CFZ Is football getting worse?

[McKDaddy]

Yes & No. A lot of what you list has certainly changed the game & not all of it is for the best, at least from a watchability perspective. On the flip side, if you grew up in my era most offensive football was very conservative, smash mouth, wars of attrition. When modern football is played well, it is vastly more entertaining and brings a lot more skill into play. I actually chose pro football over college when I was young because college was almost exclusively three downs, cloud of dust & punt 3 out of every 4 possessions. At least the NFL had some passing and nuance to the game.

You give control of the game to 5 fans & I think we could increase the quality of the product significantly while still protecting the players. Things don't have to be as convoluted as the league makes them.

 

[rnr_honeybadger]

Parity is great for ensuring that every team has a shot, the problem is that parity also ensure that every season you end up with a lot more horrible teams.

 

[817Gill]

Weird thread, most of the games have been super entertaining this year with most coming down to one score.

Don’t overreact to a few bad teams or games.

 

[817Gill]

Parity is great for ensuring that every team has a shot, the problem is that parity also ensure that every season you end up with a lot more horrible teams.

There are less horrible teams now than ever because of how many competent QB’s there are.

There are no more than 3-4 horrible teams a year if that. Wait until the end of the year and you’ll realize it, remember plenty of teams start off cold and heat up and vice versa. Only very few teams will be bad all season.

 

[csirl]

Individual athletes are better due to better individual training programs. But maybe not teams. Today's teams are really part timers compared to previous eras in terms of on field practise.

NFL coaching has become rife with nepotism. In the past a coach had to prove himself at grad assistant, high school, college for years before being hired in the NFL. Not surprised that the coach who prompted this thread (Hackett) is the coaching equivalent of Stephen Jones.

The same could be said for officiating. What are the chances of 3 members of the same family being among the best of the 10 000s of officials nationwide?

 

[Satchel89]

If you grew up watching football in 80's there was a lot of these types of games...defensive battles (snooze fest)
Denver D-line was impressive.

To your point... after watching last night's game something seems very wrong with Matt Ryan and Russel Wilson, that was ugly.
Even when they didn't have pressure the throws and timing were terrible, hard to watch

Ya Wilson looks awful this year

 

[RustyBourneHorse]

It may have been bad, but I still enjoyed it. The defenses played a part in how bad the offense looked. Watch the whole game and don't just follow the ball. You'll appreciate it more.

Oh, I agree, and I like defence. I truly do, and I get what you're saying. However, there were many days in which there was no pressure and the QBs couldn't hit the water if they fell out of a boat.

 

[ChronicCowboy]

Compared to old fashioned 20th century NFL football, this current product is garbage.

 

[Cowboys22]

I think this is a legitimate question. Is football getting worse over the years? Perhaps it's just that the Broncos and Colts are terrible teams, but it seems that football in general is becoming worse than before. I started watching in about 1999 or 2000. During the time that I've watched football since then, I have to say, it feels like it has in terms of quality. I think 2003-2009 were very good football years and even up until maybe 2018. However, since then, especially this year, football feels like it's getting a bit worse. It feels overly officiated with poor officiating, the quality of the players doesn't seem as good (especially in the trenches), and the coaches seem to be getting worse overall. I get that you can't have Belichick or Andy Reid on every team. However, my goodness! It feels like a lot of coaches have gotten dumber since the advent of "analytics" in football.

I think coaches seem to be hung up a bit on analytics compared to calling plays that the team is good at running. Look at last night. There were a few calls in the Broncos game, such as the 4th down play in OT, where the coaches are clearly overthinking things. If you're going to go for it, why go shotgun on 4th and 1? That completely eliminates the concern of the run play, which the Broncos were doing very well on that drive. That way, they could play action if they wanted to throw it. Or, just kick the field goal given that the Colts offense wasn't doing anything. Either would've been better than what the Broncos called. Watching the games so far this season, I can't help but see this with other teams, and I have to ask, to those of you that have been watching longer than I have, is the quality of football getting worse over the yearS?

Yes, football is way worse than it used to be. There have always been boring games played by two lousy teams but it never mattered because there used to be several great teams every year that would provide us with epic playoff battles year after year. Rule changes and player safety, namely making it flag football for the QBs, has watered down the game. The games used to be decided solely by the teams on the field. Now every fan of every team holds their breath during good plays expecting to see the yellow tab on the screen saying Flag. Too many subjective calls putting the game in the hands of the officials and not being called the same from play to play, team to team, or week to week. It’s ridiculous how often a penalty is called and then someone does the exact same thing a few plays later and no penalty. It makes the game hard to watch at times but there’s still nothing else like it to take it’s place so old timers like me just have to accept it and move on. I feel bad for people like you that love football but didn’t get to see it in the 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s. Not just because the Cowboys were always good but because there were always other great teams and the officials let them duke it out on the field with very limited subjectively.

 

[MapleLeaf]

So the '89 SF 49ers would get routed by the '22 Texans?

I agree that games in the 60's and 70's were a bit of a snooze fest, but there is no way a team from the 80's has the talent nor the coaching ability of a modern NFL team.

Just the concepts that are being run nowadays with 12 personnel, 4 wides and 5 wides with RPO's it would be a rout in a game where each team was transported to a field with the current abilities of their day. So the 49ers with their playbook and their practice and training methods to the Texans with theirs.

It's great to wax and wane nostalgic about our football heroes of old, but you have to look at them in the context of the football knowledge and experience they had at the time. They are locked in time.

Meanwhile the 22' Texans if they had chance to take their modern training methods, modern plays and alignment concepts, speed and talent and they would destroy that 89' 49er team.

