Brady -> Mahomes AFC dominance is best case for league realignment

[MJS]

19 minutes ago, Peevo said:

 

The reason for change is because one team (Pats and now Chiefs) have monopolized the system to a point where it is non-competitive.

 

It is a fact monopolies are bad for economies. That is a fact, right? They suppress competition.  How can we (the league) create more equitable results?  Break up the monopoly.  (AT&T in the 80's, Standard Oil).  This is not a new idea.

Oh, wow. This is the worst argument yet. And it makes no sense. What have the Chiefs monopolized? Having Pat Mahomes? He is a single person. He can't be divided among the teams. They clearly DON'T have an unfair advantage because they lost games this year. They were the 3rd seed in the playoffs. And the Bills beat them once and took them to the very end in the playoffs as well, taking them to overtime a couple of years ago.

[Mr. WEO]

40 minutes ago, Peevo said:

 

But why is change so bad?  I'm genuinely asking.

 

Until all the teams play each other we will never really achieve competitive balance in the schedule.

 

 

 

SO they should all agree to change everything every few years?   Mahomes and the Chiefs wouldn't dominate in  the NFC....because their QBs aren't as good?  This makes no sense at all.

 

What sports league does this?  None, simply because it lacks any logical reason to do so. 

[LeGOATski]

At least make it so winning your division doesn't put you in the top 4 seed. 

 

Oh, you won your crappy division? Cool. Here's your division title banner. You're still the 7 seed.

[Warcodered]

24 minutes ago, Peevo said:

 

 

Correct.  This creates a system more in line with relegation/promotion.  Teams have more to play for than just division titles and early playoff exits.  It's a more "open" system than the closed system they currently have.  That's really all I'm getting at.

Well all the Divisions would still be equal technically in that the winner gets a Playoff spot still and it's the same Playoff system best record best seed, the balance comes from the weaker teams getting moved into weaker divisions and then playing each other and the better teams playing each other as well.

[Peevo]

Just now, Mr. WEO said:

 

SO they should all agree to change everything every few years?   Mahomes and the Chiefs wouldn't dominate in  the NFC....because their QBs aren't as good?  This makes no sense at all.

 

What sports league does this?  None, simply because it lacks any logical reason to do so. 

 

Plenty of leagues do. It's called promotion and relegation. 

 

All I'm saying is, this isn't as much a problem in the other big 3 leagues because of the amount of games.  Every team plays every other team at least twice.  No one care argue competitive imbalance.  Everyone gets a fair shake at every team.

 

Until all the teams play each other, you can't objectively say any NFL team is truly the "best".  That's all I'm getting at.  

 

[BRH]

50 minutes ago, Peevo said:

 

But why is change so bad?  I'm genuinely asking.

 

Until all the teams play each other we will never really achieve competitive balance in the schedule.

 

 

 

Are you advocating a 31-game schedule?

[Peevo]

Just now, BRH said:

 

Are you advocating a 31-game schedule?

 

Yes, in a perfect world.  I addressed this in above post.

 

No playoffs.  Who ever is in 1st place at the end wins. Simple. Fair. Again, I know this will never happen.  Owners like money too much.  

[Draconator]

Peevo = Deebo

 

Don't you have a game to prepare for?

[90sBills]

12 minutes ago, LeGOATski said:

My wife coaches middle school volleyball and, I kid you not, got an email like that from a parent.

 

Her daughter, who's just learning volleyball and is relegated to the bench, deserves as much playing time as the best players ....

 

No surprise, she got a big fat NO from my wife and subsequently pulled her daughter off the team.

Salute to your wife. She did society a great service. That’s the only answer to such a request. Just like the reactions to this thread. 

[Peevo]

Just now, Draconator said:

Peevo = Deebo

 

Don't you have a game to prepare for?

 

I'm just some guy that used to work on Buffalo radio stations.

 

[1ManRaid]

Complaining about strong opponents is a quintessential "get good" moment.  Top teams already get pitted against each other in the current scheduling algorithm, that's about as fair as it can get.

