Professional Football Researchers Association Forum
PFRA is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the history of professional football. Formed in 1979, PFRA members include many of the game's foremost historians and writers.
I remember when the players wore pink cleats on October to support Breast Cancer Awreness Month. The officials also used pink whistles and pink flags. The problem was that some players also used pink towels, so when they fell from a player, it appeared that the refs had thrown a flag on the field. Why nobody though of that before I don't know, but back then I thought to myself that pink flags were are a bad idea, and they soon discarded them.
I absolutely hate it. They're making the players into cartoons almost with the graphics they show after scores. Can we have the actual headshot or picture. What is this nonsense (old pic)
Do people even remember back when Terry Bradshaw was a real analyst and not some cartoon character himself.
I may be misremembering it but I thought the cartoons started with a Super Bowl broadcast. There is always some enhancement with the scorebug and/or graphics with each Super Bowl these days. I thought the cartoons would be a one-off but here we are in what year 4 or 5 or so with the cartoons?
Something that I've always thought to be really dumb about modern day football media coverage; power rankings. They are always so egregiously stupid, especially if you are a fan of lesser team that nobody cares about like the Texans. So many times I would look at those and would see teams we beat head to head ranked over us because of some retarded reason. I don't know why these became such big articles in NFL that everybody puts weight on. I don't remember stuff like this growing up watching the sport it seems like a recent thing.
Uniforms and helmets. For a team like the Jets to dump such a great iconic look that they had in the 60's to trot out those horrible 80's green uniforms again is a crime. The modifications they've made adding the black etc. only made it look worse. The color rush stuff the league was doing was the worst. The one game where both teams wore dark home unis, one red and one green was a low point for NFL uniforms.
The pink shit for breast cancer awareness was so obviously just a marketing deal to appeal to a demographic they needed to appeal to for advertising, very gross deal all the way around. Was not a fan of that at all. I guess other cancers didn't make financial sense to raise awareness for.
The whole deal with the recent team shuffle, Rams to LA, Chargers to LA, Raiders to Las Vegas, man every time these teams uproot and abandon a city and it's fans I feel like the NFL loses a big part of it's soul, they lost a big chunk of whatever was left here.
The whole Redskins name change deal. Yeah it was a pretty bad word at one time under a certain context. Things change over time. The word gay does not mean the same thing that it did back then either, you don't see people running around talking about man I feel so gay right now like they did in the 30's anymore. Literally nobody in this day and age is running around calling natives Redskins in racist context. In stirring all this up you educated a whole generation of people my age that this was even a thing, I had no idea. I think the football team actually did the work of changing what that word meant to natives. Anytime the subject comes up I'm reminded of the 1990 Quantum Leap episode about the native boy and his grandpa on the run, his grandpa being a huge Redskins fan with the big line he kept saying through the episode; "The Washington Redskins, the best damn team in America". This was all a headline grabbing deal and propaganda for sure. Losing the Redskins to me killed off a big vibe of the NFL for me. To me that was one of the big logos/colors/franchises that gave the NFL it's charm.
Blatantly helping stars win big games with officiating. Texans have been on the wrong end of this a lot as the filler team of the NFL that was just brought in to even out at 32 and pad Peyton Manning's record. Nobody wanted to see the Texans knock Andrew Luck out of the playoffs in 2018 and the NFL made sure that didn't happen. Nobody wanted to see Tom Brady lose to the Texans in 2013 and the NFL made sure that didn't happen(I believe the only time in NFL history a team got ZERO flags). I truly believe that was the whole purpose of Houston getting an NFL team, this was meant to be a top 5 TV market home away from home pitstop for the Titans and Cowboys and to help Manning break through as the face of the league. I'm happy that two out of three of those didn't happen.
Last edited by ShinobiMusashi on Fri Oct 17, 2025 7:19 am, edited 3 times in total.
