@tiamat63 said:

Since the advent of the rookie pay tier system, that hasn't been an issue.

Sam Bradford was the last guy to get a whopper contract right out of college.

@brownsfaninpa said:

 The team is stuck with a hefty contract due to the player, and he aint earned it. 

Since the advent of the rookie pay tier system, that hasn't been an issue. 

That was 2011...  you're literally over a decade behind when discussing rookie deals.

@ballpeen said:

by and large I don't think owners really make that much of a difference

But they can have an impact.  Let's take our owner, he constantly hired the wrong people.  And he meddled into the football people's jobs.  Our owner and his hiring of lousy people kept us down for almost all of this century.

@kvoethe said:

Relegate the owners lol.

Maybe...in the end, there is probably a pretty small list of people who could buy a team.  In the end, by and large I don't think owners really make that much of a difference in the overall scope of things.  That doesn't mean there aren't good owners and "bad" owners.  In the end, I don't see the "bad" owners hiring a head football coach from their high school to head up the team. To me it comes down to "culture", but IMO that is hard to measure.

@ballpeen said:

Interesting concept.  IMO the problem would be having enough quality teams in the 'lower league" to move up.  I suppose in some ways the NFL already has that with playoffs teams and non-playoff teams.

Relegate the owners lol.

@kvoethe said:

Relegation...just like soccer.

Interesting concept.  IMO the problem would be having enough quality teams in the 'lower league" to move up.  I suppose in some ways the NFL already has that with playoffs teams and non-playoff teams.

@ap1 said:

Morality cannot be legislated. 

True, but lack of can.

@ap1 said:

Morality cannot be legislated. 

IMO, morality is why you must legislate. (if heinous of enough)  This is a loophole that has to be closed up.   

@orion said:

First, to all of you who called fans who hoped we'd lose our final games once we're eliminated from the playoffs, Not True Fans.....FU.  Obviously it's a strategy in front offices.

Now, how do ya fix it so teams won't try to make themselves lousy so they can draft towards the top of the order?

You can't just eliminate the draft because all of the good players will want to play in glamorous locations.  

Do you just come up with a draft order for year one....and whichever team drafts #1 will next year draft dead last and have to wait 3 decades before they rotate back up to #1 again?

The NBA went to a draft lottery to combat tanking.  I would suspect the NFL might do the same.

It's hard to prove out and out tanking, so a lottery makes sense.

@browns149 said:

There are 14 teams in the NBA lottery. And it is a weighted system. The worst 4 teams have the same odds of getting the 1st pick

And teams still tank

Thanks!  14 teams in the nba (like I said, I gave up on bball  -  Knicks fan...Walt Frazier is who I modeled my game after.  I was quite good at bball)

...anywho, so you've got to do away with the weighting.  All incentive to finish with the worst record must be removed.  If you miss the playoffs, you're all equal.  And it's because yaz just don't wanna play nice.  -  I used to tell my crew when a silly company policy would be brought up, "Counter to popular opinion, they don't stay up late at nights trying to think of stupid rules to put in place.  Stupid rules are in place because people did stupid things."

@orion said:

The NBA has only 8 teams in that lottery (as I recall.  I no longer follow the NBA).  dusty's suggestion puts 18 teams in that mix.  That is a huge difference.  You have the same odds of picking 18th as you do 1st.  

There are 14 teams in the NBA lottery. And it is a weighted system. The worst 4 teams have the same odds of getting the 1st pick

And teams still tank

Don't forget, what the Browns did in 2016 and 2017 was so unique the NFL investigated it and found no wrong doing. That plan was an exception to the rule. 

@browns149 said:

That is what the NBA does and it hasn’t stopped tanking 

The NBA has only 8 teams in that lottery (as I recall.  I no longer follow the NBA).  dusty's suggestion puts 18 teams in that mix.  That is a huge difference.  You have the same odds of picking 18th as you do 1st.  

@mld-woody said:

A lottery like the NBA for the bottom X teams. 

It hasn’t stopped tanking in the NBA

@dusty said:

I hate that too.

Here's a suggestion. 

The teams that don't make the playoffs are in a drawing for the first 18 draft picks. The remaining 14 are based on how they did in the playoffs with the super bowl winner picking 32nd.

That is what the NBA does and it hasn’t stopped tanking 

@dusty said:

The teams that don't make the playoffs are in a drawing for the first 18 draft picks. The remaining 14 are based on how they did in the playoffs with the super bowl winner picking 32nd.

Perfect!   Ratify that!   (perhaps the worst 9 get an extra name in the hat...but perhaps not)

As well, I'd find it hard to discern between a team that had collectively given up / coach lost the locker room bc he was Hue Jackson vs a team that was "tanking from the top"