[Peevo]

 

1 minute ago, 1ManRaid said:

Complaining about strong opponents is a quintessential "get good" moment.  Top teams already get pitted against each other in the current scheduling algorithm, that's about as fair as it can get.

 

That's only 2 games out of 17 though.

 

No one can seriously argue the Patriots run from 2001 - 2019 was competitive in the AFC East.  No one could argue that.  How many times did the Dolphins/Jets/Bills make the playoffs in that stretch? 

 

The Patriots consumed so much advantage from a weak division they cake walked to a home playoff game and a week off almost every single year.  You can't tell me that isn't an unfair advantage.  

 

We are all so scared of promotion and relegation, yet the Bills were de facto relegated out of the league due to merely existing the AFC East for 2 decades.

[Matt_In_NH]

1 hour ago, Peevo said:

The AFC domination transferred from Brady to Mahomes in the span of a season.  Now the conference is Mahomes' to dominate until he retires.

 

We just accept this as a reality. 

 

No, you beat them.   The proposed options would make the NFL worse than it is today for a bunch of reasons.  It also would show how people just want daddy to tweak the rules so they have a better chance to win which I object to.

[MPL]

Maybe if some of you guys had better aim with those snowballs we wouldn't have to be having this conversation right now. 

[Mr. WEO]

25 minutes ago, Peevo said:

 

Plenty of leagues do. It's called promotion and relegation. 

 

All I'm saying is, this isn't as much a problem in the other big 3 leagues because of the amount of games.  Every team plays every other team at least twice.  No one care argue competitive imbalance.  Everyone gets a fair shake at every team.

 

Until all the teams play each other, you can't objectively say any NFL team is truly the "best".  That's all I'm getting at.  

 

 

"Who is truly the best" is settled in the playoffs/championship in every league--not by who beat whom in the regular season.  That's, per game, meaningless. 

 

Relegation is something else entirely---relegated teams play in a lesser league, not in the 'other conference" in the same league.  It's quite the opposite of what you are imagining...

 

MAybe the NFL should make all teams share their draft boards?  Like, you know, so they don't draft Mitch Trubisky over Mahomes, for instance? 

Edited January 29 by Mr. WEO

[BRH]

1 hour ago, LeGOATski said:

My wife coaches middle school volleyball and, I kid you not, got an email like that from a parent.

 

Her daughter, who's just learning volleyball and is relegated to the bench, deserves as much playing time as the best players ....

 

No surprise, she got a big fat NO from my wife and subsequently pulled her daughter off the team.

 

And then when they ask "how is my kid supposed to get better if she never plays" and you suggest that they put in extra time outside of practice developing skills and getting stronger/faster, they get offended.

 

I'm so happy to be done with that scene.  Parents are a piece of work.

[peterpan]

Isn’t the OP just saying “let’s get rid of two conferences “???

 

im not opposed.  Keep the divisions or realign into new 4 or 8 team divisions.  They the playoffs would be seeded by record, where the Bills could meet the chiefs in the SB.

 

I personally  would much prefer the NFL roll back some of the rule changes, whereby QB wouldn’t be as important a position as it is

[zow2]

2 hours ago, RkFast said:

And in ten years when the NFC is "dominant" again?

 

 

This.  It's all cyclical.  Since a lot of the AFC have their QBs, the new batch of rookie QBs are starting to head over to the NFC.  Carolina screwed up as it appears C.J. Stroud should be in the NFC not Bryce Young but oh well, what are you gonna do.  Caleb and Drake Maye are likely headed to the NFC.

 

[Southern_Bills]

Or we could expect our players to not drop balls, miss FGs, and things of this nature in critical moments. Then all this wouldn't be an issue.

 

But yeah, let's realign the whole league for our shortcomings.

[The Red King]

The current scheduling system is a formula.  Every team in a division plays the others twice each, play (the same) AFC division and same NFC division.  That's 14 out of 17 games.  Then they play a team from each of the remaining AFC conferences that finished in the same spot aa them.  Then one game against a team from the NFC that finished in the same slot.

