Time for the fans to wake up

[net]

Just heard Drew Brees on Mike and Mike show this morning. It's time for the fans to finally wake up and be the force putting pressure on the owners and players to get a deal done.
Both sides are playing us like an accordian.
We are the customers. They aren't.
When I say this, keep in mind I side with the players. Brees made the point the owners brought this fight to the players with league revenues increasing 8 percent each year. This is a pure case of trying to bust the union and on top of that, grab more money to pay off some bad decisions the owners made in the past.
The reality is both sides think that no matter what, the fans will come back.
What if we don't? What if we make it CLEAR that we won't?
This lockout is playing the customer--the fans--for fools. I'm not, and I hope you aren't either.
How do we do this? Fairly easy. We start writing emails in increasing numbers to the team offices that each day the lockout continues, we will reduce our chances of buying ANYTHING from the NFL: tickets, memorabelia, even watching games whenever they start. We will become season ticket holders for the UFL...or perhaps start a competing league where ALL the teams are based on the Green Bay model, no owners, just fans in charge.
Congress will not move to help this situation, and the ONLY pressure that will work is when the customers say ENOUGH of the litigation! Enough of the namecalling! A deal in place by July 1 or we are gone, for good!
If you agree with me, cut and paste this and send it around.
If you disagree with me, then know you didn't do anything to move the situation to a resolution and you lilke being played like an accordian.
net

 

[ivo610]

I would like to see fans refuse to send in any money for season tickets and threaten litigation if their season ticket rights are taken.

 

[TJV]

It was the players who took this to court. Pressure has to be put on them as well.

 

[longtimefan]

Pressure will come to players once they miss their 1st checks a player making 2 mill this year will miss about 125,000.00 each week

 

[VolvoD]

Sorry, but the vast majority of NFL fans will always be fans and will continue to purchase whatever has the NFL stamp on it. How many fans won't come back? Fewer than 10% i bet.
This is simple economics of supply and demand, ticket prices and merchandise prices are through the roof because there are more than enough fans to support it. also, the real cash cow is tv and broadcast rights since a stadium can only hold so many people (and not everyone is willing to sit in a stadium seat versus their comfy sofa or bar stool).
At the end of the day i side with the owners. It is their risk, they have rights as employers, and they pay salaries that some of us could only dream of. Forget the whole "open the books" BS, if i told my employer to open the books they would tell me to go F myself, and rightfully so.
there are a lot of college players who dream for a taste of the nfl, and there are plenty more who would play for nearly free if they could. add into account endorsement deals etc etc. its not the owners fault if a player doesnt manage his money well, or if the player chooses to make really bad life decisions (drugs, drunk driving, gang relations, etc etc etc). this comes down to greedy players versus greedy owners...and in that battle the greedy owners rightfully have the upper hand.

 

[Wood Chipper]

unfortunately the NFL doesnt feel threatened they will lose fans like other sports do/should

 

[GWheels]

It has been hard for me not to turn NFL Network on or buy NFL related merchandise. Being a serious fan since I as 8 years old it's really hard not to be involved in it. I know the best medicine for the NFL and the players would be, for us, to boycott all of this. The problem is the NFL has totally dominated the sports industry. I'm sure they know what the small percentage is of fan base they could lose but I think they look at it as "collateral damage". I really don't care what side wins in the end. I just want my football.

 

[TJV]

I understand the sentiment behind net's post, but I agree with those who think it's unrealistic. IMO fans will forgive the NFL more quickly than they forgave MLB. (BTW, the Packers' books show revenues increasing about 5% over the past four years and player costs increasing more than double that.) It's frustrating being powerless in this situation but that's the situation we find ourselves in. However, thinking most of the owners want to bust the union is ridiculous. Roger Goodell's letter to the Wall Street Journal points this out. He says if the players succeed in court and remove the NFL's anti-trust exemption, it will drastically change the league. (For the much, much worse IMO.) Without a players' union and CBA, there couldn't be a draft, there couldn't be league-wide minimum or maximum payrolls, no player salary minimums and of course no salary cap. No league-wide injury settlement standards, no league-wide compensation agreement (regarding other than salary benefits like pensions and health insurance). No league-wide rules on the length of off season practices and meetings and no league-wide drug testing. All that would be determined team by team. Players fresh out of college would be free to negotiate any deal they want with any team as would veterans whose contracts have expired. The anti-trust exemption is what makes all of these league-wide rules legal.

