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Creating a Successful competitor/farm-system for the NFL: Your Turn!


Soarindude

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Lets go with a league 12-16 teams and 12 weeks. These teams would be set up in states WITHOUT professional football teams. This would mean Oregon, Alabama, Nevada, etc. recieve bids for teams. Games are played on Thursdays and Fridays. Prominent business will be give LAST bid for team ownership. Up and coming business owners will recieve first bid of ownership.Once teams are awarded ownership, team names will be assigned. A partnership with NFL may be needed in order to produce optimum revenue. The first year league draft order will be organized by randomization. Every following draft and draft order will be set by record EXCEPT the first 4 spots. They will be auctioned off to the 4 teams with the worst records in the league. Example: a team with a 2-10 record could end up with the 4th pick while a team with a 5-7 could end up with the 1st overall pick. Just an small idea for this concept

By playing on THU/FRI, you must be a spring league because the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961 prevents you from playing in the fall. More importantly, why dissuade money from "prominent businesses" so that "up and coming business owners" get the initial shot when they may not have the capital (e.g. Islanders and Spano or any other example where one's dreams are much bigger than their wallet/credit).

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Of course, if you were somehow able to convince the NFL to adopt a promotion/relegation system, you could create a spring league that bumps the bottom two teams (Houston/Washington) down to play against the best of the rest (6 teams in cities not currently featured in the NFL). The top two teams in the spring league join the NFL each year. That would spur a whole new level of investment in the non NFL city franchises, given the chance to jump into the NFL any given year. And it may even lead to added interest and TV ratings potential. (It'd just be a major bummer for owners/players/wives of the relegated, who just lost their offseason!) But hypothetically, you'd wind up with two football games with pretty high stakes: winner plays in the NFL. Nice ratings there!

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Of course, if you were somehow able to convince the NFL to adopt a promotion/relegation system, you could create a spring league that bumps the bottom two teams (Houston/Washington) down to play against the best of the rest (6 teams in cities not currently featured in the NFL). The top two teams in the spring league join the NFL each year. That would spur a whole new level of investment in the non NFL city franchises, given the chance to jump into the NFL any given year. And it may even lead to added interest and TV ratings potential. (It'd just be a major bummer for owners/players/wives of the relegated, who just lost their offseason!) But hypothetically, you'd wind up with two football games with pretty high stakes: winner plays in the NFL. Nice ratings there!

Such a league would necessitate changes to the CBA as a regulated team would be in a league which is not a part if the NFL.

Plus, there would be zero off season in terms of competition for those promoted and regulated. That's will take a toll on a roster and staff.

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Getting the exact number of teams in the league is key. Too many and you over saturate the market, diluting the brand. Too few and you under expose the league and ensure terrible viewership.

MLB has several tiers of farm clubs, which frankly wouldn't work for the NFL. Also, with too many teams you run the risk of spreading talent too thin so that some teams are essentially glorified FCS and NCAA D-II & III squads. Keep the teams relatively fewer and the rosters trimmed and you ensure that every game is basically like watching a slightly upgraded version of Alabama, FSU, Ohio State, etc.

I think a great fit would be for each NFL division to share a farm club, possibly two. Rather than create a full bore league of 32 minor clubs, you'd be left with either 8 or maybe 16 teams. This also opens up some interesting elements between the NFL - Minor League relationship:

  • A player on the "NFC North" Farm Team could get called up to any NFL team, but the Lions, Bears, Packers and Vikings would have first dibs.
  • NFL teams might think twice before trading a player down, in order to protect him from a divisional rival. The Broncos trade down a player, and then Kansas City drafts him up later in the season.
  • It prevents a dubious GM from padding the salary cap by keeping semi-good players on the farm team and only calling them up as backup, injuries, etc. A star player on the farm club could easily get drafted up by your three division rivals, so it forces the NFL teams to accurately evaluate a player and make choices accordingly. If they're going to pad a roster, it'll be the NFL roster, to keep star talent away from the farm/division rivals. But in that case, free agency plays a role and the player could just seek a contract with another NFL team directly.
  • A blossoming farm team also means more talent for the division, and thus a greater chance at wild card berths come playoff time. Talent-deep divisions (see: NFC West, 49ers and Seahawks) give themselves added insurance by cultivating a strong farm system.