 

That means the AFC West teams play the same 14 games, and the other three are stacked *against* the higher-ranked teams.  KC has to come here next season because we both finished in 1st.  Five of KC's seventeen games, almost a third of the season, will be against teams that finished in first place in their divisions.  Meanwhile, five of the Chargers' games will be against last-place finishers.

 

KC has a harder road to the Super Bowl going through the AFC.  They beat Buffalo and Baltimore on the road.

 

Let me ask this.  In the '90s do you think any Bills fan called for realignment after Buffalo won the AFC for four concecutive years?

 

 

[Ya Digg?]

3 hours ago, Peevo said:

 

I'm already getting lambasted for this so what the hell.

 

Eliminate all divisions and conferences.  

 

31 games, everyone plays everybody once.  Alternate home and away every other year.  Who ever is in 1st place wins the championship.  If there's a tie at the end, fine 1 championship game to decide between the 2 top teams.

 

You want 17 games?

 

Fine - eliminate the divisions and everyone in the AFC plays each other once.  15 games.  2 games out of conference every year.  If they go to 18 games, you can play 3 out of conference games.

 

If you want to get real nuts have the bottom feeders in each conference forced to realign into the conference.  You want 8 divisions?  Force the 4th place team to "realign" or "relegate" to the opposite conference or something.  You don't want to be in the NFC East?  Fine, don't suck.

 

I don't have every machination of every scenario worked out here.  All I'm saying is we accept the current system as is, with all of its various flaws, and "im the worst post ever" candidate for merely suggesting we can change it.

 

 

I'm finding this wildly entertaining - I kinda hope people keep crushing you so you keep putting out even more terrible ideas!!

[Einstein]

We don't need a realignment. We would have beaten them if our defense wasn't decimated.

 

Congrats KC - you won the AFC because the Bills had 5 starters out on defense. Celebrate!

PS, did you see Mahomes and the KC offense put up a goose egg in the second half against Baltimore? Imagine if our defense did that for Allen? We would have won by double digits.

[msw2112]

13 minutes ago, Einstein said:

We don't need a realignment. We would have beaten them if our defense wasn't decimated.

 

Congrats KC - you won the AFC because the Bills had 5 starters out on defense. Celebrate!

PS, did you see Mahomes and the KC offense put up a goose egg in the second half against Baltimore? Imagine if our defense did that for Allen? We would have won by double digits.

 

I mostly agree with this.  Reid is a master and the Chiefs' game plan against the Bills may have been different if the Bills had their full complement on defense.  That said, the game was very close and I do believe that if the Bills had even 2 of Milano, Bernard, Tre White and/or a healthy Rasul Douglas, they win the game.  But they didn't and the Chiefs moved on.

 

I'm not going to bash the OP, but I will disagree that realignment is a reasonable solution to the Chiefs' dominance.

[TheFunPolice]

There's like 3 AFC teams without a budding superstar QB, so we have to solve that one first. 

 

 

[Einstein]

3 minutes ago, msw2112 said:

 

I mostly agree with this.  Reid is a master and the Chiefs' game plan against the Bills may have been different if the Bills had their full complement on defense.  That said, the game was very close and I do believe that if the Bills had even 2 of Milano, Bernard, Tre White and/or a healthy Rasul Douglas, they win the game.  But they didn't and the Chiefs moved on.

 

I'm not going to bash the OP, but I will disagree that realignment is a reasonable solution to the Chiefs' dominance.

 

Milano, Bernard, White, Benford, Phillips, Rapp, Spector... all out.

Douglas and Dodson hobbled.

 

KC played our back-ups and the game still came down to the final drive.

 

They are LUCKY we were so hobbled, because they wouldn't be in the Super Bowl right now if we had our starters.

[Capco]

7 minutes ago, TheFunPolice said:

There's like 3 AFC teams without a budding superstar QB, so we have to solve that one first. 

