Ed_Formerly_of_Roch Posted July 8, 2013 Posted July 8, 2013 To me this is the most blatant attempt at trying to win votes from people. You can't change the rules after the fact. You want to make that a new law, from now on if you take money, no blackouts, great, I have no problem with that. But when the state handed RW and other owners the checks, there weren't any conditions related to blackouts, so now after he has the money, you want to add rules retroactive. So who thinks if the when the state handed RW the check and if they had told him no more blackouts, he would have accepted it. Even if he wanted to to, the league would have prevented it. More than likely he would have handed the check back and said I'll call you from LA. Do I like blackouts, no, is it fair, probably not, but suggesting to change the rules after the fact is a joke. I hope for his sake he stays in politics a long time as I'd hate to see him practicing on the outside. I recall around 15 years ago, a state senator from Rochester, Dollenger I think it was was pushing the same point. He was on the Bob Matthews show talking about it, funny it was an election year too. I called up afterwards and said the same thing now, you can't change the rules after giving them the money. In May, the 2008 presidential nominee introduced a bill that would prohibit the league from blacking out games in markets in which teams have used public financing for stadium construction. "I think that's outrageous," McCain testified May 14 during a Senate subcommittee hearing. "Now, if that stadium is not taxpayer-financed, then that owner can do anything they want to. But if the taxpayers paid for them then, by God, I think the taxpayers ought to be able to see the game whether they sell out the stadium or not."
Orton's Arm Posted July 8, 2013 Posted July 8, 2013 You had me somewhat persuaded, until this last sentence. We can choose to pay, or not pay. No one said we owe them anything. And they dont owe us anything either. (I majored in Econ too, many years ago). Natural monopolies do occur. The problem is not that they charge higher, or obtain Economic Rent. Rather, w/r/t government involvement, the problem is when they abuse that market power. Whether the NFL is or isnt abusing its monopoly, to the detriment of the public, is open to debate. But to me, the NFL is a luxury item, not a necessity like electricity, clean water, etc. So the less necessary is the product, the less the govt. should throw its weight into the situation. > Natural monopolies do occur. The problem is not that they charge higher, or obtain Economic Rent. Monopolies do charge higher prices than would have occurred in a competitive market. This results in a lower quantity supplied; and therefore in a deadweight loss. It also results in a transfer of wealth to the monopolists--a much greater wealth transfer than would have occurred in competitive conditions. Depending on perspective, some might see all this as a problem; others might not. I personally don't like it at all, but I respect your right to disagree with me. > Rather, w/r/t government involvement, the problem is when they abuse that market power. Anything they do to reduce competition--to make conditions more monopolistic than otherwise would have been the case--constitutes an abuse of market power. The sole purpose of the blackout rule is to prevent competition between one facet of the NFL (televised games) and another facet (stadium attendance). No monopoly should be permitted to engage in competition-reducing behavior such as this. > But to me, the NFL is a luxury item, not a necessity like electricity, clean water, etc. So the less > necessary is the product, the less the govt. should throw its weight into the situation. I'll go along with that. At the same time, anti-competitive business practices should be illegal for any monopoly, no matter how unnecessary its product.
CodeMonkey Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 (edited) But to me, the NFL is a luxury item, not a necessity like electricity, clean water, etc. So the less necessary is the product, the less the govt. should throw its weight into the situation. But the thing is, the government has already thrown their weight into the situation by its concessions on the monopoly as well as government handouts in the form of tax breaks and stadium funding. Eliminate all of these things and i agree with you. Edited July 9, 2013 by CodeMonkey
yall Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 (edited) What the hell am I missing? If the blackout rule is lifted, why would local over the air affiliates still be barred from broadcasting the game? the logic seems to be "We shouldnt cure cancer, because no one will make cancer drugs anymore, and then you can't treat cancer". Edited July 9, 2013 by yall
bigK14094 Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 Requiring a total sell out of tickets three days in advance has always seemed a bit harsh - especially when you consider Rich stadium had a capacity of 80,000+ (largest crowd was 80,368 10/4/92 Bills Vs Miami), and a lot of large market teams had stadiums well below that. Sure, The Ralph now only seats 73,000, yet here's a list of current stadiums with lower seating capacity: University of Phoenix Stadium 63,400 Soldier Field, Chicago 61,500 Reliant Stadium, Houston 71,054 Raymond James Stadium, Tampa 65,908 Qualcomm Stadium, San Diego 70,561 Paul Brown Stadium, Cincinnati 65,535 Oakland Co. Coliseum 53,200 Mall of America Field, Minneapolis 64,121 M&T Bank Stadium, Baltimore 71,008 Lucas Oil Stadium, Indianapolis 62,421 LP Field, Nashville 69,143 Lincoln Financial Field, Philly 68,532 Heinz Field, Pittsburgh 65,050 Gillette Stadium, Foxborough 68,756 Georgia Dome, Atlanta 71,228 Ford Field, Detroit 65,000 EverBank Field, Jacksonville 67,246 Edward Jones Dome, St Louis 66,965 Century Link Field, Seattle 67,000 Candlestick Park, San Francisco 69,732 Plus new stadiums for San Fran (68,500); Minnesota (65,000); Atlanta (65,000) will all be smaller than The Ralph if and when they're built. I think the NFL should lift the blackout for all stadiums when they sell the same number of tickets equal to that of the team playing each week with the SMALLEST STADIUM's capacity. That would be parity. So, for example if Oakland is playing then no team would have a blackout if they sold 53,200 tickets. If Oakland isn't playing and Chicago is - then the number grows to 61,500 tickets. Why the hell should Buffalo get blacked out after selling 71,500 tickets and a city like Chicago gets free tv with 10,000 fewer tickets sold? Its about revenue, not seats. Buffalo tickets are cheaper than most in the NFL, partly because of the larger stadium allows lower ticket prices. So, more tickets have to be sold to increase revenue to near the mean.
