Have you lost interest in the NFL?

[Hazel-Ra]

 

That could be because of the novelty of two teams that have decades long championship droughts playing for a championship. I've watched 2 games so far and I'm not a big baseball guy and there likely many like me.

 

I still like football, but I have to admit: After initially griping about the game starting at 7:30am local yesterday... It was kind of nice to be able to do other stuff when it ended at noon.

 

[wysknz1]

I don't watch as much in general. I watch the Skins when I can. After that, meh. My Wyo Cowboys are looking up so I try to catch them now. Can't watch everything. Also I'm sick of the commercials and the announcers. Every time they get to jock sniffing on someone I just turn the volume off. I liked it several years ago when they experimented with having no announcers. I don't need any one to tell me what's going on.

[pjfootballer]

I can't believe I'm going to say this, but, there is too much football on.  Maybe 20 years ago, I would have said, we need more football.  But think about it:  They show some college on Tuesday and Wednesday (MAC games).  Thursday is an NFL game and a few college games.  Friday, at least 3 to 4 college games are on.  Saturday from 12 AM to past 12 Midnight, there are college games on.  Sunday is the NFL from 1 PM to 11 PM.  And then a game on Monday.  I don't have time to watch all that football.

Quite frankly, I've found myself rarely watching MNF or TNF.  The matchups usually suck and I have other things I like to watch.  I also find myself not watching the SNF games either.  I will either watch our game or record it and watch later.  My interest has waned the last 25 years because we've been mediocre to suck.  It's just not that fun anymore.  I'm also tired of the same teams.  I know it's probably not the same teams, but having a team like the Patriots just takes all the fun out of it.  They've been a dynasty for 16+ years.  The dynasties of the 60s, 70s and 80s never lasted more than 10 years. 

Add in what others have said (penalties, timeouts, commercials, bias to the offenses, etc.) the games are just not fun anymore.  I feel they are kind of predictable.

The NFL has been losing me slowly, but surely over the last 15 years. 

[NickyJ]

Yes, I am losing interest. Aside from the curiosity of upstart teams like Dallas (blegh), Minnesota, and waiting for things to get weird in Denver, I've given up on other games altogether. Thursday Color Rush was the NFL's sorry attempt at trying to make the **** they put out there more colorful. Monday nights are disappointing (and since I don't have cable, I rarely stream it anyway), and Sundays are hit and miss. I was actually just discussing this on another forum, but focused more on the ratings drop than my personal interest. I'll just copy-paste what I said there:

The first of the NFL's problems is something people have always griped about, and something that has continually gotten worse: Commercial breaks. Throughout this season, there's always a string of plays that goes from a timeout for commercial, back for one play and a replay, timeout for commercial, back for a short analysis, and then commercial break without even bothering to run a play. It's things like that that turn away casual fans, who just want to see some action. Even if the commentary is in-depth, casual fans aren't there for an analysis about how a team should have run a play-action bootleg instead of a read option.

Second, penalties. No Fun League stepped it up this season, making their calls more inconsistent. Penalize one player for a celebration, let another do the exact same celebration with no penalty. Call nit-picky, phantom holding and interference calls during one game, and then let headhunting go uncalled in others. Being extra strict is one issue; being overwhelmingly inconsistent takes it to a whole new level.

Third is their bad publicity, which partially stems from their treatment of penalties. Lately, the NFL has been seemingly doing as much as it can to get bad air time for their complete botching of high profile cases. Their investigation of Tom Brady, legitimate or not, turned into a two year witch hunt. Players like Ray Rice who physically abuse people ON VIDEO get off with slaps on the wrist, while people like Adrian Peterson get suspended for a whole year over spanking his son with a stick. Again, whether you agree or not that the player did something wrong, the NFL went at it inconsistently; Rice was the most obvious offender, and got a much lesser punishment. Punishment cases like these are inconsistent, make no sense whatsoever, and give media more ammo to use against the sport, on top of its treatment of injuries.

