Mediocrity Marred NFL Product Last Season and That's Unlikely to Change in 2016

The NFL can generate buzz in a way no other sports league in America dare dream of. On an April Thursday at the outset of baseball season and just before the NBA playoffs the news cycle was dominated by an NFL trade for draft picks and the release of the 2016 schedule.

If the league announced they were changing the color in the shield from royal blue to something in a nice cerulean, people would talk about it. It would be news.

However, look deeper at the schedule for this year and strength of schedule rankings—at the final standings for the 2015 season, and another story becomes evident, one the NFL isn’t so gung-ho to have a three-hour special about on their in-house cable network.

Call it parity if you’re feeling kind or mediocrity if you aren’t. But there are a lot of so-so football teams in the National Football League. There were in 2015.

And there will be in 2016.

For a significant portion of the 2015 regular season, 20 or more NFL teams sported losing records. Things got better as the season drew to a close, but only slightly. Sixteen of the NFL’s 32 teams finished below .500. Add in three more teams that finished 8-8, and almost 60 percent of the NFL lost at least as many games as they won.

There was also a huge group of teams that were neither really good nor really bad. Nearly one-third of the NFL won either seven, eight, or nine games. Jeff Fisher only coached one of them, leaving us searching for an explanation for the other nine.

Add in six-win teams, and we’re talking about 40 percent of the NFL finishing from 6-10 to 9-7.

Woo-hoo!

It left Chris Burke of Sports Illustrated at a loss last November, when two entire divisions of the NFL were sitting under .500:

"

NFL television ratings are situation-proof. There is nothing that will keep people from tuning in. Is it too much to ask that the league provide a quality product in return?

Penalties have been way up across the league this year, and the convoluted rule book isn’t helping, as it often leaves refs grasping at straws over seemingly simple decisions like what is and is not a catch. Many analysts have waxed philosophic over an overwhelming dearth of quality offensive-line play. There are a limited number of high-quality quarterbacks, too, while those teams without one are almost doomed to mediocrity.

And speaking of mediocre, 20 of the NFL’s 32 teams are at or below .500 right now, including the entire AFC South and NFC East divisions.

The fans are not going anywhere. If boring games or clueless officiating or even an endless stream of horrific and debilitating injuries will not turn people away, it’s hard to fathom what might do it. Nor does anyone want it to fade.

We crave the NFL, whatever form it takes. It still would be nice to get a little better return on investment.

"

Burke’s sentiments were echoed by ESPN’s DJ Gallo:

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Let's be honest: Not everyone can be excellent. In fact, most of us are far from it. Being mediocre is a reasonable life goal. Mediocre is far better than bad. Slipping into the wild card of life is OK. Anything can happen from there.

So when you’re watching the NFL this season, don't wonder if the product isn't good. Just accept the fact that it isn't bad. And that's OK.

"

Of course, those sentiments were from 2012.

And that’s the thing. Mediocrity (parity, whatever) in the NFL is not a new phenomenon. There are a few really good teams (hello, New England), a few really bad ones (hello, Cleveland) and a whole lot of “meh.”

In fact, as Mike Detillier of the Daily Comet pointed out, that’s exactly how the Shield wants it. A vision for the NFL that’s been around for decades:

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It’s the NFL today. In the 1970s Commissioner Pete Rozelle envisioned a league with few upper echelon teams and few lower tier teams and having a league full of teams in the middle playing for playoff spots late in the season.

That is exactly what we are watching today.

"

And it’s what we’re going to be watching again come this fall.

Make no mistake. We will watch. As Richard Deitsch of SI wrote in January, last year's parade of parity did exactly Jack Squat to hurt TV ratings:

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The final viewership numbers for the NFL’s regular season arrived this week and the Sunday packages (NBC, CBS, Fox) were all up over last year. Same with the Thursday night package across CBS and NFL Network. Of the five NFL television rights holders, ESPN was the only partner with a decline for game viewership, dropping for the second straight year. But that’s likely due to cord-cutting as opposed to a statement on viewer popularity.

"

Will there be a few new teams who get to sit at the grown-ups table? Teams who will crack double-digit wins, as only 11 teams did a season ago?

Yes. The Oakland Raiders are an improving young team that’s had a solid offseason to date. Throw in a good draft, and when the Raiders travel to New Orleans in Week 1 to kick off a 2016 slate against teams who won exactly as many game as they lost in 2015 (per CBS Sports) Oakland will be well-positioned to make some noise in the AFC West.

Team	2015 W/L	Opp. W/L	Opp. Win %	Wk 1
Green Bay Packers	10-6	117-139	.457	@ JAX
New York Giants	6-10	118-138	.461	@ DAL
Chicago Bears	6-10	118-138	.461	@ HOU
Dallas Cowboys	4-12	119-137	.465	NYG
Detroit Lions	7-9	119-137	.465	@ IND

That noise could come at the expense of the defending world champions. While the Denver Broncos have a schedule that’s only marginally more difficult than the Raiders’, the Broncos open with a brutal three-game stretch that contains two division champions from last year in Carolina and Cincinnati.

Oh, and as of today Mark Sanchez is their starting quarterback.

The Baltimore Ravens were ravaged by injuries on both sides of the ball in 2015 and free-fell to 5-11. A healthier Ravens team, playing a slate that features opponents who finished 2015 a combined 14 games under .500, could easily start a march back toward playoff contention when they face the Buffalo Bills in Week 1.

However, the New York Jets could be hard-pressed to repeat a 10-win season that saw Gang Green narrowly miss the playoffs a year ago. The Jets face the seventh-most-difficult schedule in the NFL in 2016, lost some big contributors from a year ago and still find themselves in a waiting game at the most important position in football.

Team	2015 W/L	Opp. W/L	Opp. Win %	Wk 1
San Francisco 49ers	5-11	142-114	.555	LAR
Atlanta Falcons	8-8	142-114	.555	TB
Los Angeles Rams	7-9	141-115	,551	@ SF
New Orleans Saints	7-9	140-116	.547	OAK
Seattle Seahawks	10-6	139-117	.543	MIA

But unfortunately, that’s just about all we’ll get. A couple of new members in the 10-win club. A couple of new members in the 10-loss club. And whole lot of teams treading water around that .500 mark.

It’s the reality of the modern NFL. It’s not an especially good thing, but it isn’t a catastrophe either. It certainly isn’t the biggest issue facing the league.

It simply is what it is.

So as you settle in to pore over the schedule for your favorite team, know these things to be true.

If you love the Green Bay Packers, who have the NFL’s easiest schedule, take heart. Starting with a Week 1 tilt at the perennially hapless Jacksonville Jaguars, it’s probably going to be a good year.

If you’re a fan of the Browns, don’t get suckered in by that 21st-ranked schedule. It will end like the old one—in the AFC North basement.

But if you’re rooting for over half the NFL—be it a Bears team with the third-easiest slate or a Rams team with the third-most difficult—I don’t know what to tell you. The 2016 season won’t be especially good. Nor will it be horrible.

Welcome to the Parity Café. Today’s special is mediocrity. Your table is waiting.

Gary Davenport is an NFL analyst at Bleacher Report and a member of the Fantasy Sports Writers Association and the Pro Football Writers of America. You can follow Gary on Twitter @IDPSharks.