kasper13 Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 Blackout rule is beyond archaic. When it was passed in 1973, you got 4 TV stations. No cable let alone HD. No internet. No smart phones. So many more options today. International Cable in Buffalo tried to defy the blackout rule once. Philly with Ron Jaworski at QB was here for a Thursday Night game. 1981. International Cable said they were going to show the game on TV and screw the blackout rule. I think they showed a quarter or a half before they were shutdown. Anyway, if they want it to be fair, take the average capacity of the home stadiums for the week and if you sell whatever that number is- no blackout. Teams put tarps on seats. Other places have millions more people than WNY and yet have smaller capacity stadiums. There is always going to be a problem selling out one or two games a year as long as the Bills are a bad team. That's just the way it is.
Metal Man Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 What the hell am I missing? If the blackout rule is lifted, why would local over the air affiliates still be barred from broadcasting the game? the logic seems to be "We shouldnt cure cancer, because no one will make cancer drugs anymore, and then you can't treat cancer". You know I thought you might be missing something... but when I went back and re-read the article there wasn't any explanation about the scenario the NFL guy talked about where directTV would show the game in Minnesota but the local Minnesota affiliates could not.... Maybe I am missing something too?
CodeMonkey Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 You know I thought you might be missing something... but when I went back and re-read the article there wasn't any explanation about the scenario the NFL guy talked about where directTV would show the game in Minnesota but the local Minnesota affiliates could not.... Maybe I am missing something too? If the game is blacked out it is also blacked out for DirectTV. I know that for a fact. But if you think about it, people are paying for the ticket and some of that money finds it's way into the pockets of the NFL owners. So they should not be blacked out at all.
Tsaikotic Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 (edited) Not to hi-jack this thread..but how do you do this? If you hook your laptop up to your HD tv, can you watch anything on the computer, using your TV as a monitor? I tried this once, at my sisters house (didn't have a laptop of my own at the time), but had no luck. Can you do this, and watch, say, Youtube videos on your 46' HDTV? Is it as simple as just running an HDMI cable from your laptop to your tv? I use a 40" hdtv as my monitor...mine is hooked up with just hdmi cable...if your vid card has hdmi out just use hdmi cable...some hdtv's have a dvi input in case you have a normal vid card...if you have a newer hdtv then you should have a "pc" option on your list of input options on your tv...so plug in your laptop/desktop using which ever option you have and turn your tv input to "pc"....you might be able to just use hdmi input 2 or 3 if you don't have pc option oops..sorry...wrote this post before reading page 2 where you guys go into more detail on how to hook it up...oh well Edited July 9, 2013 by Tsaikotic
Metal Man Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 (edited) If the game is blacked out it is also blacked out for DirectTV. I know that for a fact. But if you think about it, people are paying for the ticket and some of that money finds it's way into the pockets of the NFL owners. So they should not be blacked out at all. Yeah, I get the first part and I agree with the second. What I think Yall was getting at was a part in the article where an NFL spokesperson talked about some scenario where directTV wouldn't be blacked out but local TV still would be and was using it as an argument against dropping, or for keeping the black out rule. But if the rule went away wouldn't local affiliates be able to show it as well as DTV? :blink: It's just weird that no one called them out on that... or maybe the author of the article used an old quote that was originally just an argument for DTV being blacked out...? That is the only thing that makes sense to me. Edited July 9, 2013 by Metal Man
maddenboy Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 It seems that the consensus here is to LIFT the blackouts. But, if that happens, probably stadium attendance will slowly but surely drop. (If you disagree, please tell us why, and remember we live in a colder market). If attendance drops, and with a very small, economically depressed market, we would lose yet another reason for the future owner to keep the team in Buffalo. So taken to the extreme, would you rather, in 5 years, have a team here that you cant watch unless it "sells out" (however they end up defining "sell out") or watch the Los Angeles Bills or the London Bills anytime they're on TV?
