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*OFFICIAL Week 12 NFL Thread* The stretch run is on!!

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I agree it is on any given Sunday that a "bad" team can beat a "good" team, but the playoffs are supposed to be for those teams that are the best, not just in one game (as Oakland was clearly the best team in that KC game), but of the entire season. The conferences are terrible anyway. Most are just cobbled together and don't really represent geographical rivalries. I mean, SF and Oakland, sure, but Dallas and Philly? Why aren't NYG and NYJ rivals? That would make the most sense.

I think the English Premier League has the best set up, considering they have derbies. But, they have fewer teams than the NFL (20 in the top league). Dividing it into two conferences (don't even have to be geographical east / west) and saying "play 20 games and whichever 6 has the best record advances.
 
Imported said:
I think division winners should get a playoff game, but IMO the seeding should be based on your record. The reward for a 5-11 division winner is the playoff game and shouldn't be home field.
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How does that solve the issue with a 5-11 team making the playoffs?

What happens if a 5-11 team wins the SB? D:
 
zinfamous said:
I think the quick turnaround of that entire division in such short order shows that, for the most part, the NFL has a rather good model for boosting ailing franchises.
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I think I'd rather pretend you didn't just say that than think about a legitimate reply.
 
Phoenix86 said:
How does that solve the issue with a 5-11 team making the playoffs?

What happens if a 5-11 team wins the SB? D:
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Seattle made it at 7-9. What they should do is only guarantee the two top records in the conference get a bye and home game, and the rest are seeded by record. Seattle won the opening round in large part due to their home field advantage, against the defending SB champs (Saints).

For the most part, I don't see this as an issue. If a 5-11 team gets in, then whoever they play should beat them and move on. If another team with a higher record doesn't get in, they should have won more games. The division system is probably as good as they can get, because the teams in the division have 11 common opponents. I like the wildcards, but really, if you don't win the division you probably shouldn't get in the playoffs anyway.
 
The divisions are terrible. Especially, when you have divisions with non competitive teams or ultra competitive teams.

Every team should be competing against every other team in the conference and the best make it to the playoffs. If teams can't obtain a better record than all but 5 other teams, they don't deserve to be in the playoffs. Winning your division with a losing record is beyond stupid. If they just put in a rule that if you won your division, but another team that didn't get a wildcard spot has a better record, you have to forfeit your spot, I'd be okay with it.
 
The season is too short to have parity in strength of schedule for every team in the conference. We've seen 13-3 teams lose to 9-7 teams in the playoffs, so that 9-7 record with a tough strength of schedule is better than the 13-3 creampuff schedule. A 9-7 team competing against its division with 11 common opponents ensures that the better team out of that division makes it in the playoffs. You shouldn't throw out of system for an edge case. A team with a losing record has only made the playoffs 3 times, and 2 of those were during a 9 game strike season.

In basketball, hockey and baseball seeding based on overall record makes more sense, but not really in football. I would think 30 games minimum would be needed to seed by overall schedule, with no inter conference games. EDIT: Or at least every team in a conference plays each other at least once.
 
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Phoenix86 said:
What if the team with the cream puff schedule is the 5-11 team?
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Then thats the way it goes. At least they beat out 3 other teams with approximately the same schedule. The division system is a season long playoff. If a team wins it they deserve to move on. If not, then there is no point the divisions. Remaking divisions is a different issue. The 3 division conference they had before was better, but its always a possibility with divisions. Even if there were just conferences and every team in the conference played each other, someone is always going to complain team x beat so and so at home and my team had to play team x on the road. I think the current system is good enough given the number of games they have to work with.
 
smackababy said:
I agree it is on any given Sunday that a "bad" team can beat a "good" team, but the playoffs are supposed to be for those teams that are the best, not just in one game (as Oakland was clearly the best team in that KC game), but of the entire season. The conferences are terrible anyway. Most are just cobbled together and don't really represent geographical rivalries. I mean, SF and Oakland, sure, but Dallas and Philly? Why aren't NYG and NYJ rivals? That would make the most sense.
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As weird as all of these sound, and as little sense as Dallas being in the east seems, it is all based on the age of these franchises and when there was no unified "NFL."

A lot of these rivalries had been long-established before unification, and I think more to appease the fans, and history, divisions had to be somewhat arbitrarily cobbled together to maintain that history.

I think Jets and Giants were, at one point, competing sports leagues, no? Though I seem to recall the Jets being the newer, expansion franchise when the modern NFL came into being?
 
zinfamous said:
As weird as all of these sound, and as little sense as Dallas being in the east seems, it is all based on the age of these franchises and when there was no unified "NFL."

A lot of these rivalries had been long-established before unification, and I think more to appease the fans, and history, divisions had to be somewhat arbitrarily cobbled together to maintain that history.

I think Jets and Giants were, at one point, competing sports leagues, no? Though I seem to recall the Jets being the newer, expansion franchise when the modern NFL came into being?
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Jets were in the AFL. Most of the divisions were based on the merger, but they moved some teams around a few years ago.
 
Sources are saying Redskins to bench RG3 for McCoy. This is just an awful idea, IMO. If they are deciding to get rid of RG3, keeping him in can only help their chances of someone seeing something they like in him. If they are going to release him, why not simply try and get something out of him and if he somehow does better, feign you are going to pick up his 5th year option and use that as leverage in a trade. Benching him only devalues any small value he has left.
 
