PRO FOOTBALL ’90 : Those Are the Breaks, for Better or Worse : Schedules: All teams will have a week off, but exactly when during the season the vacation takes place could be a factor.

Taking a cue from the NBA and major league baseball, which seem to play year-round, the NFL has extended its schedule this season. Instead of playing 16 games in 16 weeks, NFL teams will play 16 games in 17 weeks in 1990 and ‘91, and 16 games in 18 weeks in 1992 and ’93.

The new schedule will supply TV with one extra weekend of games this year and next, and two extra weekends the following two years.

The NFL has also increased the number of playoff teams, adding one wild-card team per conference. Where there were two wild-card teams from each conference before, there are now three.

On the first weekend of playoffs, two games will be played on Saturday, both televised by ABC, and two more will be played on Sunday, with NBC and CBS each televising one.

Four division champions--two from each conference--with the best records will draw first-round byes.

The division champion with the third-best record will play host to the wild-card team with the third-best record, and the wild-card team with the best record will play host to the wild-card team with the second-best record.

The first-round winners will then play the two division champions with the best and second-best records, the one with the best record meeting the surviving wild-card team with the poorer record.

Because the NFL has more games to televise, the league received a better TV deal. The NFL’s new four-year package is worth $3.637 billion; each team will receive $32.8 million annually, which is almost double the $17 million the teams received from the old three-year TV contract.

Most coaches and players like the new schedule because of the off-weeks. Each team will have one week off in 1990 and ‘91, and two weeks off in 1992 and ’93.

In addition, the new schedule will eliminate one of the two weeks between the conference championship games and the Super Bowl, although the NFL plans to reinstate the two-week Super Bowl buildup for the 1992 season.

Why did the NFL extend its schedule?

“The league has had a concern for some time that other sports were constantly expanding their schedule and that the NFL had the shortest regular-season schedule of all professional sports and had not made any change in well over a decade,” Commissioner Paul Tagliabue said.

“We wanted to expand our share of the sports calendar as most other sports have done before us.

“So, in looking at our schedule, we decided that we could have more flexibility in scheduling our games and we could pick up an extra week of television for our games. And we could provide a bye week for the teams, which most clubs feel will be useful in terms of healing for injuries and getting ready for the second half.”

The NFL will rotate off-weeks by conference.

Four NFC West teams, including the Rams, will have an off-week during the fourth week of the season, with four NFC East teams getting one the next week. Four AFC East teams will be off the sixth week, and four NFC Central teams will be off the seventh week.

Four AFC West teams, including the Raiders, will be off the eighth week, and four AFC Central teams will get be off the 10th week.

The four teams that finished in fifth place last season will be off the 14th week.

While most NFL owners accept the schedule format, the concept of teams being rewarded for finishing last, by getting an off-week late in the season, has come under fire.

“I accept (the new schedule), as long as it’s equal for everybody,” Raider owner Al Davis said.

“I don’t like the idea of the fifth team in your division always getting an easier schedule, but that’s the way it’s set up.”

Not all coaches are in favor of the off-week format. Some have complained that the format benefits teams that have an off-week in the middle of the season. They say a break early in the season--after only three games--does more to disrupt rhythm than provide a needed rest. But it may be helpful for a team such as the Rams that has so many out with injury.