NFL Notes: Roger Goodell, Los Angles, Rob Ryan, & 49ers

Roger Goodell

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell fielded questions from the media Sunday morning regarding a number of topics.

Regarding potential changes to the preseason, Goodell questioned whether four games is really necessary.

“There’s a value in the preseason in all fairness,” Goodell said, via NFL.com. “Do we need four (games) anymore? That’s a lot of games. So I’m a big believer in how do we get better? I personally don’t believe the preseason is at that level, so we will continue to look at that.”

Goodell said that the league’s officials due “tremendous” work and explained their evaluation process.

“If someone makes a mistake, we announce it publicly now, which several years ago we didn’t do,” Goodell said. “We obviously tell the clubs involved. And then we go back and officials can be downgraded for a mistake by individual or crew. Second, if you are downgraded … every official, every week is graded on every single call … If they are graded down far enough, the likelihood is that they’ll be suspended.”

Goodell did say that he would like to streamline the replay system moving forward.

“In general, we need to streamline replay anyhow,” Goodell said. “When I’m sitting in a stadium and I see the time it takes (to review a play), that’s a negative for me.

“I would not assume replay is not going to solve all of our officiating problems … I don’t think it will go to cover pass interference. We might decide to expand or tweak it in certain ways, but always with a balance with how it disrupts a game. … We monitor the length of the games to the second and we watch that and this year we’re up by three minutes, and that’s (troubling).”

Los Angeles

Ian Rapoport of NFL Media has spoken to two sources who believe it may not be until 2017 before the NFL football returns to Los Angeles.

“It’s gridlock,” said one of Rapoport’s sources.

Even so, the league is hoping to have a May vote regarding the matter, but this is by no means a certainty, according to Rapoport.

• Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk reports that the Chiefs believe it would be an unfair advantage for both the Chargers and Raiders to share a stadium in L.A. while remaining in the AFC West.
• Kansas City contends that this would amount to an extra home game every year in the form of a road game.
• Florio points out that each team would have one less week in which they would have to prepare to travel.
• It’s been previously suggested that one of the two teams could move to the NFC West, but Florio’s source said that this is “hardly a given.”
• In the end, Florio believes it could be just the Chargers moving to Los Angeles.

Rob Ryan

Former Saints DC Rob Ryan said of the tema’s decision to fire him earlier in the week:  “They made my bye week turn into a bye-bye week.” (Pro Football Talk)

Ryan admitted “something had to be done” because the defense “ranked 33rd in the league and there are only 32 teams.”

Even though Ryan owned up to the poor performance of his unit, he said he’s shouldering almost all of the blame in New Orleans.

“Everything in New Orleans is being blamed on me including Katrina and I think it’s a little farfetched,” Ryan said. “So the bottom line is this. I’ll hold my head high and walk out into the sunset, but believe me, I’m coming back with a vengeance.”

49ers

• Adam Schefter points out that Colin Kaepernick will miss out on $125,000 in per-game roster bonuses totaling $875,000 after being placed on season-ending injured reserve.