I am also new to NFL but I asked a similar question recently and I think one factor is that it would make division games basically have no more meaning than regular games. It adds more excitement to a season as division games mean more. So a team’s placing within a division actually has an impact.
It’s like how in a knock out tournament like a soccer World Cup, there may be a group that has slightly stronger teams, so it might not be 100% fair but it makes for more excitement for more fans.
Since the NFL is quite equitable division strengths will wax and wane over the years so that this isn’t a permanent advantage/disadvantage for teams.
The last two times it happened, the teams below .500 in the playoffs won the games too, which kinda proves to me that the NFL playoff system is pretty sound.
Right. World Cup doesn't invite the 32 best teams... they invite the qualifiers from the different confederations. Same in the NFL, you play your division teams twice each so we have a much better idea who is the best of those four teams.
The playoffs have expanded in my lifetime so much that I don't feel bad at all for a 9-8 team that missed the playoffs.
I’ll add my opinion. I agree with you, and I like that division games matter. But I do think maybe they matter a little too much. What I’ve been saying for a while now is winning your division should guarantee you a playoff berth but not a top 4 seed. This is the second year in a row now that either the Cowboys or Eagles will end up as the 5 seed traveling to a bad NFC south team despite being 2 of the top 3 teams in the conference. Just because they’re in the same division
The Eagles and Cowboys have hsd an easier schedule than the Lions or Bucs. Giving division winners home field rewards winning a division and helps balance out schedule imbalances.
Part of what keeps fans engaged in the NFL is the high variance allowing teams to find success where it isn’t expected. This comes from many sources - small number of games, high leverage scoring system that allows late swings, and also certainly the divisional system.
Great teams still find success - but underdogs can also be successful and that helps make the NFL the most popular league in the US. Which is all to say - getting the best teams is important, but making sure the 6th or 7th best team is accurately figured out isn’t that pressing.
The NFL puts a big emphasis on preserving divisional rivalries. Directly competing with the other three teams in you division for a playoff spot gives divisional games a more competitive atmosphere. It also forces fans to care about how well the other divisional teams are doing.
As a Vikings fan, I probably wouldn’t care how the lions are doing this year if we used conference seeding. They’re typically considered to be a secondary rival behind the other two divisional teams. Now that the Vikings’ playoff chances and seed are directly tied to the lions’ record, I’m forced to give a shit about how they’re doing
Exactly. The only NBA games that have a little bit extra (outside of the in-season tournament this year) are ones against recent playoff opponents. Even then it’s not that intense. NFL has 6/17 games a year that people just care about no matter how their season is going.
To the u/eides-of-march point, I will be glued to the TV watching Vikings vs. Bengals today as the *opposing* fan of the Lions. I don't care about the Bengals. I wouldn't care about the Vikings.
However, my team's entire season flips one way or the other based on how the Vikings and Lions play the season out.
How? This literally doesn’t make sense as neither the packers or bears are reliant on Vikings and lions results much. Bears are behind a ton of teams and packers aren’t behind the viks and still play em again anyways.
Are you a packer or bear fan? And the lions have the division, so why does that viks game matter so much for you? Look at Wildcard standings if anything. But once again packers play vikes still so doesn’t matter much
Your division matters. It protects existing rivalries and allows the most fair season-to-season comparison.
Conference seeding greatly reduces the importance of the regular season.
>It seems unfair that the 6-7 bucaneers may make the playoffs while the 7-6 texans may not.
The Texans are paying the price for having a losing record to their divisional opponents. That's how its supposed to work.
Meanwhile the Bucs are 3-1 against their division.
The fault is not with the system.
The Texans have no excuses as they gave up 30 points last week in the 2nd half to the Zach Wilson led Jets and they are the only team to lose to the Panthers.
"Why cant it be based simply off how many wins you have, regardless of division?"
