I’m cautiously optimistic for the Raiders. If they play like they finished last season (beating Houston and Tampa Bay to keep both out of the playoffs), they can easily be in the playoff mix (especially since the Broncos and Chiefs will be lucky to combine for 7 wins, and the Chargers like to underperform). But it all rides on JaMarcus Russell. The defense still has the very large problem of a crummy defensive line which can’t stop the run, but if Russell finally gets his act together and make the offense good enough, they can hide the run-D deficiency.
You can add in the Seattle game and the Arizona game, but still the results aren’t much different. 8TDs/5INTs and a 4-4 record isn’t as good as 13TDs/7INTs and an 8-1 record. It’s understandable that Eli would drop off a bit without someone as good as Plaxico on the outside, I don’t fault Eli at all. His season with Plaxico was outstanding. But let’s not get carried away, he was mediocre without him. It’s an understandable concern that Eli needs someone to make the offense go given how the team fared in the last six games of the season. Even the Giants understood it when they were the center of every rumor surrounding Boldin and Braylon all spring.
You’re unwilling to accept the opinion of an Eagles fan on Eli, but a Giants fan on Eli is even more unreliable.
That’s a fair point; there was clearly dropoff. When I said Eli did fine after Plax went down, I didn’t mean his numbers were just as good. (Though FootballOutsiders continues to boggle my mind by claiming Eli actually improved.) I just meant that given the following factors…
- Worse weather late in the season (expected, and causes Eli to “regress” every year)
- Stronger defenses in the late part of the schedule (luck of the draw)
- Plax goes down, meaning safeties can play up and stuff the run, putting more pressure on Eli
- Defensive front got tired, putting more pressure on Eli to get wins on offense
…he did fine. Not better than the first half of the season by any stretch, but in context I’d say he did fine.
EDIT: Also, it’s unfair to put the loss to Minnesota on Eli. Giants had already clinched home field throughout and Eli came out at halftime.
Well, since they haven’t replaced him, time will tell. I think Steve Smith will be ready to make more of an impact this year- I’m projecting him as an 80-catch/1,000 yards guy, though not necessarily this season- but they definitely don’t have anyone with Burress’ ability to stretch the defense and box out in the red zone.
Next year the draft will occur over 3 days:
Starting it on Thursday seems pretty dumb. People have big drunken draft parties for the first round. Friday/Sat/Sun is so much more a natural fit that I don’t know what they’re doing.
The big drunken draft parties are a tiny minority. Goodell summed up the thinking pretty clearly:
The Friday night tv audience is much, much smaller than the Thursday night audience.
Doesn’t putting it on the “most watched night of television” imply that there is more competition on that night, and thus, the might actually have fewer viewers overall? It seems to me that you have a core group of fans who will watch anyway, and in order to pick up the more fringe viewers, you should line the draft up against the fewest number of good shows. If there isn’t anything else to watch…
That’s not how tv works. The reason that there is more competition on Thursday night is because that’s when the big audience is watching. Friday night is the graveyard shift for original programming, when only a fraction of the normal weekday audience is tuned in. When you put something on Friday night, you expect fewer people to watch.
Granted the NFL draft is “event” viewing, so you’ll get your core audience to tune in no matter what. That’s not who they’re thinking of with this move; they could start the draft at 9:00am on Sunday morning and still draw millions of core fans. They’re trying to broaden the appeal to viewers who wouldn’t otherwise watch. There’s a far better chance to get them on Thursday night than Friday night. No comparison.
If the big audience is on Thursday, don’t networks (like the NFL is) put their big time shows on Thursday? I remember when all the mega shows were on Thursdays. If (and I’m working on the assumption that it’s true) all the big time shows are on Thursdays, doesn’t that mean fewer people are likely to watch because they’re forced to choose between their favorite show and the draft?
Maybe people just turn on the TV and surf around, never really having a “favorite” show to act as a destination program? I don’t really understand how it works, I guess. I only turn on the TV to watch something in particular.
Eh, the NFL does too much these days to try to broaden their audence at the expense of their core fans. Yes, the hardcore fans will still watch the draft on thursday night - but the draft party experience… spending your whole saturday with your buddies watching the draft - will be less practical.
This goes for other areas too, of course - stadiums are too “family friendly” now. Cleveland Browns Stadium is full of security guards in every section who are there to give you a hard time if you stand too much. People are kicked out for excessive swearing or giving the opposing fans a hard time.
Used to be if you sat in the Pound with a Steelers jersey, having it ripped off and torn to shresd in front of you was getting off easy. Now you have to make sure you don’t swear and stand a lot because apparently a football game is supposed to be the same experience as disney world.
Not really. Apply your logic to network shows. Why don’t they move, say, Survivor to Friday nights to trounce the inferior competition?
Also, IIRC sweeps are November and May, meaning late April may be all reruns anyway.
I agree. The NFL is going the way of the “No Fun League”. This decision smacks of a vampiric desire to try to capture extra viewers of the draft process, as if they need it. The last draft was the most watched ever, and that’s after they already re-tooled the days it was broadcast.
