The basic unit of organization in the National Football League is the football team. The Green Bay Packers is the only NFL team that is organized as a publicly-owned enterprise. The rest are private franchises. Each team has a corporate staff that manages the business activities of the team, a coaching staff that trains the team and a players' roster, with up to 100 players. There are 32 teams. Each team belongs to a division.
NFL divisions are based on geography and named for cardinal directions: north, south, east and west.
Northern
Northern Divisions teams include the Chicago Bears, the Detroit Lions, the Green Bay Packers, the Minnesota Vikings, the Baltimore Ravens, the Cincinnati Bengals, the Cleveland Browns and the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Eastern
Eastern Division teams include the Dallas Cowboys, the New York Giants, the Philadelphia Eagles, the Washington Redskins, the Buffalo Bills, the Miami Dolphins, the New England Patriots and the New York Jets.
Southern
The Southern Division teams are the Atlanta Falcons, the Carolina Panthers, the New Orleans Saints, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Houston Texans, the Indianapolis Colts, the Jacksonville Jaguars and the Tennessee Titans.
Western
The Western Division teams are the Arizona Cardinals, the St. Louis Rams, the San Francisco 49ers, the Seattle Seahawks, the Denver Broncos, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oakland Raiders and the San Diego Chargers.
The divisions are equally divided between two conferences, so only half the teams in the same divisions play each other during early tournament games. The National Football Conference includes the Bears, Lions, Packers, Vikings, Cowboys, Giants, Eagles, Redskins, Falcons, Panthers, Saints, Buccaneers, Cardinals, Rams, and the 49ers. The rest belong to the American Football Conference. These conferences and divisions are organized for the tournaments that lead to the Super Bowl. The tournament structure is complex, and -- many say -- unfair and designed to make maximum money from television revenues. Conference and division shampions play each other in playoffs, in addition to playing "wild card" teams that played well during the season but did not survive the complex tournament schedule. The two division champions play in the Super Bowl.
The league is the highest level of NFL organization. A commission that oversees a vast corporate staff runs the NFL. As of 2011, the NFL Commissioner is Roger Goodell, and some call him the most powerful man in sports. Staff divisions for the NFL include the NFL Management Council, NFL Business Ventures, NFL Broadcasting, NFL International, NFL.com, NFL Public Relations and NFL Sponsors. Aggregate League revenue in 2010 was $8 billion.