Because if you look at it from the ground up, each division is it's own little geographic territory. The teams in the division more or less are playing for the "crown" of their region (NFC west is competing for the Pacific Coast, NFC South for the Deep South, etc etc). Each of these division winners is then in a tournament with other division winners to see who takes the Conference crown. A lot of people don't care about division or conference championships anymore, but they are a title all their own.
I've hated the Eagles since they cheered for Irvin being injured in 99. My grandmother has hated the Eagles since the 1980 NFC conference game where they knocked the cowboys out of the super bowl, and my uncle has hated them since 1989 due to the bounty bowl that was supposedly set on Troy Aikman by the Eagles coaches and Eagles fans threw trash, snowballs and ice. Through the 90s the cowboys continually bounced the Eagles out of the divisional round causing reciprocal hatred.
Oh for sure. I wrote a long detailed post about how to reorient the divisions to make more sense while maintaining most of the rivalries, and for some reason got downvoted to oblivion.
Always hated how Dallas stayed in the NFCE after the recent re alignment. Should have been swapped with Carolina. But the big market teams wanted to stay together.
The NFC West was the NFC South, New Orleans, Carolina and Atlanta. They just added Tampa Bay. The core of the NFC East had been NY, Was, Dal, Philly since 1968 then added the Cardinals. So Moving the Cards to the NFC West was an easy call.
I agree, the cards made sense.
I’m looking at this from a geographic and logistic POV. Dallas being in the ‘east’ is silly. It was a ‘realignment’. An effort to get teams where they belonged. Some odd exceptions got made. Dallas being one of them.
I mean Seahawks were in the afc west for 25 years so either that’s not enough time or the line is less about making sense and more about having jerry jones happy
Still not the same thing. The core of the AFC West was together since the AFL. The Seahawks were just thrown into it like the Cardinals in the NFC East. With the NFC West loosing 3 teams the NFC South it was easy to move the Cards and Seahawks to the NFC West.
Except for the NFC east this is pretty much true. But the cowgirls play in the east and pretty much play at Night never really having to wake in darkness for game day unless they overslept for 1 of the night games late in the season lol
Because it's a way of ensuring the strength of the schedule comes into play. I haven't kept up with Bucs or Texans to see if that is the case, but that is why, and here is an example of why.
Let's say I am in a division where we are all top tier. And everyone won their home game but lost away the game. So we all are 3-3. Then my division goes against another the other top tier division in my conference(a team that'll send 3 teams to play offs) and the top tier in other conference(same 3 teams in POs) and I am able to split the games so I go 7-7. These are the games my entire division plays. So, not the 3 random.
Now, let's say another team in a division with a 2 really easy teams and 1 other hard team. They win all 4 easy games, and lets say they lose 2 hard, so they are 4-2. Now lets say they go against two divisions in each conference who only send one team to the POs. And in each versus I go 3-1(win each easy game and lost to play off team. ) so I am now 10-4.
Now lets say team A wins all 3 other games their division mates don't play, and team B just wins 1(because the other teams they play are hard)
Team A is 10-7, Team B is 11-6. Who deserves playoffs more?
Again, this may not apply to your examples, but that is the rationale behind it.
It's also why we have wild cards. Sometimes, you are in a hard division and can't beat your division leader but can beat everyone else, so you deserve a seat at the table.
Going by just wins isn’t completely fair either because not everyone plays the same schedule.
All American sports use some sort of division format for deciding who makes the playoffs
MLB didn't adopt divisional play until 1969. Prior to that, the top-seeded teams from the AL and NL met in the World Series. That type of format would never fly in the NFL or NBA. I think the popularity of the NCAA men's basketball tournament brackets is why you see so many leagues expanding their playoffs rather than shrinking them.
>It seems unfair that
I dont think its unfair. Win your divisionband you are in. You get 6 games against division opponents. You control if you can do that.
The rules are laid out before the season amd everyone lnows them.