Both sides seem too willing to cripple the golden goose. If the players won't come to an agreement until they start missing paychecks, the season will be compromised causing some damage to the league and themselves. The owners should compromise so they avoid a loss in court that would lead to the above scenario and eventually only a few rich, competitive teams with the rest of the teams serving mostly as a minor league system for the rich teams. The competitive balance, to the extent it exists, would be shattered. TV ratings would likely eventually plummet along with the ridiculously rich contracts with the networks. A few teams and a relatively few number of players would benefit greatly over the short term, but most of the teams and most of the players would be worse off IMO. I understand the players would like to keep the exact same split of money that the previous CBA called for and going to court is likely just a tactic. But it's a very, very dangerous one. The players representatives need to heed the warning: Be careful what you wish for.

Under the old CBA of the money split (about $9,300,000,000) about 53.5% went to the players. How 'bout trying a 50/50 split for two or three years with a stricter rookie pay scale so more money goes to veteran players? Everything else stays the same. There. Done. My fee? Only one tenth of one percent of the $9.3B!

 

[Wood Chipper]

personally I think fans need to stop whining. you can be mad but in all seriousness how has this affected you? football season has not been interrupted and the draft still happened. the people who are most affected right now are the players who are not getting paid or doing their normal off season activities.

 

[PFanCan]

Without a players' union and CBA, ... that would lead to the above scenario and eventually only a few rich, competitive teams with the rest of the teams serving mostly as a minor league system for the rich teams.

So true. This scenario would be the end of my life-long passion for the NFL.

I currently live in the UK- home of Premier league football (soccer) where big-spending Manchester United has won 12 of the 19 titles. Only Chelsea (3), Arsenal (3), and Blackburn (1 in '94) have also won the title. Honestly, it's great soccer, but boring as @#!*% as there are only a few teams that have any chance of ever winning the Cup. Even ManU fans have GOT to be bored...

No union = same result.

Then again, the world is ending on May 21st, so who cares? :rabbi::liturgy:

 

[GBPack2010]

All those expensive stuff the players own and hefty luxury/property taxes will demand millions instead of hundreds of thousands of $. Until then we'll get a deal. I doubt talks will really start until August if we're lucky.

 

[TheGiftedApe]

Fans need to get a union

 

[Wood Chipper]

Fans need to get a union

agreed

 

[FrankRizzo]

It's the team we love.
And the players.

However, there are 3 sides to the NFL, and in my opinion, it is WE THE FANS who are the most important, and we are the ones who get screwed. Nobody speaks and negotiates on our behalf.

Where is the NFLFA?
NFL Fans Association?

In some things, there are price limits, ceilings. I know supply & demand rules, but tickets, jerseys, other souvenirs, and concessions are bulls*** way too high. And the DirecTV NFL Sunday Ticket is the worst.

We get screwed. The league, the owners, the agents, and the players make more and more and more.

The rate of those increases is way way way way way higher over the past 3, 5, 10 years than anything in real life (other than our f**** health care costs). Who is looking out for us?

Nobody can justify why the price of the Sunday Ticket has increased by double over the past 5-10 years.
It's because the NFL gives DirecTV an "exclusive" which in real life is called a monopoly.
Because A) DirecTV pays so much to the NFL to be the sold provider of it, B) The NFL gets maximum $, and then C) DirecTV is able to max charge WE THE FANS by charging 2 arms, 2 legs, and a ********, why? Because we have to pay it to THEM because nobody else has it to offer it cheaper. That should be illegal.

