Why the NFL Stinks: The Dreaded Dozen

The NFL easily has the best marketing in sports, and this year they need to.

The speed of the game and the injuries the play causes, the expansion to 32 teams and massive over-coaching have been some factors leading to this being the worst NFL season in modern history.

Only three games last week had a victory margin of seven points or less. The previous week only had two.

The quality of play stinks. For the first time in 11 years, I am questioning my NFL Sunday Ticket subscription. Why am I paying $300 when I can see a majority of the important games for free? In many cases, by not paying for it I would have no opportunity to see quality games like Titans-Jaguars or Lions-Rams.

In previous years, the NFL had a lot of mediocre teams, but this year the league is filled with really bad teams. Let’s have some fun and explore their awfulness:

Buffalo is awful because the owner is a clueless demon and the coach appears to have zero interest in winning. The philosophy of the franchise is to see how much they can annoy their fan base in hopes of finding a richer city and more money. Teams where the fans are rooting for the owner to die are terrible.

Oakland is awful because the owner is paranoid and crazy. The franchise player might be a backup if he returned to LSU. The coach was the only person willing to take the job and now he’s headed down a path of job destruction. The Raiders draft speed over talent even if the talented players are just a bit slower. They also appear to have a desire to destroy their fan base in hopes of moving.

St. Louis is awful because they have one win in the last year. The win included a touchdown pass from their kicker, and a safety suffered when the only thing the Rams interceptor had to do was stay in the end zone, or out of it once he left it. If you live in St. Louis and need to watch actual football, $300 is cheap for the Sunday Ticket. The Rams currently have no active owner and are trying to sell the team and may move. Sense a trend?

Tampa Bay is awful because they have lost 11 games in a row. They actually thought that Byron Leftwich could start in the NFL despite his awful stint in Atlanta. They hired a head coach who appears to be lost. They also appear to have a desire to sell the team. Their hopes to get stuck in London and never come back sadly did not come true.

Detroit is awful because they also have just one win in the last year and lost to the Rams at home. On Sunday, the NFL presented the worst matchup in its history. The people of Detroit must be thankful for the concept of blackouts. The Lions are 1-6 and already have more material for the highlight films this year.

Cleveland is awful in fascinating ways. Randy Lerner must have studied the movie "Major League." They have enacted some of the techniques to be pathetic, minus the uplifting winning. The GM had to be escorted out of the building. The franchise quarterback is being sat to avoid paying him a bonus. The current QB appears to be playing terrible on purpose. It's a uniquely sad team. I can’t wait for Cleveland versus Oakland in December.

Carolina is awful, although that win in Arizona is really confusing. Carolina has no quarterback of NFL quality and makes a lot of mistakes. They lost to the Bills at home by 11, so they must be pathetic.

Tennessee is awful because they lost a game by 59 points this season. Tennessee has serious quarterback problems and a defense that went from strong to sad in one season. Although they beat Jacksonville, Maurice Jones-Drew had 177 yards on eight carries. They won because they faced a worse team.

Seattle is awful even though they have two shutouts this season. Seattle may be the king of the awful teams, as they dominate really bad teams, but are pretty bad against teams not in the Dreaded Dozen. Seattle needs a new quarterback, new running back and some good luck, because they've been cursed ever since the Super Bowl against the Steelers.

Jacksonville is awful, despite having a good shot at reaching 4-4 this week after they play the Chiefs at home. I’m sure that one will have a similar buzz to the Packers and Vikings from last week. The Jaguars just got blown out by a winless team and had to beat the Rams at home in overtime the game before. The fans have already left the Jaguars and they will probably sell and move at some time. At least the Jaguars former season-ticket holders are smart enough to use their money elsewhere.

Kansas City is awful because they decided to make a backup quarterback the face of their franchise while destroying another that could have made progress and been an effective starter in this league. Add to that the turmoil of Larry Johnson and the pit that Herman Edwards and Carl Peterson put the franchise in, and this will take awhile to dig out of. Kansas City fans deserve so much better.

Washington is the jester of awful, as they somehow beat Tampa Bay and St. Louis while providing the only victories for Detroit and Kansas City. The owner has created a laughingstock franchise. The head coach had the playcalling taken away from him even though he was hired as the offensive coordinator and became the head coach when no one wanted to work for Daniel Snyder. They lost to the Chiefs at home, a game that should have been blacked out in Kansas City, Washington and North America.

The NFL has a dozen terrible teams and the problem the league has is a majority of the teams owners not investing in the success of their franchises. Seattle and Carolina will come back to the realm of the acceptable. But teams like Buffalo, Oakland and Cleveland appear to be hopelessly pathetic.