The 18-game NFL regular season ain’t dead yet.
That was the word yesterday from Giants owner Steve Tisch, who revealed league owners still intend to push converting two exhibition games into regular-season contests despite the union’s apparent victory on that issue in the recent labor battle.
“I’m not saying it’s alive, but I know going forward that this is an issue internally that’s going to come up,” Tisch said at the official unveiling of newly re-christened MetLife Stadium.
“I don’t know if it’s going to be spring of 2012 or fall 2013, but it’s an issue the owners have paid a lot of attention to and will continue to do so.”
An 18-game regular season especially in light of the rising concern about concussions in football was thought to be merely a bargaining ploy by the owners in the lockout negotiations, and the players succeeded in getting it off the table until at least 2013 under the terms of the new collective bargaining agreement.
But Tisch said the owners have not lost their resolve to shorten the exhibition schedule and lengthen the regular season, and that doing both could be a topic when the preseason as a whole is assessed at the owners’ next scheduled meeting in October in Houston.
“It’s an issue the players know the owners are talking about and the NFL is talking about,” Tisch said. “I don’t think it’s one of the most controversial issues ever discussed by owners, and I think the fans kind of have spoken also on how they feel about the preseason.”
An NFL spokesman disagreed, saying discussions at the October meeting will focus more on improving player safety in the preseason in general and that the “18-2” concept is not on the official agenda.
What prompted Tisch’s surprise comments was a tidal wave of Giants injuries in Monday night’s 41-13 preseason win over the Bears at the Meadowlands, the most devastating being cornerback Terrell Thomas’ season-ending right ACL tear.
The Giants lost two other players for the season as rookie defensive lineman Marvin Austin suffered a torn pectoral muscle and cornerback Brian Witherspoon also tore his ACL and was subsequently waived/injured.
“The preseason always presents a lot of injuries,” Tisch said. “It’s one of the reasons going forward that ownership and the players association are going to look at the preseason coming up in the next round of owners meetings. I mean, these guys aren’t out there playing golf or chess or tennis. Injuries are a big part of the game, but there have been a lot of preseason injuries across the NFL. [Monday] night’s was a rough one.”