The NFL Should Have Minor Leagues

“Life isn’t always fair.”

I heard that a lot as I was growing up, but it never made sense to me. Sure, it may be true, but many people use the phrase to rationalize bad, erratic, or  presumptive behavior. I never could understand how that justified anything, and I still haven’t to this day. So when I see something like this, I shake my head and feel for blue collar NFL football players.

You don’t have to look very far to find careers that have been made in the NFL because of misfortune, luck, or sheer determination.

The player in the first video, Joe Webb (QB – UAB 6’4 220) has the prototypical size for an NFL quarterback, yet is already labeled as a failure in the NFL without taking a snap at QB. I believe in second chances, but when it comes to being close minded, NFL scouts are scared to even give first chances. I don’t know anyone in recent memory that can jump over 7 dummies that is projected to be drafted in the 7th round. Well, now I do.

Scouts often get too caught up in physical statistics. They are too focused on finding that  quarterback with the rocket arm, the perfect build, or the total package. I can’t really blame them though. Most of the time, they will dismiss a quarterback completely with a small flaw such as a long throwing motion, but they will take the poor cerebral quarterback quarterback that can’t diagnose a dime from a quarter (pun intended). No quarterback that has been labeled as short, slow, or untalented has never succeeded in the NFL… EVER.  The point is, no two quarterbacks are alike, and to evaluate every quarterback through the same unproven measureables is lunacy at best.

Joe Webb is just one example of why the NFL needs a minor league system. There is too much talent in the NFL draft that is evaluated improperly every year to not have one. If MLB gains enough money per year (along with the Minors) to keep them going, the NFL should have no problem doing the same.

Don’t give me this garbage about NFL Europe either. Putting American football with American players in cities scattered throughout Europe is about as likely to fail as a minor league cricket organization in the United States. There’s just no market for it. Why would a player want to go to Europe to play in front of crowds smaller than what they played for in college, in a far away place, and at a discounted rate? The business plan was doomed from the start. Move the teams back to the United States, and you at least give yourselves a fighting chance, AND develop players.

The way it stands now, most teams don’t even know what they have until someone gets hurt. There’s no telling how many careers in the NFL that never were because of close mindedness. Now that there is no minor league system, players that were improperly labeled don’t even have a fighting chance the NFL Europe gave. There are plenty of undrafted free agents, that go on to do amazing things, that are forced to go through other routes to the NFL because of these preconceived notions.

But, life isn’t fair.

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