Should the N.Y. Mets be community owned like the Green Bay Packers?

BY JOE FAVORITO

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

ON N.J. SPORTS MARKETING

The power of the people, now amplified through the avenues of social media. It has recently been the impetus in rallying support and eventually toppling governments in places like Egypt, and it has a profound effect in Algeria, Tunisia, China and Libya in influencing public opinion and creating a rallying point for those enterprising enough to find platforms to voice social unrest when government sought to squelch ever-growing voices.

So, can such a powerful channel be used to wrest power from the hands of those in control of sports entities in the United States, or at least provide impetus for the sale of a team or the governance of an organization, or even the move of a franchise? Sports after all, is fueled by passion, and if the people spending money are unhappy, could they find ways through the use of the digital space to force a change of power or even take control? It sounds great, doesn’t it?

After all, any sports historian knows that the current NFL Champions, the Green Bay Packers, are a community-owned team run by a board, not by one single owner, and it works at the bottom of the Bay, doesn’t it? So why can’t it work in Sacramento, a city trying to keep its Kings, or in New York, where financial troubles have waylaid the Mets or even in New Jersey, should the Devils have to seek a new owner?

Recently one of the louder voices in the Mets search has been a group looking to sell shares of a community-owned team, ala a Wall Street investment, which would raise the money and give “everyone” a chance to own the team. In Sacramento, the Glass Agency, a Sacramento advertising firm, has launched a campaign in the region encouraging citizens to show their support for keeping the NBA Sacramento Kings in Sacramento. The campaign, which officially tipped off on Tuesday, February 22, will run for four weeks and includes billboards, online advertising and social media, all done pro bono with the idea of giving the people a chance to chime in and be heard. In other places, England for example, Ebbsfleet United was purchased and then sold back to the fans who were able to vote on lineup changes and other business, while in Torrington, Connecticut a semi-pro baseball team was taken over by community vote as well. None obviously had the great results of the Packers, and for good reason.

Sports are a multi-billion dollar largely private business, not a fantasy game.

While it would be great to think that the power of the people can move mountains and fix the wrongs done on the field of sport, the truth is that even the most questionable moves are made not as a democracy but as a dictatorship in sport. Votes, boards, leadership has to be done by a select, small and hopefully confident level of key executives, not the great unwashed. For all of the thousands of trades discussed on talk radio, online and at the water cooler, few have the wherewithal to make deals, just as few are qualified to govern, to run major corporations public or private, or to run government on any level. Could anyone stand back and say they could do it better? Sure. Are there groups in any realm of business that don’t do a good job? Of course. Could common sense dictate more at a crucial juncture? Yes. Could anyone make the tough decisions in business, especially one run as much by emotion as sport? No.

The Packers work because they are structured by fans that have shares but don’t really have any major say in the decision making. The shares have no real value financially, they cannot be traded and there is no return. Those looking to buy the Mets and sell shares are looking to place the team on the open market, with the volatility there for all to see (as well as the books). In the business of sport, where multi-millions would have to be raised, accounted for and managed, and the return might not be there for some time, those looking to balance the financial with the emotional will be left wanting, especially those uninitiated in the ways of the public markets but wanting to spend dollars, hard earned dollars, to get a “say.” However unless you have the millions…your “say” and your stake will probably be left unsatisfied.

Now with all that being said on ownership, is there a place in today’s volatile social atmosphere to rally and force a sale, at least to a group with the financial wherewithal? Can there be a rise of the people against the overlords in sport to make change? Tough to say. “Fan protests” in years past…burning tickets, gatherings at City Hall etc., have failed miserably to move the needle of an owner or to find a way for a public entity to step in and stop a private person from exerting his will. No one could stop the Colts from leaving Baltimore, the Sonics from Seattle, the Browns from Cleveland, the Dodgers from Brooklyn, and in all likelihood no one can probably stop or start a sale of a team or its movement from people with means.

The Sacramento plan has some great merit to it if it is beyond the emotional and more of the financial. However in the end of Joe and Gavin Maloof are lured to a place with a new arena there is little the fans can do to stop them, unless someone comes along with big bucks and a plan for a new arena that entices both ownership and the Honorable Kevin Johnson.

It’s nice to think about these plans that the teams we root for are public institutions, but hard to really prove in today’s economy. By the way, those publicly owned teams in the UK and Connecticut. Failures as business models and on the field, as bickering, dollar shortfalls and a lack of consensus hurt the product and made decisions impossible.

So what can a fan do? First, leave the decisions to those of means and with good business sense. The complexities of sale are way more than what is on the surface, as is the case with any business decision. Second root and hope for change, albeit silently. The lack of noise sometimes speaks more to change than those with loud voices and transport, short term plans. Third, hope for a miracle, we all love a comeback.

It may be easier to topple a dictator than it is to find a way to buy the Mets by the common folk. And endlessly more important in the grand scheme, no?

Joe Favorito has over 24 years of strategic communications/marketing, business development and public relations expertise in sports, entertainment, brand building, media training, television, athletic administration and business. Visit him at JoeFavorito.com.