 

 

Well, two of them are in the AFC East so I don't mind putting off this whole solving thing for a bit 😅

[Goin Breakdown]

-Chiefs should give opponents 14 pts to start a game 

- opposing teams should be allowed to hit with chairs

- opposing teams should be able to Tag in any Pro Bowl player or all pro from the previous year to play in the upcoming game against the chiefs. 

Edited January 29 by Goin Breakdown

[DrBob806]

4 hours ago, Peevo said:

 

But why is change so bad?  I'm genuinely asking.

 

Until all the teams play each other we will never really achieve competitive balance in the schedule.

 

 

The NFL scheduling formula is presently brilliant. It was even better when it was just 16 games.

 

Yes, there are quirks, like some divisions can have "down year(s)," but it's great for the fans, especially the opposing conference match ups by division. Before 1978, AFC/NFC games didn't rotate like they do now. We also have rotating AFC vs AFC, NFC vs NFC by divisions. 

 

You may not be old enough to know, but there was a period where the NFC won 13 SBs is a row, late 80s into the 90s. 

 

A lot of this stuff is by chance/luck. I wouldn't ruin a good thing.

21 minutes ago, msw2112 said:

 

 

I'm not going to bash the OP, but I will disagree that realignment is a reasonable solution to the Chiefs' dominance.

Correct. The Chiefs are dominant because they presently have the best coach & the best QB. The scary thing is their defense has truly improved. 

[Peevo]

6 minutes ago, DrBob806 said:

The NFL scheduling formula is presently brilliant. It was even better when it was just 16 games.

 

Yes, there are quirks, like some divisions can have "down year(s)," but it's great for the fans, especially the opposing conference match ups by division. Before 1978, AFC/NFC games didn't rotate like they do now. We also have rotating AFC vs AFC, NFC vs NFC by divisions. 

 

You may not be old enough to know, but there was a period where the NFC won 13 SBs is a row, late 80s into the 90s. 

 

A lot of this stuff is by chance/luck. I wouldn't ruin a good thing.

Correct. The Chiefs are dominant because they presently have the best coach & the best QB. The scary thing is their defense has truly improved. 

 

 

Appreciate your perspective.  I appreciate you engaging with my point.

 

I'm too young to remember the early 90s. 

 

But there seems to be a real hesitance to my generalized "every NFL team should play every NFL team" each season idea.

 

This is not a crazy idea, in my opinion.  It's almost heretical, judged by some of these responses.

 

NHL teams play a brutal, violent, unhinged, bloodsport 82 times a year.  How many concussions per year in the NHL?  It's just, if not more violent, than the NFL.  Then after all of that, they play another 20 plus brutal, violent, exhausting playoff games to determine a champion.

 

Daring to suggest professional football players play 31 games in a calendar year is somehow some absurd idea.  Increase rosters, bake in some "no more than 20 starts per player" rule and really force teams to have 2 QBs to be competitive.  I know, none of this will happen. 

 

But isn't this more fun than "the Bills should draft this player in round 5 I've never heard of from a college i've never watched" conversation?

[DrBob806]

10 minutes ago, Peevo said:

 

 

Appreciate your perspective.  I appreciate you engaging with my point.

 

I'm too young to remember the early 90s. 

 

But there seems to be a real hesitance to my generalized "every NFL team should play every NFL team" each season idea.

 

This is not a crazy idea, in my opinion.  It's almost heretical, judged by some of these responses.

 

I could see a day where they eliminate divisions (I doubt most fans would like that). 

 

There's little chance they'd expand the schedule beyond 18 games (it's probably coming in a new CBA down the road). 

 

The NFL is such a machine, but out of respect to the other major sports, they wouldn't want to overlap more than they already do, and when the teams get the injury bug, the product suffers. Realistically, out of the 14 playoff teams this season, maybe 4 or 5 were "healthy." 

[UKBillFan]

The one thing I would say - and apologies if it's been said already - wasn't the whole point of the cap to reduce the likelihood of dynasties?

 

Hasn't really worked, to be honest.