Goodell has done absolutely NOTHING to rectify these problems. Instead, his greatest achievements are moving the extra point from the two yard line, practically eliminating kickoff returns, and turning catches into a guessing game of "what does the referee feel like calling it today". Until Goodell does something, ANYTHING, to help games make more sense, more and more fans will be driven away from a traditional sport that is obsessed with throwing away its traditions.

[thebluefood]

On 10/30/2016 at 4:15 PM, BRAVEONAWARPATH said:

Yep...and that was unthinkable a few years ago.

 

NBA all the way for me.

Replace "NBA" with "MLB" and that's where I am, too. For all the flack baseball gets about its pacing, there are few games more inherently and commercially "herky-jerky" than football. Unless there's a pitching change, you usually get a half-innings bereft of commercial breaks and that's pretty sweet.

I got into football when I was about 8 but baseball has always been in my life. Now that D.C. has a baseball team (and NLDS choking aside, they are consistent winners) and the game as a whole is in a pitcher's renaissance (been seeing a lot of excellent pitching this year in the World Series especially) I've been migrating back to it gradually over the past decade or so.

I still love football and watching/listening to NFL games, don't get me wrong. It's no wonder why the NFL has been king for all these years. It was made for TV and that's one of its strongest and weakest suits. Unless you have prime seats or you have a pair of binoculars, watching a football game in person can be a miserable experience but the "stop-and-go" nature of the also made it a prime spot for advertisers.

At this point I'd say I'm a Redskins fan - not so much a "football" fan.

[Aireskoi]

I agree with most everything said so far, and I have one I didn't see mentioned.

The international games piss me off.  No offense to any other country, but these games belong in USA only.

I would rather see the NFL do a tour of smaller markets near the home cities than to have them take it out of the country.  Bring NFL to states and regions that have never had a team, just for the week.  Let the area enjoy the revenue, and give the local fans something to remember.  I think it would be like the London game with all teams represented in the stands...or just stay home and keep it there.  Giving up 1 of 8 guaranteed real games (like holidays) that local fans wait all year for, even if some of the teams seasons are done by week 10 (week 4 if you're a Browns fan) is wrong.

[Ray-Ban Dan]

9 hours ago, Rey713 said:

 

Fun fact: Newton has gotten more roughing the passer penalties than any other QB since 2011.

Are you sure about that? Because I just read that he didn't get one roughing the passer call all of last season.

[Ray-Ban Dan]

23 hours ago, Taylor703 said:

Losing interest? No. I'm just growing tired of the NFLs hipocracy. Watching Norman get called for silly penalties where he barely touched Greens face mask and then nothing when Crowder nearly gets his head ripped off. Watching some QBs barely get touched and they call roughing and then watching Cam Newton weekend after weekend get absolutely destroyed by dirty hits and they simply won't call it is pissing me off. 

The officiating is awful and I've started to see more and more that they're picking and choosing who gets the calls. The NFL needs to get this under control because they're absolutely killing games and pushing out the casual fan. I firmly believe officiating is the reason their ratings are dropping so much. 

I agree with everything here except on Norman. You can't be serious with that. I was literally cussing at the tv yesterday, watching him repeatedly get called for the same damn thing. Even Gruden was visibly pissed at him. 

[Rey713]

1 hour ago, Ray-Ban Dan said:

Are you sure about that? Because I just read that he didn't get one roughing the passer call all of last season.

 

I got it from NFL Network. Just be because he didn't get one last season doesn't mean he didn't have the most called from 2011 until now.

[Ray-Ban Dan]

3 hours ago, Rey713 said:

 

I got it from NFL Network. Just be because he didn't get one last season doesn't mean he didn't have the most called from 2011 until now.

