The New England Patriots are looking for ways to improve this offseason after their surprising run to the 2026 Super Bowl, which ended in a tough defeat against the Seattle Seahawks. Throughout the regular season, many attributed New England's success to their historically easy schedule, which will get a lot tougher for the upcoming 2026-27 campaign.
Recently, Patriots owner Robert Kraft signaled his openness to a potential 18-game schedule, an idea that has been floating around the league front office for years now, but he did have some conditions.
“#Patriots owner Robert Kraft told reporters he's in favor of an 18th regular season game under these conditions. Remove one preseason game (from 3 to 2). Add a second bye. All 32 NFL teams would have an international game every year,” reported Ari Meirov of The 33rd Team on X, formerly Twitter.
In order to cut down the number of postseason games, the NFL would likely need to go back to giving two teams a bye in each conference, or potentially cut down on the number of teams that make the playoffs altogether. As Kraft noted, a second bye week during the regular season could also pay dividends in terms of increasing the schedule.
It's unclear how the international games factor into Kraft's thought process, but the NFL indeed has been pouring immense amounts of resources into putting its game onto the global stage in recent years, with teams playing games in other countries more often than ever before.
Still, at this point, it doesn't seem that the NFL will be adding an 18th game to the schedule at any point in the immediate future.
The Patriots' 2026 schedule is slated to be announced in May.
