While the 2024 Summer Olympics are set in stone and ready to take off within the next ten months, the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles will have a new sport to debut: flag football.
“We are convinced that flag football will offer an exciting new dimension to the Games – uniting them, for the first time in history, with America’s number one sport in its youngest, most accessible and inclusive format, which is already spearheading extraordinary growth, particularly among youth audiences, women and girls and in new countries worldwide,” Pierre Trochet, President of the International Federation of American Football, said in a statement earlier this week. “We have no doubt that inclusion in the Olympic Games will further accelerate this dynamic.”
It’s unclear if current or former NFL players will play for the U.S. flag team in 2028. During a conference call with reporters on Monday, Broncos running back Javonte Williams said he would want to play quarterback or linebacker if he suited up for Team USA at the Olympics.
The NFL has pushed to promote flag football in recent years, presumably to attract young players and fans to the sport. Peyton Manning starred in several NFL commercials last summer promoting flag football.
The league recently switched the Pro Bowl to a flag football format (a change that Russell Wilson suggested to Roger Goodell). Wilson’s suggestion is unsurprising, given that he was named a Global Flag Football Ambassador last year.
Wilson will be 39 when the 2028 Olympics arrive, so he seems unlikely to play for Team USA, but Wilson will undoubtedly remain an ambassador for the sport.
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