The Drubbing

The NFL has some bad teams. I mean really bad. St. Louis Rams, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Oakland Raiders and the Detroit Lions to name a few. Teams so bad even their home-town fans don’t want to watch them. Watching the Atlanta Falcons stomp the San Francisco 49ers 45-10 is fun in the first half, if your a Falcons fan. But after that it gets boring, pathetic and embarrassing to watch.

Fortunately we can look to the European football leagues for a solution. Split the league up into two divisions by level of competition. [Note: NCAA football has a similar configuration, but until they get a playoff system in their premier league, they're not worthy of being a model for anyone else.] This can easily be accomplished and here’s how we do it.

First, just split the teams up. This one is easy. In the premier league we have 16 teams:

1. Arizona Cardinals
2. Atlanta Falcons
3. Baltimore Ravens
4. Carolina Panthers
5. Dallas Cowboys
6. Green Bay Packers
7. Indianapolis Colts
8. Jacksonville Jaguars
9. Minnesota Vikings
10. New England Patriots
11. New Orleans Saints
12. New York Giants
13. Philadelphia Eagles
14. Pittsburgh Steelers
15. San Diego Chargers
16. Tennessee Titans

And in the second-tier league we have the, err, second-rate teams:

1. Buffalo Bills
2. Chicago Bears
3. Cincinnati Bengals
4. Cleveland Browns
5. Denver Broncos
6. Detroit Lions
7. Houston Texans
8. Kansas City Chiefs
9. Miami Dolphins
10. New York Jets
11. Oakland Raiders
12. San Francisco 49ers
13. Seattle Seahawks
14. St. Louis Rams
15. Tampa Bay Buccaneers
16. Washington Redskins

If the NFL wants all of its franchises to fly high, they need to take a page out of European football's book

Second, make the two leagues fluid. At the end of each year the top-two teams from the second-tier move up and the bottom two teams in the premier league drop down. This gives every owner a greater incentive to do everything in their power to build the best possible team. It also gives cities like Detroit, Oakland and St. Louis a chance to see their teams win some games and not be absolutely embarrassed 12-14 games a year. A few years ago Atlanta would’ve certainly been in the bottom tier, but they would’ve won their way up by now because they can obviously compete on that level. The Bears and the Jets would be the obvious favorites to move up this year, but you also have teams like Cincinnati and San Francisco that would certainly give them a good run.

Third, expand the league from 32 to 36 teams. It makes the math a little easier and who wouldn’t want to add an NFL franchise to their city. And this could be done after the new system is in place for a few years. While there are many worthy cities, The four at the top of my list are Los Angeles, Salt Lake City (only because Las Vegas isn’t an option), Portland and Toronto.

Another NFL franchise in Los Angeles might just be the kick in the ass that Al Davis needs to stop flushing the Raiders down the crapper and start making some changes for the positive, namely stepping down from every responsibility other than writing checks. And they’re a city large enough to support another NFL franchise and they could start right away and just build the team a new stadium as time goes on.

We need some more teams out west, and since Vegas isn’t an option, Salt Lake City is the next best. We’d have a new “home town” team for players like Steve Young and John Beck to land at. And Utah fans have already proven themselves to be extremely supportive and dedicated with the Jazz. They deserve a shot at another professional sports franchise.

In another bid to have more teams out west, Portland makes the list. We’d have another city with unpredictable weather, making for some interesting games and I’m sure we could find another software/footwear billionaire to foot the bill and build a good fan base.

Toronto makes is also at the top of the list for several reasons. The city is in close proximity to other NFL franchises, so it’s not as far as it may seem. It would help the NFL expand outside of U.S. borders which is a priority for every professional sports league. And lastly, I can’t think of anything better than adding another stadium that could potentially become a second venue with the mystique, weather and eventually the history of the Frozen Tundra of Lambeau Field.

This will be good for the NFL, it’s fans, it’s coaches and it’s players. Fans want to see competitive, high scoring games. Period. So when you’re pitting two more even rosters against each other every week you get better football games. Fans will watch those games and be willing to pay to go see them. The situations in Detroit, Tampa Bay and Oakland aren’t good for anyone. This can change that. This would give teams the opportunity to build a strong team, instead of being forced to win now every year. If a team is in the second division they can afford to stock up on draft picks, teach those players the NFL game, let them develop over 2-3 seasons and then when you make the jump to the premier league they’ll be ready to go on a multi-year run. That will also give coaches more stability so they can actually have an opportunity to build a winning program.

I can only think of one legitimate reason why this should not happen. And that’s because it would piss off all the old-timers for changing the league from what they remember it being, and because it would screw with the record books. But that’s happened numerous times before. So for the good of the league and the NFL fans, let’s make this happen. 2010 sounds like a nice round year to get this kicked off. Commissioner Goodell you have your orders, now get to it.