The N.F.L. Season Has Begun. The Off-Field Games Started Weeks Ago.
A league with no shortage of messy controversies over money, safety and player’s rights.
CHICAGO — The never-ending reality show known as the N.F.L. began its 100th season on Thursday when the Packers beat the Bears, 10-3, in the latest edition of one of the league’s oldest rivalries. Banners were raised, names like Halas and Lombardi were celebrated and an N.F.L. museum in Grant Park showed off a version of every Super Bowl ring.
It was the kind of party the league likes to throw: a celebration focused on the “heroes of the game” and the values of grit, determination and teamwork that the N.F.L. wants us to believe are the cornerstones of American life.
Yet the N.F.L. exists with conflict and the league has no shortage of messy controversies over money, safety and player’s rights. A big party can’t mask them. The N.F.L. would love to avoid many of these disputes, and not draw attention away from the game itself. But these dark clouds create a bottomless supply of fodder for sports radio hosts, cable television talking heads and fans on social media, and that ultimately benefits the league, intentionally or not.
That’s because at its heart, the N.F.L. is a media company that produces football games. Nearly 60 percent of the league’s $14 billion in annual revenue comes from selling its broadcast rights. While the teams are constantly upgrading their stadiums and trying to improve the “fan experience,” far more fans follow the N.F.L. on television and social media.
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So while some scandals embarrass the N.F.L. — remember Deflategate? — they keep Americans tuned into football when the games aren’t being played, a big reason so many networks devote so much time and resources to covering the N.F.L.
Like so many off-seasons, this summer had no shortage of scandals. One of the biggest stories involved Ezekiel Elliott of the Dallas Cowboys, who spent part of the preseason in Mexico while he and the team’s owner, Jerry Jones, faced off over his demand that he be the highest paid running back. Elliott won.
In Oakland, wide receiver Antonio Brown was locked in a stormy fight with his new team, the Raiders, because the helmet he preferred was no longer allowed. The team fined Brown nearly $54,000 for missing so much of training. The drama tested the boundaries of players’ rights in a league dominated by coaches who demand lock-step loyalty.
And wouldn’t you know it, film crews from HBO and N.F.L. Films were there with the Raiders to document the tale for the show “Hard Knocks,” the football documentary.
Then there is New England Patriots owner Robert K. Kraft, who was charged with two counts of solicitation of a prostitute. A Florida judge threw out key evidence, and Commissioner Roger Goodell has taken no action against Kraft, raising questions about whether owners and players are held to different standards.
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Perhaps the most long-lasting controversy did not involve money or nefarious behavior. Less than two weeks ago, Colts quarterback Andrew Luck said that he was retiring at 29 because of mounting injuries. The admission by one of the league’s most recognizable stars reignited the uncomfortable debate over injuries in America’s most popular sport.
The N.F.L. will survive another player holding out for money. The standoff over a new helmet will be a footnote by season’s end. But Luck’s decision represents a thornier issue for a league that has seen a steady decline in the number of children playing tackle football, and which will pay more than $1 billion to retired players with significant cognitive and neurological problems.
“The greatest danger to the league is not too many games on TV or players making too much money, it’s that football is a violent sport, and you cannot legislate the violence out of the game,” said Upton Bell, the son of former N.F.L. commissioner Bert Bell and a one-time team executive. “The great decision will be whether the American public and its love of a violent game overcomes the idea that this is a game that produces wounded warriors.”
When N.F.L. games make up nearly every one of the top 25 most watched shows on television, and the league routinely draws more than 17 million fans to its stadiums, it’s hard to say the business model is flawed. But participation rates in youth and high school football are slipping as parents steer their sons into other sports.
Younger fans are also consuming football differently than their parents and grandparents, further removed from the grit and violence of the game thanks primarily to the ubiquity of smartphones that give them more ways to spend their time. Rich Luker, who has been surveying sports fans for a quarter century, said every leisure activity is trying to figure out how to reach young viewers.
Leagues like the N.F.L. have tried to meet their younger fans where they live by creating apps, video streaming and other features for the smartphone. But the internet is a delivery system, not a destination. Better, Luker said, to try to establish personal connections to the sport by promoting the playing of football, even if it’s just a game of touch football in the park.
“Sports leagues can no longer assume they will get fans,” he said.
Thursday’s game — a messy defensive slog won by the Packers, 10-3 — isn’t likely to win the N.F.L. many new younger fans who play fantasy football, watch RedZone for the scoring and weigh in on social media about the latest scandals.
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