Also I'm sorry but I have always thought Fantasy Football was the dumbest shit. The rules of the game and how it works are just dumb to me. Absolutely hate how big of a deal it became in the coverage of the sport and the impact it had on how the media covers it(and possibly swaying some of the offensive rules changes, I.E. fans want to see more scoring for their fantasy leagues, gross). Get that shit out of here.
Great call on fantasy football Shinobi, which also made gambling more acceptable for the league, who continues to deny its influence, while profitting off of it.
A team game and loyalty from fans, suddenly became about statistics and offensive perceptions. Where did defense and special teams coverages fit into this?
In the past, great players who played and consistently performed made fantasy leagues seem redundant but with so many great players missing games nowadays, the future of fantasy is in speculating the contributions of rookies, undrafted free agents or castoffs from other teams, who can and will, suddenly impact a particular ballgame. Should this really be happening? In the past, no, because defenses were more coordinated to stop certain skill levels of play and positions, but now, with more handcuffing, a less talented or skilled offensive player can come in and contribute to a win, or a loss.
I remember the first Packer game to be televised from old City Stadium. It must have been about 1950; perhaps '51 or '52. The press box had two booths for radio broadcasts but a separate booth was built for the TV broadcast. It was a little to the side of the press box, not connected to it. I always sat right next to the press box entrance, so I had a very clear view of this new TV booth. There were two people in the booth, the broadcaster and an engineer, no color/analyst person. And, to my astonishment, they both sat with their backs to the field! The game was covered by a single fixed camera, mounted on top of the press box, and the broadcaster did his play-by-play based on what he saw on the monitor on the back of the booth. That was more than my young mind could comprehend (I was 11-13).
ShinobiMusashi wrote: ↑Fri Oct 17, 2025 7:08 am
The whole Redskins name change deal. Yeah it was a pretty bad word at one time under a certain context. Things change over time. The word gay does not mean the same thing that it did back then either, you don't see people running around talking about man I feel so gay right now like they did in the 30's anymore. Literally nobody in this day and age is running around calling natives Redskins in racist context. In stirring all this up you educated a whole generation of people my age that this was even a thing, I had no idea. I think the football team actually did the work of changing what that word meant to natives....
I'm not particularly fond of the name change either but "Redskins" was offensive to real-life, modern Amerinds.
I have/had an American Indian friend who found the term very objectionable. She said she was OK with respectful Indian names like the Warriors (I have no idea of that name was chosen for Amerind Warriors) but Redskins and Chief Wahoo, etc. were not OK with her and her family/tribe.
I think The Washington Warriors would've made an excellent name (and the team could've kept their logo, etc.) but I guess they couldn't work out a deal to share with the NBA team.
ShinobiMusashi wrote: ↑Fri Oct 17, 2025 7:08 am
The whole Redskins name change deal. Yeah it was a pretty bad word at one time under a certain context. Things change over time. The word gay does not mean the same thing that it did back then either, you don't see people running around talking about man I feel so gay right now like they did in the 30's anymore. Literally nobody in this day and age is running around calling natives Redskins in racist context. In stirring all this up you educated a whole generation of people my age that this was even a thing, I had no idea. I think the football team actually did the work of changing what that word meant to natives....
I'm not particularly fond of the name change either but "Redskins" was offensive to real-life, modern Amerinds.
I have/had an American Indian friend who found the term very objectionable. She said she was OK with respectful Indian names like the Warriors (I have no idea of that name was chosen for Amerind Warriors) but Redskins and Chief Wahoo, etc. were not OK with her and her family/tribe.
I think The Washington Warriors would've made an excellent name (and the team could've kept their logo, etc.) but I guess they couldn't work out a deal to share with the NBA team.
Here's an experiment for those who think "Redskins" is no longer an offensive term: Go to my birthplace, Shawano, WI, on a Saturday when a lot of Menominees are in town shopping. Approach one of them and say something like, "Hi, Redskin, how are you?" NB: Make sure you try this on an elderly woman or a child. Do NOT try it with an able-bodied male.
