Goodell expects NFL players to compete in 2028 Olympic flag football

Roger Goodell said he “absolutely” expects active and retired NFL players to line up for flag football at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, turning the league’s Olympic green light into an immediate roster fight. NFL clubs had already voted unanimously on May 20, 2025, in Eagan, Minnesota, to allow player participation and authorized the league to work with the NFL Players Association, the International Federation of American Football and Olympic authorities on the rules.

The framework leaves little room for error. Olympic flag football at LA28 will have six men’s teams and six women’s teams, each with 10-player rosters in five-on-five play, and the NFL has said each club may send one player. That makes every slot valuable, especially for the current flag standouts who built the sport’s U.S. identity long before NFL stars arrived.

Goodell said the calendar helps the league’s case because the Olympic tournament will come before NFL training camps begin, and he said players “love the big stage” and would treasure a chance to win a gold medal. Pierre Trochet, the president of IFAF, said the vote adds another dimension to an Olympic debut that is already drawing attention far beyond the flag football community.

The selection politics are now the part to watch. USA Football expects to announce Olympic selection procedures later in 2026, but the debate over who should fill the roster has already sharpened. Olympics coverage has noted that Darrell Doucette, one of the sport’s top U.S. flag players, has estimated only one or two NFL players may end up on the 10-man Olympic roster, a projection that captures the tension between star power and keeping the team true to the sport as it exists now.

The IOC approved the qualification system for LA28 in February 2026, and the United States automatically qualified in both the men’s and women’s events as host nation. LA28 has placed both tournaments in the first week of the Games at BMO Stadium in Los Angeles, giving flag football one of the earliest stages of the Summer Olympics and, possibly, its most watched roster battle.