Brand NFL MAKING AND SELLING AMERICA’S FAVORITE SPORT doc

[...]... wear.’’≥ Double-R Bar brand or nfl brand, it did not matter to Rogers—or to Kent, who left Rogers for the nfl when Rozelle brought nfl Enterprises in-house and renamed it nfl Properties (nflp) in 1963 nflp would not produce significant profits until the late 1980s (its birth date in 1959 is only symbolically important), but in the 1990s it would become something like a nerve center for a ‘‘new nfl ’ broadly... the sport And when the subject is the nfl s public image, what actually happens is less important than what the media reports as happening Image and brand are about perception—what we think when we think about football For understanding that, one must look to what we collectively have been watching and reading about football over the years My story, then, is about pro football’s image and meaning, and. .. of the nfl s past half-century, taking into account its merger with the American Football League and the evolution of the Super Bowl, the development of nfl Films and espn, the roles of iconic figures from Vince Lombardi and Joe Namath in the 1960s to Deion Sanders in the 1990s, the eruption of drug scandals in the 1980s and domestic-violence scandals in the 1990s, the shifts in labor relations and racial... book, then, about the image and meaning of nfl football, and about how money and marketing transformed the ‘‘modern nfl ’ of the 1960s into the ‘‘new nfl ’ of the 1990s, told partly from the perspective of a 1960s-era player I entered the nfl in 1970, more or less on the cusp of Pete Rozelle’s power as commissioner, and left at the end of the league’s period of consolidation and the beginning of its period... When the nfl becomes a ‘‘product’’ and ‘ brand, ’’ is it di√erent as a sport? This book is my attempt, if not to find definitive answers, at least to tease out what is at stake in that question INTRODUCTION 9 1 THE CREATION OF THE MODERN NFL IN THE 1960S Professional football became Americans’ favorite spectator sport in the 1960s It was a decade of great players (as is every decade): Johnny Unitas and Sonny... o≈cial language of the realm NFL Films and the Epic of Pro Football In 1963, the same year that he suspended Hornung and Karras, Rozelle incorporated nfl Properties, and in 1964 he brought nfl Films in-house as ‘‘a promotional vehicle to glamorize the game and present it in its best light.’’π In relation to the later marketing of nfl football, Rozelle’s initial steps seem small, and they were always predicated... eyes An nfl Films cinematographer has described the goal as portraying ‘‘reality as we wish it was.’’∞∏ Through the montages of violent collisions and the close-ups of bloodied fists and contorted faces spraying sweat drops in super slow motion, nfl Films lets the viewer see and feel more intensely the thrill and power and struggle of professional football The presence of nfl Films’ cameras and microphones... wondered what it felt like to be a left guard making $300,000 and playing alongside a left tackle making $6 million Having grown up during the era of ‘‘The Game of the Week,’’ I have pondered how football fandom has been altered by having sports on television 24/7, and nfl games televised not just throughout the day on Sunday but on Sunday nights, Monday nights, and occasional Thursday or Saturday nights,... strikes of 1974, 1982, and 1987, labor peace was not finally achieved until 1993 Al Davis won a major lawsuit against the nfl in 1982 and moved the Raiders from Oakland to Los Angeles, unleashing an upheaval among nfl franchises whose owners now could exploit their own free agency while still denying it to players By 1989, when Rozelle retired, the nfl was hugely popular and making millions for its... 1982, and 1987—fans were outraged by their ‘‘greed.’’ Exactly how much the owners made in profits was never very clear, and when they cried poor and worried publicly about rising costs and soaring salaries, fans did not have enough information to know whether to take their complaints seriously Only in recent times has the nfl been swimming in dollars, with salary caps and signing bonuses, club seats and . Oriard, Michael, 1948– Brand NFL : making and selling America’s favorite sport / Michael Oriard. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 978-0-8078-3142-7.