Media Economics & Sports

The economic system involving sports, corporate America, and the media is an interdependent one. Athletes make huge sums of money paid to them by owners who make even larger sums of money. Agents, free agency, and other phenomena keep athlete salaries rising. So, too, does increased ticket sales to games, increased TV viewership, enormous media contracts, TV advertising, and corporate sponsorship and endorsement deals. The economic rewards in the sports industry are so enormous that corporate America, the media, and sports franchises are driven to earn a larger slice of the profit pie. Mergers and acquisitions, alliances, cross-promotion, enormous advertising expenditures, staggering media contracts, and a host of other phenomena are used as a means of retaining competitive advantage among teams, among corporations, and among media and advertising players. This analysis will explore some of these phenomena in the National Football League (NFL), the richest media prize in sports, in o

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e considered unheard of in today’s relationship, the NFL agreeing to reduce its rights fees after the networks lost money on their deal in 1987 (Fatsis and Pope 1). These days such cozy negotiations are a thing of the past, with the deal between CBS and the NFL demonstrating the hardball tactics now used by the league aware of the enormous profit potential and revenues from media rights “It was, in fact, hard-nosed bargaining – including a half-billion-dollar bluff – by the NFL and its skillful commissioner, Paul Tagliabue, that ran up the record bids” (Fatsis, et al, 1). Revenues are generated for the 28 sports franchises in the NFL from the following sources: gate receipts, media revenues (television-cable, national, local, and radio), stadium revenues (concessions, advertising, parking, suites, luxury seating), licensing and merchandising. Sports franchises enjoy enormous revenues from these sources, and it is quite revealing to disclose that in the history of football franchises no franchise owner has ever sold a team without making a profit. Yet, while the above revenue sources have always been profitable for franchise owners, the significance of these sources has changed now that the media, corporate America, and sports
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Approximate Word count = 2186
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page)