First, schedule all international games happening in the US during Weeks 1–4. During this time period, all four European teams would be “on tour” in the US, playing their four away international games and then return to Europe afterward to play the rest of their season. A side effect of this scheduling decision would be that the NFL season for European teams would effectively begin in early October, about two months after start of the European soccer season. Avoiding competition with European soccer for TV time and attention would definitely be a positive for these teams.

Photo by Alexander Schimmeck on Unsplash

Second, schedule all international games happening in Europe during Weeks 9–12. Why not earlier? I want to avoid giving the European teams a split schedule of 8 international games followed by 9 divisional games. Imagine if American teams played their six divisional games all in the row at the end of the season! That just wouldn’t feel right. I would give them Weeks 5–8 to play their first set of divisional games and a bye week before hosting their American counterparts. I would also be willing to give each American team a bye the week after they return from a European trip. Now let’s look at the schedule for teams in the European division.

Each European team will play:

Nine (9) games against division rivals, consisting of at least one home and at least one away game against each opponent, with no more than five and no fewer than four home games. Eight (8) games against American teams that finished in the equivalent position within their respective divisions in the previous season, four home and four away.

Once we have the schedule sorted out for the American teams, the European schedule naturally falls into place. Four games against AFC teams, four games against NFC teams, and a triple round-robin within the division. The biggest wrinkle that I can see is the fact that two European teams would end up playing nine home games over the course of the season and the other two would only play eight. I’m not entirely sure how much this would matter, but one way that it could be ironed out would be for each European team to play one game per season at a neutral venue (my first thought would be Estadio Azteca in Mexico City, but perhaps somewhere closer to home like the Stade de France, Estadio Santiago Bernabéu, or Cruyff Arena might be more hospitable). In any case, this schedule seems sensible to me, and is close enough to a facsimile of the American schedule to be considered fair.