A wild AFL should move to a conference system

Googled 'Origins of American sports conferences and divisions' and got this Wikipedia link - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athletic_conference [No apologies for restating this, but] most references here to 'conference/s' really mean 'division/s', which in North American pro sports are regionally based, despite, mainly for historical reasons (link - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Football_League#Teams ), the occasional and decidedly odd allocation, such as the Dallas Cowboys being in the NFC East, and the Indianapolis Colts being in the AFC South. Very interesting cultural situation in top-tier US pro-sports: there is a long history of vigorous capitalist-style competition between and within individual sports, as shown by Cat above, but the internal day-to-day running of a League is almost 'socialist/ic' with tight central control over them with stuff like drafts & salary caps, and even more so in what owners can and cannot do in their sporting market. (Perhaps the Soviet Union would not have been such a social disaster and economic basket-case if the NFL Commission had been running it! Maybe the same could be said at the moment of our federation?) Which segues to the claim that the AFL's draft and salary cap are anti-competitive and restraints on trade: 95% rubbish, close to moronic in its ignorance. Its clubs are to the AFL what their departments are to David Jones, K-Mart and Myers: the market competition is externally between the stores (not internally among their departments), and in the Foot-Ball external or general market it is between the AFL, the NRL, Super Rugby and the A-League.

Not what the idea is. What this is referring to is the way games are fixtured and is based on previous year's finishing position. You wont have byes, just on any given week some games will be 'in conference' while others will be 'cross conference'. There will always be the ANZAC Day and Eve, QB, Kick Off, Dreamtime, Derbies, etc etc, but sometimes those participants wont always have a rematch same season. But I don't think that's the end of the world. The rematches are frankly over rated, and don't always attract the same numbers second time round, SA showdowns & WA derbies aside. The odds are (under this system) that most seasons there will be at least one rematch of the SA or WA derbies however so any loss in dollar terms and ratings is minimized. That will be easily offset by a slightly longer season.

Great idea, easily the best one yet !!!

Well the NBA is a merger of the BAA and NBL. They do have West/East conferences now, but not sure it started that way. So many teams moved, changed names, multiple teams played in multiple cities, it is hard to keep track.

I may be misunderstanding, but does that apply with the 'East/West' conferences in the NBA?

Agree.

because of the continental size of that nation before viable air travel

Leave it alone I say.

But are these groups really 'conferences', in the American sense, which, after all, is where they originated (because of the continental size of that nation before viable air travel)? And if we are going to adopt and adapt their arrangements, we should at least get the nomenclature right. They look more like 'divisions', that is, sub-groups within conferences. In my limited awareness, the only Australian top-tier club competition to gave run genuine conferences was the National Soccer League in the 1980s. Although not sure that a mere 18 clubs is enough for a realistic conference arrangement, here is how one might be arranged: ~ one conference would have the four SA + WA clubs, the other would have the four Qld + Syd clubs (an arrangement which reduces continent-wide travel); plus ~ one conference would have five Victorian clubs (including Geelong), and the other conference would have the other five Melbourne clubs (and if reckoned a good idea, Victorian clubs might be re-arranged, say, every four or five years); ~ Finals (yes, 'finals', NOT playoffs): two McIntyre VFL-style conference Final Fours > two conference title games (note: NOT conference GFs, nor 'Championships' - we have our own specific meaning for that word) > two conference winners + two conference runners-up; then, da-dah! ~ an AFL McIntyre Final Four comprising the two conference winners at 1 and 2 (doesn't really matter much) and the two conference runners-up at 3 and 4 (also doesn't really matter much). Draw some diagrams, and you'll find that there are three possible GF match-ups (note: NOT 'Superbowl', that's their term), with at least one of the conference winners in all three possibilities . . . . . One advantage is that this three x McIntyre Fours might deal with the main weakness of the NFL Superbowl, namely, that one conference might be far stronger than the other in any given season. Have fun trying it out on the AFL's final H&A ladders from 2012 to 2016.

No preseason, 2 sections of 9, you play each other twice and the other section once. Final 8. Sections are decided every year by odds and evens at the finish of the home and away. AFL will not like because they cannot manipulate the draw.

While I completely agree that a grouped fixture system is the only way to significantly reduce the fixture scheduling inequity. To address longer term equity issues, it almost certainly needs to be rotating, rather fixed, groupings. The underlying inequity in the current fixturing method is the the final combined ladder may not, as much as possible, reflect the true ordering of teams, and finals are very much based on final ladder positions. The more bunched teams are the more likely fixturing has had an impact. As soon as you add a unique match to the schedule or return to a combined ladder to decide qualification/position, both if which this system does, you increase the inequity. I agree with 3 'conferences', but these should rotate each season so every team, at a minimum, plays every other team home and away twice over 3 years. I also agree with 4 ladders, the 3 'conference' ladder. The 4th table designed to address the main equity issue with the conferencing, strength imbalance between conferences, so the fourth ladder is the 'Conferences' Ladder where the combined performances of all teams for each conference are recorded for games against teams from other conferences. By default, the 'conference' on top of the conferences table get finals spots 1, 4 & 7, 2nd 2, 5, 8 & 3rd 3 & 6. Mathematicians can determine levels of differences that consitute a significant difference between conferences, and based on those calculations substantially stronger conferences can gain and substantially weaker conferences can lose finals spots. That's my thinking anyway. My working title for the system is 'Your Mob, Our Mob and the Other Mob', or 3 Mobs for short.

Look there's a very easy solution to all this mess without creating a bigger one. A simple rolling draw. The fairest system possible. But the AFL do 't want fair - they want revenue. Until they change priorities we won't have fairness in the 'draw'. As a sporting competition fans and clubs should insist on the precedence of equality, but as long as we're all divided and coming up with all kinds of different solutions, none of which the majority agree with, nothing will be done, except possibly the AFL using the disenchantment as to create an even more unfair and revenue raising system such as a top six split after round 17.

Keep it as it is. If it ain't broke......