[zow2]

This thread is the dumbest thing I've ever seen.  But I'll play along.  The AFC should have a secondary tournament, KC not allowed to be involved.  So that way Allen, Lamar, Lawrence, Burrow, Stroud, Herbert...will all have a chance at a trophy 🙄

[Einstein]

32 minutes ago, UKBillFan said:

The one thing I would say - and apologies if it's been said already - wasn't the whole point of the cap to reduce the likelihood of dynasties?

 

Hasn't really worked, to be honest.

 

It takes a Great Coach + Great QB + Great GM to overcome the cap and create a dynasty. KC has all 3.

And even with that, they don’t beat us if they weren’t playing our practice squad defense.

[UKBillFan]

Just now, Einstein said:

 

It takes a Great Coach + Great QB + Great GM to overcome the cap and create a dynasty. KC has all 3.

And even with that, they don’t beat us if they weren’t playing our practice squad defense.

 

Maybe two of three, as I'm not sure the Pats had a great GM whilst Belichick was there...

[Billy Claude]

I could see them going to a FIFA style lottery to have new divisions every year.   You can have the drawing two weeks after the Super Bowl.  Imagine the ratings. It would blow the NCAA bracket drawing out of the water and keep the NFL front and center with all the networks/streaming services for another few weeks.

 

There are advantages.  For one thing, you don't have to watch the Jets twice every year.

Edited January 29 by Billy Claude

[JoPoy88]

All I’m reading here is “loser mentality has so infected my brain let’s just turn the NFL into the Premier League.”

[st pete gogolak]

Realignment because Patrick Mahomes is too good?  Eh, no.  Realignment because present setup is stale?  I’m open to that.  How about geographic realignment (Pats, Jets, Giants, Eagles in one division, etc.).  How about four 8 team divisions, 16 playoff teams (no byes!).  

[Shaw66]

6 hours ago, MJS said:

This is just dumb.

I'm afraid so.  

 

It is true that the soccer leagues in England and/or elsewhere do something similar, by having teams move up and down from the majors and minors.   

 

It is true that things could be done differently, but why?  You'd lose rivalries.   You'd lose some compelling stories, like Allen and Mahomes playing against each other.  

 

The NFL is wildly popular.  In 2022, I think the stat was 37 of the 38 most watched TV shows were NFL games.   Someone sent me something that said the more people watched the Bills-Chiefs last week than watch all five 2023 World Series game COMBINED.   If I have a business that is THAT successful, I'm not going tinkering with it to make it easier for a few teams who think they have tough competition.  Plus, which NFC team, especially one without a quarterback, wants to be transferred in the AFC?   

 

I suppose you could have a league with no divisions, and at the end of the season you could have a tournament, seeding every team based on its record.   Seedings might make the tournament a bit easier for good teams (seeded brackets would mean that a good team would have less chance of facing the Chiefs early), but who really cares about that.   Every team, every player will tell you that to be the best, you have to beat the best. 

[psuscott16]

I would love it if they got rid of the divisions and just played every team once with 2 crossover games (could do by previous year seeding or regional rivalry). It would be as close as they could get to true playoff seeding. 

 

I think the biggest reason teams dominate divisions is from great coaching with a good roster. Playing the same teams twice a year, the great coaches learn how to own them and it results in the lesser teams cycling through coaches every few years, sometimes letting good coaches go that just can't hang with the great ones. 

[Einstein]

1 hour ago, UKBillFan said:

 

Maybe two of three, as I'm not sure the Pats had a great GM whilst Belichick was there...

 

That’s old Belichik.

 

But the Pats had All-Star rosters for many years. 

 

Brady (HOFer), Gronk (HOFer), Moss (HOFer), Welker (All Pro), Wilfork (HOFer), Vrabel (All Pro), Bruschi (All Pro), Samuel (All Pro), Harrison (HOFer), Light (All Pro), Mankins (All Pro), Gostkowski (All Pro).

 

All those players were on the SAME team. Not different years. That’s an insane amount of talent.