RL's biggest problem is lack of money. It's hard to change that straight away.
In my opinion though, the ease in which it takes the 'big' clubs to make the playoffs is making them reduce the week to week intensity, as a high intensity isn't needed to make 'the 8'
And this IMO is our 2nd biggest problem. Bigger than P&R or the salary cap level. The no 1 prize in the game isn't really contested for until week 2, or arguably week 3, of the playoffs. The period in which we have the highest intensity match is reduced to 2-3 weeks of the season.
If the playoffs where exclusively for 4 or 5 teams every September, then the 'big' clubs would have to gave a higher intensity more often leading to better games, especially games amongst the elite. This would in turn increase the crowd numbers and better atmospheres and therefore more money for RL.
And for those that say the lower clubs will have nothing to play for, tell me what Wigan have got to play for once they have achieved the 2 more wins I mentioned at the beginning??

Agreed.

This theory that the lower clubs would have nothing to play for is a bit nonsensical to me. Surely the idea at the start of the season is for them to compete hard to avoid being lower clubs?

In every sport on earth there are winners and losers. How this idea that it's not fair for the losers ever took root in British Rugby League is beyond me.

the history books show Leeds as champions last year, we won the hubcap, which no-one, other than the team that wins it considers to be worth anything.

get 5 or so more wins and start resting players ready for the end of season knockout

And when we win the league this year the history books will show us as winning it in 3 years out of 4. History will scrap 8 team play offs especially if the best team doesn't get to the GF like the last two seasons. Someone will wake up and realise that this situation is bad for the sport.

We will continue to try to win every game the same as every other team. As for resting players, if they are knackered then rest them if they are fit let them play. A professional sportsman always wants to play and hates sitting in the stand. It's what they train all week for.

If you don't treat every game as important why should fans turn up to watch? We pay decent money for our season tickets, why bother, if what you advocate comes true. Thankfully Wigan and the rest of rugby league continue to play every game with the same intensity and don't cheat the fans.

If you want a more competitive situation, take the number of teams that could feasibly win the play-off, and have less play-off places than that.

So if we say Saints, Wigan, Wire and Leeds could feasibly win the title, we only offer 3 play-off places, thus ensuring that the best teams have to fight for admission to the end of season jamboree rather than canter through the season as they do now.

BUT leeds were CHAMPIONS last year, they got a crack at the aussies, they got the glory, they got the big shinny trophy, we got a hubcap

leeds were CHAMIONS the year before, warrington got the hubcap.

the league is a qualifying tournament for the playoffs, the playoffs decide who is the CHAMPION team, and its not the team who won most games, its the team that hit form and won four or so on the bounce at the end of October! its a bonkers system, i can't explain it to any non on rl followers, they dont get how in football terms Man U won most games and finnished top of he pile, but Tottenham could be the champions.

whilst i dont condone it, what wouold you rather do celebrate beating leeds at the DW or Old Trafford?

Old Trafford

Do people really not understand how the team who wins the GF can be champions? Do they not understand how the team which wins the SuperBowl is the champions in the NFL? or the team which wins the Fifa world cup final is the World Champions? Do they struggle to understand how Borussia Dortmund and Bayern Munich are in the Champions League final? Tbh if they can’t understand how a league + play-off competition structure works I cant imagine they are particularly smart people, it isn’t a particularly difficult concept

No isn't a difficult concept - just a daft one. I have never agreed with it and never will.Try explaining it to non RL sports fans (or the general public) and they understand how it works well enough but still look baffled as to why it exists and the in-built unfairness of it.

If you have a league competition then the top team should be the champions not someone who finishes lower down who just happened to have 2 or 3 good (or lucky) games right at the end of the season - or a team can finish top and not be champions due to misising players/bad luck etc -

You chose some bad examples though - the Fifa world cup/champions league etc are both knock out competitions with a qualifying round of a mini knock out league - very different from a full season league.

It is unfortunately the system we are stuck with and it does not look like changing.

Really? They look baffled by the unfairness of it? The structure which is the basis of pretty much every major team sporting competition bar European football, baffles people? The NFL, NBA, MLS, NHL, Aviva Premiership, Super Rugby, French Elite, Top 14, NRL, BBL, Cricket, MLB, Championship RL and Championship RU, Pro 12, CFL, AFL all use a league + play-off structure to decide their champions yet it baffles people that SL does as well?