Then there are the cost of jerseys. During Super Bowl week here in Dallas, we received our official (fake) Matthews and Rodgers jerseys from overseas. They were the same high quality (stitched numbers front and back, stitched name) as the $200 ones on NFL.com and Packers.com. But they cost us $40 from the brave Asians. They use the same materials and manufacturing process as the non-Americans who do the officially licensed ones. But the NFL rapes us 5 different ways on those with licensing fees to themselves, the NFLPA, the teams, and who knows who else. They turn a $30 piece of apparel into a $150 or $200 piece.

The rich get richer.

And it is THOSE TWO sides who are fighting over millions of dollars? Why aren't we?

I buy my jerseys from Asia proudly, and I have boycotted the past 2 years of the Sunday Ticket, and instead watched Packer games at local sports bars.

 

[TJV]

… But the NFL rapes us 5 different ways on those with licensing fees to themselves, the NFLPA, the teams, and who knows who else. They turn a $30 piece of apparel into a $150 or $200 piece.

… DirecTV NFL Sunday Ticket is the worst.

I buy my jerseys from Asia proudly, and I have boycotted the past 2 years of the Sunday Ticket, and instead watched Packer games at local sports bars.

Looks like a problem solved.

BTW, they are fighting over billions, not millions, annually. Seriously, IMO the NFL should be free to sell its entertainment product anyway it wants, including Sunday Ticket as long as no one is forced to buy it. And the reason why the TV contracts and the payment from Direct TV to the NFL and the cost of Sunday Ticket keeps on going up is because the demand for the product remains fantastic.

If you had a product to sell should it be illegal for you to get top price for it?

 

[Wood Chipper]

nfl gives out to many "exclusives" examples are madden and sunday ticket

 

[Guacamole]

Don't fprget about all the businesses that will be hurt. With the black outs that happened here in San Diego(huge fairweather fans) alot of the Sports bars were hurting. The good thing was that there were other games on TV, but if there are no games at all to watch....people will start to get layed off

 

[FrankRizzo]

If you had a product to sell should it be illegal for you to get top price for it?

Tell me why this is not considered a monopoly then?
Define "monopoly" for me.

I thought they were considered "illegal".

 

[TJV]

Tell me why this is not considered a monopoly then?
Define "monopoly" for me.

I thought they were considered "illegal".

That's good question. I don't think the NFL is a monopoly since other professional football leagues have and do exist and because the NFL doesn't dictate what each team can charge for tickets, concessions, etc. It also doesn't set a maximum salary for a player. (Beyond that, I don't think a monopoly in the entertainment business is harmful or important since it involves entertainment and not an essential good or service.) But when the USFL wanted to compete directly against the NFL it filed and won an anti-trust lawsuit against the NFL in 1986. (Previously the USFL played in the spring and summer.) It couldn't charge the NFL with just being a monopoly (or a "pure" monopoly) since the USFL - a professional football league - existed. Instead they alleged the NFL had a monopoly regarding TV broadcasting rights, since at the time the NFL had a deal with all three of the "major" networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC. The jury found that the NFL was a legal monopoly but used predatory tactics. However, it also found the USFL filed the case in order to force a merger with the NFL and most of its problems were due to mismanagement so it awarded the USFL one dollar. Luckily for the USFL, damages are tripled in anti-trust cases, so it was awarded $3. That "victory" in court ended the USFL. BTW, Al Davis testified against the NFL in that case and Donald Trump owned the USFL's New Jersey franchise.

More important and more recent is a 2010 US Supreme Court case having to do with trademark licensing (American Needle vs. NFL) in which the Court, in a 9-0 ruling, ruled the NFL is a cartel of 32 independent businesses. So since I am an extremely biased Green Bay Packers fan, I'll go with the United States Supreme Court. I suggest other Packers fans do the same because if the NFL is found to be a monopoly, the consequence would be what Goodell spelled out in his letter to the WSJ which IMO would be disastrous for the league.

BTW, there are plenty of places to find the definition of "monopoly" and you can also find American Needle's brief, the NFL's response and Justice Steven's opinion online.

 

[LAG]

I have stopped buying NFL merch and stopped the NFL Network. Nope, no support from me until a deal is inked. No apologies.