A Look into the State of the NFL
Glory Jones, Nov. 2017
The ratings of the National Football League (NFL) have recently decreased; it’s no secret that this is happening because recent events have brought a massive amount of attention to the League. The causes of the NFL's declining ratings have shown to the public how much the league is tied in with society. Subsequently, the efforts to try and keep up NFL ratings have revealed a large corporate institution behind a association of football players.
A major reason for the declining popularity of the NFL is simply the fact that people have refrained from watching it. Although motivated by different reasons, the types of people who’ve stopped watching the NFL have ranged from young liberal millennials to old conservative baby boomers - showing that anyone and everyone can generate an effect on all levels. The use of NFL Sunday Tickets has declined in relation to the NFL players’ actions to address problems in society. In a J. D. Power survey taken from a sample of people who have watched a football, basketball, or hockey game, 26% of the sample was recorded as having watched fewer games due to the national anthem protests. The protests officially started on September 1st, 2016 when Colin Kaepernick took a knee during the national anthem to protest the injustices taking place in black communities. Early in the 2017 season, more players began to take part in the protests sparked by Kaepernick, angering many fans with the show of “disrespect” towards the anthem and the flag. These fans chose not to watch NFL games as long as the men playing in it didn’t “respect the flag”. In that same sample previously mentioned, 24% of the people watched less NFL due to ostracizing Colin Kaepernick for his peaceful protests.
These same people also stopped watching NFL due to off-field issues, in particular domestic violence. Crossing sports and societal standards, this has led to organized efforts to boycott the NFL, its teams, and its merchandise.
Lastly, the overall popularity of football is going down in America because less people want to play it. Many players, old and young, have dropped the sport because research of football-related brain damage has circulated throughout the country in these recent years. In a study published by the scientific journal JAMA, the brains of 202 deceased football players from different levels of play were evaluated by neurologists. Upon these evaluations, 177 of the 202 deceased players (87%) were diagnosed with Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy or CTE; the likelihood of affliction increased with their level of play. Studies like this alarm many, leading to less association with the sport. This has been seen in so many contexts, from current football players stopping their play to young kids being discouraged from the sport in an attempt to keep their developing minds safe.
Due to the reasons mentioned above, total NFL viewership has gone down by 7.5%, the average household rating has fallen 1.8%, and 25 of the 31 NFL teams have been drawing fewer to their games. After the fall of overall popularity, the NFL’s response to the decline shows that football’s popularity is as important to the league as beaches are to Florida. In efforts to assuage the growing concerns over the safety of football players, the NFL pledged 100 million dollars towards research in the field of neuroscience; the league has also made 47 rule changes since 2002 and implemented a strict concussion protocol. In attempts to end the controversy due to the “Take a Knee” protests many NFL owners and players met in New York on the 17th of this October, and more meetings like this may be scheduled in the future. Since the NFL’s declining popularity made apparent this year, many endeavors have been enacted to regain lost viewership and money made from tickets and merchandise. Perhaps the most relevant example that can be given right now is the activities involving the owner of the Dallas Cowboys, Jerry Jones. Hoping to attract lost fans back to the games, Jones took a firm stance against the national anthem protests, saying the NFL was suffering from them and also threatening to bench any player of his who would take a knee during the anthem. This was despite the apparent need to address the injustices taking place in African-American communities.
The evident influence that corporate wealth has in large sporting organizations such as the NFL was made more clear when ESPN hostess Jemele Hill, in response to Jerry Jones’s stance against the anthem protests, suggested the best way to bring attention to these social issues would be to boycott the Dallas Cowboys, their merchandise, and their advertisers. Hill’s comments subsequently led to her two-week suspension, highlighting the relationship between large corporations and the NFL. From observing the collective amount of efforts to increase the popularity of the NFL, one can sum them all up and infer that business and money has a huge impact on the NFL. Going along with current events, anyone following sports or politics can notice the state the NFL has been in this year. Organized efforts to boycott the league have been led by many people of all ages with different motives. Football, inherently tied to the NFL, is an aspect of American culture in a slump due to concerns regarding brain damage.
As these have led to an overall decline of NFL ratings through falling viewership, less purchasing of merchandise, and less support of individual teams, owners of the league and its teams have attempted to resolve these issues with relative urgency, showing to America the real influence money has in the NFL.
Works Cited:
Breer, Albert. "Declining NFL Television Ratings Presented at Meetings Grabbed Attention of Owners." Sports Illustrated. October 19, 2017. https://www.si.com/nfl/2017/10/19/nfl-ratings-decline-owners-players-meeting-mmqb.
Mez, Jesse, Daniel H. Daneshvar, and Patrick T. Kiernan. "Evaluation of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy in Football Players." The JAMA Network. July 25, 2017. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2645104.
"NFL issues response to CTE research report." n.d. NFL. July 26, 2017. http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000822159/article/nfl-issues-response-to-cte-research-report.
Rovell, Darren. "Anthem protests led poll of reasons viewers tuned out." ESPN. July 27, 2017. http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/20171611/national-anthem-protests-no-1-reason-viewers-tuned-nfl-games.
