Super Bowl XLIV: Fixing the NFL Game

Woe my head. The Super Bowl starts on Sunday night at about 6:00 p.m. my time. 

That's no time to start a party. If the game goes three hours, folks ain't gonna get home 'til 10:00 or 11:00 p.m.

Folks like me have been advocating a lot of changes for the NFL for a long time and the beginning change is switching the Super Bowl from Sunday to Saturday.

The NFL plays games on Sundays for two reasons: 1. tradition and 2. preserving Saturdays for college football games.

But the Super Bowl is now played a month after the close of the college season and, if the NFL wished to preserve tradition, cornerbacks could actually pound receivers after five yards and there would be no "tuck rule."

Playing the Super Bowl on Saturday would give fans traveling to the game a better  opportunity for travel without taking substantial days off of work, boost bar and restaurant business, and boost more at-home party activity (which would translate into more sales of NFL sponsored Super Bowl stuff).

Network TV on Saturdays is the vastest of the vast wasteland. Give us a Super Bowl on Saturday night and watch how we party!

Then there's this two-week constipation of Super Bowl news. No matter how much you love Drew Brees' story of his birthmark or admire Peyton Manning's focus, two weeks is TMI. Only devotees of the two teams involved in the Super Bowl can give up two weeks of time to one game.

Give us one week between the AFC and NFC championships so we can charge up for the Super Bowl and make our bets, talk our smack, and recharge our hype.

So we're watching Super Bowl XLVI, the game is tied and it goes into overtime. The simplest and first step forward toward changing the overtime rules starts with one simple tweak: The team who held the ball on offense as overtime expired will have to kick off the ball to the other team to start overtime.

Is this a big deal? Yep, a way big deal. Consider the NFC championship game between the Minnesota Vikings and the New Orleans Saints. If the Vikings knew they had to score at the end of regulation or give the ball over to the Saints for the start of overtime, Brett Favre might have never thrown that interception. The Vikings likely would have gone for the long field goal attempt rather than put the ball in Favre's hand.

Using a coin toss to determine who gets the ball in overtime is just plain stupid. The NFL and players argue against each team getting a possession in overtime because of potential injuries and wear and tear on players.

If the NFL refuses to allow each team a possession in overtime, it is ludicrous to allow a flip of a coin to determine which team gets the ball first in overtime. The existing overtime rules put more importance on a coin flip than talent or skill or coaching.

The NFL doesn't start each quarter with a coin flip so why allow the overtime quarter to start with a coin flip. If you don't score at the end of regulation to break the tie, you aren't getting the ball to start the next overtime. You had your chance at the end of regulation and now it's the other team's chance to start overtime.

The damn coin flip. Get rid of it! In each NFL game, the visiting team should be able to decide whether to receive or kick off at the start of the game.

So, to sum up our NFL changes:

1. Super Bowl should be on Saturday. Let's get ready to paaarty!
2. Super Bowl is played a week after the NFC/AFC championship games. We don't need two weeks of reporters trying to come up with the same stories over and over again. Let's get the party started!
3. No coin flips in any NFL games. If tied at the end of regulation, the team playing defense at the end of regulation gets the ball on offense. At the start of all games, the visiting team chooses whether to receive or kick off. At the Super Bowl, fans get to vote until 24 hours before the game as to who is the home and visiting team. (Corporate alert: pay money to sponsor the fan vote for which team is the home team and which team is the visitor.)

We'll fix the so-called Pro Bowl, draft day, and some other issues next week.