The biggest adjustments would be made on the offence to accept the rules that existed at the time for contact and holding, etc. But the windows of opportunity and size and speed advantages would be ridiculous.

e.g. Troy Hairston outweighs Tom Rathman by 15 lbs and matches the weight of Romanowski. I can guarantee that Romanowski in his day would not have seen the type of FB with the size and speed of Hairston in 89. (If you look at all the measureables from Romanowski to Hairston ,outside of footspeed, which more than likely hand timed since it was only the second year of the modern combine Hairston the better physical specimen.)

I will accept that there are some players who could be multigenerational in talent, but those would be very few and far between. Very few.

Football in the past has always been great, but sometimes it is better to keep the players, the stories and the myths in the past where they belong.

 

[Shane612]

I think this is a legitimate question. Is football getting worse over the years? Perhaps it's just that the Broncos and Colts are terrible teams, but it seems that football in general is becoming worse than before. I started watching in about 1999 or 2000. During the time that I've watched football since then, I have to say, it feels like it has in terms of quality. I think 2003-2009 were very good football years and even up until maybe 2018. However, since then, especially this year, football feels like it's getting a bit worse. It feels overly officiated with poor officiating, the quality of the players doesn't seem as good (especially in the trenches), and the coaches seem to be getting worse overall. I get that you can't have Belichick or Andy Reid on every team. However, my goodness! It feels like a lot of coaches have gotten dumber since the advent of "analytics" in football.

I think coaches seem to be hung up a bit on analytics compared to calling plays that the team is good at running. Look at last night. There were a few calls in the Broncos game, such as the 4th down play in OT, where the coaches are clearly overthinking things. If you're going to go for it, why go shotgun on 4th and 1? That completely eliminates the concern of the run play, which the Broncos were doing very well on that drive. That way, they could play action if they wanted to throw it. Or, just kick the field goal given that the Colts offense wasn't doing anything. Either would've been better than what the Broncos called. Watching the games so far this season, I can't help but see this with other teams, and I have to ask, to those of you that have been watching longer than I have, is the quality of football getting worse over the yearS?

I don't think QBs are as good this year. All the known great QBs, Rogers, Wilson and Brady are getting long in the tooth.
I'm waiting for Lawrence, Herbert, Fields, Hurtz, Burrows, and Tua to mature.
FG kickers are FAR better today than they were when I was a kid in the 70s.

 

[Captain-Crash]

You were not around when football was real. This crap is a reflection on society. Weak, pampered crybabies.

 

[dreghorn2]

So the '89 SF 49ers would get routed by the '22 Texans?

Jim Burt and Michael Carter were their NTs at 260 and 285 lbs respectively.

Pull up the weights of their linemen on both sides of the ball -- pretty eye opening.

edit -- sorry this was talked about earlier in the thread

 

[DasTex]

The one part that is worse for me, is watching the game....seeing a big play, but holding back on the excitement, until I don't see that yellow flag symbol pop up at the bottom of the screen. I absolutely hate games with ticky tack calls back and forth. Ruins it for me

 

[blueblood70]

So the '89 SF 49ers would get routed by the '22 Texans?

 

[JonesBoys]

1974 for me. The game is absolutely different now as compared to back then, and what changed were the rules allowing offenses to open up. For example, as good as Aikman was back in the early 90's, imagine how dominant he would be now with the protection provided to QB's. Imagine how dominant a really good receiver from those days would be now knowing the defense was no longer allowed to blow them up for nothing more than just running a route.



It is overly officiated, but at times also seems to be overly selective. Take the no call PI in the Saints / Rams playoff game. Take Dallas vs. NY 2 weeks ago where nearly nothing was called compared to last week vs. Wash where it seems as though the refs were making up for their no calls the week before. There's is zero consistency.



Want to know what is really missing from the game today? It's the hardnosed style of coaching you used to see from coaches like Vince Lombardi, Jimmy Johnson, Bill Parcells, etc. That style simply doesn't work any more because the players have turned into overly sensitive snowflakes. This was slightly before your time, but I remember Aikman lashing out at Barry Switzer because he was being too soft on the players. Even military boot camp is different now compared to when I went through it in 1985.

What really has changed with the game is the level of passion you get from the players. Salaries back in the 1970's and 80's weren't squat and almost every athlete had to work a normal job in the off season to make ends meet. They played for the love of the game. Now it's all money driven. I would estimate that at least 60% to 70% of the current athletes playing in the NFL today wouldn't be there if the money wasn't so outrageous. Most of them give their best efforts in the beginning to earn a good contract then go on cruise control.

This was a good post from you....

Add in the fact they have less practices and coaches seem to have less control with overreaching owners ect. The bottom line when money becomes more important and football is now clearly more entertainment than a sport, it starts to lose it soul.

 

[ghst187]

Answer. Resoundingly YES it’s getting worse and a huge part of it has been Roger Goodell…

 

[Captain-Crash]

This is the era where we don't want our product to get hurt. Make new rules to protect everyone because our players make us money.
In real football, they played and played hard with few rules to protect the product.

 

[Jipper]

this thread has a pretty bad "get off my lawn, shaking a cane,etc." feel to it....

With the exception of inconsistent officiating and way too many flags the game is as good as it has ever been. Hopefully the nfl starts to really use technology the right way and starts to take the subjectivity out of a lot of the rules that lead to inconsistent officiating.

 

[JonesBoys]

Answer. Resoundingly YES it’s getting worse and a huge part of it has been Roger Goodell…

Goodell does what the owners want which is to make more money. As long as the sport continues to make more money they don't care what the product looks like.