Re: Re: Re: No national games!
Originally posted by AZCB34
Hate to quibble but the goal should ALWAYS be to win the Super Bowl (no matter how realistic) but I get what you are saying.
Also, not only do the Cards have to win but they will have to do so consistently to get the national TV love...which is of course Monday Night Football. Sunday Night is great but many of those games are the teams who don't get shots on Monday.
The one problem with this is the recruiting edge. Many factors come into play when a guy decides where to play...money, winning etc...but I also think a team may have a bit of an edge if they get on MNF or even SNF regularly. Let's face it, these guys all have egos and the idea their peers would be watching is a selling point.
I think that the prerequisite for being on MNF (to get a guaranteed MNF game) is getting into the playoffs. The Cards got that MNF game vs. the Neeners (when Aeneas killed Steve Young) the year after they went to the playoffs. I think that all playoff teams get at least one MNF game, and teams that consistently win get more.
As for not even having a Sunday Night game, I think it has to do with the national conception (however untrue) that the Cards are just a team that isn't very entertaining, not even to their own fans. Remember the Cowboys-Cards or Cards-Lions game last season, which Boomer (Chris Berman) said was the "Worst Game Ever"? That doesn't get the networks very excited to put the squad on display.
After 2001, the Cards were supposed to be a team on the rise, and we got 2(!) nationally-televised games. That shows there's hope for the franchise, and the NFL wants to put us on TV. That, combined with good competition in Division, helps us make the case for national games. If the Cards can show that they're competitive, even if they go 5-11, but their loss differential is maybe 4-10 points, maybe with a couple of high-scoring OT games, I bet we'll get a national game next year.