All The Owners Are So Bad In Multiple Ways - Work Stoppage 2027 Style

[Bertz]

This is a good article, I frankly don't expect to lose any games but that 60ish game mark looks like an absolute red line.

[macarthur31]

54 minutes ago, Bertz said:

This is a good article, I frankly don't expect to lose any games but that 60ish game mark looks like an absolute red line.

On one hand, the owners will still get the TV money for 2027 games - whether or not they happen.  That seems to me to be a useful bolstering for their war chest.  However, if they do "punt" on the season, that costs them a year in waiting to do a new lucrative media deal.  So, how greedy are they?

[Bertz]

5 hours ago, macarthur31 said:

On one hand, the owners will still get the TV money for 2027 games - whether or not they happen.  That seems to me to be a useful bolstering for their war chest.  However, if they do "punt" on the season, that costs them a year in waiting to do a new lucrative media deal.  So, how greedy are they?

This feels super super super important:

Quote

 

For 2023, local media accounted for 21 percent of the average team’s revenue, with 12 percent being the lowest and 32 percent the highest, the union told its players.

Central revenue, meanwhile, made up 26 percent of an average team’s income. This bucket, which is shared equally by the 30 teams, includes all the national TV deals — but also includes other streams, such as national sponsorship deals.

 

So 26% is shared revenue, and that is mostly but not all national TV money.  Let's for the sake of round numbers call it 20% that they can count on still getting from the central pot even without playing

~20% is local TV, which has some leeway for missed games (30ish, depending on the team) but much less than the national deals

The remaining 55% is not broken out, but it's presumably mostly game day revenue.

So if owners want to absolutely maximize their free lunch they're looking at ~1/3rd of their typical revenue? However the national TV dollars are essentially just borrowing from 2029.  You also, presumably, have major deleterious effects on the next set of rights deals.

I just see no reason to believe owners are willing to do that.  If I had to place odds on how this plays out, it'd be something like:

4% - A deal is reached before spring training is impacted.  This would have been 0% six months ago, but Monfort and Moreno are two of the mkre problematic owners from a labor standpoint and they're on the way out 

10% - A deal is reached where ST gets a bit of a haircut but before the regular season is impacted

70% - Like last time, a deal is reached where 162 games are played but with a scheduling adjustment (the league setting Opening Day a week early was not an accident IMO)

10% - We miss games, but basically just enough to be obnoxious.  Teams play like 148 or something stupid like that

5% - We miss enough games to horsefeathers with local TV contracts, but few enough to avoid this 60 game national TV cliff 

1% - We cross this national tv red line

0% - We miss a full season or more

 

[Andy]

12 hours ago, macarthur31 said:

On one hand, the owners will still get the TV money for 2027 games - whether or not they happen.  That seems to me to be a useful bolstering for their war chest.  However, if they do "punt" on the season, that costs them a year in waiting to do a new lucrative media deal.  So, how greedy are they?

That 2027 thing is textbook bad faith maneuvering. The NFL pulled the same horsefeathers during the 2011 lockout, as I recall. At the absolute best, it's sketchy, and more likely it illustrates that they absolutely did intend and have intended to have a lengthy lockout if they felt like they could get away with it.