PITTSBURGH (AP) – Hines Ward rarely looks forward to late December and early January, when his shoulders sometimes ache so badly they hurt on every pass reception and his legs start rebelling after multiple games on unfriendly artificial turf surfaces.
He can’t imagine what it might feel like if those games, now the 15th and 16th of an already long NFL season, start arriving sooner as the 13th and 14th games of an 18-game season.
The very thought of playing two more games that count each season led Ward to predict that the days of players spending a dozen seasons in the league will quickly end.
Any player who lasts eight seasons – and Ward doubts there will be many – will have played as many games as a current nine-season veteran.
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