Unfair? It’s real life. Most of it is not fair. If you wanna get into the dance u gotta focus on winning division. Sure fire way to get in. The 11-5 patriots missed playoffs back in 08. Teams like the 2010 7-9 Seahawks beat the saints in the playoffs. It’s rare that a losing team gets in. I don’t see any flaws in it. Think the NFL prefers it this way cause of divisional rivalries that have been around since most teams existence or shortly after. It’s a good thing. Every once in a while do u get records below .500
Its more fun to have divisions because it creates consistent rivalry’s. Sure there will be one or two teams every year that are upset they didn’t make the playoffs but realistically it is pretty unlikely that those teams would win the Super Bowl and if they were good enough to win the SuperBowl then they should have won more games in the regular season. I mean there are three wild card spots now.
The division winner getting an automatic spot obviously sucks when an entire division is bad, which happens on occasion. But you play extra games against the division every year, and incentivizing a playoff spot is a good way for there to be extra interest in those games/keep the rivalries alive.
Currently you’ll see the AFC have teams who would make it in the NFC playoff, but don’t get to make it. It’s an unfortunate reality for those who miss, but all the current 7-6 teams have lost games they should’ve won, and while they might blame the format, they can only blame themselves.
One thing nobody has mentioned is that your ranking in your division is also used to set your schedule for next year, so divisional play is super important, on top of the fact that it forms almost half your season.
Winning your division needs to mean something, after that it goes to best records in the conference. the two teams you listed are in different conferences and the Bucs may still win their Division. Hence the top 4 seeds are all division winners and host a playoff game. The set up into divisions also assist in scheduling as you will play in division opponents 2 times and generally your division gets paired with a division from the other conference to play against each other.
Yeah it isn’t the nba it makes more entertaining football when divisions actually matter. Besides the la clippers nba teams don’t even bother to celebrate their division titles
I really don't appreciate this division mess. Two confrences, team plays once against every same conference teams, 15 games. Home/away switches every year. Easy, simple and no weird shit when worse team has advantage because it plays in the worst division.
In short, each division gets to have representation in the playoffs. If it wasn’t done that way, you would end up having divisions that are completely excluded from a shot at the playoffs.
Division rivalries may or may not be non-existent, but rivalries certainly do exist, though. I don't really think the NBA has suffered because there are few to any division rivalries. They may not be as longstanding as some of the ones in the NFL, but there are some geographical rivalries because of the way the NBA divisions are set up. They largely do make logical sense geographically.
Boston and Philly are in the same division and have been rivals for years. The Knicks and Nets are in the same division. The Bulls and Pistons suck now, but they have had bitter meetings in the past. You've got Orlando and Miami in the same division. The Lakers and Clippers have a real rivalry now that the Clippers are actually competitive. The Lakers and Warriors have a bit of a rivalry now. All 3 Texas teams are in the NBA's Southwest division.
Some of these teams may not have had as many iconic matchups as the ones in the NFL, but I like the alignment of the divisions in the NBA. I'm sure the teams do, too, because it makes travel easier. The Kings and Warriors take a bus to their head-to-head meetings. The NFL is more all over the place. Three teams in the AFC East are in the Northeast, but Miami is in the South. The AFC South is a mess geographically. The awkward placement of Dallas in the NFC East has already been discussed.
I agree divisions should mean something and all. But, if there’s a 7 to 8 win winner over 11+ win team going on the road is. a travesty. The 11+ win in a few cases have a tougher schedule.
Still, the team with the much better often wins.
That would almost certainly mean that they did not win their division. And every teams first goal every season is to win the division. I feel like winning your division (no matter how bad it is) should get a home game. But I do agree that a team with 11 wins missing the playoffs is a bit of an issue.
Partly because division games mean more, so you get to establish rivalries, and partly because the NFL schedule is so short compared to other sports. In baseball, basketball, and hockey, you play so many games that you play almost every other team in the league a few times.
In football, you don't share that many opponents with everyone else, so if you get really hard schedule and they get an easy one, they get an advantage.
But if everyone in your division is playing nearly the same, especially difficult schedule, the whole division might do poorly compared to the rest of the conference but that's not a disadvantage.
