I have always felt that a longer barrel was smotther asnd more fluid when shooting. I owned an Remington 870 with 21" barrel and it patterned well, but when in the field it never performes as well as my 26" benelli tube. I also shot horrible with that gun on any kinda clays, but am normally "pretty good" at trap, skeet and sporting clays. I think it woulb piss a lot of people off if they stopped offering up to 28" lengths.