2026 NFL schedule | AFC record predictions | NFC record predictions | The Rams and the league’s ‘creative Super Bowl’   In 2024, to make up for the fact that Aaron Rodgers tore his Achilles one play into the 2023 season, the NFL put the Jets through a slate of prime-time showcases that would make even the most ruthless stage mom blush. Having learned its lesson with Rodgers specifically, the NFL gave the Steelers a sweetheart schedule to open the season in 2025, likely hoping that Rodgers would factor into that season’s playoffs in some meaningful way (he did, kind of). In that same 2025 season, the NFL put the Chiefs in one prime-time game after another and a season opener in Brazil. The exhausted perpetual Super Bowl contenders gassed out about halfway through the season and finished 6–11.  To say that teams cannot be screwed by the schedule is ignorant . That is why this column exists every year.…