Is There a Right or Wrong way to Build an NFL Roster?
The most popular league in the United States is the National Football League (NFL). Roughly 975 billion minutes (about 1,900,000 years) were spent watching the NFL by the 336 million people in the country during 2023.
The end goal for NFL teams is winning the beloved Super Bowl trophy. 32 teams, all completing to complete a singular task. What is the best way to go about this?
“There’s a wrong way to do it, but not necessarily a right way,” Sportswriter Thomas Pfeister said. There are three ways to acquire talent to a roster, drafting, trading and signing players. All three methods have their pros and cons.
(Once I finish my interviews, I will discuss the pros and cons of the three methods, to put them shortly in my own words though, NFL draft is cheapest but is not surefire, free agency is best bet but can be expensive, and trades is kind of in between the two)
(I have four interviews next week, one with a Kent State sports administration professor, one with a sports administration graduate student, and two more with sports journalists, slightly procrastinated this paper so did not have all interviews ready for the draft)
Every year, the NFL hosts a draft where teams select players directly from college. Each team gets one pick in all seven rounds, along with compensatory picks. A compensatory pick is a bonus pick given to teams who lost more players in free agency than they gained.
NFL draftees are given rookie contracts that last four years. Players drafted in the first round have an option for a fifth year.
A second way to acquire players is through trades. Teams can swap assets such as players and picks with other teams. Teams can make trades to clear cap space, acquire starters, depth, draft picks among others.
Players oftentimes have no say of when or who to be traded to. Unless if players have a no-trade clause. A no-trade clause is a built-in agreement in a contract where players can veto a trade involving themselves for whatever reason.
Teams can make trades up to the Tuesday after Week 9. This is the trade deadline, where teams cannot make trades until after the season.
The third and final way to acquire players is through free agency. At the start of every league year, a free agency period starts where teams offer contracts to players who are out of jobs. The only stipulation is teams must stay within the rules of the salary cap.
Teams can sign players year-round; however, most signings take place before the season starts. Pfeister believes free agency is where the offseason is won and lost.
A combination of these three must be used to build a roster, but when should NFL teams focus on what?
(Here I will discuss when teams should focus on draft, free agency, and trades through quotes of my interviews) (After that I will discuss trends scene between NFL teams that have won the super bowl with the number of trades, draft picks and amount of money they spent on free agency)
(In my own words, teams at the bottom of the conference should focus on the draft to bring in young guys, teams trying to reach Super Bowl contention should focus on free agency to bring in proven veterans, and teams that are already true Super Bowl contenders should be compliant with giving up assets if they believe it will win them a Super Bowl)
(This will be the main chunk of my story, I will include my graphs in this section by where they are discussed, however I unfortunately do not have my story finished yet so they will just be sitting here)
(Here I will place my conclusion, will not include much here as I do not have the body completed, but I will give a little bit)
Teams must experiment to build a championship level squad. There is luck involved with it, but nobody has won a Super Bowl solely based on luck.