In the latest valuations by Forbes, the AVERAGE NFL team is now worth $2.34 BILLION. Vince McMahon is "attempting" to start an ENTIRE league for an equal amount to 4 PERCENT of a SINGLE NFL franchise.
He'll be lucky to compete with the Lingerie League in salaries at that rate.
I'm all for competetion in the marketplace but not when it's done by a showman....on the cheap....trying to pander to a niche political audience.
He'll need a lot more than $100 million to succeed. He needs to get other investors.
I think the NFL is valued at around $17 billion. He doesn't need quite that much, since presumably he won't be in 32 cities right away, but he'll need substantially more than the $100 million figure being tossed around.
I don't think "pandering" to a political audience has anything to do with anything. I think it's called marketing. Probably more than half of football fans believe players should stand for the anthem. I wouldn't call that niche, I would call that "most people."
Catering to markets is the way companies make money. People want their football players to stand for the anthem. The XFL is trying to give the people what they want.
I also disagree with you that Vince McMahon is a bad choice... I think he's a great choice. He has experience building up sports brands, and I think he connects with your average redneck football fan. They just need to field some competitive teams, and they need to not go the "gimmick" route that they did last time like with the "no kickoff" thing and whatnot.
Forbes had the Cowboys alone at north of $4 billion. So agreed in that he'd definitely need more startup $ or he's going to be getting guys that the CFL doesn't even want.
I say it's pandering to a niche because he immediately started with the anthem stuff yesterday and therefore made it political while saying he wasn't.
You very well are probably right that a majority of football fans just want everyone to stand. But you are pandering to a niche when you make it a central issue because now you're placing too big a focus on the business of those fans that won't watch the NFL period because of the anthem stuff- which at most is like 10% of football fans.
I don't concern myself with the whole standing/sitting for the anthem thing. If someone wants to sit down, or kneel, who gives a ****. We don't live in North Korea. These are grown *** men who can do whatever the **** they want. At the same time, I don't think they're some kind of heroes to be celebrated, either. There ain't gonna be one ****ing ounce of social change that happens because colin kaepernick kneels during the anthem. If anything, he's just bringing hate down upon himself and making himself look entitled.
It's the same reason why right wingers don't like Hollywood actors. And I can understand where they're coming from.
How are you gonna be a millionaire who's job is to play a game or look pretty on film, and at the same time try to lecture and moralize to regular people? These guys don't know what work is, they don't know what struggle is. Blue collar people get offended by that kind of thing, and it makes the stars and athletes look like divas who are out of touch.
So I can understand that point of view as well.
But let the peasants worry about that ****. What Vince McMahon is doing is he sees millions of camo-wearing, budweiser drinking rednecks who are mad at the NFL.... and he sees that as an opening. It's an opportunity to make money. There's nothing more American than that.
