Nfl 2008

First time a Niners QB has thrown for over 300 yards since 2004.

Eat it fellas!

Let me know when they stop with the ridiculous salary cap. You say the NFC East is where it's at this year. The NFC East is always where it's at. It's the only division in the league that's competitive from top to bottom, every year, and it covers the four biggest markets. What the NFL does is ridiculous. No other major sports league is so obtrusive into the ability for certain teams to succeed with respect to others.

How so? Please elaborate.

I'm not sure where you're getting "competitive top to bottom, every year" from.

Just in 2004, The Eagles won the Division at 13-3 and the Giants, Redskins, and Cowboys all finished 6-10.

I wouldn't call that "competitive top to bottom"

From 1997 to 1999, the NFC east was the picture of mediocrity, with records of 10-6, 10-6, and 10-5-1 winning the division. The NFC east was victorious in one playoff game in those three years combined.

Also, how does the NFC east cover the four biggest markets? Chicago is not in the NFC East. Los Angeles doesn't even have an NFL team!

There are a few competing forces in the NFL.

1.) Cyclical churn of teams from good to bad, through a combination of salary cap and bad teams getting higher draft position

2.) Teams that are well run organizations and generally maintain a high level of play, suffering only short lapses of mediocrity. See the Eagles, Packers, and Steelers as examples.

3.) Teams that are poorly run / cheap organizations that consistently suck with fleeting moments of competence. This can happen even when they luck out and draft a franchise QB. See the Bengals as a prime example

4.) Teams that are savy/lucky enough to land a great QB. See New England, Indianapolis, GB during the Favre years.

Over longer numbers of years, teams can transition from one category to another. For example, Green Bay was firmly in category three for the entirety of the 70's and 80's. They got into Category 2/4 by 1) Hiring Bob Harlan who 2) hired Ron Wolf who 3+4) hired Mike Holmgren and traded for Bret Favre.

SanFran was also firmly in category 2, and had the fortune to have two hall of fame QBs back to back. Even after Young retired, they were still good for several years. But family in-fighting led to incompetent management which continues to this day.

As a GB fan, I'm quite aware that the Packers would probably have folded without the coming of the salary cap era. That would have been sad to see.

If there was no salary cap my Niners would still be continuing their dynasty...

I actually kinda doubt that. Their ownership is a huge mess right now. When you hire Dennis Erickson as a coach, you've got big problems at the top of your organization.

York never would have been the owner.

DeBartolo would have won more championships after 1994. The salary cap dismantled that '94 team, which was quite possibly the best team we've ever had.

More championships would have equaled more money in DeBartolo's pocket. More money in DeBartolo's pocket would have prevented him from conceding ownership because of financial problems.

Debartolo = Championships

Championships = Dynasty

Therefore...

No salary cap = My Niners' continued dynasty

The problem with the NFC East teams' records is that they have to play 6 games each season against each other. Even when they aren't the best teams, they never stink and there is almost never a case where one or two of the teams are pushovers. Most divisions have at least one wimpy team.

Their markets are huge. Between the Skins, Eagles, and Giants, the NFC East serves a huge chunk of the most populous areas of the eastern seaboard. South of Skins territory, it's more about college ball, and north of Giants territory it's more about the red sox. Even outside the cities, in this area, the population is fairly dense. Then there's Dallas, which serves another huge area. No other division serves anywhere close to that many fans. I would say it's probably a factor of two or three difference. ... West coast isn't as football crazy. There's the Raiders, yes, but that's not a ton of fans.

Anyway, the salary cap is almost certainly here to stay because it allows the league to rake it in. There's really no competition with the NFL, so the product can suffer to a reasonable degree without fans going away. For what it's worth, we see the same economic factors in gasoline.

Even if the salary cap stays, there are ways to be less ridiculous. For example: single league table with seeding for the playoffs. This would prevent the problem of having stacked divisions.

Anyway, fuck it. The whole world knows that I barely watch the NFL anymore. The whole experience has gotten too slow and too contrived in the last ten years. It's merely a vehicle for TV ads.

I don't think the numbers bear this out. In 2003 The Giants were last in the Division at 4-12, tied for worst record in football. And Just in front of them, at 5-11, were the Redskins. The strongest division top to bottom that year looks like the NFC West, which of course currently is the worst division in football. Like I said, these things are cyclical. As I mentioned in my previous post, over the three year period of 1997-1999 the current NFC east won 1 playoff game, and the best record in that time was 10-5-1. The division was undeniably weak those three years. As a whole the division won two playoff games, but the other was current NFC West squad the Arizona Cardinals beating Dallas.

Sure, it was a very strong division last year. 3 of the 4 teams made the playoffs! So what's wrong with that? Do you maintain Philadelphia got screwed? The AFC South was just as strong, with Indy, TN, and Jacksonville all making the playoffs. Did Houston, at 8-8 get screwed?

