And In Such Small Quantities

A thought while mulling over the wackiness that is the NFL world where the Arizona Football Cardinals have their terrible division wrapped up by Thanksgiving, just like the old Ram teams used to do, with the old Ram quarterback...

What would a terrible NFL season look like? I'm thinking that it would have five components.

1) A terrible (and more importantly, disappointing) season for your favorite team.

Well, mine is 0-3 in the division, can't stop the run (the single most nauseating way to lose on defense), and short of a remarkable turn of events, appears to be drawing dead for the playoffs. This, after seeming to be one of the best five teams in football on several occasions this year. Disappointing.

2) Coin-flip resolutions.

Last week in Minnesota, the Vikings held on for an important home win against the Packers when a 52-yard field goal drifted wide. This, after giving up touchdowns on special teams and on Gus Frerotte's TAInt.

Thanks to the Bears losing to the Titans, they are right in the division race.

Last night in Arizona, the Niners would have won had Frank Gore been able to remain upright after a defensive tackle grazed him with one hand. Instead, he tripped, and the Cardinals had a four-game lead in the division. All hail our new Cardinal Overlords!

3) Boring teams at the top.

Right now, we're staring right down the barrel of a Titans-Giants match. Over-under on punts: 20. Not since Tony Siragusa thugged his way to the Lombardi Trophy has a champion looked so unpalatable.

4) Fading ratings.

Nope. Blame/credit fantasy leagues.

5) Faltering attendance.

Not a problem unless you are Bengal Fan, and even if you are, you just use the Web to fill the place with Road Team's Fans. Sell the tickets and they will come.

So, is the NFL, for lack of a better term, recession-proof? It certainly seems so, though one wonder about the relative wisdom of defying basic economic laws. After all, (some? many? most?) people thought that the housing market was receession proof, that credit markets would never get to a point where they'd be allowed to fail, that the Republicans would hold Congress and the Presidency for decades...

What it speaks to, really, is the NFL's essential and incredible conservatism in limiting the access to their product. In a marketplace where, last year, every single team sold out every single game for a two-month period despite the skyrocketing cost of going to a game, the NFL played no more games, launched no new teams, and didn't launch any satellite leagues.

Imagine any other business that would have done the same.

Now, imagine that you are a shareholder of that business. You'd be bent at the lack of expansion, wouldn't you? Hell, you'd probably be worried about some competitor coming in and taking your overflow interest.

I'm not going to give them credit for incredible foresight in this; I think they are just complacent rich snobs who are enjoying their status as the lock low communists/ monopolists of American sport. But it's hard to say that, given the current economic climate, that it's the wrong play.