Ready for a sub-.500 playoff team?

Zero2Cool
Elite Member Topic Starter

14 years ago

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmonsnfl2010/100924

I'm only quoting the part that sparked my interest. I believe Rourke will like this setup, because, I don't. Not in spite of me, but differing opinions on scenarios.

Here's my question: Why create the potential of a 10-win team missing the playoffs just because we were obligated to include a sub-.500 team? The easiest solution: Any division champ that doesn't win eight games loses its guaranteed playoff spot. If you go 7-8-1, 7-7-2, 7-6-3, 6-6-4, whatever ... you're out. I want eight victories. Minimum. Then again, you shouldn't sneak into the playoffs with eight wins just because you lucked out with a crappy division. The NFC West has lost 58 percent of its games since 2002. Fifty-eight percent! Why should the division champ be grandfathered in every year like some drunk legacy kid at a country club?

A more radical (and fairer) solution: We shake things up starting in 2011 and create four eight-team divisions ...

AFC East: New England, New York, New York, Buffalo, Philly, Baltimore, Washington, Carolina.

AFC West: Oakland, San Francisco, San Diego, Seattle, Denver, Arizona, Kansas City, St. Louis.

NFC Central: Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Detroit, Cincinnati, Green Bay, Indianapolis, Chicago, Minnesota.

NFC South: Miami, Tampa Bay, Dallas, Houston, New Orleans, Tennessee, Atlanta, Jacksonville.

Geographically? Makes total sense. Finally. (Is there anything dumber than Baltimore being in the AFC Central but Miami being in the AFC East?) Competitively, since the owners are stupidly/stubbornly/indefensibly/greedily/soullessly/selfishly pushing for an 18-game regular season and will inevitably prevail (sadly, there's no real way to stop them even as their sport inches closer and closer to that final scene of "Rollerball"), we change the schedule's requirements so teams play home-and-homes with three of their division rivals every season (never the same three teams); they play the other four division rivals once; they play four teams from the other division in their conference; then they play four teams from the other conference. That's 18 games ... and tons of collateral damage. But, hey, who cares about the health, happiness and well-being of retired football players?

For my revamped playoffs, the four division champs would earn byes for Round 1. Everything else would play out like it does now: 12 playoff teams, four rounds, winner takes all. And we'd never have to worry about a sub-.500 team getting 10-plus points at home in a first-round playoff game ever again.

Eight teams, per division? I think that eliminates a lot of rival games. I like having two chances to pounce the Vikings and Bears. If you were to play everyone in your division, that leaves two out of division games to be played.

Would that make playoffs more exciting because teams would be less prepared?

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Porforis
Veteran Member

14 years ago

The idea of increasing the number of games, or drastically restructuring divisions drives me up the wall everytime the subject gets started. It has everything to do with sucking extra money out of fans, and there's so many reasons why getting rid of preseason games and adding regular season games is a BAD IDEA.

More directly on-subject, I like the idea on paper but when's the last time a 7-9 team won their division? It might be something worth putting in the books just in case, but there's plenty of more pressing matters at hand that the league should be focusing on. There may not BE a next year.

Formo
Veteran Member

14 years ago

"Porforis" wrote:

This.

Thanks to TheViking88 for the sig!!

Nonstopdrivel
Preferred Member

14 years ago

Eliminating preseason games and increasing regular season games will have one effect, and one only: increase the number of sucky games at the beginning of the season. Right now the first couple of weeks tend to be really sloppy. If we go to two preseason games and 18 regular season games, we'll probably see at least four weeks of bad football. So fans will still be paying full price for a sub-par product.

Zero2Cool
Elite Member Topic Starter

14 years ago

Two preseason games .. so first game starters play three quarters, then only a couple series in the second?

GOPACKGO1225
Registered

14 years ago

I never understood why the Cowboys are in the NFC East.

mi_keys
Senior Member

14 years ago

That sounds like a terrible idea. He's cocking up far more than he could ever hope to fix.

I went back and looked at every year since 1970 to see how many times teams had .500 or below .500 records and won their division. Only one team has won their division with a .500 record in the last four decades (San Diego in 2008). Only 11 teams have made the playoffs with a .500 record or worse and all but San Diego have been wild cards. So what problem does he plan on fixing?

In the mean time he is planning on breaking up rivalries in favor of geographic proximity. I'm sorry but if you need to be told why Baltimore is with the AFC North (old Browns, heated rivalry there) or the Dolphins are in the AFC East (again rivalries with the other East teams) or Cowboys are in the NFC East you're not following rivalries in football.

Also, if he's so worried about geographic proximity, going to four divisions makes everything more spread out. One of his divisions has Dallas and Miami in the same division. That's something like 1,300 miles apart, and not all that closer than Dallas and New York.

Terrible idea.

Born and bred a cheesehead

Zero2Cool
Elite Member Topic Starter

10 years ago

This would be fascinating.

Michaeld David Smith says: Using ESPN’s NFL Playoff Machine, I found a scenario that saw the Packers finishing at 12-4, losing the NFC North tiebreaker to the 12-4 Lions, and then losing the NFC wild card tiebreaker to the 12-4 Cowboys and 49ers.

Green Bay fans would be livid if that happened, although that scenario is a long shot. However, there are plausible scenarios that have an 11-5 team missing the playoffs while a 5-11 team wins the NFC South.

wpr
Preferred Member

10 years ago

Why would anyone be lived? If you don't win the division you are an at large/ wild card team. If there is a softer division and a team with a losing record gets in that's the breaks.

sschind
Senior Member

10 years ago

#10

Yeah, lets fix more shit that ain't broken.

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