If RL were to decide its champions in a straight league structure, it would be the only major Rugby competition of either code to do so.

Both you and I have the same opinion, and I don’t think we are thick, stupid or dim. We know how it works we just don’t think it’s fair, logical or well-constructed. Yes it’s the way it is and if the RFL says that whoever wins are Champions, they are Champions, those are the rules they are the governing body. Some folk just don’t agree or accept it, and never will. Change it!

To be fair I don't mind the play offs, just the fact that they're made up off 8 teams from 14, and there's very little difference between 1st and 4th or 5th and 8th.

Ok
Instead of answering a post which took the OP slightly off topic (I.E understanding the concept of the play offs - which BTW I agree with the play offs just not the current structure) can you answer the original post?

lets have a look at the quality,intensity, crowds and final outcome of the original 5 team, then 6 team play offs and comapre it to what's happening under the 8 team structure.
Do you think it has improved things overall for the game?

IMO - foget restructuring the league into 3, playing each other X times, having a cut off half way through the season and then playing 3 leagues of 8 bla blah blah etc. just look at the Top 8 play off and get it back to top 5 making it as hard as possible for team 5 to win it and loading big advantages to team 1 then team 2 etc and you'll answer most of RL's apathy problems in one stroke.

To worry that those teams who can't make the top 5 (How many are ruled out already at this point mathematically over half way through the season) at this stage of not giving them anything to play for is ridiculous!
Almost as ridiculous as saying to the team at the top at this stage that get another couple of wins and you can basically coast for the next 10/11/12 games! Oh wait a minute!

There are other issues such as P&R, franchising, player drain etc. but I dont believe they drown the main issue of the every week RL watching Speccy like us.
IMO This would

Why do Leeds fans alway go on the attack how many other major sports competitions also use a a playoff structure when the discussion is about the ease of the top 8 system in a 14 team league, meaning teams can coast for the majority of the year (or just be a terrible team)and still win.

I don’t disagree there are problems with the play-offs, but for me the problems aren’t anything to do with the A)having them, or B) the structure of them.

The entirety of the problem is the number of clubs who can compete. If we had 14 clubs all at roughly the same level then the structure of the season would be absolutely fine, all the issues regarding the intensity of the season, the difference between finishing 1st and 4th and whatever would be, if not completely resolved, certainly minimised. Those complaints are a symptom, the disparity in quality throughout the league is the cause. Thats what we need to address.

I still think having an 8 team play off is bound to devalue the regular season, even if the NRL did it, you would still get some teams taking it easy for a very long part of the season, which is no good for us fans, who above all else want to be entertained every week. I agree it wouldn't be as bad if we were playing a team that could beat us every week, but the dead rubber element shouldn't be ignored either. What we can both agree on is changes need to be made. I'm absolutely rugby league obsessed, and I've still found myself getting bored with 20 minutes to go at more than half of our games this year. That can't be right.

Whether 5,6,8 whatever I don’t think it makes a fundamental difference to how the league is approached by sides. It is tinkering around the edges. Some maybe be better structures than others, but its not a huge difference and doesn’t make a huge difference in quality, intensity etc etc,
No it wouldn’t. It would increase the apathy for large parts of the league. There are pro’s and con’s to every system. But look at it the other way. Would Wigan winning the hubcap have meant any more to you if they got a bigger advantage in the play-offs and still lost?
Why is it ridiculous? I appreciate the thinking that we shouldn’t set up the league to protect mediocre clubs but casting out large parts of the league from qualifying would simply reduce the intensity in a different way. Top clubs would go from playing lower clubs who were in with a chance of the play-offs to playing clubs whose season was already over.
It would be far better to have 14 sides who were all more than capable of beating each other on their day. If we can get all the league to roughly the same level then all the intensity arguments and what have you would be resolved because the lower clubs would win more games, the top clubs would win less, there wouldn’t be a huge disparity in points between 1st and 14th which means 1st couldn’t take a long rest because an extra 3/4/5 losses which could easily happen would take a club from 1st to 9th and out of the picture.

Any structure where more than half of the teams qualify for the play-off's is inherently flawed

Top 8 out of 14 is a complete joke. Now top 4........

