Last weekend I watched what analysts called the best NFL playoff weekend of games all-time! All 4 games went down to the final play, and both favored number 1 seeds.
The Green Bay Packers and Tennessee Titans lost at home. The Buffalo Bills and Kansas City Chiefs put on a show for the ages Sunday night!
It makes me think about whether or not the NFL overtime rules should be changed, as Buffalo did not get a chance to respond after the Kansas City Chiefs won the coin toss and scored a touchdown to end the game in overtime. Under the current playoff overtime rules, the team that has won the coin toss has a record of 10-1. The only loss was the Saints in 2018!
The National Football League was formed in 1920 and merged with the American Football League (AFL) in 1966. Three seasons later, Joe Namath led the heavily underdogged New York Jets to an improbable Super Bowl III win in the 1968-1969 season over the Baltimore Colts. The Jets have not won another Super Bowl since!
An old moniker, the (NFL) No Fun League has changed with the times and now allows choreographed team end zone celebrations after touchdowns. The NFL has come a long way since John Madden (RIP) was coaching the Oakland Raiders in the 1970s. After leaving coaching, Madden became a great broadcaster using his new “telestrator” toy to teach the viewers at home the way he taught his teams the X’s and O’s of the game. He continued to keep pace with the times and younger generations with his famous Madden NFL video games.
Even with NFL teams taking a financial hit due to Covid-19 restrictions, and playing mostly in empty stadiums in 2020, according to the Forbes financial publication, the average value of NFL teams increased 14% the past year. A big reason for that is the media partnership deals valued at $112.6 Billion that the NFL signed last March, along with a new Collective Bargaining Agreement.
For the 15th consecutive season, the Dallas Cowboys topped the Forbes list of the NFL’s most valuable franchises, even though they have not played in a Super Bowl in over 25 years. According to Forbes, the Cowboys lead the NFL in annual revenues of over $800 Million. The Cowboys are worth $2 Billion more than the 2 least valuable franchises, the Bengals and Bills, which have a combined value of $4.545 Billion.
Although every team saw an increase in value in 2020, no team had a bigger increase than the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, after signing Tom Brady and winning Super Bowl LV in 2021. The Bucs went from the 29th most valuable team at $2.28 Billion to the 21st most valuable at $2.94 Billion.
As you can see with our New York Giants and New York Jets, who are 20 and 24 games under .500 respectively for the decade, winning is incongruent to a franchise’s business valuation.
This fascinated me, so I decided to interview my client and friend Gordon Smeaton. Gordon spent 20 years as an NFL Executive in charge of fan engagement in global markets. Gordon is credited with pioneering the NFL pre-season games in Japan, Australia, and Canada. He set up the first-ever international regular-season game in Mexico City, which then led to the London games now played every season!
Gordon’s 5 factors that account for the differences in franchise values:
It is interesting that the Bills and the Bengals (the 2 lowest valued franchises) were so close to playing this weekend in the conference finals. Stay tuned for another weekend of exciting NFL playoff games!