PGA Tour CEO Bryan Rolapp: Don’t Rule Out NFL Adopting a Draft Lottery

Bryan Rolapp spent two decades inside the NFL offices before taking over the PGA Tour, and Rich pulled him back into the conversation he is asked about most often this time of year. With the NBA lottery on Sunday and every other major sport now using one, why doesn't the NFL?

Rolapp's first move was to refuse to close the door.

"I don't think anything's off limits ever if it makes it better," he said.

His second move was to ask what problem a lottery would solve.

Chris ran the case for it. The NFL has open tanking. Rosters get assembled to lose. He pointed to Max Crosby, who reportedly sat for the Raiders late last season before having surgery, a sequence that became a public dispute when one team that traded for him later returned him.

Rolapp pushed back on the framing.

"The 50th or 51st man on an NFL roster will not fall out any opportunity to make sure that he stays put," he said. The roster construction part of the argument runs into the personnel reality of the league. Players, even on bad teams, are playing for jobs.

He shared a story from a player whose name he kept private. A player on a team that finished poorly told him there was no scenario where he would coast.

"Everything's on film," the player said, in Rolapp's recounting. "I'm always playing for a job. It's whether a job here or the free agent market. I don't care if we've won two games or 12 games. I'm going to play as hard as I can."

Rolapp said that during his time inside the league office, he never heard tanking discussed seriously. What he did remember discussing was the related problem of end-of-season meaningfulness. Bill Polian's decision to take a knee on an undefeated Indianapolis Colts season pushed the league to redesign the late schedule, loading it with divisional games to keep playoff-tied teams motivated through Week 18.

Rich brought up the obvious counter-example. The Tank for Tua campaign happened in public.

Rolapp's answer was structural. The NFL is not hesitant to fix problems when they become problems.

"Knowing Roger and the owners like I do, they would address it and get on it," he said. "But the draft works pretty well now. I don't know why they would go to just go to a lottery for the sake of going to a lottery."

The answer was not a no. It was a not yet, and only if a real reason shows up.

The NBA's lottery is Sunday at 3 p.m. Eastern.