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Schedule/playoff format suggestion:


Dkollidas

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With all the discussion we’ve been hearing regarding adding games to the schedule in the new CBA, and the playoff format as well, I figured to make a topic on it.

 

Honestly I like the schedule as it is now, except for having 4 pre-season games. It is overkill. But with regard to the regular season, it just works so well. Even number of games played, 16 games each in a 32 team league is nice and divisible. 

 

My suggestion would be to go to 8 playoff teams per conference, and get rid of the bye weeks. 

 

Bye weeks, in such a physically demanding game, give far too much advantage to the team with the week off. 

 

These teams are already getting home field against everyone else, which is also a major advantage in a game where crowds can easily make it hard for the road teams offense to make calls and checks on the field.

 

Currently, the league plays 11 playoff games. 4 Wild Card games, 4 Divisional Games, 2 Conference Championships and the Super Bowl.

 

Adding two teams and doing a traditional 1-8, 2-7, 3-6, 4-5 setup in each conference would put the total at 15 playoff games. Adding 4 playoff games to the total. This would be huge for revenue with the ability to televise 8 playoff games per weekend. Networks would be going hard after that as ratings for playoff games are usually quite a bit higher than regular season. 

 

 

I think players might be in favor of this because it gives more teams a chance to win. Adding playoff teams and taking away the bye weeks helps level the field. 

 

The teams would like this because it adds revenue league wide from TV deals, and with more teams making the playoffs, I would lead to more teams having a chance at playoff revenue (ticket sales, merchandise and concessions, etc). 

 

 

 

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My preference has long been to get rid of divisions and play every team in your conference once plus one game vs. an out of conference team.

 

Divisions are just a dumb way of deciding who the best teams are and handing out home games to division winners when they beat up on a bad division gives teams too much of an advantage in the post season. If every conference team has pretty much the same schedule it makes seeding those teams in the post season as fair as it can be.

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Never ever ever ever remove a first round bye from 1 or 2 teams. That's what the best team should be playing for. It is what makes it more likely you will see the best teams in the Super Bowl. Go to 7 playoff teams per conference. 1 Bye week for the best team and seed the next six 1-6. There needs to be a reward for being the best.

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3 hours ago, MDH said:

My preference has long been to get rid of divisions and play every team in your conference once plus one game vs. an out of conference team.

 

Divisions are just a dumb way of deciding who the best teams are and handing out home games to division winners when they beat up on a bad division gives teams too much of an advantage in the post season. If every conference team has pretty much the same schedule it makes seeding those teams in the post season as fair as it can be.

I've always agreed with this as well. I've always found divisions kind of pointless. Like technically I've always looked at it as, let's say one team in a division wins the division at 10-6 but they go 0-6 against divisional opponents and let's say another team in the division goes 6-10 but 6-0 in the division. Wouldn't you say at that point that the 6-10 team actually won that division since they won all division games? Obviously, I'm not saying that the 6-10 team should make the playoffs, but how do you call a team that went 0-6 in their division as division champs? I get they have the better record of the two teams but it makes no sense. I've always felt like for playoff purposes that the teams with the top 6 records in each conference should make it. Divisions shouldn't even matter in all that. So that means if you have a 9-7 team in the 7th spot in each conference and there's a division winner at 8-8 that the 9-7 team would basically take that teams spot which they deserve based on having the better record. That's why divisions should be eliminated 

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4 hours ago, MDH said:

My preference has long been to get rid of divisions and play every team in your conference once plus one game vs. an out of conference team.

 

Divisions are just a dumb way of deciding who the best teams are and handing out home games to division winners when they beat up on a bad division gives teams too much of an advantage in the post season. If every conference team has pretty much the same schedule it makes seeding those teams in the post season as fair as it can be.

 

 

The only way this would work....

 

you basically have 4 8 team divisions. One division vs other for 15 games thrn play one game against other 2conferences as positional games.

 

then p,ayoffs eoukd be

 

4 divisional winners get byes. Thr next 3-4 teams among these two merged divisions get wild cards 

 

then cross over playoffs

 

2 division  winners from the two division pairing p,ay otherdivision wild card teams. 

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Thoughts:

 

1. There has to be two preseason games, in my opinion. 

 

2.  Bye weeks have to stay. Can’t see the NFLPA letting go of those (nor should they). 

 

3. I like the addition of playoff games. Would definitely make for intriguing viewing and increasing player pay. Win-win. 

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15 minutes ago, TroutDog said:

Thoughts:

 

1. There has to be two preseason games, in my opinion. 

 

2.  Bye weeks have to stay. Can’t see the NFLPA letting go of those (nor should they). 

 

3. I like the addition of playoff games. Would definitely make for intriguing viewing and increasing player pay. Win-win. 

 

No not less bye weeks but more with guarantee that any team on TNF will have weekend before off.

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The absolute last thing I want is to have the playoffs diluted by having more teams. It's perfect now. Making the playoffs is actually an accomplishment. In the NHL if you don't make the playoffs you pretty much suck.

 

I want to keep it as strong as possible. I don't want the Bills or any other team to get into the playoffs with an 8-8 record because we allow 16 teams on. That's hogwash.

 

Weak teams occasionally sneak in to the playoffs as it is. Expanding the playoffs ensures that weak teams will get in almost every year.

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3 hours ago, Doc Brown said:

The only change I'd make is the division winner should make the playoffs but shouldn't be guaranteed a home playoff game.  The WC home games should be given to the teams with the better record.

 

This. Division winners shouldn't get auto home games, best record should determine that.

And while I'm not against adding more teams to the playoffs in theory, I am against getting rid of the bye week. Those teams earned that spot, and it helps ensure the best teams make the Super Bowl.

There have been times in other sports (especially the NBA) that a great team gets knocked out by a lousy bad match-up, then that lousy team goes on to get swept in the next round. The NBA has adjusted their playoff seating quite a bit. Their old formatting also made it to where the two best teams in each conference rarely met up in the Conference Finals and instead got matched up in the Divisional round.

That was problematic because it diluted the excitement and competitiveness of the Conference Finals, as everyone already saw the great series in the previous round & weren't interested in what's supposed to be the 2nd most important series of the year. 


Anyway, I'm not a fan of not rewarding teams who do well in the regular season. 

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12 minutes ago, dneveu said:

What about 7 playoff teams? Only one team gets a bye so it keeps competition going through week 17 and you add an extra wildcard team, and an extra 2 playoff games.

Six is perfect as you have a 62.5% chance of missing the playoffs so it rarely rewards mediocrity.  Keeps the regular season meaningful and you get a lot of dramatic week 17 games for that final Wild Card spot.  Giving the two best teams in each conference a bye followed by a home game gives them a huge advantage reinforcing the importance of the regular season.  You can also have that 5th or 6th seed Cinderella story, but they're going to have to win four straight games away from home to take the Super Bowl.  It's the best format of any of the four major sports by far.

 

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It's extremely doubtful the union would permit the removal of the bye week.  Player injuries are a major issue and providing a week break during the season isn't going anywhere.

 

Any schedule changes must result in increased revenue or the discussion doesn't even get off the ground.  

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1 minute ago, BillsVet said:

It's extremely doubtful the union would permit the removal of the bye week.  Player injuries are a major issue and providing a week break during the season isn't going anywhere.

 

Any schedule changes must result in increased revenue or the discussion doesn't even get off the ground.  

The NFL wouldn't want that either as it's one less week of TV revenue.  Adding a bye week for more tv revenue is more likely as discussed in another thread.

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