Yes, I'm aware of that. What I was trying to say is, I don't believe that stat to be true. In fact, I think it's possible you heard it wrong. It's more likely he has had the fewest called during that span. I watch all of their games I can (most of my friends and family are fans) when the Redskins aren't playing, and I don't recall ever seeing him get one. Even the one vs Denver was nullified, due to him being called for grounding. You got a quote?

Edit: so I just went back and read the story at ESPN. It said that in his first two seasons, he got 14 roughing the passer calls, which I'm assuming was probably the most. But in the last two years, he's gotten ZERO. What you heard was he had gotten the most roughing the passer calls in his first 2 seasons, not that he's gotten the most of any other QB in his career, up to now. Huge difference there.

[redskns21]

This is a great thread, I have been a diehard football fan for about 25 years, have purchased the ticket for as long as I can remember. I even remember following preseason games on ES from Bubba's Winamp stream.  I still get the ticket as I watch the Skins every game.  I now record the game and watch it on a 45 minute delay to fast forward through the commercials, halftime, etc.  I then sort of follow Red Zone, but don't regularly watch any of the SNF, MNF or TNF games at all anymore.  It used to be that I couldn't get enough football and I knew every player and everything about the NFL.  Now, I'm just not as invested.  I think that all the reasons I feel this way have been touched on above.  The biggest thing for me is the saturation of games and analysis (which isn't great to be honest) and the horrible officiating and rules.  Why they don't or haven't attempted to fix this by even making the refs a full time employee of the league just boggles my mind.

[Ray-Ban Dan]

There is bad officiating in every pro sport. There are also commercials. Personally, I think those are lame reasons to stop following a sport---especially when that sport is easily the best around. To each his own.

[Taylor703]

4 hours ago, Ray-Ban Dan said:

I agree with everything here except on Norman. You can't be serious with that. I was literally cussing at the tv yesterday, watching him repeatedly get called for the same damn thing. Even Gruden was visibly pissed at him. 

My issue wasn't that Norman was getting called, my issue was that his penalties weren't even remotely close to what happened to Crowder yet they somehow missed that but saw Norman doing it 5-6 times? 

[Ray-Ban Dan]

Just now, Taylor703 said:

My issue wasn't that Norman was getting called, my issue was that his penalties weren't even remotely close to what happened to Crowder yet they somehow missed that but saw Norman doing it 5-6 times? 

Oh, the Crowder play was definitely ridiculous, no doubt. And yeah, a few of Norman's weren't bad. My issue is, he knew they were calling it, yet he kept doing it. Gruden looked pissed. But honestly, I wish he had told him to knock it off.

[Duckus]

After my kid was born 3 years ago I basically only started watching Skins games. I even miss 1 or 2 skins games, which before never happened. 

[drowland]

Yes, overall I've lost interest in the NFL.  The product just isn't good right now and it's been declining for years.  People have already stated the officiating and constant commercial breaks, but the real issue for me is it's just bad football.  8 weeks in and if I didn't know better I'd think it was still preseason with some of the games I've watched.  I hope London tells Goodell to keep this crap in the US.  The fundamentals of the game are getting lost.  Teams have guys out there who can't block, can't tackle, can't run routes, can't catch a cold, can't run out of bounds when they're supposed to, kickers missing kicks, bad QBing, etc.  

I think a lot of it is due to how the college game has changed along with the practice restrictions the NFL has.  With more pressure on college coaches to win, the game has gotten dumbed down so much.  Then these guys come to the NFL and have to learn complex offenses and defenses.  So it's becoming a ripple effect because NFL teams are starting to dumb down their playbooks.   With the cap limiting your resources, you need rookies and UDFAs to play and balance out the high paid vets.  

I read the NFL is looking into bringing back a developmental league which is a good start.  The NFL dropped NFL Europe because owners were having to shell out $1 million each for it to run.  Seems like a small price to pay.  

 

 

 

[TheGreatBuzz]

Don't forget about the cut back in practices also as to why the product on the field is worse......

