Good thing we are signing Pat early

[RunKC]

The NFL is going to keep booming financially, even moreso than before. Mahomes contract will seem like a steal the moment he signs it

NFL is Bullish on Its $25 Billion Revenue Goal Ahead of Super Bowl

NFL executive Brian Rolapp has an old photo on the wall line of sight. It shows a group of prep-school football fans so captivated by a game that they ignore a building engulfed in flames behind them.

“Without exaggeration, it sits in a place where I look at it every day,” said Rolapp, the chief media and business officer for the National Football League.

For years, pro football has inspired that kind of passion in millions of fans. The NFL generated about $15 billion this past season, making it the king of U.S. sports. And the league is about to lean even harder on its fans, aiming to boost its annual revenue to $25 billion by 2027. That may test the limits of a sport grappling with shifting TV habits and controversies surrounding brain injuries and the national anthem.

But tailwinds could help the NFL and Commissioner Roger Goodell achieve their growth targets. The spread of legalized sports betting across the U.S. promises to lock in fans and keep them riveted to games. Tech companies like Amazon.com Inc. and Facebook Inc., meanwhile, have emerged as bidders for big-dollar broadcast packages.

“Roger’s aspirational target of $25 billion is starting to look pretty good,” said Marc Ganis, a sports consultant who advises the NFL and a number of its owners on business strategies.

According to the league, NFL regular-season games, excluding those played in London, averaged 15.8 million viewers. Moreover, 45 of the top 50 telecasts this season were NFL games. The AFC championship -- won by the New England Patriots, who face the Los Angeles Rams in the Super Bowl on Sunday -- drew almost 54 million viewers. That’s more than double the number of people who watched the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade or the 2018 Oscars.

“There’s nothing left in media that will aggregate that many people,” Rolapp said.

Just how valuable NFL games are to the broadcast networks and digital newcomers like Amazon and Facebook will determine whether the commissioner hits his revenue target.

The NFL reaps about $5 billion a year from its TV contracts with CBS, NBC, Fox and ESPN. All indications are that the league will get a lot more when the contracts expire after the 2021-2022 season.

In November, Major League Baseball signed an extension of its TV contract with Fox Sports, which agreed to pay $5 billion over seven years, a 36 percent annual average increase.

50 Percent

Ganis, the consultant, said the NFL will do much better. He expects the league’s next TV deals to yield increases in excess of 50 percent. On top of that, he expects a new billion-dollar package of games will go to a digital distributor such as Amazon, which currently pays $50 million a year to show “Thursday Night Football.” Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos personally held talks with Goodell about the Thursday night package, which helped the league boost online viewing by 86 percent.

Online executives aren’t the only ones clamoring for a tie-up with the most visible and valuable U.S. sports league.

When Papa John’s International Inc. and the league ended their relationship after the company’s former CEO blamed player protests for sliding sales, it took the NFL just 24 hours to announce a new, bigger deal with Yum Brands Inc.’s Pizza Hut.

New Sponsors

More widely, the NFL has added seven new leaguewide partners since January, including its first casino partner, Caesars Entertainment Corp., and its first presenting sponsor for the conference title games, Intuit Inc. The NFL and its clubs brought in a record $1.32 billion in sponsorship in 2017-2018, according to consulting firm IEG, significantly more than the National Basketball Association or Major League Baseball. That doesn’t count the league’s newest partners, including home-improvement giant Lowe’s Cos., which chose the NFL after exiting a 17-year relationship with Nascar.

“Let’s face it: The NFL is dominant,” Lowe’s Chief Marketing Officer Jocelyn Wong said. “It’s the largest, most avid fan base. That was very important to us.”

Every summer, by virtue of an odd semipublic ownership structure, the Green Bay Packers disclose their shared and local revenue -- a glimpse into the financial health of the league.

For the 2017-2018 season, the NFL divvied up $8.1 billion among its 32 teams, a 5 percent jump from 2016 -- despite declining TV ratings and continued criticism from President Donald Trump over players kneeling during the national anthem. The Packers’ total revenue has increased every year since 2003.

Sports Betting

The prospect of widespread legalized sports betting in the U.S. will only buoy the ability of leagues to make money.

