NFL Insider: What Living Under the 2010 Rules Means for 2011

If you have been playing close attention to the news that’s coming out of the NFL right now you may have heard that if the lockout is lifted, either by the courts or an agreement between the owners and the players, the NFL could revert to the rules used in 2010, to govern the 2011 season.

The most noticeable effect that this would have would be to free agency.  Free agency would be conducted like last year’s free agency period and this would encompass the following;

Only those players with six or more years of NFL service would be eligible for free agency;

Those teams that were the final eight teams in the playoffs will be restricted from signing free agents meaning that they can only sign free agents if they lose them.  So if one of their unrestricted free agents gets signed by another team then that team final eight team is able to sign another unrestricted free agent.  The purpose of this rule is to help even things out and make it difficult for teams to repeat as playoff and/or Super Bowl contenders and make things more competitive.

NFL teams will also have three tags to use to keep players that are at the end of their contracts (such as the franchise and transition tags).

So is this the ideal scenario for the NFL?  Could this possibly be the way that the league ends up going this coming season?

First things first of course, the league and the players have to come to an agreement and so far it looks like that’s going to be a long ways away.  So when this actually happens, the fastest and perhaps most organized way for the NFL to get things up and ready for the 2011 season may end up having to go back to the 2010 rules.

This will give the league some semblance of organization and the ability to get back to business quickly.  Since everyone, players and owners included know the rules from last year it’s going to be much easier to implement things and get going on a new NFL season.  The NFL may have to do some other special things to help get the league ready for the season but the quickest and most efficient way to prepare for 2011 is to stick with what they did in 2010.

Granted, this may not be favorable for some teams but it’s the quickest way to get everything back to normal and get the 2011 NFL season underway. 

And anything to get the season going quickly would be desirable to most anyone.