In today’s society, the fandom of sports has become as social and well as an individual’s consumption of culture. Over time, developments in the social world have altered these ways of consuming sports, which is what Richard Giulianotti focuses on. Furthermore, Giulanotti believes that the normatively desirable form of cultural consumption of sports is the attachment of sports franchises to a city and the “die hard” attitudes of fans. This is what the MLB represents, compared to the NFL, which focuses its broadcasting on a nation-wide basis to gain a national public. This way of consuming sports demonstrates the importance specific spaces, such as the stadium, to the fans, as well as the strong local sports subculture. The “die-hard” fan supports the team that is based in his local community and has a long-term emotional investment with it.
b.) Meanwhile, these norms deviate from the National Football league’s norm. The NFL is a fundamentally different type of product than baseball, in that instead of settling for the local team, followers search for a team, such as on national television. With this, it attracts a national public. Two ways football differs from other sports are through globalization and commodification. First, the globalization of sports refers to the decline of the attachment of sports to certain regions. The NFL has developed to become less centralized, and with the followed the broad trend in sports identification away from the supporter model and toward the more detached, consumer-oriented identification. For this reason, the NFL has created one national public instead of many different local publics such as in the MLB. Another aspect is that of commodification, in that the leagues have created competitive equality among teams by imposing “sameness” on teams. This would make contests more even, and hence presumably more dramatic to a national public. This means that instead of being attached to cities, they are tied to leagues and networks. Additionally, the commodification includes the aspects such as the “burgeoning popularity”, the “advent of pay-per-view television” and “increased ties with corporations and other business institutions” (Giulinaotti 3). The connection individuals have towards a team become to be mediated by the market. Ultimately, changing social institutions have produced different types of sports spectators over time, which can be seen in the NFL.
Question 2:
Ever since Cricket has been brought into the Unites States from Britain, it has failed in gaining wide support as well as popularity. According to Kaufman & Patterson, this is due to the popularity of a sport being a function of the social class structure of a country that adopts it. With this, Cricket has not succeeded in becoming popular in the United States, and North America in general, due to certain individuals wanting the sport to be exclusive to themselves. They do this in order to receive and retain a certain social status, which would not be possible if everybody was able to play this sport. Ultimately, the key factor in the decline of cricket’s popularity in North America was the equality of economic opportunity, which is how Jason Kaufman and Orlando Patterson would explain cricket’s lack of commercial popularity and success in the United States. Social elites limited the equality of cultural opportunity for cricket due to facing the loss in economic prestige.
Certain commonwealth nations have embraced the emergence of cricket in their country, leading to immense popularity. With this, they have successfully incorporated participation of masses without altering the status of elites. In the United States, social elites have excluded other social classes from participating in the sport of cricket to maintain their social superiority. With this, elites cultivated an exclusive image of cricket leading to a decline in its popularity. Additionally, these elites wanted to prevent the inclusion of all participants due to the undesirability of mass commercialization. For cricket, the sport was used as a mechanism of status distinction, and institutions for this sport exclude the masses from participating and consuming this sport. The sport of cricket was not intended to be monetized and popularized in the United States, compared to sports such as baseball. Where baseball was a sport available to all wanting to participate, cricket was a protected sport in the United States as a sign of cultural primacy. All in all, Cricket was never intended to be commercialized and monetized, but rather, was intended to be exclusive to certain individuals belonging to a social elite. For this reason, Cricket participators and organizers in the United States never had the aim to make money off of cricket the same way they did for sports such as football or basketball. Ultimately, Cricket’s lack of commercial popularity and success in the United States is due to cultural choice, not a lack of a monetized system.
The breakdown of the revenues from the four professional sports demonstrates the strong distinction among leagues to operate according to either a cultural logic of local publics or of national publics. The MLB, NBA, and NHL teams attract a large amount of revenue from the local media compared to national media, whereas the NFL does the opposite. This is due to the MLB, NBA, and NHL attracting a local public by attaching teams to locations. They generate social support and build on a loyal local following through broadcasting their games to cable and local television. Furthermore, the creation of a permanent fan base by creating a support system of “home” teams creates a strong tie between cities and teams. These leagues have attached teams to supportive cities, and with this, individuals settle for their local teams. Additionally, the local media presence for these leagues overpowers the national media presence, due to the strong local support and following, which is why the local media revenue is higher than the national media revenue. Additionally, these sports receive high revenue generated at their stadium, since local fans attend their team’s games due to the short proximity of locations as well as to show their support at the event instead of watching it on television.
Compared to this local public, the NFL has attracted a national public, in which the focus has shifted from teams and cities to leagues. Football’s huge following can be viewed as a direct product from its lack of attachment to cities and no local television contracts, and rather, the cultivation of a national public. By embracing televisions and nationwide broadcasts, the NFL has attracted a nationwide audience due to its easy accessibility. Due to television, sports consumption has changed dramatically, in that fans do not have to settle for their local team, and rather, are able to search for a team. All teams that are in the NFL attract a single national public, compared to the many teams in other sports attracting various local publics. NFL teams still have associations with cities due to their names, however, they are to be watched by the nation. With the NFL, people have free choice on who to follow and support and do not have to settle for convenience. Therefore, the revenue from the national media is larger than the local media’s revenue, in that the entire country is able to watch and support the team of their choice. With this, the revenue generated at the stadium is not as high as in other sports, due to these teams not attracting local audiences and fanbases.
