What's Wrong With The NFL?

Roger Is Not Helping

Ratings for the nation's most popular television programs are off by significant percentages this year, which has raised alarm bells in various sectors of the marketing and advertising media. As I have a foot in both worlds, I'd like to dig into the reasons why this is happening. But first, some ground rules.

1) Before anyone throws my opinion out as being clearly in the tank for some other sport, or being anti-NFL in some way, my bona fides. I run a fantasy football league, play in another, write about it for a blog, take my mom to a road game every year, and watch way, way, too much of this stuff. I'm a lifer. I like the game. I'm not against it.

2) I'm going to try to keep this to new factors, since the ratings decline is also new. It's not as if people are suddenly discovering that the game is violent, that women on the sidelines are objectified, and that commissioner Roger Goodell is cartoonishly corrupt. Those are all known quantities coming in.

So, what's new?

Well, the most obvious point of order is that one of the more remarkable Presidential campaigns in the history of the nation has been taking up all of the oxygen in the room, but it's not as if these audiences are really the same. In any event, the debates haven't ran into football games very often, and the ratings haven't grown now that those events are over. So while this might be a factor in just limiting overall coverage, it's not likely to be a massive point.

The next factor has actually been addressed during the campaign, with one of the contenders (you can guess which one, right? Sure you can) taking issue with the new concussion protocols as somehow being too restrictive. I think there's actually a bit of a point here; if you were weaned on more thrilling displays of violence, maybe the weaker tea that the NFL is serving up now as a middle ground between player safety and viewer appeal just doesn't cut it for you. If this is a major factor, then the NFL's decline could be seen as a purposeful long-term controlled descent, as part of a more sustainable economy. But while long-time fans might grumble about these new rules, I kind of doubt that anyone is really not watching because of them.

Another possible factor is San Francisco 49er QB Colin Kaepernick's continuing symbolic protest against the national anthem, which seems to (a) really rankle some in the audience by its seeming intrusion of politics into sport, and (b) prove the point that if you really want people to pay attention to your political point, you really need to put it into non-political areas of society. Kaepernick's exploding popularity in jersey sales makes me think that the controversy probably isn't that much of a net negative for the league.

Now, I'd like to pivot this into factors that I think are at play here. The first is the seemingly constant deterioration of the officiating, and the murky nature of the league's rules. Things that should be as cut and dried as humanly possible -- what is a catch? what does a player have to do to demonstrate possession of the ball? -- are a constant source of shrug, wait for replay, and we're into the realm of conspiracy theory and random chance. Any time a game can have its integrity questioned, it's not exactly a win for the league's broad appeal, especially to more casual fans.

Which leads me to the next point -- the NFL's declines are, in all likelihood, entirely in the realm of casual fans. Lifers are hooked on the stuff; it's the bigger crowds that gravitate in for night games and playoffs that generate growth in a mature market. Which is a major issue for the league, since two of three night telecasts seem to show the league at its worst, rather than at its most appealing. Games on Thursday are much more likely to show random or lesser teams, with blowouts more common due to the odd schedule, especially when one team comes in with more rest. Those games also get the coverage of Phil Simms, who might be the most irritating announcer on broadcast TV now, if my social media feed is any judge of it. The Monday Night Game has more of the Thursday feel to it, with Jon Gruden matching Simms' obsessions with quarterback minutiae and self-branding. I get that this isn't exactly new styles for either man, but with each passing year, the tendency seems to be getting stronger.

Before we move off the schedule, a further point about this: why is the league so skewed away from 4pm EST Sunday games? This week, we had 7 in the 1pm slot, and 2 in the 4pm; if the Falcons-Packers game hadn't been close, that entire block of time would have been must-skip TV. Combined with the increasing presence of games from London in the morning (can't imagine those are terribly popular with West Coast audiences at 7am local time), and nearly half of the league's games this weekend were viewable on broadcast, spread over a half dozen time slots. Maybe more, if you live in a media market with bleed over coverage fields. There's not much in the way of mystery anymore, and the timesink just keeps growing.

Speaking of the mystery draining out, let's look at fantasy football... which has likely crested in popularity, especially with the boom/bust nature of daily fantasy sites for an expansion of gambling opportunities. With the exercise growing further and further away from something a hobbyist could do without a major time commitment, we're going to a place where only hardcore nerds and fast twitch waiver wire obsessives need apply. More and more people seem to be cutting back on the number of leagues they play, and the demographic group of these leagues also looks to be graying. Not exactly a great trend for marketing pros.

A quick word about the compelling year and World Series that baseball is enjoying, and that's this: there's no strong likelihood of MLB really poaching much of the NFL's market. In its heyday, the NFL would just rollover any contenders to their time slot.

Here's another factor that I think people miss out on... the NFL's probably on the wrong side of momentum with women now. The annual October "pinkwashing" isn't without controversy or detractors now, and the league's sadly erratic history with cutting ties with domestic abuse perpetrators can't be doing much to help its chances. More and more moms and dads are keeping their kids away from the game for safety concerns, which also can't be helping.

Finally, this -- the NFL underserves its market through artificial shortages, by only playing at one time of the year, and not expanding into more regional markets that are currently dominated by high school and college games. As an aside, more and more folks in my network seem to be growing more interested in the college game, especially when it comes to casual betting. If nothing else, the announcing teams seem better.

No, the more you think about it, the more you might be inclined to think that we haven't seen the end of soft ratings for the NFL.

The bigger question is... have we hit the bottom yet, and if not, what does the bottom look like? (My guess is a Thursday night game between Tennessee and Jacksonville. But your mileage may vary.)

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