Important Note:
Opinions are fun. My friends tell me I am someone with lots of opinions and that's fine since I don't get mad at others when they disagree with me. In this same spirit I am interested in hearing yours views as long as you are able to share your views without boiling over. I look forward to hearing from you. I tend to write in the form of short essays most of the time, but contributions do not need to be in this same format or size. Some of the content here will date itself pretty quickly, other content may be virtually timeless, this is for the reader to judge.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1
The home team and my living room
Posted at: Jan/16/2014 : Posted by: mel
Related Category: Common Sense, Sports,
I have never been very good at that spare time thing. If I am not working or sleeping, I am probably doing something for youth soccer or attempting a long overdue home project. Sunday, January 5th, 2014 was a rare event for me as I watched most of one football game and part of another. I was not an overt fan of any of the teams playing that day, it just became part of my afternoon. In truth, I am what most would call a “fair weather fan,” so I was amazed to see the seats filled at Lambeau field despite the extreme weather conditions. It was less than 10 degrees Fahrenheit at the time of the kickoff in Green Bay Wisconsin, thank goodness for television and a comfortable family room. I know, I live in sunny Southern California, but it amazes me that anyone would endure the cold and discomfort to see the game in person. I remember as a 10 year-old watching the legendary “Ice Bowl” at a friend’s house on their brand new 17 inch black-n-white TV. With the temperature at -15F in Green Bay and the grass field frozen, Bart Starr dove over the goal line in a quarterback sneak with 16 seconds left on the clock giving the Packers a 21-17 victory over the Cowboys in the NFL Championship (Now called the Superbowl). Last weekend the winds of the jet stream shifted bringing extreme arctic cold weather again to the northeastern part of the country. The weather guys called this the “polar-vortex” and the sports commentators were speculating on another Ice Bowl. While it did not get in the sub-zero temperatures, it was nevertheless a very cold day to sit in an open stadium. I have actually attended a few professional football games in the past. I have to admit that the in-person experience is a great deal different from the television experience. In my home, the viewing experience is aided by 6-10 cameras along with a direction staff that are constantly zooming in on just the right angle ensuring I have an impossibly great perspective of the action. When play does stop, I am generally taken to a commercial with a significant amount of adult oriented double entendre. I have to admit that the lines for food and the restrooms are a lot shorter at my home than at the stadium. Nevertheless, there are some cool things going on at the stadium that I can’t get at home. Regardless of how good or bad the game is, there is always entertaining behavior in the stands. I guess in retrospect I should be happy that guests don’t behave in the same way when they are in my living room. Of course, when play stops at the stadium the ever smiling cheerleaders rush to entertain...I have never had a squad of cheerleaders in my living room and they are clearly, much more entertaining than a beer commercial. I can’t imagine enthusiastically cheering for the home team when my teeth are chattering. If my TV is to be believed, that's what fans did during the weekend’s frigid opening round of the NFL playoffs. It was 10 degrees in Green Bay, 25 in Philadelphia, and in the 30s in Cincinnati. I can easily relate to the fans that watched from the comfort of their warm living rooms and still boasted of their team loyalty. Just because you are in your favorite chair doesn’t mean you’re not dedicated to your team. For the fans that attended the games and braved the extreme cold, I now understand why a “fan” is derived from the word “fanatic.” Sports promoters go out of their way to convince us that fans should always support their home team, regardless of defeat or poor management. I personally find this notion ridiculous, but that may also explain why I don’t watch or follow a lot of sports. I don’t go to restaurants that serve me poorly prepared food and I don’t return to the grocery store that always has long lines. I definitely won’t return to the local cleaner if they ruin my shirts, even if they are the closest. In that same spirit, just because a team is from my home town does not guarantee an endorsement from me. That team needs to earn my support with quality staff, good management and solid execution. At some point years ago you were probably bounced around on your grandfather’s knee while he told you about an era when “men were real men.” The football fields were large puddles of frozen mud and the players wore helmets made only of sewn leather. For the fan, the only way to see their team play was to brave