Are Major League Sports In Decline?

One of my best memories of my youth is watching St. Louis Cardinal baseball games on weekends with my dad. Watching the Cards with my Oklahoma kin folks in the early 1960s when I spent my summers down there was another happy memory.

Dizzy Dean, Hall of Fame former pitcher for St. Louis, was an Arkansas native and he spent many years commentating televised games for the Redbirds. He was funny and entertaining which meant that you would have a good two hours of entertainment between the play on the field and Dean’s comments from the booth. He often sang “The Wabash Cannonball” during broadcasts but I never knew why. I do know it was fun watching St. Louis and I have been a fan ever since then.

America is the go-to country when it comes to movies, music, television programming, printed materials and yes — sports. They all serve a bit of the same purpose. They provide an escape from stress, whether from the job or from the family, and it serves a really good function in keeping folks mentally refreshed.

No one watches sports for its educational value and they sure don’t watch it for its political instruction. Hence my headline lead, “Major league sports in decline?”

Way back in March, the United States entered a pandemic which resulted in millions of school children sent home, thousands of businesses shut down, thousands of churches forced to close their doors, tens of millions of Americans losing their livelihoods, with politicians scrambling to gain political advantages amidst the turmoil.

Movie houses have been and are staying closed, lots of restaurants have had their business cut in half or ended, the travel industry has taken huge hits, and life as people have previously known, ceased to exist. Cities are burning, hordes of young people are moving about the country leaving in their wake injury and destruction, and social media is lit up with people yelling at one another, predicting the end of mankind if the other ones’ political views are adopted.

After five months of unprecedented bad news and sobering outlooks for the future, Major League Baseball and the National Basketball Association were slated to get back in business in late July. Lots of rosy outlooks were predicted for the broadcast of the first pro sports team play in months.

Major League Baseball had their best year ever in 2019, and were hoping to top that in 2020 — until the covid-19 virus shut their season down. The NBA was so-so when covid-19 hit but they, like baseball, were counting on huge television success when live games were finally back on the air.

Needham and Camp analyst Laura Martin, a respected numbers cruncher predicted that the comeback for baseball and basketball would be stratospheric. She believed that sports starved fans were desperate for the product the NBA and MLB produce with huge ratings victories in the offing.

Martin said “the return of live TV sports will set records” with the last half of 2020 making up for the first.

With the two sports bleeding money with the shutdowns, and people needing an escape from the pressures of living in 2020, success was all but assured. As most folks know, pro sports’ real money comes via advertising. Product manufacturers pay the sports organizations money for placing ads during the games’ broadcasts.

Here’s the rub. The more fans watch a particular game, the more the ads cost. The reverse is also true.

Colin Kaepernick was a benched quarterback for the 49ers in San Francisco. He decided to attract attention for himself by disrespecting the American flag by kneeling during the National Anthem. He got the attention he wanted, convinced others to follow his example and though he hasn’t played a down since 2016, he is now worth close to $100 million dollars in contracts he signed because of his activism.

The NFL lost millions and millions of dollars when pro football players opted to disrespect the United States before games. Then fans started tuning out the games, and the losses mounted through until the protests faded in 2019. Billions of dollars were lost.

The NFL made $8 billion in ad revenue last year. A return to protests and mixing sports with politics will almost certainly take a bite out of the league’s viability.

We need only to look at the roll out of baseball and basketball last month. Baseball had a big first night but when fans tuned in to see political messages on the field, they tuned out, leading to sharp declines in following nights.

Just before the leagues’ reopened play, ESPN ran a prime time program featuring former New England Patriot quarterback Tom Brady hitting golf balls off a tee. The program attracted 5.18 million viewers. That has been the most watched show since.

The NBA did baseball one better. They had political messages on their courts, and they also removed players’ names from jerseys so they could place more political messages that fans had no choice but to see. Their ratings sank like the Titanic.

Professional golf is now the ratings leader at ESPN. A recent PGA tourney in Memphis outperformed pro basketball and now that network is going to tape delay golf tournaments to be broadcast in prime time. First time in history.

The most political pro sport is basketball and its ratings are tanking.

Golf is the least political pro sport and its ratings are soaring.

If the NFL is still set to emulate the NBA with political messaging, they may have a hard time making ends meet.

People do not watch pro sports to be preached to or scolded. They watch to be entertained. Pro sports changing their core mission from playing their sport to affecting political change will be their undoing.

JOHN MCGEE, AN AWARDWINNING COLUMNIST, SPORTS WRITER AND ART TEACHER AT PEA RIDGE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS, WRITES A REGULAR SPORTS COLUMN FOR THE TIMES OF NORTHEAST BENTON COUNTY. THE OPINIONS EXPRESSED ARE THOSE OF

THE WRITER. HE CAN BE CONTACTED THROUGH THE TIMES AT PRTNEWS@NWADG. COM.