NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell arrives at a news conference after the NFL Fall league meeting, Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2019 in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee)

Dear Mr. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell,

Roger … can I call you Roger? I feel like I can, since you’ll never actually read this. Roger, I have a lot of respect for what you do. Under your tenure, lots of great things have happened in a game I love. I know your job is to take the heat off of the owners who actually run the game, and to pretend to be in charge of everything as the public face of football. You get booed so they won’t. I can respect that, especially since you get paid enough every year to buy your own island.

That said, things aren’t perfect. There are things that we desperately need as football fans, like for starters, an actual definition of pass interference. And for roughing the passer, while we’re at it. No one wants to see their quarterback knocked out, but neither do we want to see guys get 15-yard penalties for contact that amounts to bumping someone trying to get on the elevator while you’re trying to get out.

We hate those people, don’t we, Roger? See? We’re not that different, you and I. We should be friends.

We also need the “Sky Judge,” the referee in the booth who can fix bad calls. Look, we understand it’s a tough thing to admit, but regular human mortal refs just can’t keep up with how fast the game has gotten. The review system isn’t working, it’s long and tedious. If Cris Collinsworth can show us where the ref missed a call inside of ten seconds after the play, you should have a guy in the booth at least that smart to do the same.

We also would like a consistent discipline program, the one we have seems to be pretty much pulled out of your hat. If you don’t want Antonio Brown to play and screw up the 100th Anniversary Season any more than he already has, we get that. But where’s the process?

There’s other things we need, like decent teams in New York and LA and much less Joe Buck. But we can start with the easy ones.

There are also things we don’t need, like a team in London. Trust me, nobody cares. The NBA and MLB are only 50% on making teams work in Canada and that’s just across the border. Having one team at least a seven-hour flight away from everyone else is completely out of the question. Jacksonville seems to love making London part of their market, just let them continue that.

It seems like we also need a cure for tanking. There are three games this week where a team is predicted to lose by double-digits. No one wants to watch those games, except college football players terrified at where they might get drafted. Go with the NBA draft lottery system, so we’re not rewarding the Dolphins and Bengals for actively trying to stink.

And speaking of bad football, nobody wants a 17-game season, either. We have plenty of football, and the team owners have plenty of money. There’s no logical reason to screw up the schedule just so you can put your product on display in places that will never get a team. Making Washington play Arizona in Mexico City isn’t putting on a quality product, it’s more like exporting our toxic waste, but putting it in Christmas wrapping paper to pretend it’s a gift.

And also, we don’t want franchises moving. The Chargers are in a soccer stadium and can’t sell it out. And two years later we’re still calling them the San Diego Chargers! We can’t have that now, can we, Rog?

We’re easy, Roger. Most of us have been fans all of our lives, and we love this game. But there are times when we hate the sport. Just make it easier for us to watch a game and not worry about the details. That’s all we ask.

If you have any questions, just message me on Facebook. That’s where I am every Sunday, making fun of your games.

Sincerely,

Reid

Now on to the picks. In week nine, I went 5-1, and 4-2 against the spread. In my defense, I thought the Giants were simply awful, not atrocious. Lesson learned. For the season, that makes me 37-17-1 straight up, and 29-25-1 against Las Vegas. As always, these are for the purposes of comedic discussion only. No wagering.

Minnesota (+3) at Dallas: Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins is to prime-time games like I am to yoga pants. They just don’t show my best side.

Pick: Cowboys to win and cover, winning by more than three.

Baltimore (-10) at Cincinnati: In retrospect, Marvin Lewis should have been the coach of the year in 2018 for somehow getting six wins out of this apathetic Bengals squad. Watching them play just reminds me I have laundry to do.

Pick: Ravens to win and cover, winning by more than ten.

NY Giants (-3) at NY Jets: When the NFL talks about putting a team in London, I always think “Why don’t we try and put one in New York first, then we can talk.”

Pick: Giants to win and cover.

Atlanta (+14) at New Orleans: The one-win Falcons used their bye week to change punters. Sometimes things happen in the NFL that are so dumb, any joke I could make would be superfluous.

Pick: Saints to win but not cover, winning by less than fourteen.

Buffalo (+3) at Cleveland: The Browns are 2-6, and this week cut a guy for Twitter-related reasons. Again, sometimes any joke I could come up with wouldn’t be nearly as funny as reality.

Pick: Bills to win it outright.

Seattle (+6.5) at San Francisco: New Seahawks receiver Josh Gordon has been suspended often for pot in the NFL. Now he’s playing in a state where every fan could legally show up for the game stoned. This is irony so rick and thick, I wish I could slow-drizzle it on my pancakes.

Pick: Seahawks to win it outright.

I’ll also take Green Bay over Carolina, Detroit over Chicago, and hoodies over flannel. Good luck, everybody.

Reid Kerr thinks we’re done with Terminator movies for at least ten years. Reid’s second book, “I Hate It Here: A Love Story,” is out now on Amazon.com. You can always tweet questions, comments, and angry messages to him at @fistfulofsports.