National Football League

[movingtarget]

Broncos promote QBs coach Davis Webb to offensive coordinator

Jared Goff says Drew Petzing a 'home run hire' for Lions offense: We'll 'run what we're best at'

Titans hiring 49ers assistant head coach Gus Bradley as their new defensive coordinator

NFL announces multiyear return to Mexico City for regular season games starting in 2026

 

[movingtarget]

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell discusses 18-game schedule, diversity hiring ahead of Super Bowl LX

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

18 game seasons are both inevitable, and a bad idea. They would certainly need a 2nd bye week, plus to expand both the roster, and practice squads. But even then it's a bad idea, as QBs are likely to go down even more frequently than they do now. Imagine weeks, 17, 18, 20 when a winning team loses their QB, and are led into the playoffs with their version of Jarrett Stidham. Or tough guys like Josh Allen has a foot so badly broken he can't play. Plus the longer the season gets, the more likely players will sit, like they do in the NBA, where teams strategize losses, just to get to the "tournament" of the playoffs healthy. Fans will be upset if they are in a city like Arizona, looking forward to seeing someone like Lamar, or Allen come there and play for maybe the only time in their career, only to find out it's a "rest" game for that star.

I think what the NFL needs to do is plan to expand another 8 teams. Yep, eight. Four in Europe (England, Germany, Spain, France, or two in one of those countries, UK and Germany seem most popular), and four in the US (plenty of cities possible: St. Louis, San Antonio, Portland, Oklahoma City, San Diego, Salt Lake City, maybe even Toronto). AND have a second bye week. This bye week could do two things. Help teams travel to/from Europe. But also have one bye week the week before a Thursday night game. All this would take are a few billionaires to buy a franchise. And since the NFL basically prints money they are so successful, it wouldn't be a bad investment for any potential owner.

 

[Nomad]

Let's not also forget early in the season the Raiders beat the Patriots. In New England.

This goes to shows how meaningless week #1 results are. After that win, the Raiders lost 4 in a row before their "big" win against Tennessee in week #6. Then basically they lost the rest of their games. OTOH, NE experienced the opposite winning 14 games, the division & AFC championship.

I remember that opening win by the Raiders & thought they're off to great start & Carroll looks to be a good hire. Man, what an illusion that was. Lol.

 

[movingtarget]

This goes to shows how meaningless week #1 results are. After that win, the Raiders lost 4 in a row before their "big" win against Tennessee in week #6. Then basically they lost the rest of their games. OTOH, NE experienced the opposite winning 14 games, the division & AFC championship.

I remember that opening win by the Raiders & thought they're off to great start & Carroll looks to be a good hire. Man, what an illusion that was. Lol.

49ers beat Seattle in week one but couldn't compete with them in the two late season games...........

 

[movingtarget]

18 game seasons are both inevitable, and a bad idea. They would certainly need a 2nd bye week, plus to expand both the roster, and practice squads. But even then it's a bad idea, as QBs are likely to go down even more frequently than they do now. Imagine weeks, 17, 18, 20 when a winning team loses their QB, and are led into the playoffs with their version of Jarrett Stidham. Or tough guys like Josh Allen has a foot so badly broken he can't play. Plus the longer the season gets, the more likely players will sit, like they do in the NBA, where teams strategize losses, just to get to the "tournament" of the playoffs healthy. Fans will be upset if they are in a city like Arizona, looking forward to seeing someone like Lamar, or Allen come there and play for maybe the only time in their career, only to find out it's a "rest" game for that star.

I think what the NFL needs to do is plan to expand another 8 teams. Yep, eight. Four in Europe (England, Germany, Spain, France, or two in one of those countries, UK and Germany seem most popular), and four in the US (plenty of cities possible: St. Louis, San Antonio, Portland, Oklahoma City, San Diego, Salt Lake City, maybe even Toronto). AND have a second bye week. This bye week could do two things. Help teams travel to/from Europe. But also have one bye week the week before a Thursday night game. All this would take are a few billionaires to buy a franchise. And since the NFL basically prints money they are so successful, it wouldn't be a bad investment for any potential owner.

Like to see them ditch the Thursday games permanently but they won't. Coaches hate them and players probably aren't too keen either. If they do go to 18 games, retaining the Thursday games is ridiculous. They could easily fill the gap with a few late Saturday games where the rest period between games is a better option. They could use the mid week to screen NFL related content.

