Football vs football

Another article now appearing in Late Tackle magazine:

To the unconverted, American team sports might as well be from another planet – fiendishly complex and stat-obsessed, yet simultaneously ultra-tedious, with adverts every other minute to ensure games last for aeons. But although some of those accusations are hard to deny, the NFL – now the granddaddy of US sports – is ultra-competitive and genuinely unpredictable. Remember the heady days when the unfancied likes of Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest could win the old first division (yes kids, football did exist before the Premier League)? Such tales still happen, only in a different sort of ‘football’, played across the pond, on a field named after a type of grill and in full body armour, which can best be described as rugby with huge shiny knobs on.

Here are some reasons why. Any of the below are even less likely to happen here than a witty bon mot from Michael Owen, but one can certainly dream.

The draft

All-singing, all-dancing - NFL draft day

Amazingly for a nation where ‘socialist’ is a dirtier word than ‘paedophile’, the draft represents an egalitarian ideal of which Karl Marx would be proud. Instead of professional clubs developing their own young players, it’s the colleges who fight an eternal arms race for the nation’s best prospects. The pro team with last year’s worst win/loss record then has the first choice of college player in each drafting round, all the way down to the Superbowl winner who makes do with the last pick. At a stroke this stops the best teams from automatically hoovering up all the top prospects, which has been the ruination of many an English youngster’s career if they are condemned to a life on the bench.

There’s an unpredictable element too, in that not all college stars can perform in the big leagues and many players fly under the radar. Whereas record-breaking Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning was the 1998 draft’s number one overall pick, his elite rival Tom Brady of the New England Patriots, who goes to bed with supermodel Gisele every night, was only the 199th man drafted in 2000. Hence the new NFL rule limiting the size of rookie contracts in an attempt to minimize the cost of high-profile failures.

Tom Brady, with Gisele. Git.

Teams can also trade draft picks throughout the season or even on the day itself, often in part-exchange for other players, but let’s not worry about that right now.

The salary cap

Back when I started watching NFL in the late 80s, the more success teams like the San Francisco 49ers achieved, the easier it was for them to lure away the best players from poorer teams, much like Manchester United used to do before they became a bit crap. Recognising that the league needed to be more competitive, the NFL introduced the salary cap in 1994. Limited on how much they can pay their squad, teams now find it impossible to stockpile talent, as the best players spread out across the league in search of contracts commensurate with their talent (and ego) levels. ‘Parity’ being the NFL’s buzzword, out of 32 teams only the Cleveland Browns and Detroit Lions have been in existence for more than two decades and not yet reached a Superbowl.

Again, there are hugely complex loopholes and workarounds related to the cap which I won’t pretend to understand, but the basic principle still holds. And if that’s not enough parity for you...

League structure and schedule

Now, admittedly the lack of promotion or relegation and small number of games per season (16 for non-playoff teams) will be anathema to ‘proper football’ fans, but the NFL’s scheduling and playoff system aims to bring fairness to all. As schedules are weighted rather than drawn randomly, the previous season’s divisional champions all have to play each other and the worst teams do the same, thus allowing ‘rebuilding’ (ie crap) teams the chance of an easier rise and making life that much harder for the elite.

Television

A proper commentary duo, yesterday

Although the NFL is doing its best to get in on the action with its own cable channel, nearly every game is available to watch for free on network TV. Fans will generally get to see two Sunday afternoon games tailored to their local region, plus nationally televised matchups on Sunday and Monday nights. Highlights of all games are up online promptly and at no further cost. Just imagine - live football every weekend on ITV with Clive and Andy in the booth... Okay, maybe that’s not such a great idea.

The Superbowl

Nobody does spectacle like the Americans, and the Superbowl is the ultimate high-stakes, multisensory, world-gobbling extravaganza. The whole country grinds to a halt for the duration. Companies spend millions on blockbuster promos to fill the advertising slots. The halftime show is an epic production in itself. The coin toss has its own sponsor. Wouldn’t it be amazing if the FA Cup final actually meant something again?

America: never knowingly understated

In summary, NFL teams can now only achieve lasting success through effective leadership at all levels. Squads must be continuously maintained through canny drafting and trades. The likes of Roman Abramovich can buy footballing success by throwing money at every problem. Meanwhile, the Dallas Cowboys will never succeed while their supervillain owner Jerry Jones keeps meddling in on-field affairs, no matter how many scapegoated coaches he fires or how big and shiny his new stadium looks.

Fairness and equality are distant memories in today’s Sky-bankrolled, big club cartel-dominated domestic game. Sadly, recent attempts to incorporate US-style practices, such as Liverpool’s hamfisted Moneyball experiment which left them with Stewart Downing, Charlie Adam and Andy Carroll, are unlikely to whet anyone’s appetite for further transatlantic cultural exchange. And short of a proper global financial crisis (where rich people and businesses actually lost all their money) or a benign Marxist coup, wholesale change to football will surely never happen.

But, if you feel the ratio of mega-hype to genuine competition has finally reached the tipping point that stops football from being fun any longer, there’s always the option of looking to the New World, getting your stat head on and becoming an NFL convert. Shoulder pads not required.