Yahoo Finance Goodell, NFL in fight to save public image as Rice scandal deepens
The hits keep coming for NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell. Two days after TMZ released a video from inside a Revel Casino Hotel elevator showing former Baltimore Raven running back Ray Rice striking his then fiancé, the AP reported that law enforcement officials had actually submitted the video to the NFL back in April. Recall that back in July Goodell handed down a 2-game suspension for Rice’s accused assault of his fiancé, a punishment that was roundly criticized for its leniency.
With more graphic footage coming out, and reports suggesting the NFL had actually seen Rice’s alleged actions, calls have been coming for Goodell’s resignation, or at least an investigation. Last night Goodell acceded to those calls and hired former FBI director Robert Mueller to head up an independent investigation, which will be led by NFL owners John Mara and Art Rooney II. Results of the investigation will be released publicly upon completion.
The NFL needs to tread carefully here as the financial fallout could potentially be huge. The league reportedly rakes in around $9 billion in revenue every year, and as Yahoo Finance’s Mike Santoli and Jeff Macke discuss in the attached video, the last thing the NFL needs is another PR hit that could rattle corporate sponsors.
“Financially the NFL has always been this very protected, very, very lucrative micro-economy, they have an anti-trust exemption, they are a not-for-profit on the books,” Santoli notes. Scandals like the ones involving Rice, the bullying of Dolphin’s offensive lineman Jonathan Martin, and the NFL’s ongoing concussion litigation are only deepening the government’s resolve into opening the books on the NFL’s inner workings, as Macke astutely points out 70% of the costs for stadiums and facilities for NFL teams are borne by taxpayers. The stakes, both from private and public coffers, are tremendous.
Will getting rid of Goodell solve the NFL’s image problem, at least for the sake of sponsors? While groups like the National Organization of Woman are calling for Goodell’s head, owners and sponsors aren’t going that far, hoping time will help weather the storm.
“I do think the corporate sponsors are exactly doing that (hoping it fades away), hoping that this is just a thing you have to absorb and deal with. They’ve already bought the season’s commercials, they’re trying to see if they can get the attention back on football,” Santoli says. “This is a league by the way that weathered the Michael Vick dogfighting thing… it seems like nothing [usually] sticks, but it can change if you have this sense that the NFL can’t handle its own affairs, that you need the government in there.”
Unfortunaely for the NFL that horse has already left the stable. Members of the House Judiciary Committee sent Goodell a letter calling on him to fully address the problem of domestic violence in the league. Specifically, the committee members said the league had not been clear about how it requested the Rice video from law enforcement, or why it did not try to obtain the video from other sources, presumably the Revel security officials.
NFL owners like Bob Kraft of the Patriots and Mara of the Giants are backing Goodell, for now. But if the scandal spirals out of control, and advertisers start pulling sponsorships and ad dollars from the NFL, a financial hit could drop the sword of Damocles on Goodell’s head.
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