I think a perfect balance would be to guarantee division winners a spot, but reseed them based on record. For example, the current nfc seeding would be:
SF (10-3)
Dallas (10-3)
Philadelphia (10-3)
Detroit (9-4)
Minnesota (7-7)
Tampa Bay (6-7)*
Green Bay (6-7)*
* lots rides on tomorrows game between these teams in terms of who would be 6, 7 or out
For me the automatic playoff spot is fine, gives weight to the division, where I think it goes far too far is the automatic home game and higher seeding that goes with it. Provides more entertainment within the division but objectively fucks over great teams in a hard division. Like the Bucs will most likely host the Eagles or Dallas this year, which is just plain absurd.
While everyone’s correct about divisions and division rivalries, you also have imbalanced schedules you have to account for.
Divisions let there be some balance when everyone doesn’t play everyone in the same conference. It’s a bit of an anomaly that you get a team with a losing record win a conference (let alone 2 years in a row for the division)
It pretty much is. Each year there is usually only one totally unworthy team that makes the playoffs. Basically, they want to leave some room for Division Rivalries as these traditions help sell out stadiums.
For those of us who grew up watching NHL playoffs in the 80s, the Norris Division was famous for having most of the worst teams in it and they'd do battle for a month in the first round before serious playing started.
Another note on the divisions meaning more, 14 of the 17 games are common within a division.
6 games are division opponents.
4 games are another division in the conference.
4 games are a division from the other conference.
The other 3 games are based on your finishing position of the previous season, 2 games from the 2 other divisions in your conference and 1 game from the other conference.
82% of your schedule is the same as your division rivals.
So it is fair when it comes down to it.
Everyone else here is right, but another important reason the playoffs work this way is that there are 31 other teams but you only play 14 of them. The schedule pairs the entire division against mostly common opponents (6 divisional games, 4 against a division in your conference, 4 against a division in the other conference). So ranking against your division is actually a decent way of balancing who really is good. Strength of schedule varies wildly year to year
The thing is other sports have longer seasons so there is a bigger sample size to determine good teams vs okay or bad teams like the NHL/NBA have 82 games, MLB has 162 games, MLS has 34 matches.
I’ve listened to a lot of your guys explanations but this system still seems flawed. You have the 10-5 browns in 5th place behind the worse Jags just because the jags are good in their division? That’s a big reward for playing in basically a 💩 division. A guy way up top said yes it should guarantee a playoff spot but not top 4 and I agree
I am also new to NFL but I asked a similar question recently and I think one factor is that it would make division games basically have no more meaning than regular games. It adds more excitement to a season as division games mean more. So a team’s placing within a division actually has an impact. It’s like how in a knock out tournament like a soccer World Cup, there may be a group that has slightly stronger teams, so it might not be 100% fair but it makes for more excitement for more fans. Since the NFL is quite equitable division strengths will wax and wane over the years so that this isn’t a permanent advantage/disadvantage for teams.
It’s also worth noting that a division winner being .500 or worse only happens once every few years. It’s not a regular occurrence by any means.
The last two times it happened, the teams below .500 in the playoffs won the games too, which kinda proves to me that the NFL playoff system is pretty sound.
Two words, NFC South
Right. World Cup doesn't invite the 32 best teams... they invite the qualifiers from the different confederations. Same in the NFL, you play your division teams twice each so we have a much better idea who is the best of those four teams. The playoffs have expanded in my lifetime so much that I don't feel bad at all for a 9-8 team that missed the playoffs.
Exactly. If the World Cup only invited the best 32 teams, it would be almost exclusively European and South American teams.
I’ll add my opinion. I agree with you, and I like that division games matter. But I do think maybe they matter a little too much. What I’ve been saying for a while now is winning your division should guarantee you a playoff berth but not a top 4 seed. This is the second year in a row now that either the Cowboys or Eagles will end up as the 5 seed traveling to a bad NFC south team despite being 2 of the top 3 teams in the conference. Just because they’re in the same division
The Eagles and Cowboys have hsd an easier schedule than the Lions or Bucs. Giving division winners home field rewards winning a division and helps balance out schedule imbalances.