the elements and cheer for that team while wrapped in the bear skin from the creature you wrestled with days earlier. I don’t know how much of that is true, but grandfathers like to tell stories flavored like that. It sounds like pretty godforsaken and gruesome conditions to me. I think I would have preferred the comfort of a drafty old house and the static laced hum from the old console tube AM radio. I do know that the meager salaries players’ received in that lost era all came from the tickets fans bought in exchange for the privilege of dragging their butts’ through the metal turnstiles at the stadium. Television has changed the game of football quite a bit. Beyond the spider cameras racing back and forth on cables over the field, there are the commercials. Play on the field is often stopped so that those watching from home can be reminded they need more chips or have the wrong brand of pickup parked in their driveway. Clearly, the viewers at home have priority over those at the stadium. In truth, sports tickets have likely become passé. The best seat is in your living room. Television contracts have elevated the football audience from tens of thousands to tens of millions. The result in the new era is that television contracts are now the primary source of revenue for a team’s management, the owners profit and the players’ salaries. Advertising agencies devote a lot of energy to studying and bragging about how many millions of people are watching the game at any given time on their televisions. As with anything involving people, there are always contradictions. One of the most glaring in football is the infamous “blackout rule.” Effectively, these rules promise that if a certain minimum number of seats are not sold at any given game, the television broadcast is blocked for that community. This notion amazes me since it is reasonable to presume that a sizable portion of the viable TV audience for any game would come from that team’s local community. With television dollars driving the league, the contradictory blackout rules mean that large groups of potential views may be deprived access to their team’s game. Instead of being told they need a new razor, a special brand of chips or to rush out and buy the car of the year while dealer interest rates are low, they are likely mowing the lawn. Television contracts are driven by advertising dollars which are motivated by the number of viewers making this practice seems contradictory to me. Three of the first-round NFL playoff games did not immediately sell out this season. By league dictate this means the entire home-team city that failed in its ticketed support would have been summarily punished; deprived of a televised rendition of the game. It reminded me of one of those old westerns; the bad guys threaten to burn down the town unless someone steps forward and sacrifices himself. Despite being post season games, with bone chilling temperatures the community support was not there to freeze your tush to an outdoor stadium seat. I would have thought that with big-screen and beer sales up just before the weekend...that would be enough. If I lived in metropolitan Cincinnati, I would have much preferred putting on warm clothes and trudging a block or two, before parking myself in a friends ‘man-cave’ as opposed to spending 3 hours outside watching the game in person. With enough pleading, a number of Cincinnati based business stepped up buying some of the remaining blocks of tickets and the local broadcast blackout was lifted. I wonder how many people would have returned their new big-screen TV’s if the leagues ban had not been removed? The idea of blackmail has always offended me and this sure sounds like that legendary form of extortion. Maybe the reason for the blackout rule is because the television broadcast looks better when the stadium seating is full and sounds better with the cheering masses. Hollywood moved past hiring 50k extra’s for their big movie events years ago. Now they use a handful of real people, a few hundred inflatable fans, and a lot of computer graphics to make them seem like 50 thousand. Obviously, if the game was managed by a major studio, they would add a sound track to fully complement the television viewing experience. In the end, the best seat for any major sporting event is in my living room. As luck would have it, that first Sunday of the NFL playoff season represented more football than I had watched all season. With idle Saturday’s and Sunday’s a rare commodity in my life, I doubt I will watch any more football this season. As a fair weather fan, my football season was over after one game. Inflated ticket prices, television blackouts, luxury boxes and whining players with inflated salaries have made sitting in the stands at a major sporting event inaccessible to most people. In truth, I have found a way to enjoy the best of both sports viewing experiences. With the aid of my computer I can watch the best of the commercials and enjoy the cheerleaders as well while munching on the chips of my choice.
Comments (0) [Add Comment]
