Good. I was thinking that it’ll actually be worse for the NFL next year if they don’t do something because so many of the tickets already sold are probably not refundable, so most people will go ahead and go to the games.
Some attorney would love to take a class action against the NFL and all 32 teams as co-defendants if they refuse a refund.
There are 3 pieces to this business model. First, for this year...most all teams have sold their tickets. The marginal teams probably have 100,000 tickets for home-games left to be sold. Most will discount them enough (30-percent probably) to sell them. For play-off games? Same deal....discounted probably. But as you get to spring of 2018 and the ticket sales start up...there, you will see heavily discounted tickets (30-to-40 percent off, I would imagine).
On fan gear...three months before Xmas? The sport shops are going to take a major hit and be left with stock. You can figure a 50-percent cut on orders after you get to the end of this season.
Then you come to the TV contracts. Normally 3.5 billion would flow to the NFL. I’ll take a wag at 2.5 billion being the sum for this season sent over. The bigger issue is that there are always contract negotiations going on and the networks will low-ball the number now on future talks. I would take a guess that the NFL and the unions will be looking at a loss of 25-percent on the next big contract signed.
But ask yourself this...can you survive through 2018, 2019, and 2020 season like this? If Trump runs in 2020 and wins? Can you survive through to 2024, as a NFL team? Salary cuts coming? NFL players strike on the cuts? For players, they might want to polish their resumes and prepare for the real world.
If someone has a ticket and can't get a refund the only logical response is to burn the ticket.
Whether you attend the game or not, the money for the ticket is lost (if you can't get a refund.) That is sunk cost.
Of course, you could try to give the ticket to someone that doesn't care about the NFL’s hideous policies. But that's like giving a child a loaded weapon. Not something any caring adult would do.
Again, burn the ticket and save yourself additional cost of going to the game, paying parking, paying for water, paying for a program, etc.
Destroying the ticket and boycotting the NFL is part of the continuing high cost of being an American.
I have season tickets and asked my rep for a refund and was declined. The response was quite obviously prepared for her.