Eh. Making games is hard.
Ignoring the specifics of the game mechanics entirely, we can reasonably agree that 2K's game is most likely one featuring:
- striking (possibly not photo-realistic) 3D graphics which will impress on PS5 / XBOX Series X
- motion-captured animations
- real-time physics calculations when in-game actors collide
- original foley and licensed library audio for sound effects
- prominent placement of licensed assets (the NFL teams and NFLPA players) which require third-party approvals
- either licensed audio for music (which requires more third-party approvals) or original music composed in-house
- online head-to-head game modes with real-time gameplay (as opposed to turn-based or asynchronous)
- a live service which frequently delivers new content into the game, and
- a microtransaction-based in-game economy
Even with just those things - we haven't even put the specifics of
football in that feature set, whatever style you want it to be, much less a season or a franchise mode - you're for sure looking at a two or three year dev cycle and a dev team of at least 100 people, likely more.
Anyway, I anticipated this game would get delayed in the E3 thread, so this announcement doesn't surprise me at all.