Social media platform X (formerly known as Twitter) has announced the multi-year renewal of its long-standing content partnership with the National Football League (NFL).
The NFL first partnered with X under the Twitter moniker in 2013, and through the extended deal will continue to use the social media giant to broadcast highlights of in-progress games as they happen, including every single touchdown.
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The renewal also expands the NFL’s sponsorship inventory on the platform, with further space for co-branded highlights, polls, spaces (X’s vocal forum discussion segment), and more ready for potential collaboration with other corporate X user brands.
The announcement comes amid talk that the NFL will expand its regular season to 18 games, reducing pre-season games and placing the Super Bowl on a three-day President’s Day weekend holiday.
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell recently stated that although he is “happy” with the current 17-game regular season, he would support the league moving to an 18-game format and reducing pre-season games.
Speaking on the Pat McAfee Show ahead of the NFL Draft, Goodell said: “I think we're good at 17 now, but listen, we're looking at how we continue. I'm not a fan of the pre-season and I don't think [fans] like it either."
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By GlobalData"The reality is, I'd rather replace a pre-season game with a regular-season game any day. That's just picking quality. If we get to 18 [regular season games] and 2 [pre-season games], that's not an unreasonable thing."
In extending the regular season, a second bye week for each team would likely be added, potentially pushing the Super Bowl back to the Presidents Day weekend, which Goodell believes could be built around the season-ending showpiece.
The NFL moved from 16 games per year to a 17-game season following collective bargaining talks with the NFL Players Association in 2020, with the 2021 season the first to employ the new calendar.
Plans to expand the season to 17 had been in place for years before that, however, with more games giving the NFL more content to sell to broadcasters, more sponsorship and advertising inventory, and a bigger pool of fixtures to send abroad as part of its annual International Series.
