Teams you feel aren't ever going anywhere

[RRMarshall]

You can add the Pats to the list. As much fun as the ride has been, BB has shown he can not construct an offense with skill players to compete with the modern day offenses. I say 7 wins is the max this year, and don't see things getting better soon.

[Brian wolf]

I disagree on the Pats. With Bill O Brien back, he has another QB to develop, without Brady's release or skill as a passer but Jones can be the smart game manager that can utilize his ground game as the Patriots try to add weapons for him. Just like in 2007 for Brady, Belichick has to realize the more talented a receiver, like a Moss or Welker for Brady, the better his chances for Jones. Ironically, Brady won championships with different receivers and made all of them look good. The jury is out whether Jones can do the same thing or needs his own superstar to thrive. Hopkins might have been that player but he chose to resurrect his career in Nashville. Can Gesecki, Hunter, Bourne or Smith-Shuster be that guy?

[Todd Pence]

The Carolina Panthers. Just one winning season since their Super Bowl appearance eight years ago.

[Bryan]

The Dolphins - another franchise for which it has been AGES (50 years, to be exact) since they won a league title. Heck, the Miami Dolphins haven't made it as far as a conference championship game since the early '90s. A strong legacy (thanks to the [early] Don Shula years) but not much positive to say about MIA over the last 40 years, or so.

Its amazing to me how many franchises in the NFL fit this description, despite all the rules being in favor of parity. While Rozelle was great for the business of the NFL, I think the product on the field suffered and is still feeling the effects of the Rozelle/Tagliabue sterilization of professional football. There are way too many teams in the NFL; the league never should have expanded after the merger. 26 teams already had the league at its breaking point; hastily added teams like the Falcons and Saints were perpetually terrible, you had guys like Marty Domres starting at QB, it just didn't seem like much forethought was put into the shaping of the NFL.

So now we have teams that still make money despite not accomplishing anything for decades. The Dolphins are a good example...they fluctuated between wild card round losers and outright terrible since the early 90s. As you pointed out, they haven't even played in a conference championship game in decades. They've also screwed up their uniforms. Same is true of the Redskins. They are so irrelevant that people don't even know the team name. They haven't played in a conference championship since 1991. In a league where its not unheard of for teams to go from 'worst to first', how is it possible for multiple franchises to be so consistently mediocre?

An honorable mention goes to the Bears. A backwards organization with Virginia McCaskey laughably being nominated for the Hall of Fame, they had a complete idiot named Ted Phillips running the operation from 1993 - 2022. That's 30 years of being the VP of Operations/CEO for the Bears franchise. In those 30 years, the Bears accomplished:

4 postseason wins
21 seasons of .500 or worse
11 last place divisional finishes in the same division as the Lions

It's almost criminal that Ted Phillips was paid a salary for one year, let alone 30. His record for futility is unmatched in the modern era of pro sports. But this is what the NFL has become.

[Brian wolf]

Yep, and in my opinion, the NFL teams and owners make more money than the public knows about. I guesstimate 5 billion more than they admit or willing to submit, not that profits on the books will ever be transparent. The Better Business Bureau would not approve of over 18 teams, haha ...

[7DnBrnc53]

Its amazing to me how many franchises in the NFL fit this description, despite all the rules being in favor of parity. While Rozelle was great for the business of the NFL, I think the product on the field suffered and is still feeling the effects of the Rozelle/Tagliabue sterilization of professional football. There are way too many teams in the NFL; the league never should have expanded after the merger. 26 teams already had the league at its breaking point; hastily added teams like the Falcons and Saints were perpetually terrible, you had guys like Marty Domres starting at QB, it just didn't seem like much forethought was put into the shaping of the NFL.

I agree. I would like to see the NFL contract four teams (Chargers, Jags, Bills, Texans. Then, move the Titans back to Houston and re-name them the Oilers), but that probably won't happen (the NFL isn't the only sport that has been ruined by expansion, though. The NHL has too many sun belt teams).

Also, a big part of that sterilization is the owners taking the money from the TV networks. Art Rooney told one of his sons that they are going to regret taking all that money because it will become their game, not the owner's game. That's exactly what happened (Bernie Parrish was right).

I know that this is a football board, but the NBA is a big example of this. In the 90's, Dick Ebersol got NBC to purchase the rights to broadcast NBA games for one man: Michael Jordan. He turned it into a TV show instead of a sport, and made MJ the good guy (and everyone else the bad). It's very possible that Ebersol manufactured six NBA titles for Jordan.

[racepug]

How could I forget the CLE Browns? They have truly been one of the most dysfunctional, pitiful N.F.L. franchises (at least) since Bernie Kosar was unceremoniously dumped from the team back in the early '90s. It's gotten to the point where I don't ever expect anything positive from them under any circumstances.

[NWebster]

Think about how Davis tricked Ed McGah into signing papers that handed him control of the franchise. If that never happens the franchise probably never leaves for LA or LV...and also isn't handed over to Mark Davis. Under this ownership the Raider ship is listing.

There is not nearly enough written about this. I'd love something of an inside account, but sadly we're now largely exposed to the party line(s). I love the Raiders I love AL Davis, but I'm thoroughly convinced he bamboozled his way into ownership and that the full details will never be known.

[Brian wolf]

The League ... written by David Harris, goes into details about how Davis was given an ownership stake into the Raiders, thanks to majority owner Wayne Valley and then he manipulated Ed McGah into both ganging up on Valley, to where Davis would end up owning a majority of the team. The book has good details, even about Carroll Rosenbloom and other owners but Harris is only allowed so much information and has to put out a book thats still caters to the whims of Rozelle and the media machine that the league allows or discourages.

When Bernie Parrish put out his book, They Call It A Game, Rozelle and the league were successful at convincing the media and putting out their own publicity PR to discredit and dismiss the book that exposed, predicted and showed how owners and the league could do what it wanted, regardless of violating labor issues or anti-trust exemption. Parrish merely speculated about fixed game outcomes to point out broader issues with television, ownership and management collusion, and gambling but the NFL's publicity machine focused on that one fleeting theory he had to discredit and laugh at the book and truths he exposed. The things that are happening now, Parrish pointed out over 50 years ago ...

[7DnBrnc53]

When Bernie Parrish put out his book, They Call It A Game, Rozelle and the league were successful at convincing the media and putting out their own publicity PR to discredit and dismiss the book that exposed, predicted and showed how owners and the league could do what it wanted, regardless of violating labor issues or anti-trust exemption. Parrish merely speculated about fixed game outcomes to point out broader issues with television, ownership and management collusion, and gambling but the NFL's publicity machine focused on that one fleeting theory he had to discredit and laugh at the book and truths he exposed. The things that are happening now, Parrish pointed out over 50 years ago ...

Also, I heard that Art Rooney told one of his sons that they were going to rue the day that they took all of that money from the TV networks, and that it would become their game (which it has).