A lot of people have pretty much written off the NFL for the rest of the season over this. People at work started conversations with, "Well, I'm done with the NFL for this year." One gal mentioned she called her cable/satellite company and cancelled her sports package and told them why.
I'm questioning the effectiveness of it. The NFL has been declining in ratings for a few years now. Here's a pretty good explanation from last year.
A more compelling theory for the decline in NFL ratings
• The election. People have been so absorbed with Hillary vs. The Donald they just didn’t have the time or energy to … take a break and watch football. To which I say: Are you kidding? Who didn’t want three hours of distraction from that train wreck?
• Colin Kaepernick. Football fans are such hardened right-wingers that the sight of the 49ers quarterback and a handful of other black players protesting police violence is a deal breaker. You know, six guys “misbehaving” and it’s, “Screw the NFL.”
• No Peyton Manning. And no Tom Brady for the first few games of the season. These established stars are the main/only reason lifelong fans watch the games on TV. Right. Just like fans turned off their sets when Fran Tarkenton retired.
• Glut. The NFL decided Sundays weren’t enough omnipresence, and that the Disneys and CBSs of the world would pay fat fees for the rights to games on Thursdays, in addition to Sunday nights and Mondays. Even if you like candy, it tastes better if you binge on it only once a week, not every day.
• Shaking down taxpayers. All but the most blinkered get-a-life fans have grown restless with the way the NFL — one of the most profitable private enterprises in the country — has suckered local politicians into financing “public stadiums” for the league’s further enrichment. I like the smell of that one.
• Constant bad publicity. Locally, over the past 15 years, our beloved Vikings lead the league in arrests for DUI, domestic violence and on and on. And that’s just here. Nationally, “stars” like Pittsburgh’s Ben Roethlisberger, Tampa’s Jameis Winston have the kind of reputations for predatory sexual behavior mothers have warned their daughters about since time immemorial. And the picture isn’t a lot better with lesser-known players. Any fan with a conscience has a tough time cheering on a guy accused of rape … twice.
• The NFL hates fun. Seattle Seahawks star Richard Sherman (a Stanford guy who actually graduated) recently said: “The league isn't fun anymore. Every other league, you see the players have a good time. It's a game. This isn't politics. This isn't justice. This is entertainment. And they're no longer allowing the players to entertain. They're no longer allowing the players to show any kind of personality, any kind of uniqueness, any individuality. Because they want to control the product. They want to control the messaging, etc., etc.’" On the other hand, if you have an authoritarian streak and prefer your entertainment controlled by heavy-handed, military-like rules, the NFL is your game.
•
Millennial tech heads. Young fans aren’t umbilically linked to their 60-inch Vizios. They’re watching on other “devices,” which Nielsen hasn’t figured out a way to detect and survey. Never mind that the best guess from experts is that people actually
watching entire games on cell phones is in the hundred thousands, not the millions that would explain the ratings decline.
• NFL RedZone. The NFL’s coziness with fantasy betting has created a new generation of fans who care less about the strategies and drama of the game itself and more about the scoring highlights, which NFL RedZone compresses into a streaming highlight reel … without 200-300 commercials. On that latter point, we may be getting somewhere.
Things haven't changed all that much, but have player's salaries changed? There is currently $19 billion in active contracts and $863 million in free agents to players in the NFL.
union mo betta)