CodeMonkey Posted July 10, 2013 Posted July 10, 2013 (edited) It seems that the consensus here is to LIFT the blackouts. But, if that happens, probably stadium attendance will slowly but surely drop. (If you disagree, please tell us why, and remember we live in a colder market). If attendance drops, and with a very small, economically depressed market, we would lose yet another reason for the future owner to keep the team in Buffalo. So taken to the extreme, would you rather, in 5 years, have a team here that you cant watch unless it "sells out" (however they end up defining "sell out") or watch the Los Angeles Bills or the London Bills anytime they're on TV? I'm not sure that I disagree completely, but I doubt that its true. I did a very unscientific survey of myself and a few friends/coworkers, all Bills fans, no season ticket holders, most go to at least one game every couple years at the Ralph. Out of the 10 people (told you it was unscientific ) exactly zero said they have ever, or would even consider going to a game because it was blacked out. If they could not watch it live, they would watch the replay in a few days. About half said they record the game to watch later half the time anyway due to not wanting to spend a Sunday afternoon watching football. So I do not see blackouts generating significant last minute ticket sales. And most of the last minute sales would probably be from stubhub etc. and not the Bills ticket office anyway. However, an argument could be made, I suppose, that no blackout rule could cause some people on the fence about seasons to say the heck with it and watch on TV. But again, I would not expect that number to grow to be anything near significant. And a better cure for the apathetic TV viewer is to not suck as a team, not blackouts, anyway. Bottom line, the people that are going to go, are going to do so blackout or no blackout rule. And the ones who prefer to watch from their couch are going to do so, blackout or no blackout rule. The blackout rule just delays some people seeing the game for a few days, that's pretty much it. Edited July 10, 2013 by CodeMonkey
atlbillsfan1975 Posted July 10, 2013 Posted July 10, 2013 Kind of weird McCain brings this subject up. Attendance to games has been on a decline for a few years now. Due large in part to the HD experience and being able to watch games in your home vs a stadium with a bunch of obnoxious (d)ucktards! If anything i think the NFL is going to be looking for ways to bring fans back to the stadium. Hopefully it is positive means, ticket prices, overall experience heightened, etc...
Mr. WEO Posted July 11, 2013 Posted July 11, 2013 It seems that the consensus here is to LIFT the blackouts. But, if that happens, probably stadium attendance will slowly but surely drop. (If you disagree, please tell us why, and remember we live in a colder market). If attendance drops, and with a very small, economically depressed market, we would lose yet another reason for the future owner to keep the team in Buffalo. So taken to the extreme, would you rather, in 5 years, have a team here that you cant watch unless it "sells out" (however they end up defining "sell out") or watch the Los Angeles Bills or the London Bills anytime they're on TV? Don't have to chose between London or LA Bills because neither will happen. Anyway, all evidence points toward the blackout rule having little effect in Buffalo. It doesn't spur people to buy more tickets--and why should it? The people going to the games aren't buying tickets to avoid a blackout for the home viewer. It's a pointless rule. Also, the weather in Buffalo has nothing to do with sellouts. Several cold (or colder) weather teams (GB, NE are 2) don't have any trouble selling tickets in December...
Just Jack Posted July 11, 2013 Posted July 11, 2013 Also, the weather in Buffalo has nothing to do with sellouts. Several cold (or colder) weather teams (GB, NE are 2) don't have any trouble selling tickets in December... Because when December comes, they're still playoff contenders.
RealityCheck Posted July 11, 2013 Posted July 11, 2013 The layers of bulls**t on this subject are slowly being peeled off like an onion. Football for many fans is an addiction (I know I am), and the NFL knows this. Clever marketing aside, they are trying to squeeze every penny they can out of the fans. They use these convoluted explanations that don't add up because the last thing that they want to say "listen, last year was great, but it's not enough money. It will never be enough money, and if you don't support the local team directly, we will use propaganda to create the illusion that we will move the team and try to create leverage to extract it from you in taxes. One way or the other, we would like to extract every penny we can from every orifice of your proverbial body. So what will it be? If we have to for the tax money of non-football fans, then we will". Wages haven't budged for a while, all budgets are collectively running deficits, and expenses are rising, the owners have recognized this trend for a while and understand that if they don't use every tactic possible, they stand to trend backwards in terms of revenue. Looking at how the salary cap is trending is indicative of some hard choices. A true believer in capitalism understands that you vote with your money, the rest of it is window dressing for the idealists.
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