It has been argued that the top eight is far too easy to qualify for.
Tony Smith said a couple of weeks ago that the play offs were too easy to get into.
If want to make it more difficult then make it a top three play off system.
The League Leaders go straight into the GF then teams 2 & 3 play off for the other Grand Final place.
That should make it tough and keep the intensity going even for the best of clubs.

The top 3 idea is a no go. We all know that Sky call the shots and want more play off games.

There needs to be far heavier weighting in favour of the top couple of teams in line with the original thinking behind what was behind the top 5, a format perfectly structured for my money. Maybe this would raise everyone out of apathy that has seen me personally jack in my season ticket for the first time in 30 yrs. How's about a top 6 something like:
Week 1 Top 2 get week off, 3v6, 4 v 5
Week 2 1 v 2 - winner straight to GF winners of week 1 play each other
Week 3 Loser 1 v 2 plays winner of the 3-6 play off

We can't persist with a system where finishing in the bottom half of the table is rewarded with a play off spot and 6 places is plenty to scrap for. The worst element of the current system is the dead rubber week 1 games for the top teams, 4th place should definitely not get a 2nd roll of the dice, saving this for the top 2 would be sufficient incentive for the top teams to scrap for points until the end of the season and win back bored apathists* such as myself!




*New word I'm promoting around the area.

Lets just carry on as we are then?
Here endeth your contribution to the debate?
We've been down this lets make all 14 teams competitive scenario (Tempted to say rubbish) for the last 5/6/7 years.
Well guess what, we can go to the local pubs and clubs, let have everyone have a pick alternate and come up with a competitive group playing a game.
Doesn't mean it will be any good!

Lets swing the pendulum slightly the other way and say you know what, to qualify for the Play offs you're going to have to be Bl00dy good!
If you're not you won't qualify!

PS

JTB's play offs I could understand (Still think Top 5 was better) but anythings better than the rubbish served up now.

Oh and BTW! Your comment
"Would Wigan winning the hubcap have meant any more to you if they got a bigger advantage in the play-offs and still lost?"

Yes it would!

Because the odds were stacked far better in favour of the team that valued the 2 league points EVERY week and then we still lost, that would be our fault.
At the moment a team that coasts through or struggles through or whatever and ends up in 5th could almost argue theyve got a better deal than 3rd & 4th?

If we or any other team fail to take advantage of that "Stacked in favour of the Top teams in the league" system then that's their problem.
But I'll gaurantee if you look at the history of the comp you wouldn't get as many lower league placed teams upsetting the odds and in turn it will make them fight for the Top 5/6.

For those who dont make the top 5/6 then here's a novel idea, try harder, think smarter, work smarter and come back Better next year?

So the 9 teams out of 14 who wouldn’t qualify, 18 out of your 27 games. How intense are they going to be?

You can lose 10/11 games and finish 5th. The season would literally be over by now for 3 teams this year. Over the next 4 or 5 games it is likely that another 3 or 4 teams will hit that threshold. The season would be over for half of the league after 2/3rds of the season. How intense are the games going to be for them? You are guaranteeing that large parts of the season are a dead rubber for large parts of the league and saying it would promote intensity.

You also moan at what you describe as ‘lets make all 14 teams competitive scenario (Tempted to say rubbish)’, which again, in this context, doesn’t make sense. Whatever concept you choose, whichever play-off system or league system you go for, if half the league are rubbish, then large parts of the season will be a procession. Making those games against lesser sides dead rubbers for those sides isn’t going to make them more intense and competitive it will make them less.



PS

You do have only yourselves to blame anyway. You lost. Who else can you blame for that?

But that is besides the point. Why does winning the hubcap mean more if you still don’t win the GF? Would you be sitting here saying “well we won the hubcap and that is clearly more important now we f@cked up winning the grand final with even more advantages’? Of course not, give the team who wins the hubcap a free pass to the final and a 10 point head start, its still going to be a poor relation, its still going to be a lesser trophy and it is still going to be insignificant compared to the GF and you know it, that’s why your complaint isn’t that we have a GF its that Wigan didn’t win it and they didn’t get enough of an advantage toward winning it.

and for this year with half their season as dead rubbers? just give up, go home, regroup for another go? Doesnt sound like a plan to make the league more intense to me.