Just a thought.

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Defenses are too technique specific to have farm teams for more thanks one team. Then there is the issue of four GMs and four coaches to agree on how to build a roster, how to coach them (with another "independent" coaching staff) and issues of actual playing time.

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There's already a farm system for the NFL, it's called the SEC. Thank you, and please stop making all these "NFL needs a minor-league system" threads.

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There's already a farm system for the NFL, it's called the SEC. Thank you, and please stop making all these "NFL needs a minor-league system" threads.

Only the SEC has future NFL players? You learn something new every day.

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I can't stand when people say "the NFL already has a minor league it's called college football"... every professional sport is connected to college... so does that mean that every major sport should get rid of their minor league/development league? Should the NHL fold the AHL, should MLB dispose of the MiLB, and should the NBA get rid of of the NBA D-League? It goes on and on... simply put: NFL would benefit from a development/minor league.

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I can't stand when people say "the NFL already has a minor league it's called college football"... every professional sport is connected to college... so does that mean that every major sport should get rid of their minor league/development league? Should the NHL fold the AHL, should MLB dispose of the MiLB, and should the NBA get rid of of the NBA D-League? It goes on and on... simply put: NFL would benefit from a development/minor league.

Um, what? The difference is that college hockey/baseball doesn't get nearly the same following football does, how many games a week do they get in retrospect of every saturday a triple, sometimes quadruple-header by ESPN, plus not to mention the weekday games not limited to as far back as MAC football on Tuesday nights. Also, college football games sell a ton of tickets, almost half of all FBS teams have a stadium that seats 40,000+. Even the low-end teams still have ticket sales that at least compete with the other sports.

In a sense, College football is the development league, the only part of the developmental league aspect is that it's not directly affiliated with the NFL, and the money generated goes to the universities instead of splitting it with NFL franchises. College teams develop talent, and help take it to the NFL. That's what a developmental league should be, and the NFL has the perfect one hiding in the shadows.

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I can't stand when people say "the NFL already has a minor league it's called college football"... every professional sport is connected to college... so does that mean that every major sport should get rid of their minor league/development league? Should the NHL fold the AHL, should MLB dispose of the MiLB, and should the NBA get rid of of the NBA D-League? It goes on and on... simply put: NFL would benefit from a development/minor league.

No it wouldn't. Considering the annual player turnover in the NFL, careers aren't long enough for a post-college stint in "the minors". At least, not enough to justify the expense of having a farm team for each NFL team (and no, that is the absolute minimum number of teams for this to work.) College baseball and hockey are heavily regional sports and never developed to the point where they could outstrip a systemic minor league setup.

On 8/1/2010 at 4:01 PM, winters in buffalo said:
You manage to balance agitation with just enough salient points to keep things interesting. Kind of a low-rent DG_Now.
On 1/2/2011 at 9:07 PM, Sodboy13 said:
Today, we are all otaku.

"The city of Peoria was once the site of the largest distillery in the world and later became the site for mass production of penicillin. So it is safe to assume that present-day Peorians are descended from syphilitic boozehounds."-Stephen Colbert

POTD: February 15, 2010, June 20, 2010

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You guys have your opinions and I have mine... lets say it's not a development league but more of a priming league... max number of years a player can spend in the league is 3 years then he must tryout and sign with an NFL team. Those 3 years could allow NFL teams to evaluate the "advanced development" of those players as opposed to straight out of college players with little pro experience other than "pro style offenses"

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Actually, once the major FBS teams break away from the NCAA and start paying players, this will be a moot discussion.

