Madden 21: 11 Changes to Franchise Mode NFL fans need to see

It’s due time for Madden 21 to have some overhauling changes to Franchise Mode.

Did anyone ever ask you if they could copy your homework? And did you ever respond, “Yeah, just change it so it looks different?” And did they never actually change it, but only pretend to? Well, you must know what it’s like to create Madden 21’s Franchise mode.

EA Sports announced new “changes” to the beloved Franchise Mode last week and fans are beyond disappointed. One look at the new features in Madden 21 shows a clear lack of focus on Franchise, now dubbed “Classic Franchise.”

While the new-and-improved Face of the Franchise looks cool enough, it’s time that Franchise Mode gets the improvements it deserves. Many fans have cited the game mode’s similarity to previous versions and have demanded a complete overhaul. (A simple Twitter search of #FixMaddenFranchise will further display the frustration.)

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While a complete overhaul is sorely needed, here are 11 specific changes we’d love to see in Franchise Mode.

1. Customizable Relocation

As an owner, you have the option to relocate your team. The available cities are alright but the rest is a train-wreck. You’re forced to choose between predetermined names, logos and uniforms that aren’t the best. The worst part is that these options have barely changed since Madden 25 introduced the current version.

Madden should follow the footsteps of other video games, like NBA2K, and allow for total customization of the names, logos and uniforms. A smaller feature could also be the option to customize current uniforms. Users could change their own uniforms every five years, just like the NFL allows. Surely this would be a fun, often-used feature.

2. In-Depth Scouting Process

This is arguably one of the biggest features fans have clamored for. The current scouting process is relatively simple and not much has changed over the last few editions. There’s too much potential to make this portion of Franchise Mod better.

While there’s already a scout on the team staff, adding regional scouts could add a layer of realism to the process. You could even get feedback on them about certain positions and players. As for the players, information such as collegiate stats, injury history and specific traits would be extremely helpful. Imagine more detailed scouting reports on players that go beyond basic letter grades.

For example, it’s Week 12, and your regional scout just informed you that the running back from Florida you like injured his knee. As the NFL Draft approaches, you revisit the player and see that his agility and explosiveness were impacted by his knee injury, thus knocking him down a round.

Do you still take the risk? These are immersive, real-life scenarios that would draw more customers to Madden, while satisfying the current ones.

3. Hiring Coaches

The hiring process for coaches in Franchise Mode isn’t really a process at all. You offer a coach his preferred deal and wait a couple of weeks until he usually accepts the offer. It’s simple, yet hiring coaches in real life is anything but simple.

A big part of the process involves the coach’s staff. At the bare minimum, you should have a say in who the offensive and defensive coordinators are. When hiring head coaches, you should be able to interview current coordinators from other teams. Some would be interested in the opening, while others would deny the interview.

Instead of picking one guy to run your team, imagine interviewing potential candidates from across the league and choosing your coordinators to go with the candidate. Or maybe the candidate already comes with coordinators who you can fire. There’s a lot of possible ways to go here, but one thing that’s certain is the needed expansion of the hiring process.

4. Playing as a Coordinator

While on the topic of coordinators, how cool would it be to start out as a coordinator, or even a position coach? The latter may be a bit more complicated, but one can dream, right? This would tie into the previous suggestion about incorporating more detailed coaching staffs to Franchise. It would be like NCAA14 (a.k.a. the greatest video game of all time) where you start as a coordinator and can eventually be hired or promoted to head coach.

You would have specific tasks catered to your specialty and when you complete them, you start to gain traction as a possible head-coaching candidate. You could interview with teams and answer questions about potential schemes and goals.

5. Realistic Trading

Raise your hand if you’ve become frustrated at the game for denying an obvious trade. You can put your hand down now. There’s no way around it; Madden‘s trade logic is and has always been ridiculous. You can’t trade a first-round pick for an aging quarterback but they’ll definitely take two first-round picks for those 70-overall running backs you just picked up.

Trading needs to be fixed and that includes CPU-CPU trades. There’s no reason that a backup defensive tackle should cost three mid-round picks. Feel free to leave your best examples of this botched trade logic in the comments or let me know on Twitter @ZachCohenFB.

6. Modifying In-Season Contracts

A personal pet-peeve is the inability to offer free agents contracts longer than one year once the main free agency period has ended. We see teams offer multi-season deals during the season all the time, especially during the preseason.

There are plenty of scenarios that could warrant this in Franchise, too, like if you just traded a player or if a younger player unexpectedly becomes available. The current solution in Madden is you need to re-sign them after the season and, while it doesn’t do much damage to the game, it isn’t all that realistic.

7. Extending and Restructuring Contracts

Speaking of contracts, Madden allows for contract extensions in a player’s final season. Most of the time, this is when players negotiate new deals. However, this isn’t always the case. While you can technically alter the contracts of players in their profiles, Franchise should offer the option to look ahead and begin contract extensions with certain players.

Perhaps if a player fits specific criteria, they can become eligible for extensions prior to their final year under contract. While we’re at it, this should also include contract renegotiations. Again, these are technically possible yet not directly offered through the game.

8. Improving CPU-Generated Prospects

There’s a reason why user-created draft classes are so popular in Franchise. Aside from scouting and drafting actual college players, they are much better than CPU-generated classes.

The CPU’s classes are always top-heavy with barely any depth and there’s almost never impactful starters in the late rounds. Improving CPU draft classes would add more value to the draft, especially during the later rounds.

9. Adding Season/Career Details

Another less discussed issue in Franchise is the lack of detail for previous season statistics. A player’s career stats can be viewed at his profile, but even then it doesn’t say what team(s) he played for.

In a perfect world, you can see the course of a player’s career through his stats and you can look back at stats from previous seasons. Want to know who won the Super Bowl in 2023? Want to see when Aaron Rodgers joined the Patriots? These should be easy answers to find and would add to the game’s complex, evolving nature over time.

10. Choosing Special Teams Lineups

More options have opened up for rosters in recent years. Long snappers, third-down backs and nickel corners were just few of the many new editable roster spots. Why not take it a step further and allow for users to set their whole special teams? Users could decide which players would take the field for field goals, kickoffs and all special-teams situations.

Not only would this add some realism to the game but it could allow users to get certain players much-needed snaps. Have a third-string running back with a Star trait, but you can’t find a way to get him on the field enough? Put him on special teams. Most young players encounter this rite of passage anyway, so why not make it a feature in Franchise?

11. Live Pro Bowl Voting

Madden developers finally gave in to the ageless demands of fans by allowing users to play the Pro Bowl. In Franchise Mode, users can see their best players get elected to the yearly all-star game.

One feature from an older Madden that could be brought back is up-to-date Pro Bowl voting. During the season, you can check to see which players are getting the most votes and so on. There’s no harm in adding this cool feature back to Madden. This would especially help if your team reaches the Super Bowl.

For some reason, the game doesn’t record which players were unable to participate in the Pro Bowl due to their Super Bowl obligations. This makes it seem like some stars just weren’t good enough to earn votes. There should be asterisks next to replacement players and information about who they replaced.