NFL (2024 Season)

[webny99]

A "well-run" or "poorly-run" franchise generally starts with ownership, but rarely is the owner anywhere close to the #1 factor in roster building or anything that actually happens on the field. (The 2022 Colts are possibly a notable exception.)

[thspfc]

Agreed that the owner is far down on the list of what affects a team's success. And I wasn't saying that the Packers would be that much better as a franchise if they had an owner. I was simply saying that it would have helped in not squandering draft picks via trade because the team president talked too much.

I can think of one recent example where an owner significantly changed a team's course for the better: Stan Kroenke funding SoFi Stadium and moving the Rams to LA. And on the flip side, also one: Dan Snyder's entire existence. That's it.

[triplemultiplex]

The owners are the bosses.  They make the hiring decisions about who runs their team.  They absolutely are to blame if their team has sucked for a quarter century.  A couple bad seasons are a fluke and attributable to any number of factors, but if they are consistently bad or mediocre for decades, then clearly there's something wrong at the top of the organization.  Fish rots from the head, yo.

[thspfc]

The owners are the bosses.  They make the hiring decisions about who runs their team.  They absolutely are to blame if their team has sucked for a quarter century.  A couple bad seasons are a fluke and attributable to any number of factors, but if they are consistently bad or mediocre for decades, then clearly there's something wrong at the top of the organization.  Fish rots from the head, yo.

You're avoiding my question.

So you're at least partially blaming the failures of those franchises on their owners.

Surely the opposite logic applies when it comes to successful teams, right? Can I just list the last 10 Super Bowl winners as evidence? Must have been the owners, right? Explain to me why it's different with successful teams.

[jgb191]

The least that any owner can do is hire an executive, Team VP or CEO/COO, and that executive does the rest:  hire a General Manager, Talent scouts, public relations, marketing, etc.  All the owner does is in this case is administer paychecks and be hands off and just sit back.  The results fall on all levels; the only thing the owner can do is change his executive running a different show.

The most the owner could also take on all other roles himself outside of coaching and playing; Jerry Jones is the owner, president, and general manager of the Cowboys.  In this case the weight of the results increase drastically on the owner compared to the silent owner.

I guess my point is that I believe the weight of the success/failure varies according to how much the owner does to his organization.

[ET21]

One month until the draft!

[Roadgeekteen]

Lamar Jackson has requested a trade from the Ravens.

[webny99]

Lamar Jackson has requested a trade from the Ravens.

He reported it himself. Definitely a unique situation, and you could argue whether he should want to leave the Ravens, but I kind of like the fact that he's going against the grain and not giving any agent or insider information.

[Roadgeekteen]

Lamar Jackson has requested a trade from the Ravens.

He reported it himself. Definitely a unique situation, and you could argue whether he should want to leave the Ravens, but I kind of like the fact that he's going against the grain and not giving any agent or insider information.

He also requested it a few weeks ago, and nobody else found out until now.

[Ted$8roadFan]

Lamar Jackson is playing the only cards he has the best he can. He (and the league) are haunted by the ghost of Deshaun Watson's Cleveland contract.

[Roadgeekteen]

Lamar Jackson is playing the only cards he has the best he can. He (and the league) are haunted by the ghost of Deshaun Watson's Cleveland contract.

Browns playing 4D chess to screw over a division rival

[jgb191]

Lamar Jackson is playing the only cards he has the best he can. He (and the league) are haunted by the ghost of Deshaun Watson's Cleveland contract.

I think the Browns' strategy might have been to screw all the other teams, especially if they can't fix themselves, by the illusion that QBs are worth fully guaranteed contracts.

[triplemultiplex]

Surely the opposite logic applies when it comes to successful teams, right? Can I just list the last 10 Super Bowl winners as evidence? Must have been the owners, right? Explain to me why it's different with successful teams.