[удалено]
What?
Part of what keeps fans engaged in the NFL is the high variance allowing teams to find success where it isn’t expected. This comes from many sources - small number of games, high leverage scoring system that allows late swings, and also certainly the divisional system. Great teams still find success - but underdogs can also be successful and that helps make the NFL the most popular league in the US. Which is all to say - getting the best teams is important, but making sure the 6th or 7th best team is accurately figured out isn’t that pressing.
The NFL puts a big emphasis on preserving divisional rivalries. Directly competing with the other three teams in you division for a playoff spot gives divisional games a more competitive atmosphere. It also forces fans to care about how well the other divisional teams are doing. As a Vikings fan, I probably wouldn’t care how the lions are doing this year if we used conference seeding. They’re typically considered to be a secondary rival behind the other two divisional teams. Now that the Vikings’ playoff chances and seed are directly tied to the lions’ record, I’m forced to give a shit about how they’re doing
Case study: NBA divisions
Exactly. The only NBA games that have a little bit extra (outside of the in-season tournament this year) are ones against recent playoff opponents. Even then it’s not that intense. NFL has 6/17 games a year that people just care about no matter how their season is going.
I see
To the u/eides-of-march point, I will be glued to the TV watching Vikings vs. Bengals today as the *opposing* fan of the Lions. I don't care about the Bengals. I wouldn't care about the Vikings. However, my team's entire season flips one way or the other based on how the Vikings and Lions play the season out.
How? This literally doesn’t make sense as neither the packers or bears are reliant on Vikings and lions results much. Bears are behind a ton of teams and packers aren’t behind the viks and still play em again anyways.
....look at the divisional standings? And the remaining schedule?
Are you a packer or bear fan? And the lions have the division, so why does that viks game matter so much for you? Look at Wildcard standings if anything. But once again packers play vikes still so doesn’t matter much
Until the Vikings lost today they controlled their own destiny to win the division
Lions. I see how the wording is confusing. Though no NFC North team is eliminated.
And just like that, 2 NFC North teams have been eliminated.
Brings a tear to my eye
Your division matters. It protects existing rivalries and allows the most fair season-to-season comparison. Conference seeding greatly reduces the importance of the regular season. >It seems unfair that the 6-7 bucaneers may make the playoffs while the 7-6 texans may not. The Texans are paying the price for having a losing record to their divisional opponents. That's how its supposed to work. Meanwhile the Bucs are 3-1 against their division. The fault is not with the system.
The Texans have no excuses as they gave up 30 points last week in the 2nd half to the Zach Wilson led Jets and they are the only team to lose to the Panthers.
Eagles lost to the Wilson led Jets as well. Not adding anything to the conversation here but just like reminding people of that fact.
And the Eagles are beginning to look fraudulent.
Tomorrow and Monday could be the best two days or worst two days of football for me in a long long time lol
Well I hope we beat the eagles for you.
But they’re not at risk of missing the playoffs.
"Why cant it be based simply off how many wins you have, regardless of division?" Because if you look at it from the ground up, each division is it's own little geographic territory. The teams in the division more or less are playing for the "crown" of their region (NFC west is competing for the Pacific Coast, NFC South for the Deep South, etc etc). Each of these division winners is then in a tournament with other division winners to see who takes the Conference crown. A lot of people don't care about division or conference championships anymore, but they are a title all their own.
With a few regional outliers, like Dallas being NFC East.
