I forgot about the Packers splitting up their home games in the old days, good catch. Denver and Seattle also played in the pre-season opener, August 5, 1983. That makes no sense since they were division opponents at the time but it happened that way.
Yeah, they played on 8/5/83 in Denver. I just looked at the 1983 schedule. So you are right. They did meet five times in 1983. Of course, it would not count in my book as I care not at all about exhibition contests. If we were to take exhibition games into account, then there likely are several more of these examples especially when we consider that teams used to play six preseason games each summer.
Yeah, that would also bring different stadiums into play since they move the pre-season games around. That Denver-Seattle thing stuck out because I remember it happening, the only possible way to play someone five times in a calendar year. Back then it was uncommon for the regular season to spill into the new year, but the 1982 strike caused that regular season to go to January 2, 1983, allowing this scenario to happen. Now it wouldn't happen because nobody would schedule a pre-season game against a division opponent, I'm not sure why it was done then.
In the first half of the 1960s, the AFL teams had to play each other in the preseason. Denver played Oakland four times in one season. After the merger was agreed to in 1966, the AFL teams began to play NFL teams in the preseason. In 1968, the Jets beat the Patriots in Virginia, Alabama, and New York. The Virginia game was a preseason tilt.
I think that Denver-Seattle game was originally supposed to be played on November 7, 1982. The Jets played at Kansas City on 1/2/83 in front of 11,902 in a pond of red. That Jets-Chiefs game was originally scheduled for 10/24/82. The 1982 season opened on Sunday, September 12. (The 1982 calendar was identical to 2010.) I think the Jets were supposed to play the Chiefs in Week 7 and the Broncos were supposed to play the Seahawks in Seattle in Week 9 but both games were moved to January 2, which was originally scheduled to be Wild Card weekend. I am not sure why the NFL did all that maneuvering. Why not move all the Week 7 games to 1/2 or all the Week 9 games to 1/2? Why mix and match? I bolded "I think" in the previous paragraph because I am not 100% certain about the original dates of the two games in question. I used to have a 1982 preview magazine which I had kept for a long time. I don't recall having thrown it out, but I must have done so during a move. I would have my answers if I still had that magazine. I can't find anything online about the original 1982 schedule except for the Colts who were scheduled to play Miami on 10/24. That game was moved to 1/2. The Jets were scheduled to play at Pittsburgh on 11/14, but that game was cancelled. Play resumed on 11/21.
If I remember correctly the NFL tried to maximize conference matchups, since the short schedule led to a 1-8 seeding system for the playoffs within each conference. Also, the home/away factor for some teams probably made it so that they couldn't just rerun one scheduled week--all of this is guessing and going by memory so take that as you will. Of course it led the the Jets finishing the season with three straight road games and then three more on the road in the playoffs. I hated that KC game becaue we were clearly the better team, clearly didn't show up and cost ourselves a playoff game at Shea by losing it.
That was the site of Super Bowl 8. I included regular season and postseason games in the totals for this thread.
