Roger Goodell says 'we gotta shorten' the first round of the NFL Draft

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said he feels like the league needs to do something to address the length of the first round of the NFL Draft, after Thursday's extended session.

Goodell sat down with the Pat McAfee Show on Friday to discuss the draft, and said the league needs to figure out a way to shorten the proceedings.

"I started thinking last night we gotta shorten [the draft]," Goodell said, "We've got time that you can save...seven minute first round, but you can get two minutes extra if you need it. You can call it, but then you don't get it again the rest of the Draft."

Goodell has a point about the length of the draft. Even without the built-in delays, ad breaks and potential heat-of-the moment trades that can and do extend its length each year, the run time for 32 teams to make picks with 10 minutes on the clock is five hours and 20 minutes.

And remember, the first round specifically is choreographed for television. Each pick gets their moment, gets the chance to come on stage and hug the commissioner, or be seen celebrating with their families at their individual draft parties. It's about the moment, and the clock, while present, doesn't immediately start when a pick is made, and the commissioner doesn't come out to announce picks the instant they come in.

From an on-paper perspective, shortening pick times is a great way to keep the draft on a timely schedule and make sure everything is moving smoothly in the way it needs to. But there are several hurdles to that prospect.

First of all, teams would need to be on board with getting less time to make first-round picks. There's no guarantee they'd be okay with losing three minutes, even though the vast majority of teams came in under that mark in this year's first round.

On top of that, shortening the draft might draw the ire of advertisers, who pay for a certain number of placements over the course of the event, and would have less opportunities for their ads to be shown were the draft to be shortened so significantly. That would result in more ad breaks per Draft, which would likely annoy fans, given how ad-laden the Draft already feels.

There are no easy answers to the problem, but the fact that Goodell recoginzes it as an issue is a promising sign that something will be done in the future to make the biggest night of the offseason even more watchable for fans.

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