Color Commentary
What Fans, Lawmakers, Sports Writers and Others Have to Say About Expensive Sports Networks
Elected Officials
“Changes to the existing rules to tip the scales in favor of one party are particularly unwarranted in the case of the NFL Network. [The NFL] wields tremendous market power. Indeed, I am hard-pressed to think of a commercial enterprise that similarly dominates the market it serves; and its power continues to grow.”
Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA)
Letter to FCC Chairman Kevin Martin
November 19, 2007
Former NFL Players:
“This only hurts the fans that love our game the most. The blackout that threatened to keep Pats and Giants fans from seeing the season finale in December affected over a dozen other NFL markets in 2007 - from the Bay Area to Maine, from Texas to Wisconsin - and the league shows no signs of letting up.”
Duriel Harris, NFL All-Pro & former Miami Dolphin
NFL still trying to gouge fans on TV games, The Philadelphia Inquirer
February 17, 2008
Others:
“[T]he NFL's decree that church congregations be barred from hosting Super Bowl viewing parties highlighted how absurd the league's vise-like grip on where, when and how fans can watch games has become. For years, the NFL has denied local fans the ability to see games on broadcast television if the game doesn't sell out three days in advance -- discriminating against elderly, disabled and otherwise-homebound fans.
More recently, the league has resorted to holding games hostage by taking them off the broadcast schedule and squirreling them away on the new NFL Network, for which the league wants all cable and satellite subscribers to pay a hefty ransom. … While the league's zeal for getting a cut of the profits that bars and restaurants reap from such ‘public viewings’ of the Super Bowl may be understandable, applying the same rules to nonprofit religious groups is simply deplorable. The NFL needs to perform some penance for its greed.”
Rev. Willie Wilson, Union Temple Baptist Church
The NFL’s Deadly Sin, The Washington Post
February 9, 2008
Columnists, Reporters, Editorials:
“Instead of depriving most of the nation's fans a chance to see the Patriots go for a perfect regular season, the NFL folded like a cheap suit and put the game on network TV. You might think a new strategy was in order. But the league and NFL Network chief executive officer Steve Bornstein wildly overestimated the leverage they would have with cable companies. The NFL Network charges 70 cents per customer, and because the majority of fans aren't clamoring for the channel, cable companies are winning with the argument that subscribers who aren't football followers shouldn't have to pay.”
Column by Vito Stellino
League's TV strategy confusing, The Florida Times-Union
April 20, 2008
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