Committee considering removal of inactive list for Thursday Night Games

The Competition Committee is reviewing (or has already reviewed) changes that could impact NFL rosters. Once they decide what they like and don't like, they'll ship those recommendations off to the owners who will approve/reject the committee's proposals. Having old guys like Tom Benson, who specialize in family drama and estate-mongering, voting on competition issues is still hilarious; but whatever it takes to make them feel useful.

Could the league expand beyond the 53-man roster? Why not? Players appear to be getting hurt at a higher rate (unsubstantiated speculation) and the league allows for subjective eye-tests from officials on players that may or may not be hurt. Of course there's the issue of ownership -- who would foot the bill for additions made on a team's payroll. Should we go ahead and vote this as a "nah"? However, one consideration is expanding the 53-man roster to 55.

Could practice squads increase beyond 10 players, which increased from eight recently? Why not have an exception where a practice squad player can suit up for a game or two without impacting the waiver wire, active rosters or force multiple transactions to deal with one injury at one position for one game? If the player is expected to play multiple games, then they can consider the formal transfer to the active roster.

Who knows.

Either way, executive vice president of football operations Troy Vincent, hinted at proposals that would impact changes to the roster.

We also reviewed the @NFL roster system – an auxiliary list, expansion of the game roster, and how we handle Thursday night rosters

— Troy Vincent (@TroyVincent23) February 28, 2015

Per Pro Football Talk, one change that could happen soon is the removal of the inactive list for Thursday Night games.

Per a league source, the possible solution is the removal of the inactive list for Thursday Night Football. If that happens, teams would dress all 53 players on Thursday night games, with no players on the inactive list.

This is where the NFL baffles me. Instead of discontinuing Thursday Night games, often criticized for the poor play that ensues and added risk to injury (players aren't given much time to recover from the previous game), their best solution (to this lucrative quagmire) is adding seven players -- who are usually inactive because they're injured or not good enough, to play on the active 46-man roster in the first place.

I love this line near the end from PFT:

It doesn't mean that all 53 players would dress for every team in each Thursday night game; players too injured to play but not so injured to be on injured reserve won’t dress.

Really?

Mind. Blown.