New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft Mandatory Credit: Peter van den Berg-Imagn Images
By Matt Yoder on

The push towards an 18-game NFL season has seemed inevitable for a long time. But New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft wants to go one step further in the NFL’s push for world domination.

A 17-game regular season has always seemed like a stopgap solution on the way to 18 games. By cutting down the preseason from its original four games all the way down to two games, the NFL can theoretically have the same amount of game action as before, but create infinitely more value. Of course, the players will have to be compensated fairly, given the extra injury risk to starters, but the opportunity for more revenue, more games, and more national television windows is too good to pass up for the league.

The other area of expansive NFL growth has been internationally. In addition to the calendar expansion, the NFL is also growing its global portfolio with the wide expectation that the league will soon carve out a unique television package for a season-long collection of games overseas.

And according to Kraft, the push on both fronts is very real.

In an appearance on Boston sports radio station 98.5 The Sports Hub, the Patriots owner confirmed his desire to not just see 18 regular-season games, but to see every NFL team play at least one international game every season.

And Kraft framed it not just as a play at growing revenue, but at keeping players happy with their share of the pie.

“We’re going to push like the dickens now to make international more important with us. Every team will go to 18 and 2 and eliminate one of the preseason games. Every team every year will play one game overseas. Part of the reason is so we can continue to grow the cap and keep our labor happy,” Kraft said.

One of the reasons the Patriots’ owner gave for the push is that the NFL has almost maxed out its growth potential domestically, given its absolute dominance over any other sports or entertainment product in the marketplace. It doesn’t matter if it’s linear or streaming; any time the NFL shield is attached to a game, tens of millions of people will show up.

“Because we’re sort of getting near the top here with the coverage. 93 of the top 100 programs on television are NFL games. Think about that. It’s really amazing. And you look at the size of our crowds versus the other sports and it’s really, you know we had that Amazon game on Thursday a couple weeks ago. 31 million people streamed. So as long as we can keep growing revenue, we can keep long-term labor peace,” Kraft added.

Robert Kraft made it seem like these things were a done deal. Of course, it’s going to have to be settled through negotiations, but if it makes the pie bigger for everyone, it’s almost a fait accompli at this point.

And given these statements and the reasoning behind them, you can see where the NFL is coming from. Where is there possibly room for even more growth stateside when the NFL is already tops in pretty much every category? The room for growth is more games and more markets. The appetite for football in America isn’t slowing down anytime soon. And an 18 game season with a double bye implemented would mean two more Sundays (and other days of the week) with NFL football.

Similarly, the international games have been a business success for the league, and expanding to more markets can only mean more growth. Fans may not love the idea of their teams playing internationally, and Fox and CBS aren’t going to enjoy seeing more games carved out of their Sunday afternoon packages. But if this is the way the NFL looks towards growing and not just sustaining, it’s only a matter of time before it becomes a reality.

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