Author Topic: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests  (Read 7514 times)

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New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« on: October 27, 2016, 03:14:00 PM »

Offline celticsclay

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This was being discussed in another thread the other day where many doubted that the reason the NFL ratings were down was tied to the anthem. New ESPN story reports it is the biggest reason

http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/17902695/anthem-protests-part-problem-nfl-ratings

I am not in any way supporting protesting the NFL over this, nor do I think it is a great thing to do. However, I found it humorous how the NFL and many fans denied this trend despite there being tens of thousands of tweets every week with the #boycottnfl. Curious if the NFL does anything with the new data.

Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #1 on: October 27, 2016, 03:17:56 PM »

Offline D Dub

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maybe the NFL get congress to rid us of that pesky first amendment.  we're losing ratings here people!!

Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #2 on: October 27, 2016, 03:30:16 PM »

Offline celticsclay

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maybe the NFL get congress to rid us of that pesky first amendment.  we're losing ratings here people!!

I don't really think it is a first amendment right. They are employees at a company at the end of the day. My job can and does tell to not use my their platform to express my political views, but I can do whatever I want when I am not at work and wearing my employee badge (which the exception of breaking laws). I am actually supportive of starting a dialogue but pretending that make a social justice commentary while being paid by your employer and wearing their corporate logo on your sleeve is a first amendment right is a losing argument.

Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #3 on: October 27, 2016, 03:37:33 PM »

Offline Moranis

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I'd like to know if the 841 people they actually polled actually are football fans and how many actual NFL games they have watched in the last 5 years or so compared to this year.
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Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #4 on: October 27, 2016, 03:49:24 PM »

Offline celticsclay

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I'd like to know if the 841 people they actually polled actually are football fans and how many actual NFL games they have watched in the last 5 years or so compared to this year.

Yea that seemed like more information should have been included about the sampling size and how many games they had watched recently. It made it difficult to 100% understand the validity of the results. That being said, I work in social media and can do some twitter combing because of this and was surprised to see that there were 11k tweets with the #boycottnfl in them during a standard 1 week period since the NFL season started. By comparison something that is trending on twitter often has just a few thousand tweets, so that is not small potatoes.

People have wanted to act (and I probably would like it to believe it myself), that there was not a significant portion of the population that would get so upset about this they would stop watching the games. However, all data I have seen shows this has had a significant impact on viewership numbers.

Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #5 on: October 27, 2016, 03:50:13 PM »

Online Donoghus

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I know its one game but are people not going to watch Jaguars/Titans tonight because of protests?

Or is it because of oversaturation & decline in play?

I really think this poll is off.  Maybe I'm wrong but I don't think the protests are the biggest issue with the NFL & its ratings right now.   Maybe my head is in the sand here, I don't know.

I think Cuban was onto something with the "pigs get fed, hogs gets slaughtered" line from a couple of years ago. 


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Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #6 on: October 27, 2016, 04:00:52 PM »

Offline DivingCowens

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No way it is from the protests.  The most logical reason is being given no attention in these types of analyses...

DAILY FANTASY IS BASICALLY GONE!

Personally, I am not in a fantasy league for the first time in 15 years and I haven't watched but maybe 5 minutes of NFL (except for the Pats) this year.  Fantasy was largely responsible for the NFL boom in the last decade and the bans on daily fantasy and the websites which supported it surely are behind the decline. 

Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #7 on: October 27, 2016, 04:02:28 PM »

Offline TrueFan

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I used to watch a lot more NFL games then I do now. I'd say the combination of the protests, the recent findings from the last few years of the NFL covering up their concussion problems, bad publicity from handling players commiting sexual assault and that thing that happened to Tom Brady have all contributed to me not wanting to watch the NFL more.

With that said. If the product was better I might over look some of that but it's not. It's definitely a combination.

Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #8 on: October 27, 2016, 04:05:04 PM »

Online Donoghus

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It's kinda remarkable but I find myself much more engaged with college football this year than probably any season going back to when I was in college ('99-'03).    Obviously, I'm still watching NFL but finding the college games much more entertaining right now.


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Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #9 on: October 27, 2016, 04:05:35 PM »

Offline Moranis

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I'd like to know if the 841 people they actually polled actually are football fans and how many actual NFL games they have watched in the last 5 years or so compared to this year.

Yea that seemed like more information should have been included about the sampling size and how many games they had watched recently. It made it difficult to 100% understand the validity of the results. That being said, I work in social media and can do some twitter combing because of this and was surprised to see that there were 11k tweets with the #boycottnfl in them during a standard 1 week period since the NFL season started. By comparison something that is trending on twitter often has just a few thousand tweets, so that is not small potatoes.

