The NFL: A New Era in Football

The National Football League has always been an organization that generally stays out of the spotlight from scandals and other negative publicity (with the exception of the Terrell Owens coverage). Leagues such as the MLB with their steroids scandals and point shaving in the past World Series have crippled the reputation of their league. The NHL’s player holdouts and fan safety concerns have discredited that league. With the coming of the infamous Pacer’s game fight the reputation of the NBA has been criticized harshly as well. Curiously the NFL seems to stay clean and reputable having salary caps and clear penalties for offenders of the rules.

More recently the NFL has received more publicity for their salary cap cuts. A salary cap is the monetary limit that a team has to sign players. This means that with cuts in the salary caps, teams will have to cut players that take up the most room in their budget. Franchise players such as Daunte Culpepper and Willie McGinest, who have made their name through teams such as the Minnesota Vikings and New England Patriots respectively are now moving to teams that need better players such as the Miami Dolphins and Cleveland Browns due to their outrageous salaries. With this great movement of players being cut and added to rosters all around the league, it is almost a sure thing that the NFL in undergoing another new and major change. This is the reason why there is never one team that generally wins “The Big Game” every year. In the MLB, the New York Yankees have gotten used to being a constant contender for the World Series and they show no sign of slowing down. Two years ago the Boston Red Sox beat the New York Yankees and won the World Series. Having no salary caps all the Yankees do is show star player Johnny Damon 8.25 million and now Boston has one less star. This same tactic has earned the Yankees players such as Alex Rodriguez (Seattle Mariners), Randy Johnson (Arizona Diamondbacks), and Gary Sheffield (Florida Marlins). The only necessary item is money and when you can pack out a stadium to see the world’s finest play on the same team for every game, money is not an obstacle.

10-12 years ago the top 3 teams in the NFL were arguably the Dallas Cowboys, San Francisco 49ers and the Green Bay Packers. This year not one of these teams made it to the playoffs. This made way for teams that were weaker in years past such as the Seattle Seahawks, Indianapolis Colts, and Cincinnati Bengals. Even the Super Bowl Champion Pittsburgh Steelers used to be a dynastic team, but they haven’t been to the Super Bowl in 10 years. Now with the abrupt change in the salary caps there is no possible way of finding “the perfect team”. Never will there be a scenario like that of the New York Yankees of having the world’s finest on the same team. This upcoming year is going to be one that no expert can predict. The football gods have taken the snowglobe of the NFL and have shaken it violently. Teams that this year had poor records such as the Dallas Cowboys are getting arguably the best wide receiver in football in Terrell Owens. Poor teams with big players get better especially when other teams have such a huge vaccuum after losing these players. One year the position of left guard is taken by veteran and is of no concern to the team but all of the sudden problems arise in finding someone to fill the huge shoes left by these giants of football. Rookies are always the future of the NFL, but in this case, the best draft choice will crucially affect the standing this year in the NFL. All that can be said for this year is may the team with the lowest cut to gain ratio win.