The NFL Is Its Own Worst Enemy

Under commissioner Roger Goodell, the NFL has grown into a multi-billion-dollar-a-year industry that dominates not just American sports but pop culture at large. NFL broadcast rights are the tentpole holding up the cable-TV circus, NFL analysis is the anchor of every major sports website, and NFL talk is the only sports talk that gets talked all year round. Goodell believes his primary duty is to uphold the integrity of the game and ensure the profits keep coming. He calls it "protecting the shield," but the Commissioner is going to go out on his shield if he and his bosses don't stop breaking everything fans love about the game.

Football pundits have spent all season hunting for a reason why the NFL's ratings are down—by as much as double digits through the first eight weeks. The league, among others, pointed to "unprecedented interest" in the presidential election as a reason for the decline, but while the numbers have seen a post-election bump, they haven't recovered completely. Viewership is still down overall. Americans, it seems, just don't love watching NFL football like they used to.

Which is understandable, since it's not as fun to watch.

It's not the football's fault. Don't listen to the moaners griping about Monday Night Football matchups—they've been doing that since the series moved to ESPN ten years ago. No, this season has been full of exciting finishes, overtime wins, dominant performances, and shocking upsets. From rookie superstars taking center stage to Tom Brady taking vengeance, the sport itself is in a golden age of high-scoring games and nail-biting finishes.

Since 2010, leaguewide offensive averages have reached historic highs; though this season's average points-per-game of 22.6 is down slightly from a 50-year high of 23.4 in 2013, offenses are racking up more yards per game this season (350.2) than three years ago (348.5). There have already been 62 fourth-quarter comebacks this season, per Pro Football Reference—on pace to blow past the average (63.3) and the high (71) of the previous ten years.

It's everything around the football being played—the rules, the refereeing, the broadcasts—that is hurting the NFL.

First, the rulebook: an 88-page tome swollen with contradictory clauses and footnoted interpretations. Every season, teams petition the NFL's Competition Committee for reactive, often self-serving changes, and the committee considers and implements them as best they see fit.

Take something as simple (or something that should be as simple) as a reception. Back in 2000, then-Tampa Bay Buccaneers wideout Bert Emanuel made what should have been a game-saving catch in the NFC Championship Game. Referee Bill Carrollo reviewed the play, and determined that since the ball touched the ground it didn't count—despite Emanuel clearly having control before, during and after the contact. He overturned the catch, and the Bucs lost the game.

At the time, ESPN's Chris Mortensen reported that the Competition Committee would clarify the rule as a "concession" to then-Bucs head coach Tony Dungy, even though the text of the rule was already clear. ("Despite various propaganda spewed by savvy league officials at the time of the controversy," Mortensen wrote, "the rulebook simply states that the ground cannot assist a receiver in making a catch. Emanuel's catch was not assisted by the ground.")

The clarified version of the rule was further clarified in 2011, 2014, and yet again in 2015. The super-duper clarified rule now sags with addendums and case examples; it is stuffed with ill-defined phrases like "act common to the game" and "become a runner," and has been explicated by league officials with additional jargon like "complete the process" and "time element."

Asking officials to interpret lawyerly terms of art at the speed of the game—which modern hurry-up offenses have made even faster—then review those judgments in high definition and slow motion, inevitably leads to rulings that confound and anger fans. It seems like every fan base can point to an egregious, incomprehensible call that cost them a deserved victory: the Calvin Johnson Rule, Dez Caught It, the Tuck Rule, the Fail Mary. The recent bout of inexplicable officiating blunders in Mexico City even had Bleacher Report NFL editor Collin McCollough donning a tinfoil hat:

As in: I roll my eyes at 99.9% of all officiating conspiracy/the fix was in fan-talk. So far, this may actually be the argument for the .1%.

