Page 13 - Florida Sentinel 8-15-17

Sports
How To Boycott The NFL:
Stop Watching The Games On TV In Response
To The Blackballing Of Colin Kaepernick
By Terry Lee Blavity.com
During the 2016 Na- tional Football League (NFL) season, San Fran- cisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick made national headlines for kneeling during game opening National Anthem performances.
His purpose was to protest the systematic op- pression of Black people in America, particularly the issue of police brutality. Although he pursues a noble cause using his First Amendment free speech rights, since the season ended Kaepernick has been without an NFL job.
In a league that has given numerous chances to felons, domestic
abusers, and substance abusers, the blackballing of a player who used the visibility of professional sports to peacefully bring awareness to an issue is particularly troubling.
In response, Black lead- ers such as Shaun King of Black Lives Matter have called for a boycott of the NFL.
Boycotts, if executed correctly, can make it eco- nomically unfeasible for a decision maker to ignore the cause of tension.
For those considering boycotting the NFL, an ef- fective boycott should be focused on impacting tele- vision revenue, which is the NFL’s largest source of revenue.
Since March when Kaepernick opted out of
his contract with the 49ers, only two NFL teams have shown serious inter- est in him, the Seattle Sea- hawks and the Baltimore Ravens.
The Seahawks invited Kaepernick to a workout in June, but instead signed Austin Davis, a journey- man who was unsigned the entire 2016 season. Head Coach Pete Car- roll, who has aided in the development of elite quar- terbacks such as Matt Leinart and Russell Wilson, remarked dur- ing an interview that Kaepernick has the tal- ent of a starter.
The Ravens were in need of a capable backup quarterback after longtime starter Joe Flacco sus- tained a back injury dur- ing the offseason.
According to ESPN’s Dianna Russini, Ravens Head Coach John Harbaugh and General Manager Ozzie Newsome supported the po- tential signing of Kaepernick, but owner Steve Bis- ciotti was against
it.
The Ravens ulti-
mately signed David Olson, a former Stanford and Clemson quarterback who threw only three passes in his entire col- lege career, complet-
ing one. Kaepernick has a
solid NFL resume; he led the 49ers to the 2012 Super Bowl and threw 16 touch- downs and four interceptions after reclaiming his starting job for the last ten weeks of the
2016 season. When Kaep- ernick’s re- sume is compared to other quarter-
backs that have received contracts this offseason, the lack of interest in sign- ing him seems less about his playing ability and more about his protests.
The NFL sustained a revenue of around $13.3 Billion in 2015, and NFL Commis- sioner Roger Goodell has set the goal of fur- ther increasing league revenue to $25 Billion by 2027.
According to Greg Mc- Farlane of Investopedia, about two-thirds of the NFL’s revenue, in the ball- park of $8.87 billion, comes from television rev- enue. The NFL’s television revenue is derived from short term contracts with television broadcasters (CBS, NBC, ABC, etc.), cable packages, and mo- bile webcasts.
According to Nielsen Media Research, Black men and women comprise the second largest demo- graphic of NFL television observers, preceded only by White men and women. In 2016, Nielsen reported 7.1 million NFL full regu- lar season viewers, aged 18-49. Of that population, Black people comprise 1.2 million viewers or 17.3 percent of the group.
Due to the amount of Black viewers and the large percentage of NFL revenue that television is responsible for, a boycott focused on television views could be particularly effective.
It should be organized by coordinating a mass cancellation or refusal of cable packages, mobile webcasts, and by simply not tuning into NFL media on home televisions. This would decimate the NFL television revenue by elim- inating a large portion of their second largest viewer population.
This would impact the NFL at large, and put pressure on NFL owners
who looked down upon the public stance Colin Kaepernick took on po- lice brutality.
A second order effect could be a decrease in the value of advertisement bids to the NFL, as compa- nies broadcasting to NFL audiences will reach smaller audiences, dimin- ishing the effectiveness of the advertisement.
The long term effect may not lead to an NFL job for Colin Kaeper- nick, but it may cause NFL teams to second guess turning down out- spoken players in the fu- ture, for fear of financial repercussion.
Regardless of method or reason for protesting, Black people in America are unfairly seen as mili- tant when they take a stance.
This narrative is reflec- tive of the way Colin Kaepernick, Mah- moud Abdul-Rauf, and other public figures have been perceived. Different from other ethnic groups, Black people have to be uniquely hyper aware of the perceptions painted by their thoughts on social matters, particularly in the age of social media.
Black buying power is projected to rise to new highs in 2017 of around $1.2 trillion, making Black America the 15th largest economy in the world by Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Protesting the NFL by leveraging the rising spending power of Black people, as opposed to out- wardly observable means of protest, will prove to be effective by making a dent in NFL owner’s pockets, while also protecting the livelihood of Black people sympathetic to Colin Kaepernick’s circum- stance.
When the boycott is or- ganized, will you partici- pate?
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