[crabbypatty]

I've been waiting for this decline for years. I still love the nfl but they're just oversaturated to the point of ridiculousness.

uneven officiating with predictable preferential treatment shows

stupid rules that keep changing every year

gobs of commercials and sponsorships, coupled with more commercials

I miss the days of everyone playing on sunday and a monday night game.

now we have sunday, sunday night, monday night, thursday night, saturdays and then the stupid international games.

 

I want the nfl to go back to where it was, a powerhouse but without all the constant bombardment 24/7.

[Taylor 36]

A recent poll shows that many have a lot of the same thoughts that have been mentioned in this threas, but that the major reason for the declined ratings this year is due to the National Anthem protests. http://boston.cbslocal.com/2016/10/27/nfl-ratings-national-anthem-protests-poll/ 

[NoVaSkins21]

I will never stop watching the NFL, but the Thursday night football and the London games have got to go.  I may be in the minority, but who wants a game 4 or even 3 days after the last game on a Thursday.  The product is just not going to be good with the players having no rest and very little time to prepare.  No franchise, even the Jaguars, is moving to London and as we all just found out, and as we all found out, waking up on @ 9:30 to watch a football game just sucks.  Goodell, very slowly, is killing the goose that laid the golden egg.  

[NickyJ]

2 hours ago, Taylor 36 said:

A recent poll shows that many have a lot of the same thoughts that have been mentioned in this threas, but that the major reason for the declined ratings this year is due to the National Anthem protests. http://boston.cbslocal.com/2016/10/27/nfl-ratings-national-anthem-protests-poll/ 

It still just doesn't make sense to me. Up until this season, networks would never show the anthem for games; the one game in the entire year that they'd show the national anthem was the Super Bowl. I don't care either way, but to me, it seems like people are trying to find something to be offended by. But I suppose that's just me. *shrug*

[TSO]

On 10/31/2016 at 9:25 AM, goskins10 said:

 

I totally agree with this. The referees are being asked to make too many judgment calls or interpretations of rules. Make the rules themselves much more straight forward with less ambiguity and that will solve a lot of the problems.

 

 

I think it was @Bang who really brought this to my attention a few years back. 

The rules are simply impossible to ref with any consistency. I don't think you can build a robot, no matter how intricate its AI, to effectively implement it. 

It's convoluted and contradictory. The robot would malfunction and poop oil all over the players. 

Its complicated attempts to minimize interpretation have somehow managed to make it even more open to interpretation. That last bit is amazing, lol. How does that even happen!? 

As much as I hate to go the conspiracy route, I do wonder if that's the intent. It could really make life easier for those who'd want to fix things if you can get as many calls that can go either way to occur. If they do call it, "well, yeah, that's the right call", and if they don't call it, "well, yeah, gotta let these players play", etc... 

We literally don't know what a catch is anymore. Is there a time limit for when a player goes to the ground and maintains possession? Like, if one second later the DB pops the ball out it's not a catch but if it's two seconds? Doesn't matter guys, he caught it and maintained possession! 

Let's add a time limit, that'll surely help! I bet you these idiots actually tell the refs to count to two or something, I wouldn't be surprised at this point.   

[Bang]

Molding young minds..

This past week John Lynch (who was friggin' AWFUL in the booth,, jet lagged, punch drunk,.. yikes.).. started to run through a replay of a catch i believe garcon (?) made.. in which he caught the ball, tucked, turned, ran four steps then went out of bounds, never having lost any control.. and this moron starts counting and questioning if THREE STEPS was enough to constitute being a runner. Thankfully Mike Pereira shut him down.

I think there's two reasons they've done this.
1. they want to avoid future lawsuits. Regardless of what happens anymore, there are armies of lawyers willing to drag it to court to try to cash in. The NFL is a target. 

2. Fantasy football pulls in more less-than-casual fans and gets them involved than anything else. Gotta protect those offensive players so Jim Wouldn'tKnowAFumbleIfItHappenedInFrontOfHim can pretend like he has some fanhood. Lots of money there. 

