CHA_CHING

True.

I apologize if I am derailing this topic in a way to talk about the changes in parity in the NFL. This is something we could discuss at length as a topic itself and I often see it brought up in stat based NFL communities with people who run stats from before 2002 and then compare it to the modern era.

I think it was incredibly rare for a team to go 7-9 or 8-8 for 3 consecutive years in the old NFL before 2002. Usually a back to back average season spawned a playoff run the next year, or the team simply crashed and burned, requiring a rebuild.

There was a point where 2 of 3 divisions in a conference had 5 teams. The old NFC West we were a part of was like this when Carolina became a team. This made the schedules crazy cause for these teams in a division of 5 teams, half of their games were divisional. Another weird thing was playing a non-divisional opponent twice during the same season (because I recently ran stats on the early-mid 90's Chargers, it's fresh on my mind that they played the Colts twice in 1992, stomping them both times).

The infamous "last place schedule" also was a big deal and the best example that most people use of teams benefiting from this is the 1999 Rams, whom still to this day had the easiest schedule of a SB winning team. Their schedule was a ridiculously easy cake walk of garbage teams and yet they were 0-3 against the only teams above .500 that they played.

1998 Cardinals and our beloved 2000 Saints are also other examples of the last place schedule benefiting a team. That Cards team was the one that made us all believe Jake Plummer was going to be future elite QB - he had 7 game winning drives that year, all 7 against teams below .500. Our 2000 Saints were a lot better, cause we still nearly made the playoffs the next year while the Cards plummeted in 1999.

Long story short; the last place schedule was meant to help those garbage teams that were bad for years on end (unless a team decided to outright tank). This was the main thing that kept Tampa Bay from being a 2-14 dumpster fire in the years after 1986.

There is no way to create a last place schedule in a 4 team, 4 division conference the way the league has been set up since 2002. We still get those flukey 9-7 or 8-8 playoff teams, but this is still the result of a weak conference, which was the case in the old NFL. The years we had division winners with losing records (2010 Seattle and 2014 Carolina) was the result of an entire division being terrible.

The NFL has always prided itself being the one national league in the U.S. that has parity. This type of stuff never happened in the NBA or MLB (both those leagues have a problem with a handful of teams dominating it and star players driving the league - parity in the NBA has been a joke forever). Even in modern days, they are so worried about parity, sometimes I believe the fans conspiracy theories about refs keeping games close for the sake of viewership (seen too many games in the past decade that are only wins of 10 points or less but should've been blow outs).

jeanpierre

NFL has the trues salary cap and profit-sharing; Maras were true visionaries to trust the process knowing a smaller slice would actually yield more overall pie for his team...

NBA has multiple, multiple problems - too many for one post. Too many Cap exceptions, Player tampering, Devolving basketball quality skills, and the list goes on...

MLB's player union is too influential; guaranteed contracts are often death sentences for teams not named Yankees, Dodgers, or Red Sox; MLB needs a true salary cap and cessation of 100% guaranteed contracts...

What has happened in MLB that teams have felt the heat from fan-bases and money-ball strategy was born; scouting, analytics have finally allowed some teams to compete with the Yankees free agnecy buy-all...

It's not that my way is the right way, I just make the right way my way...

jeanpierre

Back to the issue of the thread though, absolutely don't like lowering our expectations of officiating on the last play of a game...

With money involved in the NFL, league officials have no excuse in not securing the best officiating possible. Judgement calls are made all game, and quality standards should be consistent start to finish...

vpheughan

What worries me is the "money" (legalized betting) will be in hundreds of millions if not billions. How can any league keep "the game pure" when we all know money talks. What's a million dollars to an official and/or a player to "turn a blind eye" or "blow an assignment" on any given play?