If there was one game through wild-card weekend that had me curious from an officiating angle, it was the New Orleans Saints' 45-28 win over the Detroit Lions.
The N.F.L. could decide as early as today whether to cancel Week 2 and play a 15-game regular season or eliminate wild-card weekend in January and make up the games then.
One calls for the league to extend the regular season into wild-card weekend on Jan. 5 and 6, eliminating that first round of the playoffs by shrinking the postseason field from 12 teams to 8.
And money is what the two extra wild cards are really all about, especially with three playoff games instead of two on the Saturday and Sunday of the wild-card weekend.
With 14 teams, only one team in each conference would get the bye that provides a week of rest, then a game against the lowest-seeded survivor of the wild-card weekend.
J.J. Watt did this, which was arguably the most important non-Broncos, non-Steelers play of wild-card weekend.
Can anyone else make a case that they were a better player on wild-card weekend?
If wild-card weekend is canceled, which remains a distinct possibility, one owner estimated, the league could lose from $50 million to $70 million in ticket sales alone.
The league originally considered canceling wild-card weekend.
He would prefer to get there with a bye through the wild-card weekend into the divisional playoffs.