OT: Byes and Seeding

[mgteich]

It is not clear at all that a bye is an advantage.

It is clear that having home games is an advantage.

Division winners should have at least one home game. That worth fight for, for the team and the fans who want to see a home game.
===========
PROPOSAL
1. Get rid of the bye
2. Have 16 teams in the playoffs, with the top seed playing the lowest each week.
3. Re-seed after the first week, so a team with the fewest wins gets a seeding advantage only for the first week.

The #1 see would then be forced to play an extra game against the #16 seed instead of having a bye, not much of an issue.

 

[patfanken]

NO MORE PLAYOFF teams. C'mon, man then half the Damn league would be in the playoffs. Here is a simple solution. Just add a simple proviso. A division winner must have at least 10 wins to get a home game. How is that different than counting conference wins to determine a #1 seed in a tie breaker. Just another arbitrary determiner. That eliminates what we are seeing this year in the NFCS yet still keeps the importance of winning your division and division rivalries intact. EXCEPT in those rare years like this one.

 

[VrabelJr]

A better solution is even simpler: Go back to 6 teams, get rid of all playoff byes.

 

[Ring 6]

It is not clear at all that a bye is an advantage.

It is clear that having home games is an advantage.

Division winners should have at least one home game. That worth fight for, for the team and the fans who want to see a home game.
===========
PROPOSAL
1. Get rid of the bye
2. Have 16 teams in the playoffs, with the top seed playing the lowest each week.
3. Re-seed after the first week, so a team with the fewest wins gets a seeding advantage only for the first week.

The #1 see would then be forced to play an extra game against the #16 seed instead of having a bye, not much of an issue.

Of course it is clear the bye is an advantage.
7 teams in each conference male the playoffs. One gets an automatic
round 1 win. The other 6 have to play.
There is no bigger advantage in football.

Your proposal is awful. The regular season becomes meaningless.

 

[TommyD4207]

It is not clear at all that a bye is an advantage.

It is clear that having home games is an advantage.

Division winners should have at least one home game. That worth fight for, for the team and the fans who want to see a home game.
===========
PROPOSAL
1. Get rid of the bye
2. Have 16 teams in the playoffs, with the top seed playing the lowest each week.
3. Re-seed after the first week, so a team with the fewest wins gets a seeding advantage only for the first week.

The #1 see would then be forced to play an extra game against the #16 seed instead of having a bye, not much of an issue.

Adding more teams to the playoffs turns the NFL into the NBA and NHL.
There are already too many playoff teams.

No thanks. Dumb idea.

 

[fnordcircle]

In what world is a bye, essentially a freebie WC weekend win with zero stress on your player's bodies or mind, not a TREMENDOUS advantage?!

 

[Nehalem]

A better solution is even simpler: Go back to 6 teams, get rid of all playoff byes.

That literally doesn't work.

After week 1 of the playoffs you would have 3 teams in each conference.

The correct solution is to go back to 6 teams with top 2 getting byes. This makes the regular season meaningful.

Seed 1: Bye + homefield advantage in playoffs
Seed 2: Bye
Seed 3/4(remaining division winnders): Home playoff game
Seed 5/6(wildcards): Just happy to make it.

 

[Uptown]

Just change the **** back how it was.

 

[mgteich]

In what world is a bye, essentially a freebie WC weekend win with zero stress on your player's bodies or mind, not a TREMENDOUS advantage?!

I don't know. I presume that you don't even have a mild interest in college football.

 

[TheRainMaker]

Go back to how it was with 16 games, 6 teams with 2 byes in each conference. It's too easy to make the playoffs these days and only exposes how pathetic teams are for not being able to make the playoffs with the current format.

Divisions are absolutely lame as there are little to no rivalries, only fake ones the media/networks makes up. Too much coach and player turnover for rivalries to exist in today's game.

 

[Triumph]

All the Pats losses were at home, but they are undefeated on the road. The added time off in the MNF game vs the Giants did the Pats no favors since they were not hitting on all cylinders in the beginning. Buffalo @ NE post bye did not look like any advantage to me.

Additional time off can be a curse. You cant emulate real game action because you don't want to injure your own players.

Miami is coming to play tomorrow and LAC is not when they show up in Denver. Let the Broncos have the bye.

 

[TommyD4207]

I don't know. I presume that you don't even have a college interest in college football.

There are 136 FBS schools.
There are 32 NFL teams.
Letting half the teams make the playoffs virtually guarantees teams with losing records will get in every year. That will not happen with a 16 team college playoff.

 

[maust]

It is not clear at all that a bye is an advantage.

It is not clear "at all" that getting a free pass to the Divisional round when your opponent in that round has to risk elimination and injury while your team has a week off to heal up is an advantage??? I'm sorry but I can't see where the advantage is anything but clear and obvious

 

[mgteich]

Just change the **** back how it was.

before the afl was formed or after? What date would you pick? the league has changed many, many times.

What we cannot seem to understand is that
1) the only constant in this world is change, and
2) professional football is a business.

The number of byes and the number of teams in the league and everything else is based on what makes more money for the owners and players.
==========
Going back to the good old days has been a mantra for thousands of years.
==========
BTW, compared to your chosen date, counting all the games,
1) were there more fans attending in 2025?
2) were there more people watching on television?
3) did more people watch the Super Bowl?
===============

 

[Uptown]

before the afl was formed or after? What date would you pick? the league has changed many, many times.

What we cannot seem to understand is that
1) the only constant in this world is change, and
2) professional football is a business.

The number of byes and the number of teams in the league and everything else is based on what makes more money for the owners and players.
==========
Going back to the good old days has been a mantra for thousands of years.
==========
BTW, compared to your chosen date, counting all the games,
1) were there more fans attending in 2025?
2) were there more people watching on television?
3) did more people watch the Super Bowl?
===============

How it was before the recent 345 Park Avenue money grab. Nobody cares about the pre AFL days…

 

[mgteich]

There are 136 FBS schools.
There are 32 NFL teams.
Letting half the teams make the playoffs virtually guarantees teams with losing records will get in every year. That will not happen with a 16 team college playoff.

Fair enough

NUMBER OF TEAMS IN THE PLAYOFFS
What "works" is measured by how much money the teams make and how many fans attend and watch. Has NFL football declined by those measures since the golden decade? the 1970's? the 1980's? the 1990's? 2000's?

NUMBER OF BYES
We could "improve" in many ways. Just asks folks. IMHO, the primary reason that posters want TWO byes is that we would get the 2nd one. If we were the #1 seed, we would be celebrating and not begging for another team to also get a bye.

 

[mgteich]

Just change the **** back how it was.

pick a year

 

[mgteich]

Go back to how it was with 16 games, 6 teams with 2 byes in each conference. It's too easy to make the playoffs these days and only exposes how pathetic teams are for not being able to make the playoffs with the current format.

Divisions are absolutely lame as there are little to no rivalries, only fake ones the media/networks makes up. Too much coach and player turnover for rivalries to exist in today's game.

ROFL
There are and will always be rivalries. There will be almost none if divisions are gone. Perhaps you would reduce the number of teams to 16 or fewer. Why have 32 when so many are so weak?

 

[Uptown]

pick a year

How it was between 1990-2019 was perfectly fine.

 

[mgteich]

How it was before the recent 345 Park Avenue money grab. Nobody cares about the pre AFL days…

It is the owners and players that share the incredible pot of money. That pot has been ever increasing since the merger. The money grab is not at all recent.