From 1934 through 1976 (except for 1974 due to a strike) the Chicago Charities College All-Star Game (generally referred to as simply the College All-Star Game) opened the NFL preseason. It matched up the defending Super Bowl champions from the previous year (the defending NFL champions prior to 1967) against a selected team of college seniors from the previous season (and in case you're curious, any college all-star played for the latter team, as, for example, Robert Newhouse did in 1972).
Hardly surprisingly, the NFL champions won most of the games: the final tally of the season series was 30-9-2 in favor of the NFL champs, with the series finale in 1976 having been called with 1:22 left in the third quarter because of severe thunderstorms.
But what if the team that had finished with the worst record in the NFL the year before is compelled to play the College All-Stars in a revived version of the game?
Since the NFL owners adamantly oppose the implementation of a draft lottery (otherwise there would be such a lottery by now), forcing the overall cellar-dwellers to begin their preseason one week earlier than the rest of the league does so may provide a disincentive for teams to tank games to get the top pick in the draft.
But what if two (or more) teams tie for the NFL's worst record?
The league already has the answer to that: see page 37 of the 2025 NFL Record & Fact Book (the 2026 edition isn't out yet) with a few simplifying variants added. For example, if three or more teams tie for the league's worst record and every team involved in the tie had at least one opportunity to play at least one of the others involved therein, head-to-head would be the first tie-breaker (this is what was actually done from 1970 through 1977 to decide wild card playoff berths and seeding between division champions).
Also, state that if two (or more) teams in the same division end up with the same record, they will always draft in inverse order of where they finished in the division standings — as has been done since 1991 to determine wild-card playoff berths.
And finally, make rules changes designed to actually increase the number of tie games — by keeping the clock run on most plays except during the last two minutes of overtime, and after scoring plays.
Half a dozen tie games in a 272-game regular season (288 once the schedule is increased to 18 games) is not going to inconvenience anyone — except for the usual kvetching journalists at ESPN and their even more incompetent competitors — and it will make it more likely that battles for division titles and playoff berths (and draft choices, too) get decided by a half game, rather than tie-breakers that make many if not most fans and even an occasional player or coach not even understand.
After all, as John Madden and Chuck Noll both said, what's wrong with a tie?
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