Realignment in the National Football League:
Did they do it right?
Naval
Research Logistics, 50(7), pages 683-701, 2003.
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Author:
John E. Mitchell
Department of Mathematical Sciences
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Troy, NY 12180 USA
mitchj@rpi.edu
November 22, 2000. Revised: July 22, 2002, February 11, 2003.
Abstract:
The National Football League (NFL) in the United States
expanded to 32 teams in 2002 with the addition of
a team in Houston. At that point,
the league was realigned into eight divisions, each containing four
teams.
We describe a branch-and-cut algorithm for
minimizing the sum of intradivisional travel distances.
We consider first the case where any team can be assigned to any
division.
We also consider imposing restrictions, such as aligning the AFC
(American Football Conference)
and the NFC (National Football Conference)
separately or maintaining traditional rivalries.
We show that the alignment chosen by the NFL does not minimize
the sum of intradivisional travel distances, but that it is close to optimal
for an alignment that aligns the NFC and AFC separately
and imposes some additional restrictions.
Data:
The data for this problem are
available.
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