 

[Nomad]

18 game seasons are both inevitable, and a bad idea. They would certainly need a 2nd bye week, plus to expand both the roster, and practice squads. But even then it's a bad idea, as QBs are likely to go down even more frequently than they do now. Imagine weeks, 17, 18, 20 when a winning team loses their QB, and are led into the playoffs with their version of Jarrett Stidham. Or tough guys like Josh Allen has a foot so badly broken he can't play. Plus the longer the season gets, the more likely players will sit, like they do in the NBA, where teams strategize losses, just to get to the "tournament" of the playoffs healthy. Fans will be upset if they are in a city like Arizona, looking forward to seeing someone like Lamar, or Allen come there and play for maybe the only time in their career, only to find out it's a "rest" game for that star.

I think what the NFL needs to do is plan to expand another 8 teams. Yep, eight. Four in Europe (England, Germany, Spain, France, or two in one of those countries, UK and Germany seem most popular), and four in the US (plenty of cities possible: St. Louis, San Antonio, Portland, Oklahoma City, San Diego, Salt Lake City, maybe even Toronto). AND have a second bye week. This bye week could do two things. Help teams travel to/from Europe. But also have one bye week the week before a Thursday night game. All this would take are a few billionaires to buy a franchise. And since the NFL basically prints money they are so successful, it wouldn't be a bad investment for any potential owner.

18 games is absurd. 17 games is absurd. Even when the league expanded in 1978 from 14 to 16 games, I don't think that was good, IMO.

I read an article once on this where researchers said 14 games was the "sweet spot" for professional football where injuries were minimized & enough games were played to make the season interesting. And back in the 14 game era, throwing for 4000 & rushing for 1000 really meant something.

And what doesn't make sense in this 21st century era of football is that players are bigger, stronger, faster causing more injuries (especially concussions) like never seen before & they want to expand the season even further? Lol.

Football wasn't meant to be played that long. It's fall sport that's meant to played in the months of Sept, Oct & Nov with playoffs/(bowl games for colleges) in the months of Dec & very early Jan. We now have playoffs taking up the entire month of Jan with the SB being played in Feb for crying out loud. The seasons are just a marathon & game of attrition.

And Football was meant for one game a week...period. None of this Thursday BS where a team has less than 4 days from their Sunday game to recover & prepare. Your body really does need a full week's rest to recover & repair. When I played in HS, games were every Friday night & when I played in college, games were every Saturday afternoon. I was so beat up after the games it took several days to feel 100% again - just about in time for the next game. I can't image what the pros must be going through at that level. No wonder drug use (pain meds) runs rampant.

But I suppose it's all about the $$$. I guess it always was...and always will be.

 

[movingtarget]

Insider chatter seems to be that the Melbourne game will be the 49er v Rams with the Rams as the home team and then the 49ers will also play in Mexico City as the home team, opponent unknown. I'm sure that Shanahan will love that ! Had a feeling the 49ers would be the opponent as they have a big fan base in Australia but divisional games as internationals seems weird and sort of unfair. Might be just a rumor, we will see..........on top of that the 49ers are one of the teams in the running for Hard Knocks selection next season. Shanahan and Lynch have said before that they are not interested but they might not have a choice in the long run.

 

[Unchained]

I could write a long post on this.

There is truth to this. Most teams are owned by good 'ol boys club of rich, white, old men. The fact that the Rooneys (and Al Davis, Mark too) hired minorities years ago, and pushed for this rule, is great and all, but it only goes so far when stuff like Philip Rivers (or Jeff Saturday) getting automatic interviews/hires. But Flores also removed himself from being considered for the Raiders HC position after just an exploratory call, for whatever the reason. If he says he knew he wouldn't get the job, he may be right. But it's pretty unlikely with the Raiders it was because of his skin color.

There are counter arguments to all this:

First, the Rooney rule is now rules, plural. They are more robust than ever before, teams must interview at least two minority coaches in person, at least once each. A video interview doesn't cut it. The rule now also applies to coordinators. So it is moving in the right direction. Flores (and others) will likely say not fast enough, or broad enough, and they may may have a valid argument, but there has been progress.

The hiring (and interviewing) of minority coaches is also cyclical. Some years better than other. The NFL will argue it's better than it was 5, 10, 20 years ago, and they would be right. But that doesn't make this year look good, and people like Flores have a right to point this year out.

Next, the article (Flores?) said "black" and that is true. But Robert Saleh was hired by the Titans. He's Lebanese-American, and a Muslim, and doesn't shy away from this or pretend to be "white". This certainly qualifies as a minority hire. Also, Mike McDaniel is biracial, and he fights against labels of any sort, won't refer to his race at all, period. But despite being somewhat pale , he also has been a known supporter of African American heritage and related causes, if quietly so. I think if he pushed it, he could have gotten a HC job, likely the Cardinals, maybe the Raiders. But he withdrew and signed on as the Chargers OC. My guess is as much as anything to take a year or two off, as he will certainly get a HC offer next year, or the year after, and likely have a choice of teams to coach.

