3 ms·

Didn't Fox start a new football league this year? I think the NFL is more of an entrenched business with great brand recognition than a cartel. College footba

Didn't Fox start a new football league this year? I think the NFL is more of an entrenched business with great brand recognition than a cartel. College football players want an NFL contract because they trust that the NFL will be around in 10 years. (Same reason that CS grads want to work for Google and not a random startup; Google will be around in 5 years.) This means that the NFL gets first pick on the most talented players. That is what prevents upstart leagues from being successful. Players have seen what happened to competing leagues; their counterparts are now unemployed. Without good players, nobody is going to watch your thing, and thus, the NFL will continue to dominate. I think that with an infinite amount of money, you could probably create a new football league for a new generation. You will need billions of dollars to build 32 new stadiums. You will need billions of dollars to pay Patrick Mahomes $500M a year to switch sides. (x32 teams x53 players on the roster = 800 billion dollars a year in salary costs ;) Because nobody has an infinite amount of money, it's not really going to happen that way. I bet you could woo a number of viewers over by having a sane online streaming package. I want to watch every game in the season for a fixed price. No blackouts. No ads. No delay.

rsync 3y ago
The NFL has an exemption from the Sherman antitrust act. Therefore, we need not argue about whether they are or are not a cartel - or are engaging in anti-competitive behavior: our government has already defined them as such.
- jrockway 3y ago
  It's somewhat unclear if they even need the exemption. It's only relevant to TV licensing deals, and TV ain't what it used to be. The NFL mostly exists to keep the dying TV business alive, but nobody actually wants to watch the NFL on TV. If the TV deals were ruled illegal, the NFL would live and the TV stations would die.
  - thehoff 3y ago
    Maybe but I doubt the NFL would continue on the way it does without TV. They must make a ton off networks who then make it back via advertising, but maybe I’m wrong. My group of friends and I definitely watch and don’t go to games because of the cost (we would not go to games just because they are not in TV). College football around here is much more affordable (as are college basketball games, G league for basketball, and minor league baseball).
jsjohnst 3y ago
> You will need billions of dollars to pay Patrick Mahomes $500M a year to switch sides. You are off on his salary by an order of magnitude. ;) He’s also the number one paid NFL player, so extending his salary to the entire roster is just hyperbolic fiction.
- jrockway 3y ago
  Well, I don't think "you can be the headline in our new league for your current salary" is going to work. He has to break a contract. He's burned his bridges with the NFL. That's going to require compensation. Yes, you don't pay your backup defensive linemen the same as your quarterback, but the point is, people won't watch if those players are bad, and people aren't going to jump ship for free. You will have to build the league out of talent that somehow won't play for the NFL. It's going to be costly.
  - jsjohnst 3y ago
    In the fan fiction land of make believe you’ve laid out here already, can’t we make the suspension of disbelief go just a tad further? Maybe every fan gets paid $1M per game they attend?
    - jrockway 3y ago
      Well, how much do you think it will cost then?
      - jsjohnst 3y ago
        Well, considering the total cap for all players on both teams playing in the Super Bowl is less than the amount you think should be paid to a single person, there’s a start. ;)
        jrockway 3y ago
        Yeah, but people want the big names, and the big names already have guaranteed income. You have to make a higher offer. I've decided I'm kind of "meh" on the whole salary cap thing. I want to see some star defensive linemen play. I want to see a $10M/year punter. Let's go CRAZY with this new league.

rsync 3y ago

The NFL has an exemption from the Sherman antitrust act. Therefore, we need not argue about whether they are or are not a cartel - or are engaging in anti-competitive behavior: our government has already defined them as such.

jrockway 3y ago
It's somewhat unclear if they even need the exemption. It's only relevant to TV licensing deals, and TV ain't what it used to be. The NFL mostly exists to keep the dying TV business alive, but nobody actually wants to watch the NFL on TV. If the TV deals were ruled illegal, the NFL would live and the TV stations would die.
- thehoff 3y ago
  Maybe but I doubt the NFL would continue on the way it does without TV. They must make a ton off networks who then make it back via advertising, but maybe I’m wrong. My group of friends and I definitely watch and don’t go to games because of the cost (we would not go to games just because they are not in TV). College football around here is much more affordable (as are college basketball games, G league for basketball, and minor league baseball).

jsjohnst 3y ago

> You will need billions of dollars to pay Patrick Mahomes $500M a year to switch sides. You are off on his salary by an order of magnitude. ;) He’s also the number one paid NFL player, so extending his salary to the entire roster is just hyperbolic fiction.

jrockway 3y ago
Well, I don't think "you can be the headline in our new league for your current salary" is going to work. He has to break a contract. He's burned his bridges with the NFL. That's going to require compensation. Yes, you don't pay your backup defensive linemen the same as your quarterback, but the point is, people won't watch if those players are bad, and people aren't going to jump ship for free. You will have to build the league out of talent that somehow won't play for the NFL. It's going to be costly.
- jsjohnst 3y ago
  In the fan fiction land of make believe you’ve laid out here already, can’t we make the suspension of disbelief go just a tad further? Maybe every fan gets paid $1M per game they attend?
  - jrockway 3y ago
    Well, how much do you think it will cost then?
    - jsjohnst 3y ago
      Well, considering the total cap for all players on both teams playing in the Super Bowl is less than the amount you think should be paid to a single person, there’s a start. ;)
      - jrockway 3y ago
        Yeah, but people want the big names, and the big names already have guaranteed income. You have to make a higher offer. I've decided I'm kind of "meh" on the whole salary cap thing. I want to see some star defensive linemen play. I want to see a $10M/year punter. Let's go CRAZY with this new league.