Why College Football Presents a More Compelling Product Than the NFL and How the NFL Can Fix It
As I have been watching the NFL this year, something hasn’t felt right. I’ve felt bored. Football has always been one of my favorite sports to watch and it’s never been something to bore me. I couldn’t put a finger on what it was until this past Saturday.
The energy that college football produces is like nothing the NFL has ever been able to produce. Every week in college football, it feels like everything is on the line. Think back to what we saw in college football this past week. Ohio State played unranked Michigan in “The Game” to try and keep their playoff hopes alive. Ohio State went down 14–0 before storming back to when. The tension that game created is something I’ve never felt while watching the NFL. Alabama played Auburn with the winner likely sealing their spot in the playoff. This coming weekend, Clemson and Miami will be playing for a spot in the playoff, as will Auburn and Georgia (though I expect Auburn to win easily.) Ohio State will play Wisconsin in a game that also has huge playoff implications. When you look at all these huge games that are being played week in and week out, one thing becomes apparent: College football presents a more compelling product than the NFL.
The most obvious reason for this is that the NCAA has over 100 teams playing for four playoff spots while the NFL has 32 teams playing for 12 spots. Week in and week out, we see one or more college football matchups with enormous playoff implications. I could name at least four games in the NFL out of the 16 that were played last week that had little or no impact on the playoff race. This would be fine if there were more games, but that’s one-fourth of the games that were played. In college football, no team in the top 10 in the country ever feels like they can afford to lose because of how competitive the game is. One loss can cost you your entire season in college football. As a Saints fan, I was upset that my team lost this past week, but I know it’s not the end of the world because the Saints still lead their division. The NFL isn’t entirely to blame though; they can’t just magically add more teams, and that wouldn’t help anyway. What the NFL can do, however, is take a page out the NBA’s playbook: They can revamp the draft to try and get teams to stop tanking.
In the NFL, the draft order is determined by record. The team with the worst record gets the first pick, the second-worst record gets the second pick, etc. The NBA uses a lottery system for their draft which teams have been taking advantage of over the past few years. The draft lottery system before the changes was pretty simple: There were 14 lottery picks for the 14 teams that didn’t make the playoffs in the recent season. The league would pick lottery balls for each pick; the team with the worst record got the most lottery balls and the team with the best record that still missed the playoffs got the fewest balls. Teams would take advantage of this system and intentionally lose games to try and get the most lottery balls so they could get the first pick. The first three picks were randomly drawn and then the order went by reverse standings. The NBA responded by changing its system. Now, the first four picks are randomly drawn and then it goes by reverse standings. This change resulted in a significant drop in teams’ chances to get the first pick. This, in turn, reduces the incentive to lose games intentionally. The NFL needs to follow in the NBA’s footsteps. They need to make a change to the NFL draft system to reduce the incentive to lose.
In college football, there is no draft and there is a four-team playoff. Every game is a must-win. In order for the NFL to make its league more competitive, it must make fundamental changes to incentivize winning rather than losing. Once the NFL becomes more competitive it can create a more compelling product that can match college football on a weekly basis.
