Sports

Commish and NFL no friend of the fans

The mark of modern sports stewardship has become the leaders’ ability to grab our wallets with one hand, shove us into traffic with the other, and still be able to stare into a TV camera and say that we owe him no thanks, being good to us comes with the job.

At a time when the NFL has never been as greed-stricken and greed-sickened, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell appeared on TV, Thursday night, to declare that he and the NFL, as always, are on your side. He did so on the NFL Network, which all fans and non-fans, by now, were expected to pay for, whether they liked it or not, and all cable companies, by now, were supposed to have cleared because, after all, it’s the NFL Network.

Goodell appeared from Green Bay, before a collection of fawning, applauding Packers fans, in what was titled a “Fan Forum,” a one-hour, climate-controlled session during which broad, harmless answers followed broad, harmless questions. NFL Network host Fran Charles began by asking/telling Goodell this tone-setting toughie:

“You like to get out to meet and greet the fans about all their issues. . . . Why do you think these Fan Forums are so important?”

“Well,” said Goodell, “because the game’s all about the fans.” The nausea was as instant as the insult.

While “the game’s all about the fans,” the largest, ugliest and most revolting NFL consumer issue in the league’s largest market is still, months after it began, erupting, still spewing toxic ooze.

The Jets and Giants in order to pay for a new stadium that few wanted, have each quickly eaten through more than 20 years of ticket-waiting lists, leaving each team to troll for unregistered chumps to fill the stadium. Both still desperately seek purchasers of extortion-based personal seat licenses (PSLs), plus game tickets that carrying face values nearly 10 times what they were two seasons ago.

And the only thing that could have happened — generations of devoted, stand-for-anything Jets and Giants patrons, tens of thousands of them, were shoved to the last rows of the new stadium or priced out, completely — is exactly what has happened.

“The game’s all about the fans,” Goodell claimed. His previous claim that PSLs “are good investments” for fans was so bogus that PSL contract language specifies that PSLs should in no way be regarded as an investment.

The game’s all about money. No adult fan is so naive to think otherwise. But the kind of money that the NFL and its business partners now demand is predicated on NFL fans serving as the nation’s biggest sports dopes, starting right here.

Typical PSL scenario: Jets’ ticket holder since the Shea days, four tickets at the 40. Last year, the tickets were raised to $105 per game. Throw in the two must-buy exhibition game extorts — at full, regular season prices — and his pre-parking bill for last season was $4,200, the highest it had ever been, but OK.

This season? The Jets wanted $700 per ticket per game, plus $20,000 per seat for the PSLs — a total of $108,000!

And one of this year’s Jets’ home games was moved to Thanksgiving night, not for the fans, but for NFL Network. As the rest of this region heads home that night, Jets’ patrons are expected to be heading out, an 8:20 kickoff.

Only something colossally greedy could make the Jets’ and Giants’ ticket waiting lists vanish in a snap; only something monstrously ugly could prevent sellouts for the first time in decades. And that’s what has happened.

The game’s so much “about the fans” that the NFL continues to sell/grant TV networks — including its own — the authority to change more and more logically scheduled games — Sunday afternoons — to Sunday, Monday and Thursday nighters, including night games played outdoors in cold weather cities in November and December.

Yeah, Rog, it’s all about the fans — how much they’ll take before they walk away (or are shoved out) and never return because the NFL taught them to stay home.

It’s so much about the fans that the NFL, for $1 billion a year, sold DirecTV its out-of-market package, then didn’t care how badly DirecTV, using the NFL as bait, suckered fans. What DirecTV has advertised “on special” for $315, it will sell — on the down-low — for under $200 to subscribers who threaten to discontinue. The NFL sold its logo, license and games to DirecTV, then allowed DirecTV to make fools of its fans.

“Anyone need two for the Aug 16th Giants-Jets exhibition? Just $700 a ticket! It’s a big one — both teams’ first preseason game! Don’t miss out on the chance to watch players you’ll never see again! Just $700 a ticket! It’s all about you, the fans!”

Here’s a tip: Duct tape that annoying crawl on TV

This from a highly regarded, longtime network sports director:

“A simple weapon I’ve used effectively to watch a game without the abusive crawl across the bottom of picture is a strip of duct tape. It’s amazing how effective it is at blocking out the visual chatter, lightly placed so you don’t smudge your screen.

“And in a second you can remove it and tape it to the back of the set, where it’s ready for the next time you’re about to throw your shoe through the screen.”

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Can’t help but feel that Erik Compton, twice a heart transplant recipient, shooting 63, Thursday, for the first round lead of this week’s PGA Tour event, didn’t make much news or noise because neither the story nor the event had anything to do with Tiger Woods.

True or False? The media, starting with ESPN, is more interested in where Terrell Owens plays and what he says than do football fans. Put me down for True.

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Despite recent rumors, Steiner Sports Collectibles does not plan to hold an online auction for Ted Williams‘ head.

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Comcasts’ Golf Channel boasts that it’s “The Only Network Dedicated To The Game.” Yet, it fails to finish the thought with “Until 6 p.m., Eastern Time.”

Thursday, with PGA Tour play resumed after a long weather delay, GC, at 6 p.m. (and as usual), dumped live coverage for its studio show, which, as usual, updated the live golf it just abandoned.