The Tampa Bay Buccaneers really know how to fire up their fans for the 2011-12 season — by blacking out their preseason games. The Bucs play the New England Patriots and because of the NFL’s anachronistic, unethical and counterproductive blackout rule, the same Tampa Bay fans that paid for the stadium the Bucs play in will be unable to see their favorite team. Brilliant.

Not surprisingly, Bucs fans say they can’t afford the tickets. Tampa Bay has been one of the areas hardest hit by the recession. But rather than give folks there something to cheer for, the NFL believes being the most profitable sports league in the world isn’t enough.

The Bucs first regular season game is on September 11 against the Detroit Lions. It will likely be blacked out. Profits before community on September 11. Nice.

Read more about the Bucs situation here.

And know that Sports Fans Coalition will continue to battle the NFL over the blackout rule. We will not stop until blackouts are a thing of the past.

For months, SportsFans.org has been calling for the NFL to eliminate its unethical and counterproductive blackout rule. Last year, there were 26 blackouts in the NFL, all in stadiums that were publicly financed. So fans who helped pay for the stadium but couldn’t afford the ever-increasing price of tickets couldn’t even see the games on television.

We have written repeated columns and posts on the subject and discussed the issue directly with the NFL. In our “Fans’ List of Demands for a New NFL Labor Agreement“, one of those demands was that the blackout rule be eliminated. And on Thursday, we formally asked the FCC to eliminate its own sports blackout rule.

Now comes word that the NFL is feeling the pressure from fans and is considering relaxing its blackout rule (which many erroneously believe is Congressionally mandated). According to Sports Business Journal‘s Dan Kaplan, NFL owners are considering allowing more owners to cover unsold seats to circumvent the blackout rule. (They reportedly may vote on the rule at their next meeting on June 21.)

Of course, the league could just eliminate the rule, but hey, at least there’s some immediate hope for fans in cities that suffer from blackouts.

by Scott Weiss

Here are the main issues that fans have been led to believe are key to the present NFL labor negotiations: how the owners and players should split up $9 billion a year in profits and should the owners open up their books, whether the season should expand from 16 to 18 games, and whether there should be a rookie wage scale.  These are all important issues, but are they really most important to football fans?

Well, this football fan, has a number of different issues that I feel are most important to be addressed in the new NFL Labor Agreement:

1. No more TV blackouts of NFL games.
2. No future seat license fees to fund NFL palaces (stadiums).
3. More fan involvement in operations of teams that receive public funding.
4. A freeze or reduction in ticket, concession, merchandise and parking prices.
5. A guarantee of no work stoppages in future CBA negotiations.
6. More restrictions on teams moving to new cities without fan input.

We have continued to hear from both the NFL and NFLPA how much they value the fans.  If they are true to their word, they will start paying attention to what their fans really want, and not just what is best for the owners and players.

I am excited that SFC Executive Director, Brian Frederick, has gotten the attention of the NFL and NFLPA.  I am also really looking forward to DeMaurice Smith’s promise to reply to SFC’s letter this coming Monday, and hope that the NFL will do the same.  I hope that other fans will answer Mr. Frederick’s request to hear what you want from the NFL labor agreement.  With fan involvement, we can make a huge difference; without fan involvement it will be business as usual.
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Scott Weiss is the Local Chapter Chair for SFC-New York/New Jersey and an SFC Sportwriter Fellow. He has been involved in the sports fans advocacy movement since 2000. He is a life long fan of the Mets, Jets, Knicks, and Rangers.

So the Fox-Cablevision blackout will be two weeks old tonight at midnight and there is no light at the end of the tunnel. So far, the 3 million Cablevision customers in the New York – New Jersey region have missed the first two World Series games and the New York Giants game last week.

Next game to fall victim will be the New York Jets – Green Bay Packers game on Sunday, which is being broadcast on Fox. The Jets are 5-1, so Jets fans will certainly be watching…wherever they can.

Needless to say, we want to scream like Fireman Ed at both Fox and Cablevision.

Fortunately for Jets fans, the NFL is publishing on its website a list of sports bars and restaurants in the areas affected that have the DirecTV Sunday Ticket and will thus be showing the game. That should be a boon to local bars and restaurants.

Of course, we look forward to seeing the NFL’s list of bars and restaurants where we can watch the 2011 season if there’s a lockout. That won’t be such a boon for those same bars and restaurants…

In the meantime, SFC will continue to fight against this and all blackouts. And we need your help, so please join us.

Fed up with the blackouts that are now plaguing their team, San Diego Chargers fans are fighting back. Thanks to the NFL’s blackout rule requiring home games to be sold out at least 72 hours before kickoff, the rest of the Chargers’ games this season are expected to be blacked out. Before this season, the Chargers had had 48 consecutive sellouts.

So some Chargers fans have launched an organization called Stop Charger Blackouts. They’re asking fans and local businesses to contribute anything they can to a pool and once they’ve raised enough to buy the remaining tickets to a game, they will do so and donate the tickets to local charities.

It’s an inspiring act. And one that should be totally unnecessary.

Chargers owner Alex Spanos should be the one buying those tickets and giving them to charity. Under NFL rules, team owners can purchase unsold tickets for 34 cents on the dollar and give them to charity. Stop Charger Blackouts, meanwhile, has to pay full price.

But Spanos must need every penny. After all, he’s only the 365^th richest American, worth $1.1 billion. And if the Chargers really are costing him money – highly doubtful considering that the team that he bought for $74 million in 1984 is now valued at $907 million – then he should open up the books and show us. But he and the other owners refuse to do that.

Spanos is not alone. Bucs owner Malcom Glazer is the 136^th richest American, worth $2.6 billion. And despite getting the city of Tampa to build him a brand new stadium less than 15 years ago, he won’t buy his team’s unsold tickets (for a fraction of the face value) and give them to charity. So Bucs fans will also likely miss the rest of their games on TV.

The blackout rule is archaic and ultimately counterproductive. Why wouldn’t an owner want as many people to consume his product – regardless of how – as possible? And is there a worse time to start blacking out games than when the team is losing and the economy sucks? (The Chargers are now 2-5.) The Chargers are already testing their fans’ loyalty with their play on the field. They don’t need to make things worse by making the games totally unavailable to them.

Fortunately for Spanos and the Chargers, there are still some diehard Charger fans like Kyle McCarthy, who founded Stop Charger Blackouts. McCarthy confesses that everyone in San Diego has been really excited about the organization, but that donations haven’t come in as quickly as needed. (Sounds familiar.) But maybe McCarthy and his friends can put enough pressure on Spanos to get him to buy the tickets or at least sell the tickets to Stop Charger Blackouts for the discounted charity rate.

Meanwhile, how about a Stop Buccaneer Blackouts? And a Stop Raider Blackouts? Better yet, how about Sports Fans Coalition starts a chapter in every city in America to address the blackouts and other local issues? (We’re working on it — if you’re interested in being a chapter chair, drop me a line.)

With enough pressure on the ground from fans and Sports Fans Coalition’s pressure on the FCC and elected officials here in DC, we can finally put an end to the sports blackout rule.

Not that we should have to.

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Brian Frederick is the Executive Director of Sports Fans Coalition. He holds a Ph.D. in Communication and lives in Washington, D.C. Email him at bfrederick@sportsfans.org.