This last point cannot be lost. I lived in Oakland years ago. I was a minority white kid living in a poor area. No one bothered me, and while I was never really racist at my core, I learned a lot there, learned to see things in a different way, and be color blind. My ex was about 1/6th black, you could kind of tell. In some pasty white racist areas, she got called things. Before her I dated a girl who was 1/2 black, and identified herself as being black. What she had to deal with, even in "progressive" areas, even what may seem simple people trying to figure out what she identified as, was at best annoying or insensitive, at worst bordering on bias and bigotry. Like McDaniel, she hated labels. I can't say, "I get it, man". Being white I won't ever truly get it. A friend of my ex, who was dark-skinned African American black once said to me, "you don't really get black culture. But you're not a racist." I took that as a compliment. As she was right.

So it's really easy for some white person (me, an NFL owner, the league of white executives) to make comments and posts like this. But we are far from any sort of arbiter, or final expert authority on this issue, and never will be.

View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KodNIP4jBfE&pp=ygUfQmFkIGJ1bm55IG5vdCBwYWlkIGZvciBoYWxmdGltZQ%3D%3D

It's mind boggling some of the upside potential to individuals and brands, franchises. NFL is literally in turbo promotion mode pulling out all the stops to market their product. I thought just a few years ago that trying to sell American football was sort of a failed fad and Canada and Europe didn't really take the bait. I will qualify that by saying I thought that the NFL looked at Canada a little like MLB and you can travel to play in Canada with relative ease and if you have a team or two in population centers, why not. NFL is thinking way, way, way out of the box and looking at YouTube, Amazon, Netflix and other services as an all win situation. In the US huge television audience for all things NFL and now they are going to try and sell an NFL service to audiences that will likely have very few if any opportunities to see a game live. NFL taking the path of least resistance to sell to Europe, Central and South America almost immediately.
If you watch the Bad Bunny, Forbes feature story you see what rubs off can be worth hundreds of millions, Kendrick Lamar seeing almost immediate cash returns on his @12-15 minutes of direct association with the NFL, guy made over $@100 million dollars after tiny partnership with NFL.
In my opinion a player like Mendoza has a bunch of upside because of his background and abilities off the field, I can see him as a Raider uniform wearing ambassador of sorts but especially in Southwest United States.. If I was a Las Vegas Raiders marketing executive I would definitely want to put money on betting on Mendoza, who even if he doesn't materialize into a superhero he has awesome potential for goals of NFL overall.
There appears to be a pretty vocal resentment in NFL fans that the league is sort of ignoring tradition and shooting for a bigger picture in what feels like all the sudden. When I watched the Forbes video it's sort of mind blowing that Bad Bunny had his music streamed over a billion times in one year. Kind of hard to wrap your head around.. Young people might sort of be redefining reference points like gold or platinum records or Billboard 100 old metrics. NFL looks to be fully embracing many, many new ways of thinking, some are saying too many.

View: https://m.youtube.com/shorts/z11I6qysbXk

 

[SHAD0W93]

Like to see them ditch the Thursday games permanently but they won't. Coaches hate them and players probably aren't too keen either. If they do go to 18 games, retaining the Thursday games is ridiculous. They could easily fill the gap with a few late Saturday games where the rest period between games is a better option. They could use the mid week to screen NFL related content.

Haven’t they also said they want games played every day of the week? That’d need Alpe’s expansion team idea, but there aren’t enough good and especially great or elite players to go around. The NFL isn’t like the quality of say baseball who has many games, high player rosters, a dedicated feeder program with the minor leagues, and the vast majority of players having a longer career. You’d just get a bunch of teams that aren’t very good and not many people will watch those games. That’s not even counting how brutal the logistics would be for teams having to go back and forth across the Atlantic.

I still like my 19 game season with the 17, 18, and 19 being against the opposite conferences same season rank from the year before. With 3 bye weeks all at the same time for everyone and during those weeks the NFL plays highlights.

 

[movingtarget]

Giants hiring Matt Nagy as offensive coordinator

 

[movingtarget]

Haven’t they also said they want games played every day of the week? That’d need Alpe’s expansion team idea, but there aren’t enough good and especially great or elite players to go around. The NFL isn’t like the quality of say baseball who has many games, high player rosters, a dedicated feeder program with the minor leagues, and the vast majority of players having a longer career. You’d just get a bunch of teams that aren’t very good and not many people will watch those games. That’s not even counting how brutal the logistics would be for teams having to go back and forth across the Atlantic.