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You guys have your opinions and I have mine... lets say it's not a development league but more of a priming league... max number of years a player can spend in the league is 3 years then he must tryout and sign with an NFL team. Those 3 years could allow NFL teams to evaluate the "advanced development" of those players as opposed to straight out of college players with little pro experience other than "pro style offenses"

You are using synonyms for the same poor concept.

What do you think BLESTO and National (as well as their current scouting depts.) do for the NFL teams in terms of player evaluation?

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You guys have your opinions and I have mine... lets say it's not a development league but more of a priming league... max number of years a player can spend in the league is 3 years then he must tryout and sign with an NFL team. Those 3 years could allow NFL teams to evaluate the "advanced development" of those players as opposed to straight out of college players with little pro experience other than "pro style offenses"

The average NFL career lasts 3 years-especially for the kind of players you're talking about. I'm sure they'll love spending that career in obscurity with comparatively low pay.

On 8/1/2010 at 4:01 PM, winters in buffalo said:
You manage to balance agitation with just enough salient points to keep things interesting. Kind of a low-rent DG_Now.
On 1/2/2011 at 9:07 PM, Sodboy13 said:
Today, we are all otaku.

"The city of Peoria was once the site of the largest distillery in the world and later became the site for mass production of penicillin. So it is safe to assume that present-day Peorians are descended from syphilitic boozehounds."-Stephen Colbert

POTD: February 15, 2010, June 20, 2010

The Glorious Bloom State Penguins (NCFAF) 2014: 2-9, 2015: 7-5 (L Pineapple Bowl), 2016: 1-0 (NCFAB) 2014-15: 10-8, 2015-16: 14-5 (SMC Champs, L 1st Round February Frenzy)

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The UFL did not average 10k/game in year one.

The UFL's problem wasn't in what it drew in attendance. It's what it spent up front before ever pumping up a football. The league spent tens of millions of dollars that it simply didn't need to before they played a game, really hosing themselves before they got out of the gate.

What's the operating cost for MLS? What are their sources of funds? I have to imagine it's an order of magnitude less than the big three pro leagues (and if not, hoo boy!).

The MLS' founding fathers went into it understanding that they were going into something for the (comparatively) long haul. At one point they'd reportedly lost a collective quarter billion dollars. I think they've recouped at least a small part of that, but they went into it with a 10-year plan rather than the typical 5, which made a world of difference in terms of stability, and thus credibility.

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You guys have your opinions and I have mine... lets say it's not a development league but more of a priming league... max number of years a player can spend in the league is 3 years then he must tryout and sign with an NFL team. Those 3 years could allow NFL teams to evaluate the "advanced development" of those players as opposed to straight out of college players with little pro experience other than "pro style offenses"

The average NFL career lasts 3 years-especially for the kind of players you're talking about. I'm sure they'll love spending that career in obscurity with comparatively low pay.

rams80 has a good point. With that in mind, here's my take:

• 8 clubs, all based in the "middle" of the country. Midwest/Great Plains/KY/TN/AL.

• No NFL team/divisional affiliations for the clubs.

• Teams are comprised of players not on 90-man NFL rosters (undrafted free agent rookies/unsigned veterans).

• All players are signed to the NFL. No player affiliations with a parent NFL club. So no NFL team can "send a player down."

• If an NFL team cuts/waives/doesn't re-sign a player, they lose all rights to said player.

• Teams are run by league appointed General Managers who then sign coaching staffs.

• The season begins first week of June. No NFL teams can sign players in this league during that time.

• The regular season runs 7 weeks. Each team plays other teams once.

• Top 4 teams make the playoffs, seeded by record. Ties broken by head-to-head matchup outcomes. Three-way ties by point differential.

• At the end of the season, all players are eligible for the NFL Supplemental Draft.

• Standard Supplemental Draft rules with regards to forfeited draft picks for the following season apply.

• There is no limit to the number of years a player can participate in this feeder league.

• Standard NFL game rules apply; the NFL can try out potential rule variations as determined by the NFL Competition Committee and approved by the Commissioner.

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