NFL SEEMS TO BE LOSING SOME OF ITS LUSTER
the project, Spanos was left with little choice but to join the Rams in their garish new stadium in Inglewood, even if it means playing two seasons in Carson’s tiny StubHub Center while it’s being built.
As ESPN.com writer Seth Wickersham put it, the NFL has “an owner unwillingly moving a team to a city that doesn’t seem to want it, sharing a stadium with an owner, Stan Kroenke, who doesn’t want to split it.”
TV ratings for NFL games were generally down this season, something that would have previously been unthinkable. In the first 14 weeks of the season, ratings were down 10%. A lot of that might have been attributable to a unique presidential campaign, but it’s still a red flag.
Lower ratings, for whatever reason, show that your product just isn’t as significant as it used to be. They show people they can live without it and once that starts, it can be difficult to restore it.
Now people in Los Angeles, the second-largest TV market in the USA, will be forced (DirecTV Sunday Ticket subscribers notwithstanding) to see Rams and Chargers games in place of what was previously a best-game-available policy. NFL rules stipulate all teams’ games be shown in their home market.
According to the St. Louis PostDispatch, the Rams’ 12 appearances on Fox’s KTTV (Channel 11) averaged only an 8.3 local rating. The Chargers’ nine games on KCBS (Channel 2) had just a 6.6 rating (L.A. had been considered a secondary market for the Chargers).
L.A. is a notoriously indifferent TV market. If the Rams or Chargers don’t improve their lackluster on-field product quickly (or perhaps even if they do), having even two teams in town isn’t likely to give much of a boost to TV ratings.
In addition to all this, there’s still the NFL’s elephant in the room: concussions.
The game has become more and more violent as players become stronger and more athletic. More and more of the game’s greats are regretting they even played the sport.
“If I knew back then what I know now,” former NFL star Bo Jackson told USA TODAY Sports last week, “I would have never played football. Never. I wish I had known about all of those head
injuries, but no one knew that. And the people that did know that, they wouldn’t tell anybody.
“The game has gotten so violent, so rough. We’re so much more educated on this CTE stuff (chronic traumatic encephalopathy), there’s no way I would ever allow my kids to play football today.
“Even though I love the sport, I’d smack them in the mouth if they said they wanted to play football.
“I’d tell them, ‘Play baseball, basketball, soccer, golf, just anything but football.’ ”
The NFL has looked invincible for so long, but as it heads toward its 51st Super Bowl, there are cracks in its iconic shield.
Carlisle writes for the Ventura County (Calif.) Star, part of the USA TODAY Network.