The NFL gets too much flack, especially where I'm from, so I'm going to defend the league. No, I'm not going to talk about Kaepernick and the protests. I'm referring to the people who say that the NFL is boring and not as exciting as college football.
The NFL might just be America's best professional sport.
My favorite league is probably the NBA, but even the Association has its flaws.The NFL, like the NCAA basketball tournaments, benefit from one-game knockouts. NBA teams play a seven-game series in every round of the playoffs. Therefore, to beat a great team like the Golden State Warriors four times in seven games is nearly impossible. The madness of March Madness is the possibility of an upset and the low seeds moving on. The NFL sees this most years, too.
What sets the NFL apart from other sports is parity. In the 2018 playoffs, most if not all of the six teams that were in the NFC side had a legitimate chance to win the conference. The Atlanta Falcons were the last seed and dominated the NFC West champs and third-seed Los Angeles Rams on the road. The Falcons then went on the road to Philadelphia and nearly knocked off the eventual Super Bowl champions, the Eagles.
Too often I have heard that the NFL is boring compared to college football. Being from Alabama, I can understand their reasoning. Alabama has no professional sport, so Alabama and Auburn football take the place. Being a fan of a college team is a bit more personal, especially if the fan actually attends the school. In Alabama, a majority of fans I know never actually attend the school for which they root.
There's a fundamental difference that I think puts the NFL over college football.
In the NFL, dynasties rarely occur. The worst team gets the first draft pick, and the Super Bowl champions get the last pick and hardest schedule the next season. That's why a Super Bowl repeat is incredibly rare. One can argue and equate these NFL structures to socialism. No one team dominates year in and year out with the exception of outliers like the New England Patriots.
However, in college football, the same handful of teams will dominate for long stretches of time. The best programs will usually get the best recruits. No matter the teams' records, programs like Ohio State, Alabama, USC, Oklahoma and just a handful of others will always get the most revenue, best facilities, best coaches and thus the best players. Out of the 130 teams in the FBS, only a handful have a chance. And the Playoff Committee is not any closer to allowing a Group of five teams in the playoffs despite UCF's success. So eliminate exactly half of the teams.
Of the 65 Power 5 teams, only a small proportion of those will have a chance at even making the playoffs. The college football playoff teams are decided by a subjective committee who has already taken flack for its decisions in the last few years. NFL teams make the playoffs by earning an automatic bid by winning the division or being one of the wildcard teams.
The NFL has a great balance across the league. This year, college football saw two teams from the same conference play in the national championship. With the way the NFL is set up, this won't happen. Ten of the last 15 Super Bowls have been decided by just one score. In the last 15 Super Bowls, there have been 14 different participants and 10 different winners. The college football playoffs have become the Alabama Invitational.
College football may be more exciting for people who live in Alabama or attend college with a prominent Division I program. But the NFL has a fanbase across the country and is better suited for parity and balance than college football is.