This weekend is the "big game" (can't use the phrase S***r B**l as the NFL has tied it up) between the New England Patriots and the New York Giants. So that got me to thinking about how competitive the NFL has been over the last year. I downloaded the 2011 regular season standing results and calculated the Noll-Scully measure of competitive balance for the AFC, the NFC and the NFL.
Here are the results. The AFC has a Noll-Scully of 1.500, while the NFC had a Noll-Scully of 1.806, meaning that the AFC was slightly more competitive than the NFC in terms of winning percent. The NFL overall had a regular season Noll-Scully of 1.636 - which is slightly higher than the NFL's historical average, but not by much.
Compared to the other three "major" US sports leagues, the NFL is the most competitive and last year was no different.