ShinobiMusashi wrote: ↑Mon May 26, 2025 8:44 pm
One thing we do know and can say for sure that the 2002 realignment robbed us of 2 potentially classic all time great Brady vs Manning games in the 2002 season. They didn't play each other at all that year, Manning was 26 and Brady was 25. They played the first meeting in 2001 but Colts were bad that year, worst defense in the league under Mora's final season with them. 2002 the Colts had Dungy. If we pretend they don't realign the league in 2002 and just put Houston somewhere in the NFC, then that 2002 AFC East division is a banger son. All 5 teams would have been going at it. New England and Indianapolis in particular would have been really going at it for playoff spots.
Seeing how Indy's defense was that year I think they could have finished worse than they did irl, potentially getting swept by NE and NYJ and maybe even Miami too(Miami beat them in Indy that year). So if New England sweeps Indy that year and gets 10 wins instead of 9, and they get the tie breaker over the Browns for the playoff spot(the Browns now having 2 games against Titans and Jaguars could most likely change their 9-7 record they had in 2002). Those 2002 AFC playoffs just got a lot more interesting, especially if Jets got #3 seed and low seed wild card winner goes to Oakland black hole to face #1 seed Raiders.
Very interesting post! Never even thought of how the 2002 season, itself, actually turns out in a no-realignment hypothetical with simply Houston going to the NFC (again,
East, my preference) and nothing else thus making two conferences, now, with the 5-6-5 format thus still a mind-scrambler for the schedule-maker.
Yes with the AFC East being
real compact! IRL the Colts finish 10-6 elsewhere (in their new division, the South) with NJY, NE, and Mia each finishing 9-7 and Buffalo at 8-8 (who swept Miami). Of course with this 5-6-5 format in, now, both conferences you wouldn't know for sure every team who each of the five would play either within their conference or outside their conference. But, either way, yes indeed it would be a..."banger son" of a division race!
The Steelers, in that 'year of Maddox', don't win the Central due to
Tennessee still being in the division with them and,
yes, this makes it all the harder for the Browns to get in. You mean they'd actually have to wait until...
2020 to make their first playoff berth since coming back in '99??
In the NFC Central you would now have TWO games between Mike Sherman and Warren Sapp instead of just one! And considering that both finished 12-4 IRL in separate divisions, who ends up winning this division with BOTH teams still in it in 2002? This simply would have added
further example as to why the Bucs should have stayed in the 'Black and Blue'.
And how about the NFC West?? San Fran (10-6 IRL), Atlanta (9-6-1 IRL as well), Saints (9-7) along with the Rams (7-9) and Carolina (7-9) ought to really make that one, really, no less interesting than the AFC East!
Again, we would not know fully who'd play who either within the conference or outside of it due to the 5-6-5 x 5-6-5 format. Can anyone come up with a guess on how the formula would be?
Going by the every-three-year rotation all along, here's what the inter-conference set-up would have been for 2002...
AFC East vs NFC East
AFC Central vs NFC West
AFC West vs NFC Central
That's if they even still GO by that with this 5-6-5 in both conferences. Maybe the Rhodes mathematicians, I mean...schedule-makers, come up with a 21st Century version of those years following the merger. Or likely the matching-conferences rotation will continue on thus all being close to the way it was the three years leading up. Simply tweak what already was with the 31 teams to, maybe, a slightly simpler version now that there are an even amount of teams again. I lean with that.