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NFL franchise in the UK: Jags? Bucs? Battle Royale!


CS85

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I never named any names... :P

But you guys start selling out games with playoff implications, and the teasing will subside.

It was sold out. No one showed up because of record weather and a slim, slim, slim, slim, shot of making those playoffs. Kind of reminded me of this.

1985-snow-bowl.jpg

Edit: Forgot to add the :P so the mods think I am not baiting. Right, Goth?

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I would like to point something out. There was a lot of Jags bashing going on in this thread. I didn't say anything. Goth comes along and singles me out. (anyone who is a seasoned member knows who you were talking about) He wasn't satisfied with me being quiet.

This is what I mean when I say "I am on to you." in other threads towards him. Funny thing is he will go in other threads and scold people for doing the same thing to others. This guy is the troll master.

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You all know I'm a Bucs fan, but in no way should a team be in London. Travel would be a logistical nightmare for both the London team and any of the 8 teams having to go there in a season. Also consider the 3 other teams in London's division, who will have to go there on an annual basis.

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You all know I'm a Bucs fan, but in no way should a team be in London. Travel would be a logistical nightmare for both the London team and any of the 8 teams having to go there in a season. Also consider the 3 other teams in London's division, who will have to go there on an annual basis.

8 teams being asked to schlep to London isn't a massive step, given the NFL are asking 4 teams to do the same from this year. I think the travel logistics could be eased to an extent by London playing 2 games in London then 2 games in the states and so on. The logistics are more serious when it comes to playoffs though. You can't build bye weeks into post season, or disadvantage a team that wins in London then has to play on the road, in say Oakland.

Wembley-1.png

2011/12 WFL Champions

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With a team in London, I am not sure that the road team will just travel on Wednesday/Thursday and play on Sunday.

The opponent will most likely need a practice facility as well, so add that to the NFL's costs.

If you are a Eastern/Central time zone team, one could still use Tuesday as the "off day" if they were at home on Sunday so they would have a day to load up for the flight on Monday and fly over on Tuesday.

Teams west of the Mississippi could have a road game in the Eastern time zone and would pack for two games on the East like teams have dome for years.

In the last 24 hours, two SkySports writers have weighed in:

1- Alex Ferguson (writer, not the former ManU Manager), who also gave his top 9 stadium choices:

First of all, it's important to say that if the NFL DO decide to give London its own franchise, it won't be greeted with unilateral support from NFL Fans UK.

The reason is simple: Many British fans support teams and are already 'mature' in their support of a team. A new NFL franchise might get them excited, but changing a Denver Broncos fan who's grown up on watching John Elway (and last year, Peyton Manning) into a London Jaguars fan is going to be pretty hard work.

Secondly, London fans better be prepared for the fact that the NFL might not be as loyal as they are used with, say, their Premier League teams. NFL teams move from place to place on a whim, and we wouldn't be surprised to see if London is simply used as bait to get a team to the Los Angeles area, where it's quite frankly a travesty that a team that once hosted two franchises hasn't seen a professional game (bar Super Bowls) since 1994.

2-Simon Veness, whose words will hurt the JAX fans. I put his words in boldface, not mine.

Exerpt:

There comes a point in any avalanche where you can no longer resist the pull of gravity and the sheer momentum of the downhill rush, when you have to abandon any thoughts of if it's really where you want to go and just let yourself go with the flow.

Almost before you could say 'Jacksonville for London" (and we will get to that thorny argument in a moment), there was The Commish talking of staging THREE games in London in 2014, and pencilling in the Jaguars very firmly for a second appearance.

The clear inference is that a three-game sell-out would be the final test for the UK's gridiron followers and, if they pack out a third game to the rafters - be it at Wembley, the Olympic Stadium or somewhere else - then the case for the NFL's ultimate eastern division will have been made. In triplicate.

Honeymoon

Initial Jacksonville objections to giving up a second home game have been eased by the simple solution of saying, "Well, OK, then. It will just be a road game instead." With the clear understanding it may be a nominal away trip on the official schedule, but it will be a 'home' game in all but name at the venue in question.

But why make the Jags take the transatlantic flight twice in one season, you may ask, especially when there are plenty of other teams you could call on?

Because there are only a handful of teams - namely San Diego, Oakland, St Louis, Jacksonville and, possibly, Carolina - who are not 100 per cent secure in their current locations and could, therefore, be moved to a strategic location of the league's choice that isn't called Los Angeles.

It is crystal clear "the league's choice" is to have a team in London, and the fact Jacksonville will have a four-year honeymoon period is the ideal proving ground. Make them twice-yearly visitors in 2014, 15 and 16, and that's seven full games in which to create your fan base.

Of course, not even The Commish can force owner Shahid Khan to up sticks and re-locate to the other side of the Atlantic, no matter how compelling the vision (and the waiting fan base).

But the league can certainly make it extremely attractive in marketing terms and hand the Jags all kinds of incentives to base themselves in north London instead of north Florida. The weather and beaches, where they are now, are certainly better but the revenue-earning opportunities are not.

Eggheads

And, before Jacksonville's existing domestic fans bombard me with the usual platitudes of "We sell out every home game," etc, let me point out the invidious economic truths of doing business in the league's second-smallest market.

Their average attendance in 2012 was 64,984, good enough for 20th out of the 32 teams. The 'capacity' of EverBank Field is booked at 67,246, except that some 9,703 seats are covered by tarpaulins during the regular season, ensuring the team can avoid local TV blackouts under the NFL's media rules.

They actually had an announced attendance of 70,251 for their final game against New England, but drew only 62,907 for the opener with Houston. Yet the 2005 Super Bowl pulled in a crowd of 78,125, while the periodic college games have additional seating taking capacity up to more than 84,000 (with a record 85,413 who saw Florida State defeat Alabama in 2007).

That means EverBank Field is realistically 20,000 below what its Jags attendance COULD be. Imagine if the Bears only drew 41,000 to Soldier Field? What kind of outcry would there be from team ownership to find a new market?

And, with an 80,000-seat stadium in London sitting empty for much of the autumn, and the huge commercial spin-offs from being the ONLY game in town, how much could a team expect to rake in for a concise eight-game season? How many ways do you need to spell m-e-g-a-m-i-l-l-i-o-n-s?

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