There’s been a lot of talk about the NFL and London recently. There were rumors earlier this month that the Jaguars were eyeing a move to London in the near future. Just days later, the NFL’s vice president of international said the league was ready for a team across the pond right now. While Jaguars owner Shad Khan recently pulled his offer to buy Wembley Stadium, throwing cold water on the rumors for now, the NFL is still very invested in expanding the game abroad.
One possibility that’s been suggested is holding the Super Bowl in London. While Roger Goodell is acknowledging that it’s “been talked about a lot”, he said the league currently isn’t planning on doing it anytime soon, according to Nick Shook of NFL.com. Goodell said the Super Bowl is supposed to be a reward for fans, and that he won’t look to put a Super Bowl in London until London has its own team. Overall, Goodell’s comments suggest the league still plans on having a franchise overseas sooner rather than later.
Here’s more from around the league:
- Browns receiver Antonio Callaway has a well-documented legal history. He dealt with lots of off-field issues while at Florida, then was arrested this summer and reportedly didn’t tell the Browns about it until it was reported in the media. Now, Callaway was pulled over for speeding on his way to the team’s game against the Chargers a couple of weeks back, according to Robin Goist of Cleveland.com. It’s a very minor incident, but still worth noting due to Callaway already being on thin ice with the team. Callaway’s role has been reduced in recent weeks, even with injuries piling up to the Browns’ pass-catchers, and it seems like he’s in the doghouse with the coaching staff.
- The Cowboys had been looking for a number one receiver for a while before trading for Amari Cooper, Cowboys VP Stephen Jones said, per Jon Machota of Dallas News (Twitter link). Jones revealed the team heavily pursued Sammy Watkins in free agency but missed out. Since then, they didn’t find a possibility they liked until Cooper became available.
- In case you missed it, a breakdown of all the recent drama surrounding ownership of the Denver Broncos.
Goodell talking his usual nonsense again. The Super Bowl stopped being a reward for fans years ago. Most fans in fact could never afford a ticket and the prime seating is reserved for those with corporate connections.
The problem with London hosting has nothing to do with it being outside the United States as the event now has more foreign viewers than domestic. The concern is mostly the weather and a Super Bowl shrouded in the frequent fog and rain that England experiences would be a disaster. A lesser problem with a European SB is that over there they use the metric system for measurement.
Metric system he says
Where a game winning 50 yard FG would actually only be credited as 45.72 metres on the stat sheet.
But US stat sheets don’t go by metres. Everything will still be in yards, nothing needs to change. It’s not like it’s illegal to use the imperial system in the UK (regardless of how much of a garbage system it is).
Odd, the metric system hasn’t gotten in the way of any regular season games
For Americans it’s just an annoyance they try to tolerate. If your a coach trying to decide whether to attempt a FG into the wind, being told the wind speed in metres per second really doesn’t help a lot because you have to have someone make the conversion to something that is meaningful to you.
Cowboys could’ve signed Josh Gordon and traded for Amari and had 2 #1’s.
I think Calloway’s role being reduced is a lot more about his dropped passes than anything about his legal history