Trust me, the NFC east is strong now, but it will not remain so in perpetuity. History bears this out.

Basketball and baseball both have conferences with divisions in which you play your opponents more often. What in the world is wrong with that? This is how you build fan interest and rivalries. That's why when they re-aligned, Dallas stayed in the NFC east. The rivalries were too good to break it up.

I certainly don't dispute the NFC east is composed of big markets with strong fan interest. But again, why is this objectionable?


Just to add more to my case:

The claim seems to be because they play each other twice, so they play more good teams and the division is better than it looks.

So here are some stats from one of my favorite websites, footballoutsiders, which uses advanced stats. One of these, Team DVOA, looks at the team as a whole and adjusts for opponent:

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/sta...fficiency-2000

The rankings of the NFC East from this century (not including Arizona the years they were in the division):

2000: 10, 11, 15, 25
2001: 2, 14, 22, 26
2002: 3, 15, 23, 28
2003: 7, 14, 25, 29
2004: 6, 21, 22, 24
2005: 7, 8, 15, 18
2006: 3, 8, 10, 23
2007: 3, 11, 12, 15

As can be seen above, the last three years, and in particular last year, the NFC East was strong. But as can also be seen, they were definitely nothing special prior to that. Other than the top team (Philidalphia) in 2001 and 2002, the division downright stunk.

Of course, interestingly enough, according to these stats Phili was good enough to be a playoff team last year. But hey, that's the way the cookie crumbles sometimes.

I'm looking forward to the GB / Dallas Sunday night game. We'll see what the pack is made of.

I think GB has as much, or more, overall talent at the skill positions, but my concern will be the line play. The GB offensive line did not play well against Detroit, and if they don't play better against Dallas, Rodgers will get sacked a LOT.

The GB defensive line has played well and gotten good pressure on the QB thus far. They must get pressure against the big Dallas offensive line, or Al Harris will get thoroughly abused.

I'm not particularly optimistic about GBs chances, but we'll see.

SDW,

Care to place a little wager on the Niners/Eagles game?

Loser has to contribute $10 to the presidential candidate of the winner's choice...

THe "numbers" are very difficult to assume. I'm not interested in going deep, but there are a great many variables that go into the success or failure of a sports team, and in the NFL format record alone is not a great gauge. Even the single tables of major soccer leagues don't always tell the whole story ... see Italy two years ago.

The point is, the NFL to me just isn't about the fans. It's about making owners and the league rich (especially the league). Wealth is a fine pursuit, but the product suffers to the point at which I've lost interest in the NFL. The NFL has not been successful at expanding into new markets where there is competition with fan-first sports leagues ... in other words, anywhere outside of the USA.

Did you read my entire post? I agree record alone is not a great gauge. That's why I gave you a whole series of numbers from football outsiders that are NOT based on won/loss record that prove my point.

The DVOA stat is explained here:

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/info/methods

Here's the pertinent part of my post again:


Anyways, I'm not trying to convince you to like the NFL. I'm just trying to convince you that your assertion that the NFC East has consistently superior teams or is a always a tougher division to play in is erroneous.

It's an extremely strong division right now, yes. In 2004, it was the very definition of mediocre.

Dawkins will be 2nd string by the middle of the season. He's lost too much of his speed, hate to say it, but it's time.


Reminds me, I need to check on his injury status, hope it's not too serious!



Agreed, they put on quite a show last night. Reid just needs to quit playing not to lose in the 4th quarter and Philly would be an elite team. He's been doing it his whole time as head coach.

Fuck.

Hope SDW is back before he has to contribute $10 to Obama...

Well at least you guys are the best 2-3 team I've ever seen...

Get your wallet out SDW...

Today's the day.

Interesting, the Eagles managed to man up and beat the Niners, then the other 3 teams in the NFC East all lost. Pretty darn good weekend! Now Westbrook needs to come off the bye healthy...\

All I have to say about the Eagles - Giants is:

FIRE REID NOW!

Most of the players put up a good effort, but ridiculously poor coaching (and admittedly a damn good Giants team) cost them a close game yet again.

From a long time NYGiants fan, all I can say is that many NY fans were calling for Coughlin's head last year (before we started jelling). Personally, it seems to me like he's a better than average coach.

Fair enough. But I've read rants almost that sound almost exactly the same in the Giants.com forums. All you have to do is replace Reid with Coughlin and McNabb with Manning.

I got a feeling this may be Reid's last year if you don't make the playoffs. If this happens, hopefully you guys will get a worse HC next year (no offense SDW2001, it's a rivalery thing )

McNabb is still fairly young, with a coach that game plans to his abilities (ie, if he's on a cold streak, run the damn ball some, throw some screens to Westbrook, etc.) and nabs him a top tier WR, I think he could put up Pro Bowl numbers again.