I am tired of reading about how the NFL’s TV ratings are down due to players not standing for the National Anthem.  The ratings are down for many reasons, not just one reason.

We as a country have a long history of saying that we support free speech.  Our actions however sing a different tune.  We either are a country that supports individuals’ rights to express themselves or we aren’t. We can’t have it both ways.  We can’t just support freedom of speech/expression for the ideas we agree with.  If standing for the Anthem is such a big deal, why is it ok to sit at a sports bar, drink beer and cram food in your face during the Anthem?  Why aren’t people standing there?  If you really look at it, the players are standing for the Anthem.  They are standing up for something they believe in.  Civil Rights.  

Here are the reasons I believe that the NFL ratings are really down…

• Salary Cap.  Teams can’t stay within the cap to retain all their talent.  The NFL needs to look at different ways to do this.  
• TV Coverage.  The NFL should be showing more games on regular TV (ABC, CBS, NBC, ESPN, etc.).  The NFL want us to watch, but they make it harder.  NFL Sunday Ticket is about money, not about the fans.  Quit blacking out games that don’t sell out.   It is time the NFL looks at building the fan base.  NFL games are expensive to attend, make the game more accessible to everyone.
• Tom Brady.  Not really, just fun to blame him for stuff.
• Fantasy Football.  Yes, I do play it.  It has ruined the way I watch games.  I no longer care about game outcomes, just how my players did.  I don’t really enjoy watching actual games until the playoffs when I can enjoy watching the actual games.  I know this isn’t going to go away, but it does impact the way people watch or not watch.
• Bad teams.  There are just too many of them.
• Bad Match-ups in Prime Time.  Bad teams get to square off in prime time on Thursday nights, Sunday nights and Monday nights.  NFL needs to move the best matchups to these prime time spots.  
• Injuries.  So many injuries.  Who wants to watch two back-up QBs battle it out?  It is  like a pre-season game.

I think you get the point.  There are so many reasons the NFL is struggling.  Blaming the kneeling during the Anthem is just an attempt to mask a much larger problem and it diverts attention away from the real reason these players are kneeling–so that no one has to have uncomfortable discussions about racism, but that’s just my feeling.

Oh, and for the record, Papa John’s pizza sales are most likely down due to better options.  LOL!

*Special thank you to my wife Kelly for serving as my editor for all my blog posts!