Ten years ago, it may have seemed silly. The idea of superstar NFL players standing atop an Olympic podium wearing gold medals for their exploits in flag football.
But, frankly, it’s a perfect fit. It should be no surprise at all that the NFL and the IOC would be willing to use each other for mutual benefit over the next three years and possibly beyond. It’s in keeping with how both organizations have endeavored to expand their global reach during our modern Content Age. Tuesday’s announcement that NFL owners will allow their players to participate in the 2028 Olympics only made it official.
NFL fans already know this implicitly. We have watched the league try to take over every day of the week, every country on the map and every streaming platform anyone’s ever heard of. NFL games are not just in London, but in Munich and Dublin and São Paulo. By the time the 2028 Olympics roll around, we’ll have exported regular-season games to Australia. The NFL has made no bones about its desire for global dominance.
The NFL has also treated flag football as a major growth initiative. Whether the league views it as an emergency escape hatch in case tackle football ever becomes taboo, a good faith effort to grow the game to new players or simply another available pile of money doesn’t really matter. It’s one of the league’s many boulders rolling downhill that won’t be stopped unless it proves unprofitable.
If you’re a football fan who hasn’t paid much attention to the ways the Olympics have changed over the past few cycles, you may be surprised to know this fits for the IOC as well. If you’re wondering, Why would the Olympics have flag football, that doesn’t sound like an Olympic sport? Well, you’re several Olympic-sports-that-don’t-sound-like-Olympic-sports behind.
Starting in 2020, the IOC not only began more aggressively adding new-age events such as 3x3 basketball, sport climbing and skateboarding, but increased flexibility for host countries to add sports they are interested in as one-offs. This is how we ended up with breakdancing in Paris (they prefer you just call it breaking), karate in Tokyo and baseball/softball sometimes in, sometimes out.
So with that added flexibility, of course the rest of the world must get trounced in football when they venture onto American soil.
Here’s the thing that must have been most appealing to every organization involved: People will watch. We know they will. We’re going to drop some of the most famous athletes on the planet into the world’s favorite biennial three-week TV show. You think ratings for the schedule release show, the Pro Bowl Games and Day 3 of the draft are strong?
NBC will show every second of Team USA’s games on Gold Zone. People who normally spend that time of year buried in training camp practice reports and fantasy football draft prep will check the schedule every night before going to bed. The schedule-makers will keep Patrick Mahomes & Co. away from Katie Ledecky and Mondo Duplantis. They will put them up against badminton. Sorry, badminton.
Kids in Chad and Ecuador and Norway will see our country’s biggest stars, and some of them might consider football in a new way. It has the potential to be like a modern Dream Team, with Mahomes, Saquon Barkley and Justin Jefferson getting the chance to be this generation’s Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird.
It does sometimes feel a little strange to watch NBA superstars at events like the Olympic Opening Ceremony, taking eyeballs away from athletes who wait four years for their sport to take center stage. But the presence of NFL stars at the Games in Los Angeles could be a win for the greater Olympic movement. Anthony Edwards made headlines for embracing table-tennis in Paris, so imagine Joe Burrow posting on Instagram from beach volleyball or CeeDee Lamb podcasting about his day at archery. The Olympics have a chance to draw more eyes to football, and it would be easy for football’s ambassadors to return the favor.
And get ready for three years of hype. Tryouts and exhibition games on NBC, NFL Network and Netflix. Hard Knocks: U.S. Olympic Flag Football Training Camp on HBO and Peacock. Hours and hours and hours of podcasts and studio shows and TikToks on the selection process.
Sure, there are questions about how good these players will be at some of the key differences in the new sport (grabbing flags, for instance) and what the practice time and qualifying will look like. But that’s for another day.
The people you can feel bad for are the current members of Team USA’s men’s flag football team, who have been traveling the world to qualify the U.S. into tournaments, winning medals and growing the sport, only to watch everyone drool over the idea of replacing them at their sport’s big moment. Will the 12 players heading to Panama in September for the IFAF Americas Continental Flag Football Championship be given a fair shot to fend off their more famous counterparts and keep their spots in the lineup? Would the involvement of NFL players at the Olympic level put more money into the sport for the group of players that actually commits to flag full-time?
It’s worth taking a step back and remembering that we are a long way from this being permanent. It may be a one-time thing. Or a once-in-a-generation thing, whenever the Summer Olympics come rolling back into the States. But it is the best chance flag football will have to get eyes at any point in the near future, which the NFL is clearly invested in.
It’s also good business for these two organizations—the NFL and the IOC—to have a strong relationship. This season’s Super Bowl will take place during the 2026 Winter Olympics because the NFL expanded its regular season by a week after the Olympics had already claimed dibs on that weekend in February. It would be smart for everyone to get along.
The inclusion of NFL players is a step that just makes too much sense for everyone involved. It’s simply a reflection of the world we live in. A chance for the rich to get richer? What’s more American than that? The NFL and the Olympics: together, finally! The only surprise is they hadn’t thought of it already.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as The NFL and the Olympics Can Use Each Other to Achieve Their Expansion Goals.