The NFL has tried everything in its power to make itself a year-round spectacle. They have added a game to the season, added a bye week (a second one might actually help the players), and moved the calendar around so that everything happens later, and take longer just as it has done with the NFL Draft. The draft used to be several more rounds but as the rounds dwindled the NFL still found a way to make the actual event of picking players longer.
The NFL does all of this believing that the NFL fans will tune into nearly anything with the official NFL shield tied to or attached to it and in fact, many of us will or at least enough of us will that they can sell additional advertising, thus further lining their already very deep pockets.