Thanksgiving 2024: 3 things to be thankful for in this NFL season
Thanksgiving is upon us, and as we enjoy football and our meals today, let's look at three things to be thankful for in this NFL season. Football on Thanksgiving just feels right, so while you sit down and enjoy your celebrations on this holiday, it's a good time to think about what we are thankful for in this current NFL season.
There is a lot to choose from, too. I was able to narrow it down to three big things, at least in my eyes. As Thanksgiving hits, let's look at three things to be thankful for in this NFL season.
Thanksgiving 2024: 3 things to be thankful for in this NFL season
An encouraging rookie QB class
Right now, all of Drake Maye, Jayden Daniels, Caleb Williams, and Bo Nix look like franchise quarterbacks, so the NFL may have just gotten the next generation of quarterbacking in the 2024 NFL Draft. All four passers have a passer rating above 80, which is nice, and both Daniels and Nix have their teams in the playoffs at the moment.
QBs are what make the NFL, and like it or not, this is a QB-first, QB-driven league. The MVP award is now basically given to the best QB, and they are front and center with each team. Watching bad QB play is just not fun, so it's great that the 2024 NFL Draft class may have produced four franchise passers.
We have not seen Michael Penix Jr or JJ McCarthy play much at all, but perhaps all six of the first-round QBs could turn into high-end passers.
Parity!
Through 12 weeks in the 2024 NFL Season, 20 teams have at least five wins, and 19 of them are at least only one game below .500. This does make it so there are a lot of two and three-win teams, but as we have seen, there is a ton of parity in the league this year, and to me, that is a good thing. It does get boring watching all of the same teams winning all the time.
It's nice to see up and coming teams like the Arizona Cardinals, Denver Broncos, and Washington Commanders breakout, and the mainstays like the Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills are still doing their thing. It'll be interesting to see just how much of this parity spills into the NFL playoffs this season.
The 7-team playoff format
The NFL expanded to a seven-team playoff format a few years ago, and it has ended up being the right decision. Only having six teams in the playoffs felt like too little, but with 14, there is that much more action. And if we head back to my previous point, these kind of tie together. We have seen that just about anything can happen any given week, and that should be the same when the playoffs roll around.
Having seven teams in the postseason is the ideal number. Eight per conference would be too many, and six is just too little. The NFL is always changing and tweaking things, but let's hope that they do not touch how they approach the playoffs.