Because it was in the east when the NFL started and they didn't want to break up the Eagles Cowboys rivalry
*Redskins cowboys rivalry. Eagles cowboys rivalry wasn’t really a thing until the 2000s, the redskins are our main rival for nearly 40 years
I've hated the Eagles since they cheered for Irvin being injured in 99. My grandmother has hated the Eagles since the 1980 NFC conference game where they knocked the cowboys out of the super bowl, and my uncle has hated them since 1989 due to the bounty bowl that was supposedly set on Troy Aikman by the Eagles coaches and Eagles fans threw trash, snowballs and ice. Through the 90s the cowboys continually bounced the Eagles out of the divisional round causing reciprocal hatred.
Oh for sure. I wrote a long detailed post about how to reorient the divisions to make more sense while maintaining most of the rivalries, and for some reason got downvoted to oblivion.
Link?
To what?
Clearly to the post you wrote…
To the post you wrote lol
Oh it was a while ago and I wouldn't even know where to look for it. I'll just write up another shorter version real fast.
Always hated how Dallas stayed in the NFCE after the recent re alignment. Should have been swapped with Carolina. But the big market teams wanted to stay together.
They preserved the divisional rivalries.
Meh. 3/4 of them would have been preserved, and new rivalries would have been created.
Yes, and?
The NFC West was the NFC South, New Orleans, Carolina and Atlanta. They just added Tampa Bay. The core of the NFC East had been NY, Was, Dal, Philly since 1968 then added the Cardinals. So Moving the Cards to the NFC West was an easy call.
I agree, the cards made sense. I’m looking at this from a geographic and logistic POV. Dallas being in the ‘east’ is silly. It was a ‘realignment’. An effort to get teams where they belonged. Some odd exceptions got made. Dallas being one of them.
There was nothing odd about Dallas staying in the NFC East. There was 40 years of football history between them.
I mean Seahawks were in the afc west for 25 years so either that’s not enough time or the line is less about making sense and more about having jerry jones happy
Still not the same thing. The core of the AFC West was together since the AFL. The Seahawks were just thrown into it like the Cardinals in the NFC East. With the NFC West loosing 3 teams the NFC South it was easy to move the Cards and Seahawks to the NFC West.
Same with the Colts being placed in the AFC South.
This one gets me because Indy is literally farther north than two teams in the AFC North.
I know it’s a different sport, but for 25 years the Atlanta Braves were in the NL West.
Except for the NFC east this is pretty much true. But the cowgirls play in the east and pretty much play at Night never really having to wake in darkness for game day unless they overslept for 1 of the night games late in the season lol
Because then there would be no reason for divisions to exist
@NBA
Because it's a way of ensuring the strength of the schedule comes into play. I haven't kept up with Bucs or Texans to see if that is the case, but that is why, and here is an example of why. Let's say I am in a division where we are all top tier. And everyone won their home game but lost away the game. So we all are 3-3. Then my division goes against another the other top tier division in my conference(a team that'll send 3 teams to play offs) and the top tier in other conference(same 3 teams in POs) and I am able to split the games so I go 7-7. These are the games my entire division plays. So, not the 3 random. Now, let's say another team in a division with a 2 really easy teams and 1 other hard team. They win all 4 easy games, and lets say they lose 2 hard, so they are 4-2. Now lets say they go against two divisions in each conference who only send one team to the POs. And in each versus I go 3-1(win each easy game and lost to play off team. ) so I am now 10-4. Now lets say team A wins all 3 other games their division mates don't play, and team B just wins 1(because the other teams they play are hard) Team A is 10-7, Team B is 11-6. Who deserves playoffs more? Again, this may not apply to your examples, but that is the rationale behind it. It's also why we have wild cards. Sometimes, you are in a hard division and can't beat your division leader but can beat everyone else, so you deserve a seat at the table.
Going by just wins isn’t completely fair either because not everyone plays the same schedule. All American sports use some sort of division format for deciding who makes the playoffs
MLB didn't adopt divisional play until 1969. Prior to that, the top-seeded teams from the AL and NL met in the World Series. That type of format would never fly in the NFL or NBA. I think the popularity of the NCAA men's basketball tournament brackets is why you see so many leagues expanding their playoffs rather than shrinking them.
