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From: wildbill@ucbvax.ARPA (William J. Laubenheimer)
Newsgroups: net.sport.football
Subject: Whither the USFL?
Message-ID: <8994@ucbvax.ARPA>
Date: Fri, 12-Jul-85 02:26:40 EDT
Article-I.D.: ucbvax.8994
Posted: Fri Jul 12 02:26:40 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 13-Jul-85 10:42:12 EDT
Organization: University of California at Berkeley
Lines: 89
Keywords: USFL, NFL, merger, realignment

Recently I was kicking the future of the USFL (aka Useless Football League)
around with a couple of fellow sports buffs (even though none of us are
crazy enough to take the league seriously, despite living in a metropolitan
area represented by one of the teams playing for the league championship).
We all agreed that if the USFL actually thinks they can take on the NFL
in the fall without a TV contract, the resulting bath of red ink will make
the First Plague of Egypt look like a fraternity prank. Thus, it seems most
realistic for the USFL to follow the lead of football conferences of the
past, give up its independence, and merge a small number of teams in with
the Big Boys. If done right, this would also clothe the NFL in an aura of
respectability, at least in Congress, and maybe help get the antitrust
guys off their backs at the same time. Thus:

The USFL consolidates into four franchises, which will be accepted into
the NFL. These franchises, which will use the named USFL team as their
nucleus, are ARIZONA, BALTIMORE, BIRMINGHAM, and
OAKLAND. These are mostly the strongest teams in the league, either in
fan support or player strength, and have the additional advantage of
replacing NFL teams in two cities which have recently lost NFL franchises.
The original player pools from which these franchises will have first rights
to consist of a roughly geographical, and approximately equivalent,
grouping of USFL franchises:

ARIZONA: Arizona, Houston, Memphis, San Antonio
BALTIMORE: Baltimore, Jacksonville, New Jersey
BIRMINGHAM: Birmingham, Orlando, Tampa Bay
OAKLAND: Oakland, Denver, Los Angeles, Portland

The NFL team holding the rights to a USFL player would lose those rights
if the consolidated franchise signed that player to a contract, but would
retain their rights if the player was not signed initially. Players signed
and then cut would have to clear waivers in the same manner as a current
player.

Now you've got four new franchises, and they aren't all that bad. Give them
an early draft choice or two, and they certainly shouldn't start off 0-16.
Baltimore and Oakland join the AFC, and Arizona and Birmingham join the
NFC. Everybody else stays where they are. Now reorganize each conference into
four 4-team divisions. The geography is mostly very reasonable.

			NFC
East		Central		South		West
Detroit		Chicago		Atlanta		Arizona
NY Giants	Green Bay	Birmingham	Dallas
Philadelphia	Minnesota	New Orleans	LA Rams
Washington	St. Louis	Tampa Bay	San Francisco

			AFC
East		Central		Midwest		West
Baltimore	Cincinnati	Denver		LA Raiders
Buffalo		Cleveland	Houston		Oakland
New England	Miami		Indianapolis	San Diego
NY Jets		Pittsburgh	Kansas City	Seattle

The regular season lends itself to a parity formula much like the current one,
only better (assuming you like scheduling parity): In a 16-game season each
team plays home-and-home against the other three teams in its division
(6 games); the 1-4 or 2-3 finishers (same group as last year's finish) in
the other three divisions in its conference (6 games); and four teams from
the other conference (either another division, or perhaps one team from
each division; in any case, in a four-year rotation covering the entire
other conference).

Playoffs work well, too. There are three reasonable possibilities:

1 (My favorite, but don't bet on it): The eight division champions play.
  Worst record at best record, second worst at second best in each
  conference. Winners play at home stadium of team with better record for
  conference championship.

2 (Most likely; I could live with it): The eight division champions qualify,
  along with the two remaining best records in each conference. Wild-card
  team with best record plays at division champ with worst record (if both
  in same division, use division champ with second-worst record). Other
  wild-card team plays at remaining division champ with worst record.
  Rest of playoffs as currently.

3 (Grotesque): The eight division champions qualify, along with the four
  remaining best records in each conference. First-round pairings are
  best champ against worst wild-card not in same division, etc. Second-
  round pairings are best record against worst record not in same
  division.

Any comments? Am I out of my tree? Would the NFL sit still for this? Would
the USFL buy it if they did?

                                        Bill Laubenheimer
----------------------------------------UC-Berkeley Computer Science
   ...Killjoy thinks spring FB's silly  ucbvax!wildbill