There are some indicators that should make NFL owners pause before they assume all will be right with the world.
• The public is not stupid. When the owners start crying poor, the fans know that NFL television ratings broke all records last season and that money floods into the owners' pockets.
• The public tends to be sympathetic to the players. Most fans are well aware that football players -- unlike many other well-paid athletes -- put their health and safety at risk every time they step on the field. They know that NFL careers are short. That the contracts are, for the most part, not guaranteed. If the public chooses sides, it will likely be with the players.
• The public is increasingly priced out. Last season, the NFL was blacked out more than at any time since 2004 and attendance figures dropped. So while the game has never been more popular, the canary in the coal mine could be actual butts in the seats.
And the NFL heads into this lockout with a P.R. issue. As the league steamed toward the March 3 deadline, a number of incidents have added up to an image problem.
• The league has paid lip service to concern over player injury while negotiating for a longer season. The league appears to be dragging its feet on concussion safety: a standardized concussion test was just instituted last week.
• During what should have been the league's finest moment, the Super Bowl, greed seemed to rule the day. Tickets were sold for seats that couldn't be used -- even though the league had advance warning. The displaced fans are suing and their plight resonates with the average NFL fan.
• Some of the owners are idiots. Reports that Carolina owner Jerry Richardson spoke disparagingly to two of the league's icons -- Peyton Manning and Drew Brees -- doesn't do much for owner popularity. If you were to take a poll by fans in each market on how much they like their local owner, the results would be underwhelming at best, save for a handful of markets.
I am already tired of the lockout and it hasn't even started. A pox on both houses, if you can figure out how to split up the billions we give you, maybe America will stop giving it to you.
I do feel sorry for the stadium employees and others who are getting shafted by the billionaires and millionaires greed.
Thomas Sowell: There are no solutions, just trade-offs.
NEW YORK—As an eager, football obsessed nation nervously monitors the NFL labor negotiations, representatives from both the league and the NFL Players Association have made statements reassuring the general public that the lockout is actually just a clever ruse to keep Jay Cutler away from football. “All the players agreed that having Jay Cutler around the game made it miserable,” explained NFLPA leader DeMaurice Smith. “So when Jay asked us when we’d start playing next year, we just made up this whole lockout excuse so he wouldn’t show up.”
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell echoed Smith’s statement, saying, “We want to let all our fans to know that we will most definitely be having football next season. I know it doesn’t look that way with all the news reports and meetings we are having, but trust me, everything you see about an 18-game schedule, revenue sharing and health benefits is crap we made up to thoroughly convince Jay that this is legit. We’re all extremely sorry if we scared you, but we could not handle another season with that man, he is simply insufferable, and a lockout was the only way to get him to go away.”
Prediction? I think the players won't cave in until they miss their first paycheck in September. While they say they want to train right now, you have to think many of them are looking forward to taking summer off and no training camps.
Labor trouble contagious? MLB & the NBA have their deals come up for renewal this year too. We chould have a hockey only fall.
Thomas Sowell: There are no solutions, just trade-offs.