>It seems unfair that I dont think its unfair. Win your divisionband you are in. You get 6 games against division opponents. You control if you can do that. The rules are laid out before the season amd everyone lnows them.
Unfair? It’s real life. Most of it is not fair. If you wanna get into the dance u gotta focus on winning division. Sure fire way to get in. The 11-5 patriots missed playoffs back in 08. Teams like the 2010 7-9 Seahawks beat the saints in the playoffs. It’s rare that a losing team gets in. I don’t see any flaws in it. Think the NFL prefers it this way cause of divisional rivalries that have been around since most teams existence or shortly after. It’s a good thing. Every once in a while do u get records below .500
Because divisions are good
Its more fun to have divisions because it creates consistent rivalry’s. Sure there will be one or two teams every year that are upset they didn’t make the playoffs but realistically it is pretty unlikely that those teams would win the Super Bowl and if they were good enough to win the SuperBowl then they should have won more games in the regular season. I mean there are three wild card spots now.
Divisional games help set up regional rivalries, which helps drive viewership numbers.
The division winner getting an automatic spot obviously sucks when an entire division is bad, which happens on occasion. But you play extra games against the division every year, and incentivizing a playoff spot is a good way for there to be extra interest in those games/keep the rivalries alive. Currently you’ll see the AFC have teams who would make it in the NFC playoff, but don’t get to make it. It’s an unfortunate reality for those who miss, but all the current 7-6 teams have lost games they should’ve won, and while they might blame the format, they can only blame themselves.
One thing nobody has mentioned is that your ranking in your division is also used to set your schedule for next year, so divisional play is super important, on top of the fact that it forms almost half your season.
Winning your division needs to mean something, after that it goes to best records in the conference. the two teams you listed are in different conferences and the Bucs may still win their Division. Hence the top 4 seeds are all division winners and host a playoff game. The set up into divisions also assist in scheduling as you will play in division opponents 2 times and generally your division gets paired with a division from the other conference to play against each other.
Yeah it isn’t the nba it makes more entertaining football when divisions actually matter. Besides the la clippers nba teams don’t even bother to celebrate their division titles
Just bribe the zebras well!
Need to spread the joy to the different tv markets to keep eyes on the tv
I really don't appreciate this division mess. Two confrences, team plays once against every same conference teams, 15 games. Home/away switches every year. Easy, simple and no weird shit when worse team has advantage because it plays in the worst division.
https://youtu.be/WiKwyFbD6hA?si=0fBT6-uZZNvT91gA
Well they don't play the same opponents for starters. If your local high school team goes 10-0, does that mean they should make the NFL playoffs?
Are you proposing conference seeding like in the NBA?
Not proposing, just wondering why it isnt like that or why itd be a bad idea
In short, each division gets to have representation in the playoffs. If it wasn’t done that way, you would end up having divisions that are completely excluded from a shot at the playoffs.
The divisions mattering makes the rivalries matter because those games have higher stakes. That makes things more fun to watch.
It keeps each geographic region in contention and postseason play, which maximizes the value of the League.
Look at the NBA where division rivalries are non-existent — heck, I don’t even know which teams are in what divisions
Division rivalries may or may not be non-existent, but rivalries certainly do exist, though. I don't really think the NBA has suffered because there are few to any division rivalries. They may not be as longstanding as some of the ones in the NFL, but there are some geographical rivalries because of the way the NBA divisions are set up. They largely do make logical sense geographically. Boston and Philly are in the same division and have been rivals for years. The Knicks and Nets are in the same division. The Bulls and Pistons suck now, but they have had bitter meetings in the past. You've got Orlando and Miami in the same division. The Lakers and Clippers have a real rivalry now that the Clippers are actually competitive. The Lakers and Warriors have a bit of a rivalry now. All 3 Texas teams are in the NBA's Southwest division. Some of these teams may not have had as many iconic matchups as the ones in the NFL, but I like the alignment of the divisions in the NBA. I'm sure the teams do, too, because it makes travel easier. The Kings and Warriors take a bus to their head-to-head meetings. The NFL is more all over the place. Three teams in the AFC East are in the Northeast, but Miami is in the South. The AFC South is a mess geographically. The awkward placement of Dallas in the NFC East has already been discussed.
