If you're big into Fantasy football, you may have noticed something about the NFL schedule this week and that is the fact that EVERY team is playing in Week 8. That might not seem like a big deal, but it's actually something that doesn't happen very often.
Since the NFL realigned its divisions in 2002, there's been at least one team given a bye from Week 6 through Week 9 in 20 of the 21 years since then. The only exception to that rule came last year, when the NFL also had every team playing in Week 8. With the league now skipping all byes in Week 8 for the second straight year -- after not doing it a single time over 20 years -- this makes it seem like a scheduling trend that the NFL will likely use going forward.
For the 2024 season, the byes started in Week 5 and they'll go through Week 14, but there won't be any byes in Week 8 or Week 12. Having no byes in Week 12 is actually normal and we'll explain why further down.
For the most part, the NFL has had a pretty consistent rule when it comes to byes: They usually start in Week 4, 5 or 6, and once they start, they usually run through Week 11, 12, 13 or 14.
There's no official rule in place for the bye week, but once the byes start, the NFL almost aways runs them in consecutive weeks until every team has had a bye. The only exception to this rule comes on Thanksgiving week when the NFL usually makes every team play.
This year, Thanksgiving will fall on Week 13 and every team will be playing that week. Of course, even the Thanksgiving rule isn't set in stone. As recently as 2021, we saw two teams get a bye during Thanksgiving week. That being said, with the addition of the Black Friday game, plus three Thanksgiving games, there's a good chance there won't be any Thanksgiving week byes going forward because the NFL will need some teams to play in the Sunday games that week.
As for the Week 8 quirk, which is happening for the second straight season, the NFL hasn't done anything remotely like this in at least 13 years. The last time the NFL randomly made every team play during its stretch of bye weeks came in 2011 when the league scheduled zero byes for Week 10. (During the 2011 season, the byes ran from Week 4 through Week 11.) That being said, the NFL was hit with a lockout in 2011, and when the schedule came out in April of that year, it wasn't even clear if the season was going to start on time, so that could have played a factor in that quirk.
The bye week has been evolving for more than a decade now. As recently as 2010, no team ever got a bye later than Week 10. However, the NFL has now pushed that out with the latest byes now coming in Week 14. (The Ravens, Broncos, Texans, Colts, Patriots and Commanders all have a Week 14 bye this season.)
Giving six teams an off-week in December isn't ideal for Fantasy purposes, but most teams seem to prefer a later bye, and there might be a reason for that: Almost every Super Bowl winner for the past 10 seasons has been a team that got a later bye. Six of the seven Super Bowl winners since 2017 have had a bye in Week 10 or later. If you go back to 2014, nine of 11 Super Bowl winners have had a bye in Week 9 or later.
Over the past 13 years, not a single team has won the Super Bowl in a season where it had a Week 6 bye or earlier. If that trend holds up, that means the Vikings, Dolphins, Rams, Chiefs, Titans, Eagles, Chargers and Lions won't be winning the Super Bowl this year. All eight of those teams had an early bye this year. This trend could kill the Chiefs' chance at a three-peat.
If the NFL expands the schedule to 18 games, the league could consider going to two byes per season. The league actually tried that in 1993, but it wasn't very popular and it was immediately scrapped starting in 1994.
One other bye nugget that might fascinate you is that there was at least one team on a bye EVERY week from 1999 through 2001. During those three seasons, the NFL had 31 teams, so at least one team had to be off each week. Speaking of 2001, the Cardinals didn't play their first game until Week 3 that season. The Cards had a Week 1 bye and then they also had Week 2 off because the NFL postponed all Week 2 games due to 9/11.