Even at the times of little news during the offseason, the NFL keeps fans in anticipation of what might come next. With less than a month until the NFL Draft, the release of the 2014 NFL schedule is expected sooner. For most sports, a schedule release isn’t a big deal, but with the small amount of games during the NFL season compared to the other leagues, the NFL schedule release becomes its own event. So much so, two teams, the Buffalo Bills and St. Louis Rams, are having contests involving fans predicting the schedule. If anyone wins the Rams contest, they'll get $100,000, which would be enough to get tickets to all the games on our list. The winner of the Bills contest will get free season tickets for life. In addition to the possibility of making someone very rich, the schedule release is also big business for those that cover America's most popular sport. The league's own network is also holding a prime time special on the night of the schedule release that will span several hours. ESPN will likely do the same, and for gridiron-starved fans, it will be must-see TV.
Each match-up is already known for both home and away games, the question remaining is when those games will occur. As the NFL has seen in the past few seasons, the timing of some of these games is just as important as the opponent. Until the actual NFL schedule is released, there is only speculation. Certain factors will cause the prices of some games to rise and fall. Sunday and Monday night games usually get the best match-ups of the week and the prime time start can and usually does impact ticket prices. Some of the most expensive games also tend to happen towards the end of the season when games have a bigger impact on playoff positioning. There will also be additional intrigue around who will play the Dallas Cowboys on Thanksgiving day. It's already been leaked the the Bills will play the Detroit Lions in one of the turkey-day games, and the schedule release will confirm whether that is the truth. If it is, it will be the 10th time in the regular season that the two teams have met. It will also be the ninth Thanksgiving Day game for the Bills, with the last game in 1994. Over the past couple of seasons, the schedule makers have made Week 17 all division match-ups, and the result has been more regular season games with a playoff spot on the lines. Two such games occurred in 2013 and featured playoff-level pricing
While we'll be sharing data once the schedule does get release, we decided to get ahead of the release by using some data from last year’s secondary market prices from TiqIQ to make a few predictions on which games will be the most expensive for the upcoming NFL season. Last In addition to a Superbowl rematch, there are a lot of exciting divisional match-ups to look forward to as well as Brady-Manning 16, which could be the last time these two legends face off. There's also a new stadium to open in San Francisco, which will surely be one of the biggest games on the 49ers Schedule.
