In the face of the coronavirus pandemic, the NFL has already canceled the Hall of Fame Game and postponed the 2020 Hall of Fame induction ceremonies. Now, reports indicate that the league will also shorten the 2020 preseason from four games to two.
As first reported by Pro Football Talk and confirmed by ESPN’s Kevin Seifert, the first and fourth preseason games will be canceled, which means that the preseason won’t begin until August 20-24. This could mean the end of the four-game preseason, which first came to be when the NFL expanded the regular season from 14 to 16 games in 1978. With the regular season set to expand to 17 games as early as 2021, the CBA allows for a more permanently abbreviated preseason.
The primary driver for 2020 is the fact that, while players are still schedule to report to training camps in late July, there have been no minicamps or organized workouts, thus no provisions for players to start the previously scheduled preseason in anything approaching football shape.
The NFL and the NFLPA continue to hammer out a series of protocols for a full regular season. These protocols will have to include constant testing, possible quarantining, and the ability to navigate the fact that some states (New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts) now require that anyone who enters from other states where coronavirus cases are increasing undergo quarantine for two weeks on arrival.
So, we’re not yet sure if this most recent cancellation is the final one in an offseason of uncertainty, or if this is, like the pandemic itself, merely a spike in a possible larger wave to come.