Television Interest In Nfl Games example essay topic

Sports in America have played a vital role in the shaping of American culture from one generation to the next. Whether it be the steadfast (former) national pastime of baseball keeping Americans on the edges of their seats watching "The Babe" swat another homer, the hard hitting action of the grid iron enticing millions of fans to its venues, or the hip-hop revolution of the high-flying stars of basketball influencing a generation of athletes to soar to their goals, professional sports in America have shaped and re-shaped the culture with every passing generation. Along with that, the pervasive ability of professional sports to evolve and adapt has lead to the steadfast influence that they have on the forefront of American culture, creating idols and heroes out of mortal athletes that people of any generation can embrace and derive strength from. However, the harsh reality of the past 40 to 50 years is that these professional sports have become less pastimes and games, but more business oriented enterprises whose primary focus is on making money. So in actuality, the athletes that the culture idolizes and adores are getting very wealthy off of that idolization and the owners and businesses that are paying the players salaries are getting even richer off of the players and off of the consumer. I use the word consumer because that is now what the term "spectator" refers to.

Nevertheless, this paper deals not with the harsh reality of the spectators demise and the rise to power of the consumer, but more with the general health of the big three major professional sports; the NBA, the NFL and the MLB. In this paper I plan on evaluating the current state of player / management relations, the current economic state, the current public relations state as it relates to television and in general, and the general order of health of each of the three major sports and to conclude, provide my own opinions based on personal research. The player / management relationship is one of if not the most important relationships in professional sports, since sports players unions can propose and execute strikes in play if demands are not met. This had not been a problem for many years, but recently has lead to many lockouts and strike situations in professional sports resulting in shortened and or unfinished seasons.

I will begin the examination of player / management relationships with the NBA whose salaries, according to the National Basketball Players Association web site, boast. ".. the highest salaries of any labor organization in the world" (web). The web-site states that the average NBA player makes roughly four million dollars a year and the union has worked to get players collective bargaining agreements, retirement plans, benefits and health insurance. As it appears, the union is doing its job and player / management relations are going well, however, there are two sides to any story. Stated from the May 2001 Journal of Sports Economics, by J. Richard Hill and Peter A. Groothuis, "Until the 1998-1999 season, the NBA had never cancelled a game due to a labor dispute. The relationship between the NBPA and the owners seemed to be working well" (133). One of the main disputes from the owners that lead to that lockout was that unlike other sports, the NBA could not limit the amount of money spent by clubs on free agents.

Clubs were allowed to disregard the salary cap, which was considered a soft cap, in order to keep superstar players that would otherwise seek more money elsewhere in the free agent market. However, the owners instead, .".. overbid on other free agents to lure them away from their current teams, staying just under the cap, before negotiating with their own superstars" (Hill-Groothuis 133). So in essence, a team could not only keep their superstar free agent, but they could acquire other teams free agents and go over way over the salary cap legally. So when the union subsequently refused to rid the soft cap for a hard one (for obvious monetary reasons) the owners imposed the lockout.

On the other hand, the NBPA was discouraged surrounding the disparity between the highest paid and the lowest paid players, claiming that the gap was way too wide and sought measures to lessen the gap and benefit those at the lower end. Steps were taken to improve this gap and evidence of the progress is reported in the Hill-Groothius article that shows improvements were actually made. In 1997-98, the minimum salary was 272,500 and the maximum salary was 33,140,000. In the 1999-2000 season, the minimum rose to 301,875 and the maximum fell to 17,142,858 (141). This is a direct result of the Executive Director of the NBPA, Billy Hunter's work in the 1999 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) and as stated in the NBPA web-site, .".. NBA players are assured of maintaining their status as the best compensated athletes in team sports over the life of the six-year deal" (web).

