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NFL's successfulsocialist model

IllegalArgument

Graduate Poster
IllegalArgument
Joined
Dec 29, 2003
Messages
1,895
I figured this would make for a fun thread, even if I'm completely wrong in describing the league this way. I'm sure I'll learn something.

The most popular sport in the USA which is nominally a capitalist country, has some very socialist ideals.

- Revenue sharing
- Salary floors and ceilings
- Caps on total salary spent per team
- Draft rules where the most successful are
penalized
- The better your record last year, the tougher
your schedule this year

All designed to maintain competition.

Discuss.
 
IllegalArgument said:
All designed to maintain competition.

Discuss.
Click to expand...
But socialism is designed to eliminate competition, so I would say the NFL is definitely not socialist.

Every corporate entity (and the NFL is surely a corporate entity) has rules within the organization, that's not what makes a socialist system.

ETA: You might try baseball, its' anti-trust exemption makes it a better candidate.
 
IllegalArgument said:
Yes, but it certainly suppresses or tries to balance competition.
Click to expand...
By that definition, McDonald's is a socialist organization.
 
Hence, the purpose of the thread. Trying to learn what socialism is, at least in the posters defination.
 
Actually the best thing to happen to the NFL was FREE AGENCY! Which is straight up capitolism baby!!! Teams bid top dollar to attract the top free agent players.

Until the free agent boom the NFL was just made up of the haves (49ers, Cowboys, Broncos) who were always in the superbowl and the have nots who werent.


Baseball has no cap, and is doing quite well. Better than ever.
 
IllegalArgument said:
Hence, the purpose of the thread. Trying to learn what socialism is, at least in the posters defination.
Click to expand...
IMHO, socialism cannot be used to describe a corporate entity. Unless, of course, it is a gov't protected monopoly.
 
You can have free agency, which just mean the richest teams will just buy up more of the best players. Why do you think they have revenue sharing.

Personally, I think the baseball situation sucks, same damn teams every year.
 
You're right. the NFL socialism is good...........FOR THE OWNERS!!! The players (aka the working men) get stiffed. Their contracts are not guarenteed and they owners make all the money. They get paid peanuts compared to baseball and basketball players.

Its not socialism, its more like JP Morgan style monopoly/anti-trust capitolism.
 
True, but as you can see if you let the salaries get out of controll like the NHL. Bad things can happen.
 
IllegalArgument said:
You can have free agency, which just mean the richest teams will just buy up more of the best players. Why do you think they have revenue sharing.

Personally, I think the baseball situation sucks, same damn teams every year.
Click to expand...

Unregulated capitalism tends to produce monopolies. And there's nothing less capitalistic than monopolies.

Sherman Anti-Trust Act
 
Tmy said:
You're right. the NFL socialism is good...........FOR THE OWNERS!!! The players (aka the working men) get stiffed. Their contracts are not guarenteed and they owners make all the money. They get paid peanuts compared to baseball and basketball players.

Its not socialism, its more like JP Morgan style monopoly/anti-trust capitolism.
Click to expand...

Do they have an Union? :D
 
IllegalArgument said:
True, but as you can see if you let the salaries get out of controll like the NHL. Bad things can happen.
Click to expand...

Ironically its the owners who cause the salary problems.

baseball does really well without salary control. As for the NFL. Their union sucks. But the contracts up, so we shall see.

By the way, the best union is baseballs, which is also one of the most successful sports.
 
Tmy said:
Ironically its the owners who cause the salary problems.

baseball does really well without salary control. As for the NFL. Their union sucks. But the contracts up, so we shall see.

By the way, the best union is baseballs, which is also one of the most successful sports.
Click to expand...
But baseball does have revenue sharing, designed to have a similar effect of salary cap. If George spends all his money to get the best players, he pays the other teams the luxury tax so that they can afford top players too.

I'm not so sure it's as successful (top to bottom) as you indicate.

The influx of new retro stadiums has helped too, but I'll wait 'til the novelty wears off a bit more.
 
IllegalArgument said:
I figured this would make for a fun thread, even if I'm completely wrong in describing the league this way. I'm sure I'll learn something.

The most popular sport in the USA which is nominally a capitalist country, has some very socialist ideals.

- Revenue sharing
- Salary floors and ceilings
- Caps on total salary spent per team
- Draft rules where the most successful are
penalized
- The better your record last year, the tougher
your schedule this year

All designed to maintain competition.

Discuss.
Click to expand...

I don't think you're wrong. A long time ago, in a galaxy far away (in other words in an article I barely remeber and can't find), I read a story contrasting the sports leagues in America with the soccer leagues in Europe. Apparently in Europe, usually regarded as more socialist, football clubs have no revenue sharing, and are expected to survive through market competition alone. Odd how these leagues would evolve into systems so seemingly opposed to the ideas of their host cultures.

Another thing the league does is give compensatory draft picks to teams that lose restricted free agents. Thus my beloved Kansas City Chiefs got an extra pick in the third round of the draft this year because they lost a tackle to the Bears last year. And I'm sure there are other things we've both overlooked.

I like revenue sharing in sports. The whole idea is to have 30 decently competitive teams playing each other, not drive down the number of teams to 2 or 3 superfranchises and 28 de facto farm clubs. Even George Will, conservative and free market through and through, said this (about baseball):

We had some conceptual contributions to this analysis, and the first one of which
was to insist that sports leagues are not supposed to be examples of free markets. If you
have 30 shoe companies competing with one another, it is perfectly rational for a few of
them to want to utterly dominate the rest, indeed to drive some of the weaker ones to the
wall.

That is not why you have a sports league. A sports league is a contrivance, an
artificial mechanism to produce something that without artifice will not exist, and that is
rough competitive balance so that you can have 15 interesting games a day throughout a
season.
Click to expand...
 
IllegalArgument said:
I figured this would make for a fun thread, even if I'm completely wrong in describing the league this way. I'm sure I'll learn something.

The most popular sport in the USA which is nominally a capitalist country, has some very socialist ideals.

- Revenue sharing
- Salary floors and ceilings
- Caps on total salary spent per team
- Draft rules where the most successful are
penalized
- The better your record last year, the tougher
your schedule this year

All designed to maintain competition.

Discuss.
Click to expand...

If football was truly socialist, there would be only one team, it would be run by the state at a loss and still somehow finish each season with a losing record.
 
Re: Re: NFL's successfulsocialist model

Jocko said:
If football was truly socialist, there would be only one team, it would be run by the state at a loss and still somehow finish each season with a losing record.
Click to expand...

Amusing as always Jocko and I mean that in a positive way.

If it's not socialist then what is it?
 
Re: Re: NFL's successfulsocialist model

Jocko said:
If football was truly socialist, there would be only one team, it would be run by the state at a loss and still somehow finish each season with a losing record.
Click to expand...

In the heads of many USians, it is only socialism if it fails. There is no such thing as successful socialism. If it works, it can't be socialism.
 
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