— Collin McCollough (@cmccollo)November 22, 2016

This doesn't happen in any other sport. Imagine MLB fans complaining that nobody knows what a "tag" is, or an NBA game grinding to a halt while officials review if a player technically committed a "dribble." Yet almost every time an NFL game is played, fans despair over the ineffable definition of "catch."

Layer on the league's attempts to improve player safety by outlawing a panoply of football techniques, and officials are drowning the game in flags. Even when bad calls don't directly change the outcome of a game, teams are breaking records for assessed penalties left and right this season.

Back in 2009, officials called an accepted penalty once every 14.7 snaps, per NFLPenalties.com; that rate has increased gradually to a high of once every 12.8 snaps so far this season. With the hurry-up passing offense in vogue, that means an average of 13.9 penalties are being accepted per game, up from 11.9 in 2009, and 12.2 in 2013.

Again: That's two more penalties per game accepted this year than seven years ago, and 1.7 more per game than just three years ago.

Full breakdown of the Raiders' record 23 penalties (they also had 3 declined and 1 offset) — Kenny Ducey (@KennyDucey)October 30, 2016

"Certainly the penalties have been on the rise over the last three, four, maybe even five years," FOX rules analyst and former NFL VP of officiating Mike Pereira told VICE Sports. "But can you say the penalties are up because the officiating's getting worse? I don't think you can." Pereira pointed to the rash of games where 20-plus penalties have been assessed: If you go back and watch the film, he said, "the fouls are there" to be called.

"I'm loath to put it on the officials," Pereira continued. "They're only doing what they've been told to do…. Put it on the Competition Committee. They're the ones that determine what are the points of emphasis."

And some of that emphasis lately seems to be severely misguided. The league's bizarrely brutal crackdown on on-field celebrations this season, for example, couldn't be more counterproductive. They're taking the moments we watch the game for—big plays, huge scores, victory-clinching moments—and grinding them to a halt for some paternalistic finger-wagging.

"I really don't agree with it," Jacksonville Jaguars wide receiver Allen Robinson told me. "We've spent our whole lives waiting; everyone has always told us, 'You can't celebrate until you get to the NFL.' For us to get to this point, and for the rules to become so strict? It's kind of frustrating."

"Look, I'm 66 years old," Pereira said, "and I was duly elected or appointed or whatever you want to call it, President of the No Fun League—when I was there, I felt that there had to be a certain amount of respect between teams." He cited a widely shared video of Pittsburgh Steelers wideout Antonio Brown twerking after scoring a touchdown as the kind of ostentatious individual display that minimizes his teammates and potentially inflames the anger of his opponents.

"There were really a couple of culprits that took it beyond where we were, and led us to where we are now. To me that was Chad Johnson and Terrell Owens. They were every week trying to outdo themselves to get on ESPN, so they could show these choreographed things that they planned during the week, trying to out-do one another." That spurred the Competition Committee—which included Marvin Lewis, Johnson's head coach at the time—to create rules against going to ground, using props and taunting while celebrating.

"We drew a pretty fine line," Pereira said. "Do we need to examine that line now? Probably so. I do think there are some things that have happened that probably didn't need to be penalized." He cited Vernon Davis' Week 6 touchdown celebration where he merely shot the football, basketball-style, through the goalposts:

Between the Josh Norman and Vernon Davis excessive celebration penalties the NFL is saying 'don't shoot anything' — Brody Logan (@BrodyLogan)October 16, 2016

These are the moments that fans, especially young fans, want to see—and, perhaps more important in today's media landscape, share. The next generation of NFL fans consumes sports through Vine and YouTube as much, if not more, than they do on TV or radio. But the league punishes those sharable moments that showcase big plays and exciting personalities, first by using penalties to discourage celebrations, and then by sending the NFL Media's DMCA takedown squad to make sure unauthorized free advertising for the league isn't disseminating online. In an age when fewer fans are watching entire games, it seems like a missed opportunity.

"We know that the entertainment part of it needs to be there," Pereira said, "but now will it be acceptable for Odell Beckham to drag the kicking net out to the 30-yard line and propose to it there? If you eliminate the line, how far does it go?"