Question 4:
a.) Over time, the view of intercollegiate sports has changed a lot. College Sports used to be viewed as part of higher-education, and not a business. As college athletics became to be viewed as being under threat of corruption due to various scandals, college athletics’ legitimacy was increasingly questioned. With this, it was seen to be in need of protection, which is where the NCAA came into play. The NCAA controlled college sports by enforcing the amateur ideal as well as controlling TV programing. The NCAA promoted the idea that varsity athletes were strictly amateur performers, and therefore, they were not recognized as wage laborers. The NCAA enhanced its legitimacy and began to institute controls through televised football, making revenue that was shared by the teams playing the televised game and the NCAA. They gained complete control of the television market for intercollegiate sports. With this, the NCAA asserted its power, allowing the NCAA’s way of understanding college sports to become the taken-for-granted understanding in society.
b.) In the court case of 1984, the court ruled that the NCAA television of college football violated laws governing fair market competition. With this, the NCAA becomes to be seen as an illegal economic trust, and with this is not in control of the regulation of football telecast anymore. Because the Court did not consider the NCAA's attempts to preserve amateurism and educational goals, it sent a message that college football is a professional industry. After the passing of this court case, the NCAA still enforced the amateur ideal, however, college football association controlled TV programming creating major athletic conferences. An increasing amount of games were televised as a direct result of this ruling, and the football field has been re-shuffling, changing the landscape of college football significantly. With this, the individual universities have continued increasing their revenue streams for television. With the growth of profits for the universities and their athletics departments, the sense of exploitation of the amateur athlete has also grown, defeating the NCAA’s passion for protecting the noble amateurism of college athletes. Today, athletes have a much greater influence over a team's success, directly and indirectly. A successful star player means winning for the team and winning means entertainment value and money. Colleges have with this become an increasingly commercialized industry, promoted by national network coverage and a million dollar professional football contract. In today’s society, there are vast amounts of sports leagues that all shape the way people consume sports by creating certain audiences in their leagues. In early leagues, teams are attached to places, creating a permanent fan base. As seen in the sports survey distribution, the NBA’s distribution of “favorite” teams is uneven, with a spike of supporters for the Los Angeles team, as well as the Oakland/ San Francisco team. The distribution of team popularity in the NBA This is due to residents of certain areas, such as Northern and Southern California, feeling like they have a communal obligation to support their domestic team. With this, individuals settle with their local teams, which have changed from a traveling team to the local public settled into a city, which is what Eric Leifer refers to as the settle logic of early leagues. With this, major league sports, such as the NBA, have attached teams to supportive cities and areas. Both of these teams are based within high metropolitan populations, creating a vast amount of fans who are loyal to the local team. In the case of the NBA, while the Lakers and Warriors undoubtedly have fans throughout the nation, they each have huge metropolitan strongholds on their respective regions of Northern and Southern California where they draw most of their fans from. Geographic identity within the NBA clearly is an important part of fandom, in which the Lakers were able to claim the Southern part of the state of California, and the Warriors the Northern.
As Early Leagues have transitioned to modern leagues, their fan base has altered as well. With the emergence of the technology of television, sports consumption has attracted a different type of public, which is that of searching for teams. The new national public emerged, in which supporters could choose what team to follow and support. The shift from teams and cities to leagues and networks represents the shift from supporters from settling for the local to searching for a team. This is what Leifer refers to in the search logic of modern leagues, such as the NFL. In this case of the NFL, people around the entire country are able to search for a team of their own and do not have to settle for their local one. This reorganization of competition has created a national public. The distribution of fans is fairly even towards the various teams. This is also due to the competitive balance among teams. The NFL’ distribution of popularity reflects parity because of its strict salary cap, revenue-sharing rules and a short schedule that has teams vaulting up and down the standings every season. With this, the various fanbases of NFL teams are identified not geographically, but rather through a nationwide search.
Question 6:
a.) The NCAA justifies its existence on two of the noble principles, which are amateurism and the student- athlete; however, according to Taylor Branch, these “are cynical hoaxes, legalistic confections propagated by the universities so they can exploit the skills and fame of young athletes”(2). The NCAA receives authority through it being vested in its claim to protect what it calls the “student-athlete” and its passion to protect the noble amateurism of college athletes. With the ideal of amateurism, the NCAA is able to bring the focus of sports on the ability and social position of an athlete, rather than on money. It is based on the presumption that a college competes solely at an amateur level, losing prestige when it loses competition. Additionally, the adoption of professionalism into college sports would result in loss of respectively on the educational field. Therefore, the NCAA has solved this dilemma by claiming collegiate institutions to be based on amateurism. Through these principles, the NCAA is able to strengthen itself as a billion dollar business, while not paying its primary performers anything but the cost of attendance of their institution.
b.) The NCAA claims collegiate sports to be based on amateurism, while also operating in a professional mode. The NCAA has done this by adopting an Amateur code defining its definition and principles of amateurism. With this, the NCAA reinforces the idea that amateur athletics is an integral part of the educational experience. Additionally, making these sports professional would destroy the concept of the student-atheltes. NCAA additionally enacted a “Sanity Code,” prohibiting all benefits for college athlete, and schools that violated this code would be expelled from NCAA membership and thus exiled from competitive sports. With this, the NCAA’s control of college sports rested on the consent of the colleges and universities it governed. The NCAA reinforces the amateurism model by demonstrating how the student-athlete is able to participate in a higher level of sports while also receiving an education. They furthermore base their principal by not paying student-athletes, which is what ultimately makes them amateurs. The term student-athlete has come into use through various cases, such as the 1950s case of Ray Dennison. Dennison had died from suffering a head injury playing football for a Colorado college team. After deliberate contesting, the Colorado Supreme Court agreed with the school’s argument that he was not eligible for benefits due to college not being in the football business. This decision had enormous consequences towards the vast number of incapacitating injury to college athletes each year. This belief, that paid athletes would destroy the integrity and appeal of college sports, is the basis of the NCAA. The NCAA relies on the ruling that in order to preserve the character and quality of college sports, athletes must not be paid.