Here’s a one-day fantasy: that these ads just go away
COMMENTARY
Fantasy football isn’t killing football. Advertisements for the new fantasy football are killing football.
While I’m sure that some fantasy football fans have benefitted from the presence of the one-day leagues that have seemingly swallowed the NFL whole, the barraged blitz of promotion that occurred last weekend during the NFL’s kickoff extravaganza has notably left a sour taste surrounding the disguised gambling ventures.
It was impossible to escape the message that both New York City-based FanDuel and local startup DraftKings wanted to force down every football fan’s increasingly bile-filled throat. You can win millions with ease and no commitment (aside from your possible gaming addiction) just by choosing the right players. Of course, the ads fail to mention the likelihood that fulfillment is likely just as probable as finding satisfaction from a late-night dating hotline.
But there’s a lot of cash at stake here — a combined $575 million in funding ($300 million for DraftKings, $275 million for FanDuel) — leading to a marketing push not seen since TBS’s relentless assault of “Frank TV’’ during the 2007 ALCS.
According to the Wall Street Journal, DraftKings was the single biggest advertiser on television during the week leading up to Monday Night Football, with 5,800 airings costing about $20 million. Since Aug. 1, DraftKings has spent $81 million on ads that have aired more than 22,000 times, FanDuel, $20 million on 7,500 airings over that same time period, according to the Journal, which also pointed out only Verizon spent more on national spots over the weekend.
Can you hear me now, indeed.
ESPN viewers couldn’t even escape the presence during morning pregame shows on the network, when the hosts boasted about their teams for the week, all emblazoned with the logo for DraftKings, which also has a sponsorship presence on ESPN’s season-long fantasy site. Yes, that FanDuel schlub may have actually turned $35 into more than $2 million by lucking into the right lineups. Everybody hates him now after seeing his mug countless times during Sunday’s games.
In fact, according to Digiday, data from Brandwatch, a social media monitoring tool, showed that 76 percent of FanDuel commercials were received negatively during football’s opening weekend, compared with DraftKings, which only garnered only 75 percent of mentions tracking with some level of distaste.
“This is not something that is year-round for us,’’ DraftKings CEO Jason Robins told the Journal about the campaign’s lifespan. “It’s a brief window where you can fish when the fish are biting.’’
It worked, as DraftKings went 3 million to 4.5 million users during the first week of the NFL season. There’s that figure that this isn’t going away anytime soon, and then, there’s this: According to Bloomberg Business, FanDuel and DraftKings were projected to bring in a combined $60 million in entry fees last weekend. Sports books in Las Vegas were expected to handle about $30 million.
The NFL’s insistence to distance itself from Vegas odds (something NBC play-by-play guy Al Michaels has repeatedly poked at over the years, including during last week’s opening game between the Patriots and Steelers) flies directly in the face of its relationships with FanDuel and DraftKings. They’re not officially partners, but Patriots owner Robert Kraft the Cowboys’ Jerry Jones even have stakes in DraftKings. And the NFL’s network partners haven’t been shy about taking their advertising money.
But Sin City can hardly disguise itself in the clever ways that the duo of online gambling sites, which, in essence, is what they are, have managed. But really, where’s the inherent skill required in order not to consider weekly fantasy showdowns straight-out gambling? Does it take a greater level of football knowledge to know that Aaron Rodgers is a good play at quarterback than it does that the Packers should be favored to beat the Jaguars?
Could it be just as easy as kick-starting a team gambling pool and label it “fantasy?’’ I’ve got the Pats over the Bills this week in my fantasy league, but in my offshore ring, I’m taking the points. Is that legal? And if so; Trademark, 2015.
Look, traditional fantasy football comes with its own set of concerning properties that can tend to infringe on the real-life aspect of the game on the field. Nobody would dispute that. But DraftKings and FanDuel have brought the invasion to a whole other level, an inescapable presence on your weekly appetite for the NFL that leaves you just as nauseous as your friend’s bean dip that you attacked far too vigorously during the pregame show.
Season-long fantasy football is a component of camaraderie among friends and colleagues, despite the approximately $70 billion empire it has become. As if that commitment for four months of smack talk is a real downer.
That doesn’t exist in the one-day fantasy world. Yet, somehow their gambling aspect has been able to hide much like legalized scalping has become a general practice across the country.
But last weekend’s push also garnered some attention that the sites probably don’t want. This past week, Representative Frank Pallone Jr., Democrat of New Jersey, asked Congress to investigate whether the sites had evaded restrictions on online gambling.
“Anyone who watched a game this weekend was inundated by commercials for fantasy sports websites, and it’s only the first week of the N.F.L. season,’’ Pallone said in a statement, according to the New York Times. “These sites are enormously popular, arguably central to the fans’ experience, and professional leagues are seeing the enormous profits as a result. Despite how mainstream these sites have become, though, the legal landscape governing these activities remains murky and should be reviewed.’’
As should their message be taken with a dose of reality. Those Pats fans seen in one of the the DraftKings commercials, for instance, the $1 million winners, took home the big check only because they had the fortune of inserting former Patriots running back Jonas Gray into their lineup one game last season, when the rookie went on to rush for 200 yards and four touchdowns in one of the most unexpected performances in NFL history.
Gray was quiet the rest of the season, and in coach Bill Belichick’s doghouse in the week’s following his big moment on the cover of Sports Illustrated. DraftKings and FanDuel won’t be piping down over the next 16 weeks of the regular season, but their obnoxious assault over one week is certainly making some of us wish they’d go the way of the one-hit wonder.
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