I still like my 19 game season with the 17, 18, and 19 being against the opposite conferences same season rank from the year before. With 3 bye weeks all at the same time for everyone and during those weeks the NFL plays highlights.

Yes, that's what I mean about not ditching the Thursday games, They want TV dominance. There should be two bye weeks already and why is the gap between the SB and the Conference Championship the only one with a two week gap ! Once again probably about TV. They could easily extend the season by a month and have extra byes. They seem okay with making the rosters bigger and the salary cap increasing so to me the extra rest is a no brainer. But of course they won't want to move the SB date etc...........if they don't go with a second bye just have a two week mid season break. More has to be done with scheduling. Giving teams multiple short week games consecutively before the playoffs and then having to play another short week with the first wildcard games is just poor scheduling.

 

[Nomad]

WTH? Justin Fields turns down a Pro Bowl invite? Lol

Jets QB Justin Fields reportedly declines Pro Bowl slot, cites offseason training

Fields cited offseason training as the reason he would not be participating

www.cbssports.com

And no talk about the Pro Bowl tonight? Game is going to be played indoors at the prestigious Moscone Center. It's sure to be a barn burner with Sanders playing. Lol

 

[Nomad]

Had a feeling the 49ers would be the opponent as they have a big fan base in Australia

Curious...why the 9ers with a big fan base down under? Why not the Seahawks, Rams or Chargers?

 

[movingtarget]

Curious...why the 9ers with a big fan base down under? Why not the Seahawks, Rams or Chargers?

No idea ! maybe because of the Jarryd Hayne hysteria in 2015 at least with the newer fans but with the older fans not so much. Hayne was a star in Rugby League so when he went to the NFL it was big news in Australia but he didn't even last two seasons

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

The NFL won't have a bye week during the season where no teams play. Zero chance.

They actually tried having two bye weeks about 10 years ago, networks complained there were enough quality games each week.

I think the NFL definitely would like to have games on at least 5 days of the week, if not all 7.

With all this travel, if they keep going overseas the NFL is going to need to bring back the Concorde, or wait a few years until new supersonic jets are viable.

 

[SHAD0W93]

Lions Fan Involved In Altercation With D.K. Metcalf Files A $100 Million Lawsuit

The Detroit Lions fans who was involved in an alteration with D.K. Metcalif during a December game as filed a $100 million defamation lawsuit against the wide receiver, the Steelers, former NFL wide receiver Chad Johnson and several companies, The Detroit Metro Times reports. He is also suing...

dailysnark.com

Like I said before, if I was the fan I would have fell forward over the barrier.

 

[movingtarget]

Lions Fan Involved In Altercation With D.K. Metcalf Files A $100 Million Lawsuit

The Detroit Lions fans who was involved in an alteration with D.K. Metcalif during a December game as filed a $100 million defamation lawsuit against the wide receiver, the Steelers, former NFL wide receiver Chad Johnson and several companies, The Detroit Metro Times reports. He is also suing...

dailysnark.com

Like I said before, if I was the fan I would have fell forward over the barrier.

The king of WR offensive penalties. I remember he had two in one game against the 49ers and Pete Carroll was giving him the death stare............

 

[movingtarget]

WTH? Justin Fields turns down a Pro Bowl invite? Lol

Jets QB Justin Fields reportedly declines Pro Bowl slot, cites offseason training

Fields cited offseason training as the reason he would not be participating

www.cbssports.com

And no talk about the Pro Bowl tonight? Game is going to be played indoors at the prestigious Moscone Center. It's sure to be a barn burner with Sanders playing. Lol

Even the highlights made me sleepy.........NFC won, is all I remember

 

[Nomad]

With all this travel, if they keep going overseas the NFL is going to need to bring back the Concorde, or wait a few years until new supersonic jets are viable.

Here's an interesting article on that. The NFL is eyeing some private companies that, in conjunction with NASA, are designing "boomless" supersonic commercial jets. Currently, NY to London takes a little over 7 hrs. The Concord back in it's day made it in about 3 hrs.

Why The NFL Has Its Eyes On The Return Of Supersonic Travel

How the future of SSTs caught the League's eye.

simpleflying.com

It's interesting how some teams approach the travel challenge of playing overseas. For example, in the week #7 matchup between the Rams & Jags at Wembley, the two teams had completely different approaches. The Jags flew out on Monday after their regular Sunday game and stayed at a training facility in London for the whole week.