Next, the focus will shift to Major League Baseball, whose player / management relationships prove to be much more complex. In general, the relationship between the players and the management in professional baseball is not good as the two groups appear to be divided on what is in the best interest of baseball. As of August 2002, the MLBPA unions', as stated by George F. Will from the Topeka Capital-Journal web-site, .".. primary objective is to protect the revenues of a very few very rich owners -principally, the Yankees'. The owners' primary objective is a more egalitarian distribution of wealth" (web). The reason that the players' union wants to support the bankroll of the larger clubs is because they feel that as the larger clubs wealth increases, their salaries will do the same. The owners however, believe that only through more evenly distributed wealth will the health of the league get better because more evenly distributed wealth will lead to more balance in competition, leading subsequently into an increase in popularity from the public.

This increase in popularity from the public would result in more ticket and merchandise sales, which would lead to bigger money deals from the networks and such. Therefore, the opinions on the best interest of the league are split and therefore, the league remains stagnant, with more and more teams becoming financially disparaged while other clubs get ridiculously wealthy. Not to mention that, also stated by Will, "Out of 224 postseason games since the 1994 strike, 219 have been won by teams in the top two payroll quartiles. All World Series games since the strike have been won by teams in the top quartile" (web).

More recently, as of August 2003 in an article from bigleaguers. com (the official MLBPA web-site), the MLB owners declared three areas in need of change: "a worldwide amateur draft, significantly increased revenue sharing, and what they characterized as a 'competitive balance' tax" (web). The MLBPA has agreed to see the owners on these issues that would prevent labor hostility through the 2005 season if the owners decide to settle on the deal and secure it. This would ensure baseballs' avoidance of another messy labor strike that would lead to decreased interest in the game and in overall revenue. So in general, player / management relations are on opposite ends of the spectrum regarding the best interest of their business, but are working together to find a middle ground and ensure the stability of the sport. Finally, the player / management relationship of the NFL seems to be the one that has remained more consistently stable and healthy. Unlike the other two sports, it seems as if the NFL takes more caution in its business dealings, which has led to healthy relations between the two groups.

Taken from the NFL. com web site, in January of 2001, the NFL teams approved a revenue-sharing plan that would work for the benefit of every team as they decided to distribute the gate receipts equally among the visiting teams. Again from the NFL. com web site, the CBA of 1993 was extended six years in 2001 and a fourth extension was agreed upon in 2002, taking the agreement through the 2007 season. Maybe more important than the passing of extended CBA agreements and revenue sharing tactics is the NFL's impression of itself collectively, owners and players / coaches. In a Business Week online magazine article written by Tom Lowry, Gene Upshaw, the executive director of the NFLPA stated, "I don't see this as us vs. the owners, but instead it's us vs. all the other entertainment choices out there: the movies, music, theater" (Lowry 2). This is a very healthy view on the status of player / management relations as it lends itself to bi-partisan politics, in which the best interest of the collective is stressed over the best interest of the individual. Another quote, from the owner perspective, impresses the same idea when Art Modell, the owner of the Baltimore Ravens was quoted in Lowry's article as saying about the teams owners, "We are 32 fat-cat Republicans who vote socialist" (2).

In case that the implications of this comment are unclear, he means that the owners are Republican in nature in that they are in the business of looking out for the wealthy and perpetuating that wealth, but when it comes to their job as owners, they vote socialist so that the source of their wealth can remain healthy and equal for all. Sports are a business and in business labor disputes are bound to happen, but with good negotiations, as exhibited most notably by the NFL / NFLPA, respectably by the NBA / NBPA and increasingly improved by the MLB / MLBPA, good player / management relations can be sustained, ensuring the overall health of the business. For the next section, since they often coincide, I will be combining the economic state of the three sports with the public relations state as it applies to television ratings and in general. First, I will discuss the economic state / pr state of the NBA. The best way to describe the economic state of the NBA is improving.

From information taken from the SportsLine. com web-site article by Rick Horrow, the NBA is taking extensive steps to ensure its economic stability and productiveness. The article states that the NBA accumulated over 2.85 billion dollars in revenue in 2000 and was projected to make 3.8 billion dollars in revenue a year before 2005 (Horrow 1). All in all, the NBA is on a long-term plan meaning that no immediate gains of significant proportions can be expected, but gradual ones are assured. In terms of the public relations state of the NBA, much like the economic state, can also be called a long-term plan.

