Can't remember when we had the latter game with the Falcons in New Orleans...

2017 & 2018

In 2017 Wk 11 was in NO and Wk 13 was in ATL...

But you are right about 2018, we did have the rare Away and Home with the ATL...

Sorry, but I believe you are mistaken. In 2017 week 14 was a Thursday night game in Atlanta, December 7th. We lost 20-17. We hosted Atlanta two weeks later on Christmas Eve at 1:00 week 16 and won 23-13.

Getting a little fuzzy there, JP.

NFL Schedule makers make this harder than it needs to be...

Season should open and close with divisional games, alternating and progressing home-away-home then away-home-away...

Conference games should be split following and preceding the division games...

Inter-conference games should be in the middle of the season...

If the league is worried about some of its favored teams traveling cross-country, it could slide the BYE games in for relief...

I watched a special on the making of the schedule. They run millions of iterations of the schedule before coming down to the final version which is then presented to Goodell for final signoff. It uses a list of rules which attempts to eliminate scheduling discrepancies as much as is possible. Each iteration is given a generated grade based upon compliance to the "rules". These rules mark down for multi-game road trips, etc. They also grade up matchups in certain time slots. It has to take into consideration events already scheduled in advance for the venues, network affiliation availability, etc. It was extremely interesting, but also clearly showed that there is no possibility of individual bias, especially on the part of Goodell. His input only involves the approval of rules, which have pretty much been the same since well before it all went completely computer driven, and the final signoff on the single schedule finally placed before him.

Unfortunately, your scenarios, while desirable even in the scheduling team's plans, are skewered by all of the outside factors concerning the venues and broadcast requirements. Events booked years in advance for the day before, during, and after game dates take precedent. Some teams are going to have back-to-back-to-back road games. There's no way around it. Or back-to-back opposite coast games. Although, the rules flag those teams to help avoid the same sort of scheduling "bad breaks" over the next couple of years.

This is all done via simulations and the team simply compares grades and then goes over the entire schedule generated of those with the very highest grades to see if any will make the final cuts.

Or that is all a smokescreen that they can tell the public to present a fair front when in reality Gotohell picks the schedule that screws the teams he wants to screw, like the Saints, the most. Sort of like when the NBA did their own internal investigation of the point shaving Ref and announced he was the only culprit.

LOL! Nope. Not a smokescreen at all. The special covered the whole process for the entire offseason the day they knew all the matchups. It followed the procedure daily as a documentary.

Here's the actual video. It is about 22 minutes long. It is well worth the watch.

https://www.facebook.com/NFL/videos/308752617366751