OTOH, the Rams having played at Baltimore on that Sunday instead stayed on the East coast at an undisclosed practice facility for that week. They departed late Friday evening arriving Saturday AM in London for their regular arrival day before a Sunday game.

Don't know how much these two different travel strategies truly affected their teams, but the Rams smoked the Jags 35-7 (maybe too many distractions for the Jags staying in London during the week before the game?).

 

[Nomad]

Stephen A.: Drake Maye's mobility 'problematic' for Seahawks - ESPN Video

Stephen A. Smith says the Seahawks should plan around Drake Maye's abilities as a dual threat.

africa.espn.com

This will will be the first SB involving a pure pocket passer vs dual-threat since SB LV where you had Mahomes vs Brady (and Brady came out on top in that matchup).

Last year of course were two dual-threats doing battle where Hurts played one of his best games of his career both passing & rushing receiving MVP honors.

 

[Nomad]

Speaking of Brady - here's his SB prediction:

View: https://youtube.com/shorts/EdG78L_CgJE?si=Q6E1ReMl8bEXfiij

 

[Alpe d'Huez]

That's not much of a prediction.

This will will be the first SB involving a pure pocket passer vs dual-threat since SB LV where you had Mahomes vs Brady (and Brady came out on top in that matchup).

Here's the thing though, Darnold isn't exactly a statue, and extends plays within the pocket very well, and while Maye can be a dual threat for sure, plenty of the time he's beat defenses with his arm. But I also think as I said before, the Patriots are going to have to utilize Maye's ability to run as part of their gameplan, which will at least force Seattle to spy him on most plays, making it a bit more challenging on Seattle's DBs, if Maye can effectively run. They stop this, the Pats will have a hard time sustaining drives, and scoring.

On paper Seattle is just better, period. But Tom is right about the "any given Sunday." As he alluded, in 2007, nine out of 10 times they beat the Giants (and they easily beat them in the regular season), but that Sunday was the one week it didn't happen.

But if we go back to that SB of Brady vs. Mahomes, Tom didn't put up big numbers, but he was clutch time and again when it mattered. He got them in the end zone when they got close, over and over, when Mahomes simply couldn't do the same. Tom also got excellent protection from his OL. Mahomes on the other hand, the Chiefs OL came into the game banged up, and their OL got worse as the game went along. Mahomes also seemed more and more rattled by the pressure as the game went on and wasn't pulling the trigger. This all basically neutralized Mahomes ability to move, and made Tom's lack of mobility irrelevant. And guess what, Tampa actually lost to KC that regular season, 27-24, at home. ...Any given Sunday.

 

[movingtarget]

Steelers hire Vikings' Brian Angelichio as offensive coordinator

Jeff Stoutland will no longer be Eagles OL coach after 13 seasons

Cardinals to hire Nathaniel Hackett as offensive coordinator

 

[Nomad]

Here's the thing though, Darnold isn't exactly a statue, and extends plays within the pocket very well, and while Maye can be a dual threat for sure, plenty of the time he's beat defenses with his arm. But I also think as I said before, the Patriots are going to have to utilize Maye's ability to run as part of their gameplan, which will at least force Seattle to spy him on most plays, making it a bit more challenging on Seattle's DBs, if Maye can effectively run. They stop this, the Pats will have a hard time sustaining drives, and scoring.

Maybe he extends plays within the pocket but he presents absolutely no running threat whatsoever. Only 95 yds rushing this year? Only 9 yds on 3 carries in the playoffs? And just a little over 1000 yds rushing in his entire career? Aren't those Peyton Manning type numbers? Lol

Agree with you on Maye. I think he's actually a better passer than runner (and probably always will be). Where as Allen, LJ & Hurts - the best dual-threats in the business - are equally as good runners as passers & can do significant damage to defenses with their running skills.

For example, Maye in two seasons has averaged 435 yds rushing with minimal designed runs. Allen & Hurts have been averaging about 590 a season & LJ is in a league of his own averaging a whopping 815 per season! (Allen & Hurts have had a couple of 700 yd plus seasons). And these guys will have anywhere from 8 - 9 designed run plays per game excluding short-yardage under center type stuff (LJ a lot more depending on what defenses are showing him).

That's why it's funny that the Eagles are trying to transition Hurts to more of a pocket passer when his game is predicated on his elite running skills as well as his above-average passing skills. And this was the SB MVP who beat KC with both his legs & arm.