Cowboys owner Jerry Jones 'a big proponent' of 18-game regular season

Dallas Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones has made it known he's, "a big proponent" of the NFL eventually expanding to an 18-game regular season. 

"That allows us to, as we go into the early games of the season, that allows us to have those games," Jones explained during a Friday appearance on Dallas sports radio station 105.3 The Fan, per Michael David Smith of Pro Football Talk. "You will get better if you play those games because you will play less preseason games."  

Jones continued: 

"But still I like to play two or three preseason games and 18 regular-season games and have been a proponent of that."

Soon after it was learned in 2021 that the NFL was shifting to a 17-game regular-season slate, PFT's Mike Florio and others made it known it was a matter of when, not if, the league would demand that players participate in 18 games each season -- 17 regular-season matchups and three preseason contests under the current model. 

Last fall, Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady said that adding a 17th regular-season game was "a terrible decision." This past June, San Francisco 49ers All-Pro tight end George Kittle campaigned for the league to offer players two bye weeks to deal with the physical toll of playing one extra game each season. 

One of the worst-kept secrets in sports is that the NFL ideally would have every Super Bowl Sunday occur over Presidents' Day weekends. It's unclear if that would be possible during an 18-game season that presumably could include two bye weeks, as the NFL traditionally shies away from hosting games during Labor Day weekends due to concerns about television ratings. The league also seems unlikely to scrap off weeks that separate conference championship Sundays and Super Bowl Sundays.