OT: Lions/Skins Game Blacked Out

The NFL should have gotten rid of the blackout rule decades ago. It's a retarded rule that accomplishes nothing besides making sure that lots and lots of fans can't see their hometown team on TV. Millions of people never got to see some of Barry Sanders's greatest home games (like his 230+ yard game against Tampa Bay) because of the dumbass rule. I don't know anyone who has ever said "Uh oh, the game's not on TV. Guess I better go buy a ticket!" Also, for some dubass reason, Toledo has always been included in the blackout area for the Lions. This was true even when the Lions were playing in the Silverdome despite Toledo being 80+ miles away. Growing up as a Lions fan closer to Ohio than Pontiac, that sucked big time.

The blackout rule is completely idiotic and unjustifiable in ANY situation, including this one. Heck, I was going to tune in to a PRESEASON game just to see how they're looking this year and they blacked that out. Nobody says "oh, gee, I can't watch the game on TV, I guess I'll go buy a ticket". You're either interested enough to pay money for a ticket, or not.

as the Lions constantly being the worst team in the NFL. If they fielded a competitive team (which after Millen, things are looking up), this would not be happening. They are the #27 of 32 in terms of highest payroll and the ownership has to understand that fans won't pay for a crappy product. http://msn.foxsports.com/nfl/team/detroit-lions/salary

I was listening to a sports talk radio program in Ohio a few years ago, and the discussion was about the Bengals. The host mentioned that the ownership finally started doing something about the putrid team and its front office when the fans finally quit going to games. Ownership didn't really know when fans weren't watching from their living rooms. But when the game wasn't on, fans found something else to do on Sundays. That led to less interest in the team in general, which led, in turn, to less attendance at the games. Ultimately, season ticket sales declined. Ford Field was limited in size because of the fear that the Silverdome had so many seats, blackouts were inevitable. Now, the Lions can't even fill Ford Field. The economy is being blamed, but I wonder.

With Michigan's economy in a continuous state of decline, I don't see how the city can support four professional sports teams indefinitely. Something's gotta give. The Lions might be the first to go.

if the Lions beat the Skins this weekend then Jim Zorn is gone. The Skins are the most painfully boring team to watch in memory. I would not want Zorn's job. Snyder is a free spending, meddling owner who's record for developing a winning team has yet to be recorded. Zorn also takes crap from Redskin's color commentator, former QB God Sonny Jurgensen. An interview between Sonny and Zorn this week had Sonny saying if Zorn had sent in a halfback pass play in the red zone as he did last week, Sonny would have called an audible or a time out to raise hell with the coach. Zorn's response to Sonny? "I would have taken you out of the game then Sonny." Geez...that's tough.

I didn't know people still watched the Lions.

If Lions fans are too stupid (itself a redundancy) to keep from watching them on TV on their own, then the NFL is performing a valuable public service in mandating blackouts. Anybody who spends even five minutes watching that pathetic product should regret wasting time they'll never get back. The only reason the Fords have been able to maintain ownership over their incompetent reign is that each year since 1965 there have been several tens of thousands of people who are so brainlessly gullible that they'll willingly take the hard-earned money out of their own wallet and put it into William Clay Ford's pink, manicured palm.

The blackout rule is idiotic for a league like the NFL. It's not a rule any other major league has. All it does is deprive the league and it's sponsors of a few million eyes. The Lions need to consider going the Jacksonville route. The Jags haven't sold out a game in like 12 years, but they tarp off parts of the stadium so all available seating is sold.

The blackout isn't going anywhere. Bob Costas interviewed Roger Goodell a couples weeks ago on Sunday Night Football. Here's what he said: Costas: Last thing here briefly, you avoided any blackouts this week, but there’s a very distinct possibility of a larger number of blackouts than we’ve seen in recent years. Given the economic circumstances. The Jaguars for example are saying maybe all of their home games would not be seen on local TV. Given the present economic circumstances in our country, would it make sense to suspend the blackout rule for a year and then figure out what to do after that? Goodell: We don’t believe it does, Bob, we recognize that it’s publicly a very attractive proposal, but this has been a policy that has been in place for several decades we had blackouts lifted that were well below the numbers that we’re talking about now we’re looking at no more than 20 percent of our games blacked out and we’re working hard. We had games that we thought we’d have blacked out that weren’t this weekend, so fans are responding, we want them in the crowd at full stadiums. http://digitalsportsdaily.com/costasroger-goodell-interview/ It's a retarded policy. I don't understand how they think preventing people from watching games encourages attendance. Winning encourages attendance plain and simple. Put a good product on the field and people will go.

Campbell just threw two passes in a row that should have been intercepted, the last one for a pick 6. While they have shown some signs of improvement, I think I'm going to stop watching now while they're ahead. EDIT: Up 13-0 at the half, the Lions are actually looking halfway decent in comparison to Washington. Stafford has been decent, which I find encouraging. The Washington offense has been terrible (0 rushing yard, 94 yards total offense) and the Detroit offense has made several long drives (116 yards rushing, 275 yard total offense). On the other hand, they haven't taken full advantage of their opportunities and have settled for two field goals. With 20 seconds left in the half, the ball in the red zone and no timeouts, Stafford threw a little dunk pass to Northcutt in the middle of the field instead of throwing it in the end zone. As you'd expect, Northcutt can't get out of bounds, and the Lions have to spike the ball and kick the field goal. And of course these are the Lions. I look forward to the creative measures they will undoubtedly take to lose the game.