Well just as a couple crap seasons can be somewhat of a circumstantial fluke, so to can a couple of great seasons.  It would take sustained success; repeated playoff appearances over many years, not just a single SB victory or even appearance as evidence of 'good' ownership.  Take the Bears.  They've been pretty awful my entire football-conscious life, except for that one year where they made it to the SB on the strength of a great defense, a once-a-generation return man and a quarterback who was just good enough to not fuck it up.  It's basically a fluke season in the context of the last 30 years and says nothing about the ownership being good. 

Of course by that measure, should-be sex offender Robert Kraft is a goddamn genius even though I've hated his guts long before he got the ol' rub n' tug down in Florida.  Being a terrible person doesn't always go hand in hand with being a terrible owner.  Kraft created the management that could build around Brady and do what they did.

For contrast, let's slide over to Dallas and the biggest ego in the owner's group.  Here's an owner who has measurably fucked his team since Troy Aikmen retired by putting his thumb on the scale in terms of draft picks, coaching, and talent.  And all it's gotten Dallas is successful broadcasting careers for ex players.  And a lot of one-and-done Januaries.  There's the saying of "always a bridesmaid, never the bride"; well for Dallas it's more like "always the flower girl, never the bride" since Aikmen retired.  And that is squarely on Jerry Googly-Eyes Jones.

[Ted$8roadFan]

Lamar Jackson is playing the only cards he has the best he can. He (and the league) are haunted by the ghost of Deshaun Watson's Cleveland contract.

Browns playing 4D chess to screw over a division rival

Especially a division rival whose very existence came at their expense back in 1995.

[thspfc]

Surely the opposite logic applies when it comes to successful teams, right? Can I just list the last 10 Super Bowl winners as evidence? Must have been the owners, right? Explain to me why it's different with successful teams.

Well just as a couple crap seasons can be somewhat of a circumstantial fluke, so to can a couple of great seasons.  It would take sustained success; repeated playoff appearances over many years, not just a single SB victory or even appearance as evidence of 'good' ownership.

I don't know what your definition for this is, but 16/32 teams have had a stretch of at least 3 playoff apps in 4 years over the last decade:

- Patriots
- Bills
- Steelers
- Ravens
- Bengals
- Texans (who were on your list of teams cited in your initial reply)
- Titans
- Chiefs
- Broncos
- Eagles
- Saints
- Panthers
- Buccaneers
- Seahawks
- Rams
- 49ers

If we increase it to 4 apps in 5 years , then 12 teams qualify. Over a third of the league, that made the playoffs 80% of the time, in a system where only ~43% of teams make the playoffs (before 2020 it was ~37%).

Take the Bears.  They've been pretty awful my entire football-conscious life, except for that one year where they made it to the SB on the strength of a great defense, a once-a-generation return man and a quarterback who was just good enough to not fuck it up.  It's basically a fluke season in the context of the last 30 years and says nothing about the ownership being good.

That's fair. It's an extreme example though.

Of course by that measure, Robert Kraft is a goddamn genius even though I've hated his guts long before he got the ol' rub n' tug down in Florida.  Being a terrible person doesn't always go hand in hand with being a terrible owner.  Kraft created the management that could build around Brady and do what they did.

Exactly my point. For every bad example, using the same logic, there's a good one.

For contrast, let's slide over to Dallas and the biggest ego in the owner's group.  Here's an owner who has measurably fucked his team since Troy Aikmen retired by putting his thumb on the scale in terms of draft picks, coaching, and talent.  And all it's gotten Dallas is successful broadcasting careers for ex players.  And a lot of one-and-done Januaries.  There's the saying of "always a bridesmaid, never the bride"; well for Dallas it's more like "always the flower girl, never the bride" since Aikmen retired.  And that is squarely on Jerry Googly-Eyes Jones.

You're crediting the Cowboys success in the 90s to their players. Which I 100% agree with. But again, by the exact same logic, you should be placing the blame for the Cowboys more recent struggles on the players. You're giving Jones none of the credit when things go right but all the blame when things go wrong.

should-be sex offender Robert Kraft

I'm not sure what you know about the case that the police don't, because Kraft was not charged with anything: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/13/sports/robert-kraft-prostitution-patriots.html

And a lot of one-and-done Januaries.