Bad calls have always happened, controversial calls have always happened, and in the past the NFL would endeavor to try to get it right. Now, they've made it practically impossible.

Consistency is key, and there is none. A team should expect that if this is Illegal Hands this week, then it is also Illegal Hands next week, and the week after. Football is at it's core a relatively simple game in terms of the rules. Now it's got too many rules, and it not only causes the officials to blow the calls, it causes them to be a lot more touchy to throw the flag.. and thus inconsistent. 

~Bang

[Taylor 36]

10 hours ago, NickyJ said:

It still just doesn't make sense to me. Up until this season, networks would never show the anthem for games; the one game in the entire year that they'd show the national anthem was the Super Bowl. I don't care either way, but to me, it seems like people are trying to find something to be offended by. But I suppose that's just me. *shrug*

I would say that is a huge issue in our society as a whole today.  People are just looking to be offended just have something to **** about and feel like they have a cause.  Everything is offensive to someone somewhere.  But, that is a topic for another forum.

[Mursilis]

This year, my fandom for the NFL has gone off a cliff - I haven't watched more than a half of even 'skins games, and I'm really not missing it at all.  At this point, I'm only going to be watching football for the remainder of the season if I have absolutely nothing else to do, which is going to be rare.  As a fan, I was never a season ticket holder, but I did follow the team religiously for a long while - knew every player, never missed a game on TV (preseason too), followed the team year-round, including the draft, free agency, camp, etc.  I couldn't get enough of it, but that's changed a lot.  

For me, there's no one reason to stop being a fan, but it's been a lot of little things adding up.  

1.  Concussions - the science is becoming clearer that football is detrimental to the health of its players, not just due to head injuries (but that's a huge part of it), but also due to repeated orthopedic and related injuries.  I've read countless stories about retired players barely being able to move and unable to get through the day without handfuls of painkillers.  I'm having a hard time enjoying a sport which pays young men to destroy their health for my amusement, and I don't believe the league really cares.  They tried to cover up this whole issue for years, and now they pretend to be concerned about 'player health'.  Too little, too late.  

2.  The greed of the league and its owners - I'm tired of billionaire owners crying poverty and basically extorting public money for new stadiums, or threatening to move their teams.  Any honest economist will tell you the public always gets screwed over on those deals, and it continues to anger me.  Public money should go to people like school teachers and police officers, not NFL owners.  They already make enough off their TV deals, ticket prices, merchandise, etc. - they don't need stadium subsidies.  Almost as bad are the fans who actually lobby for their city or county governments to pass these subsidy packages - you're being robbed, people!  Wake up!  

3.  Fan culture - Although I could afford season tickets, I've never bought them because I wouldn't go to 8 games a year even if they were free.  The experience just isn't consistently enjoyable anymore.  Part of it is Redskins being terrible for a lot of the recent past, but a larger part of it is my fellow football fans - too many vulgar drunks and too much potential for violence.  It's not a family-friendly atmosphere.  I've attended occasional live games since the 80's and had some great times in the past, but mostly those are distant memories now.  The costs and the hassles are no longer worth it.  

The fan culture which exists outside the stadium has also alienated me.  Too many fans only care about winning, and will turn a blind eye to all sorts of bad deeds if that player is on their team.  How many Cowboys fans defended the Greg Hardy signing?  Even after the Sandusky scandal broke at Penn State and it became clear Paterno knew about the accusations and did nothing, plenty of people still rushed to defend that program because Paterno was a winner.  Children were being raped and people wanted to cover it up to protect the football program!  If it's that important to you, you need to take a hard look at your values.  

 

Those are some of the big reasons; there are others, but that's enough for now.  As for the protests, I respect Kap and other players for taking a moral stand on an issue important to them (and to any Americans concerned with fairness and justice for all).  I don't like the fact their protest takes place during the national anthem, because I don't want that particular moment to be politicized, but I'm not turning off the games because of it.