Mark Cuban was right, I didn’t watch minute of the 830 AM game today. Hogs get slaughtered.
I detest these stupid London games. Plus which 5 teams are going to give up a home game, the Patriots,Cowboys, Packers, Seahawks, and 49ers certainly won’t.
So dumb. I know the coaches must hate it but the owners don’t give a crap. Only positive is it spreads the disadvantage of being stuck playing a game there across more of the league which makes a bad idea at least a little more fair.
Might as well give London a friggin’ franchise if you are going to play 5 there…
I believe that is the eventual intent.
How dare they try to expand their business. Bastards!
I really enjoyed the Sunday a.m. game (outside of the poor play by the teams). I get to watch a bit of football before I have to get on with my life in the real world, which all too often means I don’t get to watch football.
I hate all the gimmick games…playing overseas, throwback jerseys, etc. Completely unnecessary and add no value to the game.
More NFL games over there means more chances for an NFLer to go out raping, fighting or stealing. After that they’ll back off.
I mean… yes. Is the fact that they’re trying to expand their business somehow an excuse or protection from criticism of the practices they use to do so?
London games suck. They’re a hassle for the teams, a team has to lose a home game, and as an American NFL fan, I don’t care if the NFL expands its fan base. The NFL should weigh the backlash from the American fans and inconvenienced players against what they perceive to be the potential value in showcasing their sport.
By voicing our complaints, we’re adding to the former side of the equation, so that they can make better informed decisions about the worthiness of such an endeavor.
You trying to dismiss that criticism seems to be, well, inexplicable.
Yeah, it’s too much. Between now-weekly Thursday night games and an increased schedule in a country that isn’t really interested in the game anyway the teams aren’t getting the rest they need and the quality of play is suffering. There’s a reason football isn’t played every day like the other major sports. It’s punishing. At this rate the season is going to be 2 games longer and they’ll be playing 5 nights a week in 5 years.
It may surprise you to hear this, but such behavior is not exactly unknown in athletes already in the UK. In any event, NFL players are charged and convicted with crimes at a lower rate than the general population. So far they haven’t “backed off” on letting American tourists visit.
But why do you care if they play games overseas? It’s not as though it’s a hassle for you; I’m pretty sure you’re not rearranging your life around the Raiders’ practice schedule.
Frankly, I don’t care if the games are played there. I do think the 9:30 kickoff is a good idea, if they’re going to do it.
The quality of play suffers is players are jetlagged and disrupted in their normal practice/recovery/workout routines. Imagine if they did have a team in London - it would be a logistical nightmare and undoubtedly lower the quality of play. And I certainly would be annoyed if the Browns were giving up one of their home games to play in London, which thankfully hasn’t happened yet, but will at the current rate.
Umm… Don’t be so sure about that:
Selling out one game a year - or even a half-dozen - is not a very big deal. Does the NFL draw bigger TV ratings than any domestic sport?
I don’t know that the quality of play is suffering. For the most part, the games have been pretty good when the NFL hasn’t sent epically awful teams.
The Buccaneers have been sent over twice and lost a home game both times.
Do the season ticket holders for the teams that lose a home game get reimbursed? If they need to buy PSLs, do those charges get pro-rated?
They don’t get reimbursed, but they don’t pay for the game in the first place. Season ticket charges for teams playing in London are based on a 9-game schedule (7 regular season home games and 2 preseason.) The league reimburses the team and stadium authority (if applicable) for lost earnings based on their average game revenue over the rest of the season.
As to PSL charges, no. They’re not based on a specific number of games. They don’t go up if the team makes the playoffs, so that’s not entirely unreasonable.
These are grown ass men making hundreds of thousands of dollars. If they can’t perform well because they’re sleepy or their dainty schedule is thrown off, they won’t get much sympathy from me.
I have a much bigger problem with Thursday night games on a short week, because of the lack of recovery time. That’s a real issue to me, not “oh my bio-rhythms are off”. I’d take London games over short weeks any day of the year.
The NFL should add another bye week, dump a couple pre-season games, and give teams who play Thursdays or in London priority for byes to rest up.
If there is evidence of that, I’d like to see it. Jacksonville and Tampa Bay can suck as much in the US as they do in London. Hell, every team has “a lower quality of play” week to week. Part of football is overcoming that adversity.
If they balance the London games by division, so the Bengals, Ravens, and Steelers don’t get a benefit from the Browns losing a home game, would that be better for you?
There was an article on MMQB with the same suggestion, with the addition that there should be an extra regular season game as well. I’ve thought this was a good solution for a while. Every team can play a neutral-site game, so nobody loses a home game. The extra bye gives extra recovery time for the players, and compensates for the extra game, and the bye can be scheduled around the Thursday games so teams don’t play Thursday on a short week. Seems good to me.
That’s a good point: if you are concerned about the quality of play, bitch about Thursday games. Those are almost invariably awful.
You’d think it would have occurred to the NFL that they should probably limit Thursday games to teams coming off byes, but apparently not.
These are elite athletes who have the best possible training regimens, nutrition, support staff, etc. This is because we like to see a sport competed at the very highest possible level we could see. Sure, we could throw adversity at them by depriving them of sleep or tying 10 pound weights to their ankles, and I’m sure they’d manage to go on anyway, and yet the product would be diminished.
And for what? A publicity stunt that doesn’t benefit the fans or the quality of play in the league? Something with the ultimate goal of making the league significantly worse, which is what would happen if we had a London team like they wanted.
I agree that Thursday games are a problem, and should only be scheduled after a bye if they’re continued at all.
“oh my bio-rhythms are off” is a significant competitive factor in football. You dismiss it, but do you deny the empirical evidence of the divergent loss rates from west coat teams travelling across the country and playing early? And that’s a much less dramatic trip.
Again, artificially adding to their adversity just lowers the quality of the product. Sometimes it’s unavoidable, but in this case it’s quite the opposite. Expanding the NFL to Europe doesn’t benefit American fans, or the players. You could make a case that it benefits European fans, what few they are, but mostly it benefits the owners. I’d rather not lower the quality of the sport so that billionaires can gain a few more percent net worth.
I mean, that would be less bad, but still shitty.
The ultimate goal here is a team in London. Do you agree that it would be shitty for the league if that happened?
False dichotomy. This thread isn’t about Thursday games. Am I not allowed to hold the opinion that Thursday night games that aren’t after a bye are shitty and games in London are also shitty? One is obviously more relevant to this thread.
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Goodell has been chasing this thing forever and I think once the 5 games are there for a year or two he can say “look, we got five games there and it worked, we can put a franchise there.” I can’t imagine that there’s that much market in England for a team though.