In the 2001 season when the Lakers repeated their title, television ratings were at an all time high for a game 5 in the history of the NBA. According to the espn. go. com web site, ratings were 7 percent higher that the previous year and 2 percent higher than the year before that. However, in the Lakers attempt at a third consecutive NBA title in 2002, ratings dropped 26 percent from the game three the year before (web). In the bidding wars for the NBA television rights, NBC got outbid of their 1.3 billion dollar offer by the ABC and ESPN partnership and their estimated 1.5 billion dollar offer. According to Howard Fendrich of the Associated Press in an article on global technology. com, NBC has lost near 300 million dollars over the final two years of their NBA deal, but still have remained at the top in terms of ratings (Fendrich).

As for the public's perception, die hard fans persist but the casual fans are beginning to fizzle out as superstars like Michael Jordan say their final good-byes and others like Vince Carter succumb to injury frequently. The lack of excitement, the low scores and the relatively unexciting play of most of the teams has lead to a huge decrease in popularity and as B. Goldberg states on an NBA website", The NBA is a shell of its former self and is currently ranked third amongst the four major sports as far as popularity in the United States" (Goldberg 1). Possibly, with the entry of LeBron James into the NBA and other new and exciting college prospects, the public eye will once again turn onto the hardwood court of the NBA. Next, I will discuss the economic state / pr state of the MLB.

According to Don Fehr, the MLBPA Executive Director in a news release from bigleaguers. com, Fehr states that the total revenue of baseball in 2001 was around 3.550 billion dollars, up from 1.330 billion in 1990. This shows a dramatic increase in revenue over the last ten years. However, in an article from espn. go. com written by Darren Rovell, the net loss for the thirty MLB teams for 2002 is higher than expected, totaling over 450 million dollars, up from 232 million in 2001. Also, only one team is estimated to produce an operating profit in the 2002 baseball year (Rovell 1).

Rovell also shows in a different article on espn. go. com web-site, that between 1995 and 1999 only three major league teams have boasted an operating profit, the rest all reporting losses between that time. Other reasons for the decline in revenue for the MLB are, as stated by Will, "Attendance is down for the third consecutive season (5.7 percent this year [2002], which means almost $80 million in lost ticket revenue alone) " (Will 2). Also, with their being no salary cap in baseball, owners can pay whatever they want for players, therefore creating a large gap between the teams that can and the teams that cannot afford to lavishly spend. When the Rangers bought Alex Rodriguez, their ticket sales soared because of the superstar quality that they could now go and watch, however, teams that cannot afford that kind of salary due to lack of local revenue, gate sales and so on, loose out on the big name buys. Therefore creating a large gap in the competition that I brought up earlier in the paper, decreasing the overall excitement toward the game.

So of people are no longer finding the game exciting, then the whole of the business is going to suffer. As for television ratings, the LCS game one in 2002 was the most watched game in three years for the FOX network according to the champlain channel. com. However, according to the associated press, found on the Athens Banner-Herald web site, the 2002 World Series television ratings were the lowest in history. The game's rating was 24 percent below the year before. In addition to the poor 2002 World Series television rating, as also stated in the article, "In the past 11 years, the rating for the Series has gone down by 50 percent" (web). So it appears that the popularity for the game of baseball is dwindling every year and perhaps will continue to do so unless competition can be jump-started somehow.

Finally, I will discuss the economic / pr state of the NFL. According to the NFL web-site, in 2000 the NFL set the record for all-time paid attendance for the third year in succession, making over 20-million dollars for only the second time ever and with the addition of an expansion team in Huston where football is extremely popular, that number will surely rise. As reported in an article in BusinessWeek online by Tom Lowry entitled "The NFL Machine", Lowry points out the NFL's new 2 billion dollar satellite deal and the three years left on the 18 billion dollar network cable contract indicating the television interest in NFL games. The NFL has also received a 300 million dollar sponsorship from Coors. Overall, the NFL has doubled revenue over the past five years to a total of 4.8 billion dollars in 2002 (Lowry). This total is over a billion dollars higher than that of the MLB' total revenue.

