Robert Kraft, Pat's owner, to push for NFL team in London within next 10 years

[mudloggerone]

Saying that the NFL is maxed out in the U.S. Kraft says he wants to push for the NFL to place a team across the pond in London within the next decade. I think it's a stupid idea which would give home field advantage a whole new meaning. Which team would you locate there? I'm against this, what about the other Outlaws?

 

[jjtweeks]

Yea, I am against this as well. It is just a dream and will never happen I would imagine. I don't see any possible way it could work.The traveling would be the biggest thing among a whole host of others problems. i think he just says that to get some applause from an overseas crowd. He said the same thing years ago.

 

[mudloggerone]

I hope you're right JJ. If it does happen I'm praying it's an AFC team so the Saints seldom have to make that trip.

 

[Miller]

I don't like it either. Rams were the big rumor team this offseason, but IMO you'd have to realign if they do that (I have no idea what their current stadium situation is, they may have resolved this). No way you can stick a London team in a Western Division, just would be hell on the other teams and them.....if they do it, they HAVE to stick him in an Eastern Division and the East's are pretty locked in.

Just don't see it working.

 

[Arctic Dawgs]

Kraft wants a team in England. Move the Pats

 

[Mike]

NFL is watered down enough, quit with the expansion already.

 

[Phicinfan]

I don't like it. However, if the NFL continues to dominate the sports world as it has, you will soon see global expansion. I think you will see teams in Mexico and England in the next 5 years or so. They will fail, but they will be put there.

 

[Miller]

5 years?? YOu see them expanding past 32 or moving teams?

 

[deuce4321]

I can't ever imagine them putting an actual team in Europe. Maybe allow a team to represent Europe as a whole or a particular country but put the team and stadium in America. It would ruin 3 weeks for any team traveling there and can you imagine the travel for the actual European team?

 

[cctekguy]

The only way this works is if they start a Euro NFL league that takes all our scrubs and malcontents and plays a season of their own with the winner facing our super bowl champions in the Uber Bowl.

Kind of like the AFL did many years ago.

Show us something and then well talk about it.

 

[gizzil]

yeah but then the europeans would grow gorilla players in a less regulated drug testing environment a la 80s olympics. hans and franz linemen would make arnold look like a flabby couch potato

 

[Phicinfan]

5 years?? YOu see them expanding past 32 or moving teams?

Not sure. But they simply can't ignore the money that those games generated. My guess is they move teams, and keep the same league overall number.

 

[Jackson]

I hope you're right JJ. If it does happen I'm praying it's an AFC team so the Saints seldom have to make that trip.

Fact: The New Orleans Saints are 1-0 in the United Kingdom.

 

[Jackson]

I have a few thoughts on this:

1) This isn't even going to be even remotely possible. I think you'd have to half an entire division in Europe.

2) Logistics nightmares aside, I'm not convinced that the UK is ever going to adopt football to the degree that this would be lucrative. You could fill up Wembley Stadium every year when the circus comes to town, but do you expect Londoners to live and die with a team? I wouldn't. The EPL isn't going to put a team in New York City (or Tokyo or Mumbai) because it's an attractive market. Because they're aren't enough soccer fans to make it worth it. I mean, London couldn't support an NFL Europe team after 1998. Seriously.

3) I think Robert Kraft should keep his big, fat trap shut. Not only would he never consider moving his team, he would never even consider giving up a single home game to expand the Patriots' international presence (not to mention a possibly offensive mascot, if you think about it). It's just another case of big market owner's trying to bully small-market fan bases. Using London as a stadium scare-threat to eventually replace Los Angeles. That, or hyperopia.

 

[Phicinfan]

Things to think about....

Just read an article that attendance at NFL games has steadly decreased since 2007. So for the last 4 years, stadiums are getting more and more empty. Yes, they have a very lucrative TV deal, but don't confuse the fact that teams get alot of their money from gate as well.

So where could they go where the NFL is fresh?

LA is a big market, yes. But they have failed twice to keep an NFL team, and add to that the debacle of getting a stadium even started.

The next move is for NFL to go global, and try to pull in the new viewer outside the U.S.