Sometimes when it comes to sports I come up with some far out, off the wall ideas, but I really think I have a solution to the NFL’s problem of wanting to switch to an 18 game schedule while taking the player’s health and time concerns into consideration.
The first part of my podcast deals with baseball though. I came with an idea of how MLB could make the 162 schedule a little more entertaining for the fans. It would also create more a playoff style atmosphere. If MLB took the 162 games and divided it into three game series, each team would play a total of 54 of these three games series. The concept is simple. Win the series, you get credit for a victory in the win column. Fail to take two out of three, you get hit with a loss. Essentially, the standings and playoff seedings are based on a record of 54 instead of 162. You’ll hear my explanation in the podcast below.
The second part of my podcast…how to change the game of baseball. Simple. Each batter starts with one ball and one strike. So, three balls walks a batter, two strikes gets a batter out. It speeds up the game for the fans on television, more plays without a lot of pitches and the owners save the arms of their pitchers. By only needing two strikes, the pitch count would go down significantly meaning a pitcher could go into the 7th or 8th inning and be sitting at 69 pitches as opposed to 100, which has become the limit in most cases.
I understand those are off the wall ideas, but if baseball’s audience continues to shrink as younger fans gravitate toward other sports, it will take radical thinking to change the way the game is enjoyed by fans.
However, I think my NFL idea has some great traction. The players are concerned that 18 games would wear and tear and their bodies. The owners want more of a good thing in terms of meaningful games, so they say ditch two preseason games and add two regular season games. I agree that 18 games on players, plus playoff could be brutal on the players. My solution…change the length of the quarters from 15 minutes to 12 minutes. In an 18 game regular season, that totals 864 minutes of game time. In a typical 60 minute game, that translates to the equivalent of playing 14.4 games.
So, the owners get their 18 games, the players actually reduce the wear and tear on their bodies and since the games would end roughly 30 minutes earlier, the Networks could extend television commercial breaks in between quarters and even extend halftime by another 3-5 minutes allowing them more commerical time to sell in the broadcasts.
See, it’s not that far fetched is it? Why does a NFL game need to be 60 minutes…Three minutes a quarter does not change the game all that much. Enjoy my discussion with two co-workers who are hearing my ideas for the first time.