As for television and viewer interest, as stated in Lowry's article, television ratings went up 5 percent in 2001, boasting an average of 15.8 million viewers a season (Lowry). In the 2003 playoffs the ratings went up another 5 percent from the increase in 2002 and in 2001, with ratings up 9 percent on CBS, FOX and ABC. According to Rudy Martzke of the USA Today, "CBS' three playoff games have achieved the highest average for the AFC in seven years, a 19.3 rating" (Martzke). In 2002, the ratings for the main networks were as such: CBS, up 7 percent, Fox up 11 percent, ABC up 3 percent and ESPN up 24 percent (Martzke).

One of the main reasons for this increase in fan turnout and television ratings can be summed up by Steve Grubbs in Martzkes' article, when he says, "There's clearly more parity in the NFL. It's more interesting when 90% of the teams still have a chance for the playoffs" and Tom DeCa bia with, "The NFL is one of the best leagues in all of sports because, like they say, on any given Sunday most anyone can win" (Martzke). The NFL's competition advantage over MLB and its excitement value over the NBA has lead to it being the most financially sound of the leagues as well as replacing MLB as Americas pastime. The interest level is high, the fans are excited and as Steve Cox says in an editorial on slate. msn. com web site, "NFL teams do not in fact move to cities with 'bigger, richer fan bases' " (Greenberg 5). Summing up that there are no bad markets in football because no matter where a team moves, the city will and the club and the league will prosper. To sum up the situation of economic status and pr / status of the NFL, I would say that it is going well and appears to have nowhere to go but up.

Sports require fans to go to games, require fans to tune into their televisions and require fans to buy their merchandise and with the case of the "big three" the excitement and entertainment value advantage lies with the NFL, and the NBA only coming in third because of the MLB' tradition and history. Finally, I will attempt to examine the overall health of each starting with the NBA. The general health of the NBA is improving every year with continued negotiations between players and owners bettering the financial situation in the league. The retirement of star players and the aging of many others is requiring the aid of young talent to carry the torch forward for the league to survive. There are many fresh new talents, but there may not be enough to sustain the popularity of the sport. The NBA is in desperate need for a young, fresh and enthusiastic generation of superstars, coupled with good management and player relations, to succeed.

Perhaps with the ever growing popularity of NCAA basketball, this fresh talent will be produced. Major League Baseball is still considered the second most popular sport in the country and is one of those sports that almost every youth gets signed up for. However, college baseball is never as hyped up as college football or basketball, but hype never follows to closely with the MLB. Perhaps the MLB's new found affinity for the foreign market will lead to a growing world interest and an increased local interest from its fans. As for the business aspect of the league, it appears that the player / manager relations are still very unstable, but are slowly getting better. However, the growing disparity between the rich and the poor clubs and the ever diminishing competition value could potentially lead to the downfall of many baseball cities.

This could prove dangerous for the league as a whole. Perhaps if every player that begins to prosper in small economic clubs like the Pirates or the Expos, chooses not to leave for the Yankees and Braves of the league, the competition value and the consumer interest will begin to rise again. As for the NFL, things are looking nowhere but skyward for Americas new found pastime. Football is very marginalized as cities pride themselves on the winning of their team. Television ratings are soaring, deals are coming in left and right from television companies to beer companies and the Super Bowl remains a major venue for the unveiling of new commercials. Fan turnout at stadiums is high, many new stadiums are being built or renovated causing a surge in ticket and merchandise sales.

The competition level is very high, games are often times close and fans interest levels are peaked during playoff time when almost every team still has a legitimate shot at going. Overall, the rating is NFL #1, MLB #2, and NBA #3. Sports are a business, the spectator has become the consumer and it is the organization that first realizes that prospers. No business can survive without its consumers and every business must target those consumers primarily, for without them their product is nothing. Athletics has become this product and it is imperative that the "big three" continue to recognize this and keep that idea in the forefront of their dealings.

Sports are still a predominating part of our culture and serves to shape it in every generation, yet the only way that sports will be able to continue this is by staying out of strike and lockout trouble. So staying on the field or on the court is the best option for the "big three", otherwise, some other sport may come along and take their place. But for now, it does not appear that this is the case.