When -- not if -- the NFL embraces the U.S. sports betting market, the money will flow. The league should see an annual revenue increase of $2.3 billion, more than the combined estimate for MLB ($1.1 billion), the NBA ($585 million) and the National Hockey League ($216 million), according to the American Gaming Association.

Rolapp says the NFL, advertisers and networks have done research, tracking people’s eyes while they watch games.

The conclusion was familiar: Like the football fans in his photo, they’re so focused on the screen that they probably wouldn’t notice a fire either.

https://www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/a...mpression=true

[SAUTO]

Originally Posted by pugsnotdrugs19

I’ll tell you what’s going to be really interesting. If Pat is the first to get paid, and it sounds like he will be, that means other teams are going to have to make decisions on players like Watson, Trubisky, Mayfield, etc. and potentially have to pay even more for them. Not because they’re better, but because that’s just how it goes.

The sooner Veach gets the deal done, the more likely that other teams in a similar position will have to deal with the large QB cap number.

That's a great thought. Get it done and put the pressure on those teams.

[RealSNR]

Originally Posted by pugsnotdrugs19

I’ll tell you what’s going to be really interesting. If Pat is the first to get paid, and it sounds like he will be, that means other teams are going to have to make decisions on players like Watson, Trubisky, Mayfield, etc. and potentially have to pay even more for them. Not because they’re better, but because that’s just how it goes.

The sooner Veach gets the deal done, the more likely that other teams in a similar position will have to deal with the large QB cap number.

Let's see Houston compete with their "winner" QB when they can't afford anybody else and that defense slowly collapses like a flan in a cupboard.

[Sassy Squatch]

Originally Posted by O.city

I'm all about Pat Mahomes. He's awesome. Greatness abounds.

But lets pump the breaks on paying him. It was the best first year for a QB ever, but it was still 1 year.

Mediocre QBs and 1 hit wonders get paid a metric ton. Ryan, Cousins, Garoppolo, Stafford, and Carr are currently the #2-#6 highest paid QBs by AAV. Mahomes is going to get PAID, even if he has a bit of a sophmore slump.

[Prison Bitch]

I don’t believe these financial projections at all, and Ganis, the “consultant” quoted in the article, does work for the NFL.

[Raiderhater]

Originally Posted by O.city

I'm all about Pat Mahomes. He's awesome. Greatness abounds.

But lets pump the breaks on paying him. It was the best first year for a QB ever, but it was still 1 year.

I agree it was only 1 year. Most of his future seasons aren’t going to be so mediocre.

[CasselGotPeedOn]

Originally Posted by O.city

I'm all about Pat Mahomes. He's awesome. Greatness abounds.

But lets pump the breaks on paying him. It was the best first year for a QB ever, but it was still 1 year.

[Pitt Gorilla]

Originally Posted by RealSNR

The only thing I'm pumping when it comes to Patrick Mahomes is my penis, buddy!

I ain't pumping no brakes!

[cooper barrett]

I have had this go through my mind any times...

I think all player should be paid a base salary, all being the same, with deals being set for all players based on a .500 season.

Take away the glory $$$ of being a QB and just make it glory...Jeff Ford and Kermit Mahomes would make the same money. It is a "team" sport... right?

If the team finishes .750 then they make a 50% bonus, likewise if they only manage .250...

Have the NFL pay out bonuses based on playoff game/ championship/ world championship, # of people who watched, and ad revenue. Otherwise give them a piece of the pie. make it a 75/25 split. Non of this $200K, Sean Payton, theatrical bullshit. Show em the real money for making it to the AFC championship game or duper bowel. But the Fords, all of them make the same as the Hill's, Kelce's or even Kermit Mahomes.

Coaching and front end is paid the same. All head coaches get paid the same, all OC's, DC's and kicking coaches are paid alike.

No more incentives to move teams, no more franchise players, no more spring training hold outs.

Then the sun coming through a crack in my black out leather drapery hit my 3/4 empty growler bottle and all most blinded me.

I woke up, realized where I was and wept for just a second as I realized this plan would have destroyed the game as a sport.