You're arguing on behalf of the Packers' lack of an owner. Using another team's playoff failures as evidence that the Packers are better off without an owner.

Surely you see the irony there? No team has choked more in the playoffs than Green Bay over the last decade. Dallas hasn't been to the playoffs as much, and they certainly haven't done a whole lot upon getting there. (Packers are 6-7, Cowboys are 3-5.) But in the last 10 years Green Bay has more postseason meltdowns than you can count on one hand. If we go back another 10 years, sure there's the championship in there, (what if that's a fluke?) but in 2011 they had probably the most embarrassing one-and-done in NFL history, coming off a 15-1 season and getting ran out of their own stadium by a Giants team that barely made the playoffs. Plus Favre's blunder in 2007 and 4th & 26 in 2003.

[jakeroot]

Hi all. Apologies if this has come up before and I missed it.

What is the reasoning behind having a single bye week, and not two?

I've been trying to think of something, and I can't come up with anything that isn't overly technical (like programming difficulties or something). Neither my cousin or I can find any official explanation, either.

I originally thought it could be related to the Super Bowl, since that is planned in advance. But starting the season a little earlier could allow for an extra bye week and maintain the current Super Bowl schedule. Obviously some teams (Miami) would benefit from that more than others.

[Big John]

^^ They tried 2 bye weeks in 1993.  They found the competition to be too diluted in the bye weeks.

[jakeroot]

^^ They tried 2 bye weeks in 1993.  They found the competition to be too diluted in the bye weeks.

Things have changed since then, though. There are four more teams, and 17 games over 18 weeks.

[Henry]

IIRC, each team also got two bye weeks from 1999 to 2001, when there were 31 teams. That setup made a whole lot more sense than it did in 1993, with the league still at 28 teams at the time.

[Big John]

IIRC, each team also got two bye weeks from 1999 to 2001, when there were 31 teams. That setup made a whole lot more sense than it did in 1993, with the league still at 28 teams at the time.

There was only one bye week, but with 31 teams, it was spread out throughout the year with a team with a week 1 bye and another team with a week 17 bye.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

Congratulations to the NY Jets! With the Sacramento Kings winning tonight and clinching their first playoff berth since 2005-06, the Jets now have the longest playoff drought in the Big Four sports, last making it in 2010-11.

J! E! T! S!

[Roadgeekteen]

Congratulations to the NY Jets! With the Sacramento Kings winning tonight and clinching their first playoff berth since 2005-06, the Jets now have the longest playoff drought in the Big Four sports, last making it in 2010-11.

J! E! T! S!

May it never end

[Ted$8roadFan]

Congratulations to the NY Jets! With the Sacramento Kings winning tonight and clinching their first playoff berth since 2005-06, the Jets now have the longest playoff drought in the Big Four sports, last making it in 2010-11.

J! E! T! S!

May it never end

Of course, no one in the NYC area will notice. No wonder they're so eager to get Aaron Rodgers.

[Roadgeekteen]

Congratulations to the NY Jets! With the Sacramento Kings winning tonight and clinching their first playoff berth since 2005-06, the Jets now have the longest playoff drought in the Big Four sports, last making it in 2010-11.

J! E! T! S!

May it never end

Of course, no one in the NYC area will notice. No wonder they're so eager to get Aaron Rodgers.

Hopefully the Jets time with Rodgers goes about as well as their time with Favre.

[thspfc]

Congratulations to the NY Jets! With the Sacramento Kings winning tonight and clinching their first playoff berth since 2005-06, the Jets now have the longest playoff drought in the Big Four sports, last making it in 2010-11.

J! E! T! S!

May it never end

Of course, no one in the NYC area will notice. No wonder they're so eager to get Aaron Rodgers.

Hopefully the Jets time with Rodgers goes about as well as their time with Favre.

Even that would be their best season in 13 years.