Cutting back on celebrations isn't the only reason why games seem more like a grind lately. Games are longer, slower, increasingly decided broken up by people in stripes droning over the PA and walking the ball back and forth. According to the New York Times, NFL games lasted an average of three hours and eight minutes last year, six minutes longer than in 2008.

"It is a choppy game, there's no doubt about that," Pereira said, "and it's gotten choppier. There's five commercial breaks in every quarter. There's nothing choppier than having a touchdown, and an extra point, and a commercial, and then a kickoff, and then a commercial. We're talking about people sitting at home, watching on television—how do you like it when you're sitting in Buffalo in December, at the game, sitting in trying to keep warm?"

"One of the best halves of football I've ever seen," Pereira recalled, "was when the power went out in Buffalo. A Mylar balloon hit the power line and knocked everything out—no power, no television, but we played. You didn't have commercial breaks, you didn't have replays, I think the half took 20 minutes."

Some media-savvy league executives realize watchability has become a problem. In response to this year's ratings dip, NFL Network president Brian Rolapp recently told the National Association of Broadcasters they're looking at how ads run during games, per Diana Marszalek of Broadcasting & Cable.

"In a world where Netflix has no commercials," Rolapp said, "and consumers are used to 15 seconds of pre-roll, is there a better way to do commercials with our broadcast partners?"

"They're not going to go to less commercials," Pereira scoffed. "It's a money-driven league."

The pursuit of that almighty dollar has led the NFL to put its games on more nights, and in more countries—perhaps, some have theorized, oversaturating the market. How many fans are going to tune in for Thursday Night Football, Friday night college or high-school ball, Saturday major-conference action, a London game that kicks at 6:30 AM Pacific Time, the early games, the late games, Sunday Night Football and then Monday Night Football? "Every game counts, so that makes our inventory incredibly valuable," Goodell said last month, but after years of the NFL strip-mining fan interest for every penny, this season those games haven't seemed to count quite enough to get people to watch.

And while Goodell has earned the league and its owners billions of dollars over the years, he's also drawn the ire of players and fans by reactively, haphazardly swinging his banhammer whenever he sees something he doesn't like—or that he thinks might threaten the bottom line.

When you know you're at a good place — Torque Penderloin (@AndrewCieslak)December 11, 2016

Since taking over as NFL commissioner in 2006, he has portrayed the league as a sort of moral beacon, transforming the "integrity of the game" from a specifically competitive issue (no one wants to invest in a game that's rigged) into something more amorphous. This has had a way of backfiring, particularly when it comes to policing players' personal conduct. People don't want to cheer for repeat felons or abusers, but Goodell's insistence on being judge, jury, and executioner has been equally alienating for some. All too often, the NFL gets it wrong, with inconsistent punishments and inexpert investigations. The league pledged to change after Ray Rice, but this season we had Josh Brown.

We've seen it over and over again: StarCaps, Bountygate, Spygate and, of course, Deflategate. Like celebrations or illegal contact on the field, when Goodell disapproves of something, he cracks down on it in Draconian fashion. How many times can he turn season tickets into "confetti," as Dave Zirin once wrote, before disillusioned fans stop buying tickets and start looking elsewhere for entertainment?

OPEN CALL: Saints season ticket holders should sue the NFL for destroying their 2012 season. Goodell has turned your tickets into confetti.

— Dave Zirin (@EdgeofSports)March 21, 2012

For a league obsessed with optics—pink cleats in October, salutes to the military, No More—the NFL fails to understand what its audience actually wants to see. Ham-fisted attempts at player and franchise discipline have undermined fans' faith in the fairness of the league, while a muddled rulebook and conflicting points of emphasis threaten the credibility of the officials and the results. Goodell's worrying so much about protecting the shield, but a shield can protect itself just fine. The NFL just needs to get out of its own way, and put the game—which has never been better—front and center.

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