So now the Pittsburgh media is accusing the Patriots of "tampering" with the Blount situation, "speculating" that Blount's agent told him to misbehave so Tomlin would can him and he could go to the Pats. Meanwhile he conveniently forgot to mention that 30 teams were in front of the Pats with a chance to offer Blount work and NONE did, but hey, it's Bill B. so let's accuse him of cheating, sour grapes IMO..http://www.post-gazette.com/sports/steelers/2014/11/23/On-the-Steelers-Twist-in-Blount-s-career-raises-a-suspicious-eyebrow/stories/201411230134
 
smackababy said:
Sources are saying Redskins to bench RG3 for McCoy. This is just an awful idea, IMO. If they are deciding to get rid of RG3, keeping him in can only help their chances of someone seeing something they like in him. If they are going to release him, why not simply try and get something out of him and if he somehow does better, feign you are going to pick up his 5th year option and use that as leverage in a trade. Benching him only devalues any small value he has left.
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Adam Schefter of ESPN reports it is happening Sunday:

http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/nfl/rgiii-out-mccoy-back-in-as-redskins-starting-qb/ar-BBfTwoN

Gruden is trying to save his job, I think. McCoy (or even Cousins) give the Redskins a better chance to win, plain and simple. RGIII's injury excuses are no longer valid IMO and even if they were, well, would you want a guy who takes 2+ years to recover from his injuries?

Also, they're playing the Colts and probably want to save RGIII (and his fans) further embarrassment from being compared to Luck in a head-to-head matchup. :awe:
 
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BUTCH1 said:
So now the Pittsburgh media is accusing the Patriots of "tampering" with the Blount situation, "speculating" that Blount's agent told him to misbehave so Tomlin would can him and he could go to the Pats. Meanwhile he conveniently forgot to mention that 30 teams were in front of the Pats with a chance to offer Blount work and NONE did, but hey, it's Bill B. so let's accuse him of cheating, sour grapes IMO..http://www.post-gazette.com/sports/...ses-a-suspicious-eyebrow/stories/201411230134
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I often wonder who I hate more -- the Steelers or Patriots. I have to admit, if the Steelers and Patriots played tomorrow, I'd want the Patriots to beat their asses badly.
 
smackababy said:
Sources are saying Redskins to bench RG3 for McCoy. This is just an awful idea, IMO. If they are deciding to get rid of RG3, keeping him in can only help their chances of someone seeing something they like in him. If they are going to release him, why not simply try and get something out of him and if he somehow does better, feign you are going to pick up his 5th year option and use that as leverage in a trade. Benching him only devalues any small value he has left.
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I kinda sensed this happening. From a divisional rival perspective, the more dysfunctional the other teams in the division are, the better my Iggles will be. 🙂

From a pure football perspective, this doesn't make sense. They invested way too much into RG3 to not see what he can do in his final games this year. If you bench him now, you're basically cutting him because they're not going to pay the insane dollars ($18.4 mil) on his contract next year if he's not the long term answer at QB. They also have some star defensive players and you basically told players like Orakpo and Hall that they wasted 5 years of their short career on a non-contender.
 
IndyColtsFan said:
I often wonder who I hate more -- the Steelers or Patriots. I have to admit, if the Steelers and Patriots played tomorrow, I'd want the Patriots to beat their asses badly.
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Yea, I have to admit that some Patriot fans, (specially the bandwagon one's that glommed on after '01) are annoying and BB is not a very likeable guy but Steeler fan's are just as annoying, Christ when they open a "Steeler store" in a strip mall near me I about puked, giant inflatable's swinging in the breeze out in front, yeech!..
 
akugami said:
I kinda sensed this happening. From a divisional rival perspective, the more dysfunctional the other teams in the division are, the better my Iggles will be. 🙂

From a pure football perspective, this doesn't make sense. They invested way too much into RG3 to not see what he can do in his final games this year. If you bench him now, you're basically cutting him because they're not going to pay the insane dollars ($18.4 mil) on his contract next year if he's not the long term answer at QB. They also have some star defensive players and you basically told players like Orakpo and Hall that they wasted 5 years of their short career on a non-contender.
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From a pure football perspective, it makes much sense. You play the better player. RG3 lost his job for a reason.
 
akugami said:
I kinda sensed this happening. From a divisional rival perspective, the more dysfunctional the other teams in the division are, the better my Iggles will be. 🙂

From a pure football perspective, this doesn't make sense. They invested way too much into RG3 to not see what he can do in his final games this year. If you bench him now, you're basically cutting him because they're not going to pay the insane dollars ($18.4 mil) on his contract next year if he's not the long term answer at QB. They also have some star defensive players and you basically told players like Orakpo and Hall that they wasted 5 years of their short career on a non-contender.
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Benching him for the rest of the reason just hurts Washington IMO. If they are fully committed to not have RG3 on the roster next year, benching him for the rest of the season tells anyone who might want him to simply not deal and pick him up as an FA. Washington can't even pretend they are going to pick up his 5th year option or attempt any leverage in any kind of trade. I think his last 2 years, if they pick up the 5th, would be like less than $20 million. Teams have paid more for worse QBs (ones with less potential upside to boot). I actually think RG3 would fit in well with the Eagles. He runs the read option exceptionally well, he makes great short, high completion passes, and he has a canon of an arm.
 
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