Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 alpha 4/15/85; site ubvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!prls!amdimage!amdcad!cae780!ubvax!gdave From: gdave@ubvax.UUCP (Dave Guertin) Newsgroups: net.sport.football Subject: Re: Whither the USFL? Message-ID: <260@ubvax.UUCP> Date: Thu, 18-Jul-85 18:51:55 EDT Article-I.D.: ubvax.260 Posted: Thu Jul 18 18:51:55 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 24-Jul-85 06:09:50 EDT References: <8994@ucbvax.ARPA> Organization: Ungermann-Bass, Inc., Santa Clara, CA Lines: 92 Keywords: USFL, NFL, merger, realignment Summary: All for it! In article <8994@ucbvax.ARPA>, wildbill@ucbvax.ARPA (William J. Laubenheimer) writes: > > 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 > > 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 Instead of Oakland I would rather see Memphis and I beleive this would work to preserve some of the current riverlys. Also I like the Idea of four divisions within a conference. It allows for more parity and gets rid of one of the current problems in the NFL where you have some divisions with only four teams and others with five. The reason I would rather see Memphis, is that the 49ers already have a strong foothold here in the bay area and it's very dificult to support two teams here. All you have to do is examine the past to see that when one of the two teams was doing better than the other the other was losing money. However Memphis also had a strong fan following and not to bad of a team. Also by preserving some of the current riverlys the NFL would be more acceptable to the Idea and as far as the USFL goes it would be the only way for many of the owners to save face. Because as you said it is only a matter of time before they go bankrupt. My line-up would be as follows: NFC East Central South West NY Giants Chicago Atlanta Arizona Philadelphia Detroit Birmingham Dallas St. Louis Green Bay New Orleans LA Rams Washington Minnesota Tampa Bay San Francisco AFC East Central South West Baltimore Cincinnati Houston Denver Buffalo Cleveland Miami LA Raiders New England Indianapolis Memphis Seattle NY Jets Pittsburgh Kansas City San Diego Well theres probley a number of ways it could be done but at least this way a lot of the riverly match ups would remain. The most evident that would not are the Dallas vs. everyone in their present division and Miami vs. New England or NY Jets. These old riverlys could be played once a year or so and of course new riverlys would be made in no time at all. The best thing about all of this is that it would re-align the NFL and at the same time create new parity. Both things the NFL is badly in need of in my opinion.