People have wanted to act (and I probably would like it to believe it myself), that there was not a significant portion of the population that would get so upset about this they would stop watching the games. However, all data I have seen shows this has had a significant impact on viewership numbers.
but how many of those people actually have stopped or slowed down watching NFL games.  I know people that have tweeted stuff like that, that don't actually like football and have never watched NFL games (outside of the occasional Superbowl). 
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Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #10 on: October 27, 2016, 04:07:03 PM »

Offline celticsclay

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I know its one game but are people not going to watch Jaguars/Titans tonight because of protests?

Or is it because of oversaturation & decline in play?

I really think this poll is off.  Maybe I'm wrong but I don't think the protests are the biggest issue with the NFL & its ratings right now.   Maybe my head is in the sand here, I don't know.

I think Cuban was onto something with the "pigs get fed, hogs gets slaughtered" line from a couple of years ago.

Ill throw this out there. Here is the data on the #boycottnfl that has been used for the last 7 weeks.

1 billion estimated impressions from 323,019 Twitter mentions
(the software I am assuming is rounding up or down slightly to a billion, for even our biggest
campaigns at a national company we never approach that and it is given in millions like 13.7 million)

If people want to pretend this isn't a thing with that kind of data I guess it is just burying a head in the sand, no offense.

I agree it is crazy and hard to believe, but really just seems to be the case.

Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #11 on: October 27, 2016, 04:10:59 PM »

Offline celticsclay

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I'd like to know if the 841 people they actually polled actually are football fans and how many actual NFL games they have watched in the last 5 years or so compared to this year.

Yea that seemed like more information should have been included about the sampling size and how many games they had watched recently. It made it difficult to 100% understand the validity of the results. That being said, I work in social media and can do some twitter combing because of this and was surprised to see that there were 11k tweets with the #boycottnfl in them during a standard 1 week period since the NFL season started. By comparison something that is trending on twitter often has just a few thousand tweets, so that is not small potatoes.

People have wanted to act (and I probably would like it to believe it myself), that there was not a significant portion of the population that would get so upset about this they would stop watching the games. However, all data I have seen shows this has had a significant impact on viewership numbers.
but how many of those people actually have stopped or slowed down watching NFL games.  I know people that have tweeted stuff like that, that don't actually like football and have never watched NFL games (outside of the occasional Superbowl).

At this point to get this exact kind of data you would have to do a qualitative analysis which coding the statements as negative or positive along with a yes no grade on whether they previously watched the NFL would be way too big a resource investment for it to ever be included.

That being said, if you are forced to rely on anecdotal messaging, the majority of the tweets I see when pulling this kind of data is people saying "i use to be a die hard fan, but now spend sundays out with my kids and don't miss it at all" (occasionally with some unfortunate racist commentary added)

Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #12 on: October 27, 2016, 04:12:42 PM »

Online Donoghus

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I know its one game but are people not going to watch Jaguars/Titans tonight because of protests?

Or is it because of oversaturation & decline in play?

I really think this poll is off.  Maybe I'm wrong but I don't think the protests are the biggest issue with the NFL & its ratings right now.   Maybe my head is in the sand here, I don't know.

I think Cuban was onto something with the "pigs get fed, hogs gets slaughtered" line from a couple of years ago.

Ill throw this out there. Here is the data on the #boycottnfl that has been used for the last 7 weeks.

1 billion estimated impressions from 323,019 Twitter mentions
(the software I am assuming is rounding up or down slightly to a billion, for even our biggest
campaigns at a national company we never approach that and it is given in millions like 13.7 million)

If people want to pretend this isn't a thing with that kind of data I guess it is just burying a head in the sand, no offense.

I agree it is crazy and hard to believe, but really just seems to be the case.

Do we know for sure that everyone using #boycottnfl is using that hashtag solely for reasons related to protests or also other factors such as violence, an abhorrent record on domestic violence, decline in quality in play, headscratching league office decisions, etc....?




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Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #13 on: October 27, 2016, 04:14:51 PM »

Offline PhoSita

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I don't believe it for a moment, but if that's true, I say -- awesome.

If the protests truly are affecting the NFL bottom line, maybe they can do something publicly to try and address the underlying issue.

After all, the NFL could sure use something to rehab its image with the public.



All of that said, I think the ratings are down because the NFL product just isn't that great these days.  It's only truly engaging if you've got money riding on the outcomes.
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Re: New Poll: NFL decline in ratings attributed to protests
« Reply #14 on: October 27, 2016, 04:17:29 PM »

Offline saltlover

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It's a pretty silly poll.  56% of fans think the decline in ratings is because of said protests, after the media hypothesizes that it is because of protests.  A better poll would be to ask the respondent if s/he watches the NFL less, more, or the same, and if less, what the biggest reason is (with no prompting for a reason).  I'd be surprised if more than 10% mentioned protests unprompted.