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From Fair Pay, Fair Play pages 52-75. Red McCombs owned the Minnesota Vikings for 6 years. The team’s performance dropped dramatically over that period. One reason was McCombs’ severe cost-cutting: spending well below the salary cap and cutting coaches and front office staff. After he sold the team for a hefty profit, he noted thatContinue reading “Free Agent Owners”

From Fair Pay, Fair Play pages 52-75. In January 2005, Tracy McGrady made this admission about his play with the Orlando Magic in the 2003-04 season: “You can sit there and say I’m making millions of dollars and I should play hard every night and how can I not? It’s not that easy. In thoseContinue reading “Free Agent Players”

From Fair Pay, Fair Play pages 27 and 47-49. “It (sport) almost invariably has the final control on scheduling, start times, how many games constitute a playoff, on whether a game is going to be in prime time. What television does is tell a league or a team, ‘If you play at 4 o’clock, weContinue reading “Commercial Interruptions”

From Fair Pay, Fair Play pages 27 and 44-47. “Sports are foolproof when it comes to ratings,” said Charles Bergmann, associate director of Mindshare, an advertising buying firm. “Sports fans can’t wait to watch a game; they want to know the outcome.” Actually, it’s more than wanting to know the outcome. We watch our MyContinue reading “Cable TV Bills”

From Fair Pay, Fair Play pages 36-44. Indianapolis has two pro-sports teams—the Indianapolis Colts and the Indiana Pacers. The city (and other taxing authorities) put up $590 million to fund a new football stadium in the early 2000s. When Indianapolis resident Fredrick McCarthy heard the initial announcement, he said the city couldn’t afford it andContinue reading “Tax Subsidies”

From Fair Pay, Fair Play pages 34-36. In 1999, the Green Bay Packers were looking at instituting a personal seat license (PSL) program as one of the funding sources for a major stadium renovation. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel sports writer Don Walker said the PSL “seems like the ultimate rip-off. The beleaguered sports fan, disgusted withContinue reading “Personal Seat Licenses”

From Fair Pay, Fair Play pages 29-33. For decades, pro-football season-ticket holders have been forced to buy preseason tickets. As fans’ complaints grew louder in 2011, the NFL floated the idea of reducing the preseason to two games and increasing the regular season by 2 games (from 16 to 18). Pittsburgh Steelers season-ticket holder AnthonyContinue reading “Preseason Tickets”

From Fair Pay, Fair Play pages 133-159 Our society’s preferred option to assure businesses serve us with the right product at the right price is free market competition. When that option isn’t available we have to look the other options–to regulate or to own and operate. Many voices have called for community team ownership usingContinue reading “The Operate Option”

From Fair Pay, Fair Play pages 125-131 Our society’s preferred option to assure businesses serve us with the right product at the right price is free market competition. When that option isn’t available, we have to look at the other options–to regulate or to own and operate. In the 1990s, the federal government regulated cableContinue reading “The Regulation Option”