NFL Week 10 thread

Every summer, top European soccer teams come over here and play exhibition games which draw very well as one-off novelties for U.S. soccer fans. But nobody's moving Arsenal to the Meadowlands. It's strange to see the league that basically invented sports marketing forget some of its basics out of greed. British fans are OK for seeing bad teams if it's once a year. A 3-13 London Jaguars team would be a different matter.

 

I'll begrudgingly say this: The crowd atmosphere for the Falcon-Lions game a couple of weeks ago at Wembley looked pretty spectacular on tv.

 

Totally reactionary PR ploys to the shitshow caused by their own indifference to domestic violence. The only thing the NFL is leading when it comes to domestic violence is the scoreboard for number of arrests.

 

All three wins would be against West Coast teams.

 

Imagine the presumptive London Monarchs trying to sign free agents.
What a laugh that would be.

 

Stanford guys and Ivy Leaguers would be interested.

Also, the brainiacs from Florida State.

 

Fixed.

 

Yeah, and people think it's hard to lure free agents to the small markets.

 

Guys, does anyone really believe the NFL wants a franchise there? I think they're doing exactly what those soccer teams you're talking about are doing -- trying to expand the global brand, to make them a household name in the UK so they can sell merchandise and videos and sponsorships and tickets to maybe five or six games a year over there. I don't think the league has any intention of actually putting a team in London.

 

Well, they're pretty good at creating them.

 

They want to reap the popularity soccer has sown in the U.S.
When has the NFL been in the habit of showing any sort of restraint?
They're planting more of these games every season and there should be a team there in 10 years.

 

I don't think too many people believe it, but Goodell keeps saying it.

You can expand the brand without putting a franchise there. They should take 6-10 games a year and play them in different cities where they think there is interest. I'm guessing there would be considerable backlash from teams if they wanted to play regular-season games in in Asia. They've gotten away from the preseason games in China and Australia.