INDIANAPOLIS — The two-time defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs were the NFL's second-lowest-rated team (ahead of only the Washington Commanders) in the second annual “report card” that ranks the teams. teams according to various categories based on the results of player surveys.
More than 1,700 players (up from 1,300 last year) participated in the survey between August and November, which was released by the NFLPA on Wednesday. Players were asked to rate their teams on a wide variety of topics, from team facilities to coaching staff to ownership.
The top two teams in the overall poll were the same as last year, although they changed places, and the Miami Dolphins finished ahead of the Minnesota Vikings this year.
But the Chiefs' ranking stands out, particularly because Andy Reid was ranked first out of 32 teams in the head coach category, which is new this year and weighs heavily in the final grade.
Chiefs owner Clark Hunt ranked last among 32 team owners. Those ratings were based on what players perceived as willingness to invest in team facilities. The Chiefs ranked 26th in the food/cafeteria category, 31st in the nutritionist/dietitian category, 31st in training room and 32nd in staff training.
“To me, this is not an exercise in shame,” said NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell. “We want to highlight the teams that are doing well, but also highlight areas for improvement.”
The Chiefs stand out because they scored poorly in many of the same categories last year. One specific criticism Chiefs players had was that they had stools instead of actual chairs in their locker room, and the team switched to chairs, according to the NFLPA.
Chiefs players also said they were promised after the 2022 season that the locker room would be renovated, but it wasn't. According to the NFLPA, the players were told that their Super Bowl run extended the season so much that the team did not have enough time in the offseason to make renovations.
“I think there's some frustration that comes back saying, 'Hey, we keep winning Super Bowls and we're not going to get anything back,'” NFLPA president JC Tretter said.
Howell said there were several teams that placed near last last year that took the grades seriously and made improvements.
The Arizona Cardinals, for example, stopped charging players for meals, changed weight room flooring and equipment, and added a small family gathering room for game days.
The Cincinnati Bengals, who were criticized after last year's survey for not providing players with three meals a day, made a very slight change to that policy and now offer three meals at the facility on Wednesdays.
The team that made the biggest overall improvement from last year was the Jacksonville Jaguars, who opened a new training facility and jumped from 28th to 5th overall. Last year's survey included a complaint about rats at the Jaguars' team facility.
“No more rats,” was one of the things Tretter mentioned, with a wry smile, when discussing the areas in which the teams showed improvement.
The team that suffered the most significant drop in last year's poll was the Dallas Cowboys, who fell from fifth to twelfth place overall. Tretter said the main reason was the D+ grade players gave the Cowboys' coaching staff, which ranked 30th overall, primarily because players felt the team doesn't have enough coaches.
“One of the things we're seeing is a significant lack of coaching staff across the league,” Tretter said. “Teams should be encouraged to put their players on the field because that also makes them better. That frustrates a lot of guys.”
The CBA requires a minimum of three on-site coaches per team, but Tretter said that number is too low and players are talking to teams to increase it.
Last year's survey upset many of the teams that were rated poorly and did poorly by the league office, which felt they didn't get enough attention about the survey before it was released. That appears to be the case again this year.
“The league and its clubs always encourage and solicit feedback from players to help improve all facets of their NFL experience,” said NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy. “We look forward to having the opportunity to review the union's questionnaire, and the data supporting it, after it is released to the media. When we learned about the survey for the first time yesterday, we took the opportunity again to invite the union to join the NFL in a rigorous, scientifically based third-party survey as we have done previously and is what the collective agreement requires.
The survey included more categories this year than in Year 1, and that affected some teams' ratings. For example, the Las Vegas Raiders fell from third place last year to ninth this year, primarily because the poll added head coach as a category. The Raiders have one of the best facilities in the league, ranking in the top five in categories such as weight room, locker room, training room and cafeteria, but they ranked 32nd in the head coaching category because most of the Polls were conducted prior to Josh McDaniels' firing during the season.
Travel-related questions were one of the interesting aspects of the survey. Some teams still require some of their younger players to share hotel accommodations the night before a game. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers offer players the option to “buy out” the roommate requirement for $1,750 per year.
“One of the reasons this is concerning is that we are playing more international games,” Howell said. “So if we can't do domestic travel well, that's a cause for concern.”
Tretter said the Dolphins and Vikings were in “a class of their own,” well ahead of the third-ranked Green Bay Packers. He also said the group 3 through 7 (the Packers, Philadelphia Eagles, Jaguars, San Francisco 49ers and Houston Texans) were very close in terms of overall ratings.
The Dolphins finished in the top three in 10 of the poll's 11 categories and eighth in the other (head coach). They ranked first in food/cafeteria, weight room, training room, training staff, team travel and ownership. The Vikings ranked first or second in eight of the 11 categories and no worse than ninth in any of them. Minnesota ranked first in family treatment, nutritionist/dietitian, locker room and strength coaches.
