This coming season, the Jacksonville Jaguars will make some peculiar NFL history. When the Jaguars play the Atlanta Falcons and Buffalo Bills in London in back-to-back weeks, they will be the first NFL team to ever play two overseas games in one season.
According to Commissioner Roger Goodell, the Jaguars might have to get used to this London setup moving forward. And if it’s the way the league sometimes operates with its players and fans, I have a feeling Jacksonville fans should especially have a right to be miffed by the mere suggestion.
That’s because not only is Jacksonville apparently the NFL’s test subject for more games across the pond, the league could use their experience as a proving ground for more overseas games for everyone — even three games back-to-back-to-back — in the years to come.
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell says the intent of putting the #Jaguars in back-to-back London games this season is to see the impact of it and learn from it.
"We'll evaluate everything. Would we try 3 at some point? Possibly."
— Ari Meirov (@MySportsUpdate) May 23, 2023
The full quote, via Jaguars Wire:
“We like to take things in increments,” Goodell told reporters. “I think one of the things we always focus on — pretty much with everything we do, but I’ll put it specifically to the international games — is to learn from our experience every year. To try something a little different and understand the impact of that.
“This is the first time we’re going to have a team stay a week and play consecutive games. I think we’ll learn from that and that’s the intent of it, ultimately. To see what’s the impact to the Jaguars, in this case. We’ll evaluate that after we’re done. At some point, would we try three? Possibly. But I think the focus is to try to do two and see what the impact is first, and then we’ll go from there.”
It is vital to note that, technically, only one of the Jaguars’ London games next year is a “home” game, taking one away from Jacksonville’s overall regular-season slate. But still: The mere idea that the NFL could have any squad spend three straight weeks away from its home city is absurd all around.
I understand the concept of growing the game and trying to make pro football more global by giving international fans more opportunities to see matchups in person. But there’s something to be said about actually taking care of and staying loyal to the home city first and foremost. There should be no future scenario where the city of Jacksonville, or any NFL city, doesn’t see its home team for almost a month while they play several time zones away.
It’d be flat-out insulting to ask any fanbase to keep up with their team in that kind of capacity. Not to mention that the Jaguars, specifically, have played a lot in London over the years. And this was when, for the most part, they were pretty bad! These days, they have Golden Boy Trevor Lawrence and a budding Super Bowl contender on paper. They should be really fun to follow.
Now the NFL would take them away more often from Duval County? Imagine if the league did that to a traditionally more popular team like Jalen Hurts and the Philadelphia Eagles. No one stateside deserves that, full stop. But, per Goodell, we should be prepared for this reality.
And that is just ridiculous.
