NFL scheduling executive would 'love a redo' after Raiders, Buccaneers saddled with tough 2019 slates

The NFL's 2019 regular-season schedule hasn't been out of the oven for 24 hours, and one official from the league office is already basically acknowledging a misstep — one that could be corrected in future schedules.

The crux of the problem is the impact of the International Series on the scheduling process — one that is massively complex, requiring the NFL to rent hundreds of servers for cloud computing that runs 24 hours a day for 10 weeks following the Super Bowl while searching for schedules that meet a litany of conditions aimed at achieving competitive balance while also satisfying all 32 clubs and the broadcast partners that pay billions to air games.

But staging an increasing number of matchups abroad has evidently introduced a new fly into the ointment.

Both the Oakland Raiders and Tampa Bay Buccaneers face six-week stretches in which they play four times on the road, serve as the nominal "home" team for a contest in London and also have their bye. After the Raiders host the Chiefs on Sept. 15, they don't play in Oakland again until Nov. 3. After the Bucs host the Giants on Sept. 22, they don't have another game in Tampa until Nov. 10.

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"This is one that the NFL would love to have back. It's certainly not unusual for an NFL team to have one home game over a six-week stretch," NFL vice president of broadcasting Michael North told USA TODAY Sports on Thursday evening. "But when that one home (game) isn't actually home, this is likely something that the NFL would seek to avoid in the future.

"I'd love a redo on that one."

The Browns, Packers and Seahawks also have scheduling blocks that include just one home game in a six-week period, though they will be in their own stadiums. It's not an ideal construct but one the league can live with. 

But it may be a different story when a neutral site is involved, as is the case for games played in London or Mexico City.

The NFL is perfectly willing to close loopholes that put its clubs at a competitive disadvantage even if such added conditions only make it more difficult to achieve the annual 256-game scheduling solution. 

One recently implemented change is that no team can play more than two road games against opponents coming off a bye week.

North said the NFL is constantly on the lookout for anything "statistically significant enough that the league will actively seek to avoid impacting a club's schedule" if it finds an advantage is conferred by a certain mix of factors.

The impact of neutral site games — teams already receive a bye after playing in London — could be something the NFL considers with a fresh eye in the future, not that it will remedy every gripe.

As North told USA TODAY Sports on Tuesday, the night before the 2019 schedule was unveiled, the league's goal is to find "that magical, mythical one schedule that is going to be as good as possible for everybody — and there's no such thing, nobody's ever completely happy." 

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Follow Nate Davis on Twitter @ByNateDavis