Fans booing at the NFL draft is not a new thing. With New York Jets/Giants fans being the predominant force in the room at Radio City Music Hall over the last few decades, it's actually the norm. They even boo their own teams when questionable picks have been announced, but honestly you can't blame them when they selected Kyle Brady over Warren Sapp in 1995. And most notably, we can all recall the most violent chorus of boos we had ever heard when the Eagles drafted Donovan McNabb with the second overall pick in 1999. But that's what fans do. They tell you how it is. They don't hold back and they wear their hearts on their sleeves when it comes to these teams. NFL fans are without a doubt the most passionate sports fans in the country and have helped football to overtake baseball as the national pastime. So it was truly telling to hear the fans in attendance at the draft last week shower NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell with a barrage of boos as he meekly walked to the podium to start the draft. He awkwardly smiled and tried to play nice to the crowd, almost making it seem like "Hey guys, I'm with you! I love football too, so don't hate me please?" And it continued to happen everytime he came up to that podium during the first and second round. To the fans, Goodell is the face of the NFL, and more directly the face of the group of CEOs who are trying to get super rich and stop their employees from working.
That's what the NFL doesn't get. This whole work stoppage has an unprecedented context in which it is operating in, unlike any past labor dispute. The country's economic issues are widespread. Unemployment remains high and there is little relief in sight. Yet, fans still shell out gobs of money during these tought times to see their favorite games played on Sunday. The NFL has continued its tremendous growth during these times, and the fans are the biggest reason for that. So the idea of the owners wanting an additional $1 Billion off of the top of total earnings to be split between the 32 clubs and not shared with the players really resonates with the casual observer. To the fans, the NFL is becoming nothing more that Enron and Roger Goodell is Kenneth Lay. We have a hard enough time getting jobs, keeping them or earning enough money to support our family and our lifestyle. Sure, many NFL players make more money than any of us could hope to in our lifetimes, but we can relate to them in the most simple terms; they are just people who want to go into the office, put in a hard day's work and be compensated for what they do. When Big Brother says no, because I want more money and don't want to share it with you as an employee, there's no way to justify that to the fans.
So Roger Goodell, the owners, and their reps will continue to draw the ire of fans everywhere until this dispute is resolved. Goodell insists that he is trying to improve the game for the fans, but I don't recall a huge push by the fans for an 18 game season. That's all the owners and their desire to generate more revenue. Not one fanbase likes the idea of a team's home game played in London. It's part of the NFL's push to "grow" their sport internationally. Look, NFL Europe didn't work, but novelty contests that happen once a year can draw a crowd. Who cares if it's detrimental to a team or fan base, right? Despite what the league thinks, the reality is that the public sentiment is agains them. They will continue to be seen as faceless, greedy tyrants the longer this process goes on. The players have the backing of the courts (for now), and, after the reactions from the crowd at the draft, it was obvious the fans have their backs too.
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