Is Roger Goodell Good For the NFL?

To take a little break from the Skins bashing..

The more I hear from Roger Goodell, the more I dislike him. Yes, ratings are thru the roof, but don't ruin something thats not broken.

NFL Football in Europe? C'mon, we don't have a Europian Soccer team here, so they don't need one of our football teams over there. This is really about the dumbest idea to come from Goodell.

18 game season? Why? B/c it means more money, that's why. I think it dilutes the season a little.

Anyone else, kind of sick of Roger Goodell and his "new" attention grabbing rules and policies?

I think he's done far more good than bad for the league. The personal conduct policy and the way he's dealt with off the field issues, I think you have to give him two strong thumbs up. As far as expansion of the league and the season, regardless of who the commish is, these are always going to be issues on the table. Expanding to Europe has been discussed for years, it's not a Goodell thing, it's always been a long term view of the league. As for the expanded season, it's happened a few times before with success.

First off, this is a good thread. Nice break from the "Chicken Little" nonsense we've been reading recently.

I have no issue with Goodell. I think he's been very even in his handling of the personal conduct policy, given the touchy issues that presents. He's been strong on preparing the league for a potential work stoppage (negotiating the tv deals so that the league gets paid up front whether there are games or not). As far as the 18 games deal goes, I don't have a problem with it. They're looking at player safety and if they continue to take some of the viciousness out of the game, there should be less catastrophic injuries. As far as american football in europe goes, if there's a market for it, why not? Increases the talent pool which makes the game stronger... Wouldn't you rather see a city like London have a team that the fans actually support instead of cities like Tampa Bay and Jacksonville with lukewarm fanbases? Making the league multinational is also a great way of diversifying and making it independent of one country's economy. Remember, the league is a business and there's no fortune 500 company in the world that, if given the chance to go global and grow their business is going to pass on that opportunity.

He's too damn corporate to me. He's just another stiff suit on Park Ave. Get a guy in there that really knows football. Going over to Eurpore is so stupid. Just look at the league that folded? Yet he wants to expand there?? Football is an american sport..always has been and always will be. If you're going to expand do it here. And the fines for hits is just ridiculous. So tired of the guy.

I don't think the NFL should "expand" to Europe. I don't think the NFL should expand at all. I like the fact this is our sport, an American sport. Nothing against Europeans, but the NFL belongs in America only.

I don't disagree w/ Goodell tightening the code of conduct of NFL players but it just feels a little "godfather-esque" to me. It feels like they get called to the principals office. Should it be handled individually or should there be a concrete policy? I don't know, he just irks me a little.

I don't think the NFL should "expand" to Europe. I don't think the NFL should expand at all. I like the fact this is our sport, an American sport. Nothing against Europeans, but the NFL belongs in America only.

I don't disagree w/ Goodell tightening the code of conduct of NFL players but it just feels a little "godfather-esque" to me. It feels like they get called to the principals office. Should it be handled individually or should there be a concrete policy? I don't know, he just irks me a little.

Re: code of conduct, the league is out to make money and it needs corporate relationships in order to do that. If the league devolves into nothing but thug ass criminals, companies are going to distance themselves from the league. He's just protecting the brand, which is his job.

Re: code of conduct, the league is out to make money and it needs corporate relationships in order to do that. If the league devolves into nothing but thug ass criminals, companies are going to distance themselves from the league. He's just protecting the brand, which is his job.

He's done an outstanding job in that regard. Protecting the shield has been his top priority and he's followed through on that every step of the way.

Ratings are through the roof, hard to argue with the results that are out there under his guidance so far.

A big test will be the upcoming labor agreement.

Outside of suspending players Goodell has been turrible.

For starters whats with the talk of bringing a team to Europe? For God's sake they can't even get a team in LA. I personally don't mind the one game a year in London. If anything it's nice exposure for the league in one of the worlds nicest stadiums. However bringing a team to Europe is about 40 or 50 years to early. Unlike the NHL/NBA/MLB the NFL isn't competing worldwide for talent and media attention seeing as how football is exclusively an American game.

Then theres the labor negotiations. I don't know how Paul Taglibune would have done but I was under the impression that the commissioner's interest was the well being of the league, not serving as a white knight for the owners. Instead of having the owners, players, and commissioner at the negotiating table you have the owners with the commissioner and the union.

However the cardinal sin of Goodell is the 18 game season. Sure it will get the league more money but who's going to want to watch when a good amount of starters are on the sidelines due to injury. The funniest part though is Goodell talking about how excited fans are about the prospect of two extra games. Go to any blog and you'll find two types of responses. The people who absolutely hate it and the people who could care less. I don't know about you but that doesn't sound like support for the two extra games. Sure they're trying to change the rules now to prevent injuries while posturing for the two extra games but the fact of the matter is that you can't change football enough to make two extra games a year a worthwhile risk.

Then theres the record books......in short the whole thing is a mess.

It's not like Goodell is the first commissioner to talk about expanding the regular season (it's been done before), or talk about taking the game to Europe. Previous commissioners have done so, albeit more on a minor league scale. Plus, this whole expansion to Europe talk, consider who Goodell was speaking to. And all he said was we'd like to see more games played here and if it turns out it's paying off expansion is something we'd consider. You can't have a commissioner who isn't forward thinking. And he's got plenty of former NFL players and coaches and execs advising him

Outside of suspending players Goodell has been turrible.

For starters whats with the talk of bringing a team to Europe? For God's sake they can't even get a team in LA. I personally don't mind the one game a year in London. If anything it's nice exposure for the league in one of the worlds nicest stadiums. However bringing a team to Europe is about 40 or 50 years to early. Unlike the NHL/NBA/MLB the NFL isn't competing worldwide for talent and media attention seeing as how football is exclusively an American game.

Then theres the labor negotiations. I don't know how Paul Taglibune would have done but I was under the impression that the commissioner's interest was the well being of the league, not serving as a white knight for the owners. Instead of having the owners, players, and commissioner at the negotiating table you have the owners with the commissioner and the union.

However the cardinal sin of Goodell is the 18 game season. Sure it will get the league more money but who's going to want to watch when a good amount of starters are on the sidelines due to injury. The funniest part though is Goodell talking about how excited fans are about the prospect of two extra games. Go to any blog and you'll find two types of responses. The people who absolutely hate it and the people who could care less. I don't know about you but that doesn't sound like support for the two extra games. Sure they're trying to change the rules now to prevent injuries while posturing for the two extra games but the fact of the matter is that you can't change football enough to make two extra games a year a worthwhile risk.

Then theres the record books......in short the whole thing is a mess.

Per PK's MMQB:
I've thought all along that the majority of fans don't really support the idea of an 18-game schedule. In an injury-free world, they would; who wouldn't? But Commissioner Roger Goodell keeps saying fans favor the 18-game schedule. They only favor it, in my opinion, in order to NOT have four preseason games they have to pay regular-season prices for. But that's a different story than actually saying you want 18 games when so many players are getting hurt every week. And so on Friday, I asked my Twitter followers if they favored either:
a. Two preseason games and 18 regular-season games.
b. Four preseason games and 16 regular-season games.
c. Two preseason games and 16 regular-season games.
The results, over a 40-hour voting period, give us a pretty good sample -- 1,200 votes in all. How the voters came down:
C (2+16): 622 votes, 51.8 percent.
B (4+16): 363 votes, 30.3 percent.
A (2+18): 215 votes, 17.9 percent.
That means 18 percent of 1,200 football fans (presumably they are if they follow me on Twitter), less than one out of every five, want what Goodell says they want. And 82 percent want to keep it at 16 regular-season games.


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