The 2026 NFL season might kick off even earlier than usual thanks to language in the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961.
An antitrust provision prevents the league from scheduling a Friday night game for a big chunk of next year. That will create an issue if the NFL wants to stage another international game in Week 1.
Gerrit Meier, the league’s managing director of international, told Albert Breer of The MMQB that a Wednesday game is possible. Australia is potentially earmarked as the location for the first international game, and the time difference is a complicating factor.
“We’re thinking about it a lot,” Meier said. “We do not have a Friday to play next year. Those were benefits we got through the schedule and the way it fell for last year and this year. We used both Fridays for Brazil. That Friday is not available for next year to us, regardless of where we play. So that, of course, imposes the question, Where do you play a Brazil game, which is still very much on the time zone plus/minus with the United States?
“Then, of course, something as quirky as Australia, which obviously is on a completely different timeframe, but you still have to make a viewable window for the United States. So you’re 100 percent right, we need to look at it.”
Wednesday kickoffs aren’t unprecedented in the NFL.
Thanks to the timing of the holidays, the league’s two Christmas Day games in 2024 fell on hump day. The NFL even shifted the first game of the 2012 to a Wednesday to avoid clashing with a prime-time address by President Barack Obama at the Democratic National Convention.
Still, it’s going to feel a bit odd if the NFL is opening the curtain on the 2026 season outside of its usual Thursday night window.
