NEW ORLEANS — NFL commissioner Roger Goodell was more forthcoming than usual during Monday’s annual “State of the League” press conference. Here are five media-centric takeaways from Goodell’s comments.
Brady Rules
No, Goodell’s NFL does not care about Tom Brady’s alleged conflict of interest serving as Fox Sports’ No. 1 game analyst while simultaneously owning a minority slice of the Raiders. Brady said Goodell has been “incredibly cooperative” about balancing his dual responsibilities. “He calls frequently about it and says, ‘Am I doing O.K.?’” said Goodell. “I think he’s serious that he separates the two and doesn’t put the league or anyone in a position of conflict.”
I always thought this “Brady Rules” story was overblown. It’s good for the NFL to have a player with seven Super Bowl rings beam into American homes on football Sundays. It’s good for Brady and Fox, which pays $2.3 billion a year for the NFC package and Super Bowls (this will be its second Big Game telecast in three years). The notion that some Falcons assistant coach was going to blow Brady’s mind with a new X’s and O’s innovation was always spurious. The five-time Super Bowl MVP holds the record for most regular-season and postseason wins, most fourth-quarter comebacks, most passing yards, and most TD passes. If anything, he teaches them …
No Flopping Penalty
The NFL will not institute a “flopping for flags” penalty. The question was clearly a product of recent narratives around Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes, who’s perfected the art of dancing along the sidelines until he gets shoved, thereby drawing a late-hit penalty by dramatically flopping out of bounds.
Bottom line: I doubt the NFL is going to target the league’s golden boy as he, Travis Kelce, and the Chiefs draw millions of fans into the league’s TV orbit. To their credit, the zebras didn’t fall for Mahomes’s antics during the Chiefs’ divisional playoff win over the Texans. The three-time Super Bowl champ wisely kept that piece of gamesmanship in his back pocket during the AFC championship win over the Bills. “That has not been a significant issue for us,” said Goodell. “The competition committee has talked about that in the past. They probably could talk about it in the future. Wouldn’t surprise me.” Translation: Forget it.
League Favorites
Goodell did not humor the fan narrative that NFL refs favor the Chiefs. Goodell called it a “ridiculous theory.”
Really? Goodell and the NFL can lecture us all they want about how great their part-time refs are. But quite frankly, I think they stunk as a group this year. Fair or unfair, there’s a perception the Chiefs get preferential treatment. I think the NFL should try to get its arms around this issue rather than gaslighting us about how we don’t understand the speed of the game and its byzantine rules. Don’t blame it on social media either, commissioner. I hear this complaint everywhere.
A Rights Fee Raise
Goodell’s NFL is very likely going to opt out early from its current NFL media deals worth $111 billion in 2029. (The league can opt out early with Fox, NBC, CBS, and Amazon Prime Video that year, then Disney’s ESPN a year later.) The current deals run through 2033, but Goodell said the league always views its deals as “undervalued.”
Given the NBA’s 11-year, $77 billion windfall for hoops rights, you can bet Goodell and NFL owners are eager to reopen the bidding. “I think those opt-outs are incredibly valuable for the NFL,” he said. “We’ll look at Netflix, we’ll look at YouTube, we’ll look at Amazon,” Goodell added. “Not just look. We’ll continue to work with them to improve what we’re doing with them. Amazon had another 40% increase in audience. Their ratings are now coming very close to broadcast audiences and about to cross over. I think they will very shortly.”
International Expansion
The league sees overseas expansion as its last frontier for growth. Goodell confirmed he wants to eventually establish an NFL franchise overseas. “I do think there’s a potential that someday we’re going to have an international franchise. And if we do, it would not surprise me at all if the Super Bowl follows and is played there,” he said.
My money would be on either London, Munich, or Mexico City. Ditto for the NFL selling an international package of games to new or current media-rights partners once it reached Goodell’s goal of 16 international game telecasts per season. He pointed to the league’s successful Christmas Day partnership with Netflix. “We think that’s just the start.”
To sum up, the NFL wants more, more, more. More Brady. More media-rights fees in 2029. More international expansion. That’s good news for the league. But bad news for every other sports league as it tries to compete against the goliath that is the NFL.
