The NFL’s wild-card weekend could be getting a little wilder in 2015.
According to Dan Patrick — the former “SportsCenter” anchor who now hosts a radio show on the Premiere Radio Networks — the NFL will add a wild-card team in both conferences.
However, this is far from a done deal.
“There been no such decision,” an NFL spokesperson said in an email to Sports Illustrated. “It would require a vote of the clubs and it has not yet been taken up with them. If it’s taken up this year, it would happen at the annual meeting in March. The agenda for the meeting has not been formulated.”
At the NFL Fall Meeting in October, commissioner Roger Goodell said adding two teams to the postseason was one of the “priorities” for the Competition Committee this year.
“If expanding the postseason would allow other teams to get into the dance, and they have the potential of going on and winning the Super Bowl, that’s a good thing for fans, that a good thing competitively,” he said.
Should the NFL expand the postseason field to 14 teams, it would not go into effect until the 2015 season, as there are “scheduling issues” next season.
There are two possible scenarios for accommodating the seventh team:
1. Create a play-in game between the No. 6 and No. 7 seed.
2. Take away the No. 2 seed’s bye, leaving only the top seed with a bye and creating three games per conference on the opening weekend of the playoffs.