Jesus Christ. Soon we’ll have to PPV every game just for the privledge of watching NFL football, and there will be European franchises.
I for one HATE the direction the NFL is taking on this issue. There was NOTHING WRONG with the previous format, the money was rolling in, people were watching, hardcore fans could plan their weekend around it, and now this…
I absolutely hate Roger Goodell. I am totally serious. And all those whom support this. It sucks.
I’d prefer the old format (3 rounds on Saturday, finish on Sunday) too, but I’m surprised by the vitriol. I can’t see how it much matters either way.
I’m also not following the logic against it. They shouldn’t bother trying to get more viewers because they don’t need more viewers? They already changed it this year and got their best ratings ever, so why would they change it again? If the change this year increased ratings, logic dictates that a thoughtful change could increase them again next year.
Moving the opening rounds to a time when the most people are in front of a tv set seems like a no-brainer to me. Is that no fun?
I’m no Goodell apologist, though. Mention the proposed expansion from 16 to 17 or 18 games if you want to see me go off on him. That would be greedy at the expense of careers, as opposed to moving the draft at the expense of Survivor and The Office ratings.
I don’t have any vitriol, I don’t care that much.
I’m not sure how much viewership they’ll pick up. You have to be at least a moderate football nut to sit through the draft - even the first round - so I’m guessing nearly everyone who’s going to watch the draft already does.
My perspective may be skewed because I hang out on some hardcore football fan message boards, so big draft parties may seem more common to me. But the Thursday night aspect hurts that. Plus it starts a little early on the west coast - people coming home from work might miss the first 5-10 picks.
Nah - I mean what does it matter to us if it picks up some casual viewers? It doesn’t enhance the experience for the hardcore football fans and it’s not like the NFL is a struggling league that needs any attention it can get.
Yeah, like I said, it really wasn’t a big deal. The first news I got of it was in a football message boards, and there were a lot of “wtf, I can’t get blasted with my friends for the first round now, I gotta work at 6am the next day” type reactions.
I wonder if it’ll change the flow of the draft, especially with regard to trades. You see a flurry of activity on the first few picks of day 2 of the draft because GMs have had some time to adjust their plans for what has happened. Now with 3 days we’ll have even more of that.
Makes sense. FoieGrasIsEvil seems actively pissed about it, though.
I guess I am, and it’s funny: I don’t generally watch THAT much of the draft. But I was genuinely fond of the format as it was, and I think putting it on Thursday night is just dumb.
My hatred is more directed at Roger Goodell, in general. I honestly do not like that guy, at all.
My rant was mostly about pussifying the NFL in general, making it more family friendly… and I guess it’s only loosely related to this in terms of mass appeal.
I remember there was a “why you became a Browns fan” thread on the Browns scout board a few months back. He said something like “I grew up in San Diego and I’d gone to a few Chargers games… it was very laid back… people walking around in Sandals, eating fish tacos… no one was that into it… but one time back in the early 90s I went to a Browns game with my friend. There was a jackass in a Steeler’s uniform who started talking some shit… so a few guys went up to him, ripped his jersey off, set fire to it and made him watch it burn right in front of him” and I guess he’s been a fan ever since.
Now the stadium is so ridiculously pussified that you’re just supposed to sit down and shut up the whole time. The blue collar fans are getting priced out and what’s left are what some people refer to as “wine and cheesers”. There are tip lines on the scoreboard where you can call on your cell and complain that the guy next to you is saying some naughty words. The place is locked down tight, and the whole experience suffers for it.
I don’t want actual violence, by the way - for the most part no one should get their ass beat over a football game, but I liked having your rival’s fans know that if they showed up at your stadium in their jerseys and acted like jackasses they were going to pay for it. I liked when the refs actually had to move the game to the other side of the field when it was near the dog pound and they were too out of control.
I do have one fond recent memory of this - in the giant municipal parking lot down the road from Cleveland Browns stadium before the home opener in 2004 we were facing the blight on humanity from the east coast that shall remain nameless. A few times when a fan with the oppositions jersey was walking by on their way to the stadium, one guy would run out from behind a bus and dump water on him, and then a second guy would follow up and dump a ton of flour onto him. Glorious.
heh. Fuck the Patriots.
What? No, I don’t care about the Patriots. I’m referring to the city with the nation’s highest STD rates with a stab-happy murder accomplice as the face of their franchise.
Oh, I am with you there, too. The Bengals have a “Jerk” line for people to call to complain that little Tommy heard a bad man say “fuck”. And let’s be honest here: the Bengals being the franchise that they are, there are a lot of “fucks” being uttered.
It’s insane. And you know what? That Jerk line got more prank calls from drunk fans than anything else.
I do think that football stadiums should have a family-friendly section, but not the entire stadium. NFL football live isn’t for kids…sorry, it isn’t baseball.
So Senor, a tip of the hat to you. I too think that the NFL is slowly being eroded of it’s gladiator nature, both on the field and in the stands.
Bring back the clothesline tackle!