Sports as we know it has come to an end. It has. Pack up all the equipment, give the players their last checks and call it a day.
In an era when stadiums constantly are falling prey to corporate temptation to sell their naming rights to generate more money, the National Football League’s Chicago Bears have crossed a worse, nastier line.
In an unprecedented move, Bank One reportedly paid about $30 million for the rights to be the NFL team’s “presenting partner” for the next 12 years, according to Knight Ridder and the Associated Press. For the next 12 years, the team will be called “Bears football presented by Bank One.”
The team plans to make use of the name on radio broadcasts and in newspaper stories, and there will be a ton of signs around Soldier field next season.
This is madness! What is team president and CEO Ted Wilson thinking? Apparently, the team had trouble selling the naming rights to the Bears’ Soldier Field, and for good reason. Fans are attached to all aspects of their team, including the stadium and team nickname. They don’t want to be associated with their team’s corporate sellout.
If this is only the beginning, I cringe to think what’s next. Why not go all out and have every sports franchise in America auction off their names, the very thing they’ve ridden to success. I can just see the introduction to the next World Series, Super Bowl or other major sporting event.
“Brought to you in High Definition, the Verizon Wireless, in part with Suave hair color for men, Taco Bell and Famous Ray’s Pizza, the baseball of New York’s Yankees against CNN’s, Chick-Fil-A and Coca-Cola’s very own Atlanta Braves in the Microsoft, Hair Club for Men World Series.”
Bank One, which helped pay for Soldier Field’s renovation, especially is going to find this to be a raw deal.
Sportswriters, TV anchors and other media outlets never will call the team by its “new” name. Fortunately, there still is integrity in journalism and Bank One won’t get any shameless plugs, save for local papers or businesses that are close to either the bank or the team.
Corporate sponsors are nothing new in sports. Many publicly financed stadiums sport brand names – all the NCAA bowl games have a name tag and NASCAR races make a living selling company names to stick on its drivers’ cars. But teams and sponsors have found themselves in murky water because of these new-age, corporate partnerships.
In Denver, the Denver Post refused to call the Bronco’s new stadium anything but Mile High, which infuriated Invesco, because it had invested $120 million for naming rights. The same could hold true in this situation.
The Houston Astros were in a bind when it wanted to strip the ENRON label of its stadium after the company ran into legal trouble. The team later renamed the stadium Minute Maid Park to avoid any bad publicity.
The basic premise behind this move, as with all sports teams selling out, is to generate more money. While this plan will inflate the team’s bank account, it’s only going to alienate a solid fan base in Chicago, which is not going to like not having “Da Bears” being associated with some bank.
Fans already are cynical about overpaid athletes, teams that consistently lose and the perception of greedy owners who shamelessly sell stadium naming rights to the highest bidder. This move only makes things worse.
The Bears’ attendance likely should drop sharply because of this, and considering the Bears finished 4-12 last year, the team will be lucky if the new Soldier Field is half filled for games next year. This move is a dangerous step in the wrong direction, and can only hurt everyone involved. So give it up fans. If this is the future of sports, then the game truly is over.