Tagliabue Says NFL Will Expand by 1993

NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue said the league will expand no later than 1993--the first time the NFL has set a specific timetable for adding teams.

“Expansion is a very top priority--possibly by 1992, certainly by 1993,” Tagliabue said during a telephone news conference to discuss a summer preseason game in London between the Raiders and New Orleans Saints.

Tagliabue and former commissioner Pete Rozelle previously said expansion would take place two years after a new collective bargaining agreement had been signed with the NFL Players Assn. The league and union have been without an agreement since 1987.

NFL spokesman Dick Maxwell said the league would add four teams--either four at once, or two in one season and two more shortly thereafter.