What Are NFL Inactives?

NFL inactives are the list of players that are not eligible to play in a game. This list is published 90 minutes before the start of each game.

Inactives are an important part of competitive balance in the NFL, and they help teams keep their rosters small to allow them to manage short-term injuries without sacrificing a player’s long-term career. Currently, each team can field a maximum of 46 players on their active game day rosters.

The number of inactives varies by team, but it’s generally between eight and nine. It’s designed to allow a team to carry a few extra players on their roster while giving them a week to rest and recover from an injury, and it allows them to develop those extra players for potential future use.

There’s also a debate over whether or not practice squad players should be able to step in and replace an injured player on the 53-man active roster. While this idea makes sense in theory, it has its drawbacks.

For starters, it would be a new system for the league and the players union to negotiate. And it would require that practice squad players be paid at a lower rate than active players.

Another issue is that some players on the inactive list could end up getting paid if they return to the active roster at a later date, which would be an incentive for them to remain on the roster. For example, if a player has been inactive for eight games, they could be paid $15,400 a week until they have returned to the active roster.

Some fans think that inactives are bad because they make it difficult for players to get healthy and ready for the next game, but proponents argue that these lists help teams maintain a reasonable amount of depth and keep their rosters as small as possible. They also help to avoid the risk of poaching players from other teams who are on injured reserve.