As far as NFL football is concerned, we know ratings are down for the second year in a row as more and more football players, teams and now the entire franchise is standing behind players’ “right” to protest the National Anthem.
But we also know now that ticket sales at games are plummeting as well.
Since President Donald Trump called on team owners to fire players who “take a knee” to protest the American Flag and the Star Spangled Banner, the top online NFL ticket reseller TickPick reports sales have dropped almost 18 percent after Week Three.
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Last year, the drop at the same time in the season was almost 11 percent following Week Three games.
“We have seen a massive decrease in NFL ticket purchases this past week in comparison to years past. Week 3 seems to usually have less ticket orders than week 2, but this year ticket purchases are down more than 7 percent from this time last year,” said TickPick’s Jack Slingland.
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“While we can’t specify if this decrease is due to the president’s comments, player and owner protests, play on the field, or simply the continued division of consumer’s media attention, the conversation around the NFL this week has focused on the president’s comments as well as the players’ and owners’ reaction. As viewers continue to abandon their NFL Sunday habits, both the number of ticket sales and the purchase price of tickets will drop,” he told The Washington Examiner.
This should really come as no surprise. After a third week of mass protests by the NFL – the teams, the players, and now the entire league – ratings are swirling the toilet bowl.
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Through the first three weeks of the season, viewership for national telecasts of NFL games is down 11 percent compared to last year, the AP is reporting.
The games averaged 17.63 million viewers for the first three weeks of last season, but have dropped to just 15.65 million this year.
Those numbers may drop even lower, as DirecTV has offered an unprecedented cancellation option for NFL Sunday Ticket if a subscriber takes issue with the kneeling demonstrations.
The ratings have bombed because the NFL has politicized the games. People on the right are critical of the demonstrations against the National Anthem, and leftists are angry at the perceived mistreatment of their hero, Colin Kaepernick, the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback, who has yet to be signed by a team.
The protests have spread rapidly across the league after President Trump denounced them. Even the NFL came out in defense of their players.
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Next week, the ratings will be in even closer focus, since Fox News’ Sean Hannity and others have demanded – sometimes indirectly – a boycott of all NFL games.
“You’re spending a thousand dollars to go to a football game and it’s going to insult so many Americans,” Hannity said. “I don’t believe in boycotts, but naturally people are going to get turned off and turn away.”
If the players don’t tone down their behavior, he said, revenue and ratings will continue to drop.
“Players are going to see their contract numbers begin to go down, and once it starts hurting their bottom line I think they’re going to realize, maybe the American people would rather see football and would rather join and honor their country first,” Hannity said.
