flixchick

Being bought up and raised in England football, or soccer as its known over here in North America runs through my veins. I can’t help it and I’m not ashamed of it either, I was bought up on local league football but then as I got older I also dicovered the NFL and channel 4’s weekly magazine show with one live game a week shown at 1am. That was the only fix I got, thank God for the internet and Sky tv which decided to show more and more of all the sports I love (except baseball, for some reason no-one shows that, what’s up with that?).

One of the great things about football in England is promotion and relegation which can make or break a team and gives interest to the also rans and could have beens. There are four divions in a pyramid system with the EPL at the top, followed by the Championship below this, then League 1 and finally League 2. Teams only play within their division except for the cup competitions which are entirely seperate. Example the EPL has 20 teams, at the end of the season the top team (last year Manchester Utd) were crowned champions, however the bottom 3 teams are all relegated and play in a lower division, last season Derby County finished bottom with one of the worst records in EPL history. These teams that go down lose out on lucrative tv money as well as all the other benefits of playing in one of the world’s top leagues. Who wants to go and watch Plymouth v Burnley on a cold friday night when you could be watching Liverpool or Manchester Utd on super Sunday? Given the choice I know which one I’d go for!!

Here’s where it gets interesting though the three teams that go down have to be replaced by three coming up from the league below. The top 2 teams get automatic promotion while the 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th teams play off against each other for the right to go up to the Premier league. It’s estimated that when Derby won promotion to the premier league in 2007 it was about $100million to the club with the tv deals and the parachute payments for the 2 years after they came down. I guess the closest equivalent is in hockey, football etc where the worst team in the league gets the 1st draft pick. This works imilar for all 4 leagues with the exception of at the end of League 2 where the bottom club is relegated out of the league completely and is replace by the top non league club.

Now imagine this for NFL whihc has been rumoured this week. Last season Miami Dolphins ere far and away the worst team in league history, they were just awful. What incentive is there for them to improve if there is no penalty for doing so bad? Already this season people are talking about the Maple Leafs selling all their good players so they can get first pick in next seasons draft, in that case doing bad is rewarded!!!!! Now imagine if the team with the worst record in the NHL was relegated to the AHL and the top team was promoted in the opposite direction. In football you could have the New York Giants playing in the CFL (there isn’t really a subsiduary division for the NFL) and the Roughriders playing in the NFL. The prospect of playing in a lower division would surely buck up any teams ideas. I guess in baseball it would be the same as going down to the AAA minor leagues, imagine the NY Yankees having a bad season and then having to play at small stadiums across the country!!!!

Maybe this idea if introduced and thought out properly would give some added spice to the league and would give fans value for their money on going to watch a professional sports team play. Why go watch a team when you know they aren’t even trying becuase they want top draft pick next season? If you know your team has gone down fighting it hurts just that little bit less. It still hurts, trust me, I’m a Derby fan, the passion that is envoked from watching your team go to Wembley and lift the play-off trophy, knowing next season you’re going to be playing with the big boys then having to watch them be awful, getting spanked by the same big boys week in, week out, is hard, but it’s why we do it, why we love it and why I’ll live in hope that maybe next season I can go through it all again.

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