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Here’s how flex scheduling works for the 2024 season and how it will impact the back end of the schedule, and particularly Week 15.
The Kansas City Chiefs and New England Patriots were initially scheduled to clash on Monday Night Football during Week 15 of the 2023 season. To protect our hearts and minds from watching Mac Jones and/or Bailey Zappe throw picks in primetime, the NFL employed flex scheduling to bump Chiefs-Pats into the 1 p.m. ET slot and replace it with Eagles vs. Seahawks on Monday night.
The Eagles were 10-3 at the time and had just clinched a playoff spot for the third consecutive year. The Seahawks stayed in the playoff hunt right up until the very end of the season. On paper, it’s a more exciting matchup, and it was probably a better option for primetime than the original schedule based on every Patriots game I watched last season.
The reasoning behind flexible scheduling, according to the NFL, is that it “allows teams to play their way onto primetime.”
In 2006, the NFL implemented a “flexible scheduling” procedure for Sunday Night Football. Flexible scheduling ensured quality matchups on Sunday night in all weeks and gave surprise teams a chance to play their way onto primetime. For the 2024 season, flexible scheduling will also include Monday Night Football, as well as Thursday Night Football on a trial basis.
There’s a lot that goes into the league’s flex scheduling process, and there are different rules for different days and time slots and weeks. Here are the high points.
How it works
Sunday afternoon games can be moved between the 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. windows.
The league can flex games to Sunday Night Football twice in Weeks 5 through 10, and during Weeks 11 through 17, they can flex games “at the NFL’s discretion.”
The NFL can flex games to Monday Night Football in Weeks 11 through 17 at its discretion.
Thursday Night Football will be available in flex scheduling on a trial basis in 2024. The league can flex games to Thursday night up to twice between Weeks 13-17.
If your team is on the schedule for Sunday Night Football, Monday Night Football, or Thursday Night Football during those flexible scheduling windows, the NFL considers all of those games “tentative” because of flex scheduling.
Only Sunday afternoon games or games listed as “TBD” can be flexed to SNF, MNF or TNF. So you can’t flex a Thursday night game to Sunday night, and so on.
As usual, the schedule for Week 18 of the 2024 season won’t be finalized until Week 17 concludes.
The league has to give 12 days’ notice when flexing a game to Sunday or Monday night in Weeks 5 through 13 for SNF and Weeks 12 through 17 for MNF.
For Sunday Night Football, Weeks 14 through 17, the decision must be made at least six days prior to a game being flexed.
For Thursday Night Football, Weeks 13 through 17, the NFL will announce the decision at least 28 days before the game.
Buckle up for Week 15
Based on all of the above, Week 15 could get a little silly. The final bye week of the season is Week 14, so all 32 teams are playing. Things will be starting to fall into place for the postseason, so a lot of these games will be meaningful. And the international games wrap up in Week 10, so everyone’s stateside and eligible to be flexed.
Plus, the league’s got an extra night game to work with in Week 15. As it currently stands, this is the primetime schedule:
Thursday Night Football: Chargers vs. 49ers
Sunday Night Football: Packers vs. Seahawks
Monday Night Football doubleheader: Bears vs. Vikings, Falcons vs. Raiders
The earliest we’ll find out if they’re flexing that Thursday Night game would be 28 days prior, and I think that makes that one less likely to be flexed. There’s a lot of football to be played over those 28 days, and it’s hard to predict if the hottest teams will hit a skid that far in advance.
I think the Sunday and Monday games are pretty likely to be in play, though, so keep an eye out toward the end of Week 14 to see what the actual Week 15 schedule will be.
