Dont know about the some of the division names...lol But the alignment looks right on !

Yeah man, the division names are awkward, but location is good. But, how can you not like the 'Skins-'Boys rivalry. (BTW the 'Skins will win Week 1)

ya what do you mean by canadian football league? Those teams move to Canada?

No LHSLax_D24, the 'Boys will win Week 1

Canadian Football League was a joke. I live in the area... I was about to call it the damn near canada division.

I don't like the Dallas-Washington rivalry because its artificial. It's a big deal and a guaranteed monday nighter if they're both good, but if one of them sucks, nobody gives a damn. Take a real, natural rivalry like Minnesota-Green Bay, it's great no matter how good the teams are.

As long as they bring back the SEA-OAK rivalry, I'd be good with ANY realignment...

Gah! It was a jo... oh screw it, I changed the damn name, happy?

Ah, now that's a quality reply.

First off, the Pittsburgh-Cleveland rivalry; you're right, it's very geographic, it's a great rivalry. But, admittedly, it was one of the easier decisions. The Northeast and Beltway both brought themselves together far too easily to ignore. The only other option for the Beltway would be Carolina, who needs to be in the south.

To me, in state rivalries are by nature better than pure geographic proximity. Thus, I felt uniting Philly and Pittsburgh was of greater value than keeping Cleveland and Pittsburgh together, especially when you throw in Washington and Baltimore. All have great potential.

As for Indy, they were essentially the odd team out. I would much rather have had something like Indy, Cleveland, Cinci, and Detroit, but no matter how I put it together, i started breaking up natural rivalries like Chicago and Green Bay, Kansas City and St. Louis, Cinci and Cleveland. Ultimately, I had to chose which midwest team was going to end up with Tennessee, Atlanta, and Carolina. One team was simply not going to make sense, and the one that's closest to making sense out of those was Indy.

I'd honestly rather have SF, SD, Oak, and AZ in the same division, but what do I do with Seattle? There is no perfect combination... you have to come up with something solid and go with it. I put together about 5 different alignments before I chose this.

here was one of my previous alignments, maybe you'll like it better.

Western Division
San Francisco
Seattle
Oakland
San Diego

Southwestern Division
Denver
Dallas
Arizona
Houston

Gulf Coast Division
Tampa Bay
Miami
Jacksonville
New Orleans

Southern Division
Cincinnati
Tennessee
Atlanta
Carolina

Northern division
Minnesota
Green Bay
St. Louis
Kansas City

Great Lakes Division
Chicago
Indianapolis
Detroit
Buffalo

Beltway Division
Cleveland
Pittsburgh
Washington
Baltimore

New England Division
New York Jets
New York Giants
Philadelphia Eagles
New England Patriots

No matter how you cut it, you break up solid rivalries while creating more across the league. I would personally rather split Cleveland vs. Pittsburgh than Chicago and Green Bay though.

Wow so on your list the only divion to not separate is the nfc north. They're definately huddled really close but maybe disband an division and four divisions get 5 teams. Like the NFC central used to have. That was a wacky division.

the tough thing about the rivalry argument is this: the "artificial" rivalry is better than your proposed regional rivlaries...

eagles-giants is more real than jets-giants. you mention cowboys-skins, and i think losing that would be terrible. i think just cause the skins aren't that good right now, you are dismissing that rivalry.

time, and playing over and over, every year, are the keys to rivalries.

plus, i think the superbowl would be weird...

If the Giants were to move to Los Angeles, they'd have new natural rivals in San Diego and San Francisco. Their old rivalries would be irrelevant. Sure, there's the whole "we hate you because you moved" stuff, but when a rivalry loses half of its fans (since NYC Giants fans would probably all become Jets fans at that point and hate the Giants), the rivalry is dead.

So, yes, when a team moves, I do think the league should realign to suit. However, under this system, I don't think we'd see as much moving. If Jacksonville were in the same division as Tampa and Miami, I don't think they'd be in danger of moving. Those rivalries would create a passionate following for the team... Florida thrives on local rivalries in college football, why would it be any different for pro football?

For the record, I'm one of the few that has stuck with my team when it moved. I was a Minnesota North Stars fan and I'm still a Dallas Stars fan... but most Minnesotans couldn't care less about Dallas. They don't hate 'em, they just don't care. We're too far removed from that even for it to matter.

So when within 10-20 years you've turned over half of your fan base, what sense does it make to cling to rivalries that don't matter to your younger fans? If the Cowboys had moved into the NFC West, for example, along with Arizona, St.Louis, and San Francisco, they'd have built up a hell of a rivalry with the Warner lead Rams and the Warner lead Cardinals, and they'd be looking forward to fighting it out with the 49ers this season. Fans that were too young to care when they last won a Superbowl wouldn't care today about the loss of the Washington rivalry.

Besides, San Francisco vs. Dallas is a far more historically significant rivalry than anything Dallas has been involved in in the NFC East.

I could put Houston in the south if I wanted too, but I don't, I like them matched up with Dallas. In-state rivalries trump religions.

It doesn't matter what the divisions are called. That's entirely irrelevant. It's not part of the discussion. You can name them Group A, B, C, D, E, F, G, and H for all I care.