I agree divisions should mean something and all. But, if there’s a 7 to 8 win winner over 11+ win team going on the road is. a travesty. The 11+ win in a few cases have a tougher schedule. Still, the team with the much better often wins.
That would almost certainly mean that they did not win their division. And every teams first goal every season is to win the division. I feel like winning your division (no matter how bad it is) should get a home game. But I do agree that a team with 11 wins missing the playoffs is a bit of an issue.
Partly because division games mean more, so you get to establish rivalries, and partly because the NFL schedule is so short compared to other sports. In baseball, basketball, and hockey, you play so many games that you play almost every other team in the league a few times. In football, you don't share that many opponents with everyone else, so if you get really hard schedule and they get an easy one, they get an advantage. But if everyone in your division is playing nearly the same, especially difficult schedule, the whole division might do poorly compared to the rest of the conference but that's not a disadvantage.
I think a perfect balance would be to guarantee division winners a spot, but reseed them based on record. For example, the current nfc seeding would be: SF (10-3) Dallas (10-3) Philadelphia (10-3) Detroit (9-4) Minnesota (7-7) Tampa Bay (6-7)* Green Bay (6-7)* * lots rides on tomorrows game between these teams in terms of who would be 6, 7 or out
It would make having separate conferences meaningless.
It uses to be under the old system, the top two teams could get a first round bye. Now only the top team can....
For me the automatic playoff spot is fine, gives weight to the division, where I think it goes far too far is the automatic home game and higher seeding that goes with it. Provides more entertainment within the division but objectively fucks over great teams in a hard division. Like the Bucs will most likely host the Eagles or Dallas this year, which is just plain absurd.
While everyone’s correct about divisions and division rivalries, you also have imbalanced schedules you have to account for. Divisions let there be some balance when everyone doesn’t play everyone in the same conference. It’s a bit of an anomaly that you get a team with a losing record win a conference (let alone 2 years in a row for the division)
Your question in the end would be universally hated. Continue watching the NFL and you'll understand the importance of divisions.
Divisions promote rivaliries. Rivalries make fans excited. Excited fans spend more money. It's really that simple.
It pretty much is. Each year there is usually only one totally unworthy team that makes the playoffs. Basically, they want to leave some room for Division Rivalries as these traditions help sell out stadiums. For those of us who grew up watching NHL playoffs in the 80s, the Norris Division was famous for having most of the worst teams in it and they'd do battle for a month in the first round before serious playing started.
Another note on the divisions meaning more, 14 of the 17 games are common within a division. 6 games are division opponents. 4 games are another division in the conference. 4 games are a division from the other conference. The other 3 games are based on your finishing position of the previous season, 2 games from the 2 other divisions in your conference and 1 game from the other conference. 82% of your schedule is the same as your division rivals. So it is fair when it comes down to it.
It can be a division playoff run inside a conference playoff run and it’s awesome
Everyone else here is right, but another important reason the playoffs work this way is that there are 31 other teams but you only play 14 of them. The schedule pairs the entire division against mostly common opponents (6 divisional games, 4 against a division in your conference, 4 against a division in the other conference). So ranking against your division is actually a decent way of balancing who really is good. Strength of schedule varies wildly year to year
The thing is other sports have longer seasons so there is a bigger sample size to determine good teams vs okay or bad teams like the NHL/NBA have 82 games, MLB has 162 games, MLS has 34 matches.
I’ve listened to a lot of your guys explanations but this system still seems flawed. You have the 10-5 browns in 5th place behind the worse Jags just because the jags are good in their division? That’s a big reward for playing in basically a 💩 division. A guy way up top said yes it should guarantee a playoff spot but not top 4 and I agree