Snider, Mike. "Are NFL player protests 'massively, massively' hurting TV ratings?" USA Today. September 26, 2017. https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2017/09/26/nfl-player-protests-hurting-ratings/703619001/
A major reason for the declining popularity of the NFL is simply the fact that people have refrained from watching it. Although motivated by different reasons, the types of people who’ve stopped watching the NFL have ranged from young liberal millennials to old conservative baby boomers - showing that anyone and everyone can generate an effect on all levels. The use of NFL Sunday Tickets has declined in relation to the NFL players’ actions to address problems in society. In a J. D. Power survey taken from a sample of people who have watched a football, basketball, or hockey game, 26% of the sample was recorded as having watched fewer games due to the national anthem protests. The protests officially started on September 1st, 2016 when Colin Kaepernick took a knee during the national anthem to protest the injustices taking place in black communities. Early in the 2017 season, more players began to take part in the protests sparked by Kaepernick, angering many fans with the show of “disrespect” towards the anthem and the flag. These fans chose not to watch NFL games as long as the men playing in it didn’t “respect the flag”. In that same sample previously mentioned, 24% of the people watched less NFL due to ostracizing Colin Kaepernick for his peaceful protests.
These same people also stopped watching NFL due to off-field issues, in particular domestic violence. Crossing sports and societal standards, this has led to organized efforts to boycott the NFL, its teams, and its merchandise.
Lastly, the overall popularity of football is going down in America because less people want to play it. Many players, old and young, have dropped the sport because research of football-related brain damage has circulated throughout the country in these recent years. In a study published by the scientific journal JAMA, the brains of 202 deceased football players from different levels of play were evaluated by neurologists. Upon these evaluations, 177 of the 202 deceased players (87%) were diagnosed with Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy or CTE; the likelihood of affliction increased with their level of play. Studies like this alarm many, leading to less association with the sport. This has been seen in so many contexts, from current football players stopping their play to young kids being discouraged from the sport in an attempt to keep their developing minds safe.
Due to the reasons mentioned above, total NFL viewership has gone down by 7.5%, the average household rating has fallen 1.8%, and 25 of the 31 NFL teams have been drawing fewer to their games. After the fall of overall popularity, the NFL’s response to the decline shows that football’s popularity is as important to the league as beaches are to Florida. In efforts to assuage the growing concerns over the safety of football players, the NFL pledged 100 million dollars towards research in the field of neuroscience; the league has also made 47 rule changes since 2002 and implemented a strict concussion protocol. In attempts to end the controversy due to the “Take a Knee” protests many NFL owners and players met in New York on the 17th of this October, and more meetings like this may be scheduled in the future. Since the NFL’s declining popularity made apparent this year, many endeavors have been enacted to regain lost viewership and money made from tickets and merchandise. Perhaps the most relevant example that can be given right now is the activities involving the owner of the Dallas Cowboys, Jerry Jones. Hoping to attract lost fans back to the games, Jones took a firm stance against the national anthem protests, saying the NFL was suffering from them and also threatening to bench any player of his who would take a knee during the anthem. This was despite the apparent need to address the injustices taking place in African-American communities.
The evident influence that corporate wealth has in large sporting organizations such as the NFL was made more clear when ESPN hostess Jemele Hill, in response to Jerry Jones’s stance against the anthem protests, suggested the best way to bring attention to these social issues would be to boycott the Dallas Cowboys, their merchandise, and their advertisers. Hill’s comments subsequently led to her two-week suspension, highlighting the relationship between large corporations and the NFL. From observing the collective amount of efforts to increase the popularity of the NFL, one can sum them all up and infer that business and money has a huge impact on the NFL. Going along with current events, anyone following sports or politics can notice the state the NFL has been in this year. Organized efforts to boycott the league have been led by many people of all ages with different motives. Football, inherently tied to the NFL, is an aspect of American culture in a slump due to concerns regarding brain damage.
As these have led to an overall decline of NFL ratings through falling viewership, less purchasing of merchandise, and less support of individual teams, owners of the league and its teams have attempted to resolve these issues with relative urgency, showing to America the real influence money has in the NFL.
Works Cited:
Breer, Albert. "Declining NFL Television Ratings Presented at Meetings Grabbed Attention of Owners." Sports Illustrated. October 19, 2017. https://www.si.com/nfl/2017/10/19/nfl-ratings-decline-owners-players-meeting-mmqb.
Mez, Jesse, Daniel H. Daneshvar, and Patrick T. Kiernan. "Evaluation of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy in Football Players." The JAMA Network. July 25, 2017. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2645104.
"NFL issues response to CTE research report." n.d. NFL. July 26, 2017. http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000822159/article/nfl-issues-response-to-cte-research-report.
Rovell, Darren. "Anthem protests led poll of reasons viewers tuned out." ESPN. July 27, 2017. http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/20171611/national-anthem-protests-no-1-reason-viewers-tuned-nfl-games.
Snider, Mike. "Are NFL player protests 'massively, massively' hurting TV ratings?" USA Today. September 26, 2017. https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2017/09/26/nfl-player-protests-hurting-ratings/703619001/