Central PA Steelers Fans Shucked By NFL
By Rik Millhouse
September 20, 2004
Ahhh, September in Central Pennsylvania.
As summer wanes and the days grow shorter, as
humidity clings in dying fits upon acres of corn long since harvested and that
still left to be shucked, as the Friday night lights bleed down on local
football heroes... all is as it should be.
Unless of course you happen to be a Pittsburgh
Steelers fan.
You see, this majestic tract of hills and
valleys, stretching from the Capital steps through rolling Amish farmland, past
the Susquehanna River and over into the urban York landscape --- this
Pennsylvania, according to the National Football League, is Ravens Country.
Such in this region is the displaced existence
of those who wear the black and gold, a proud tradition as much a part of
Pennsylvania's legacy as historic Gettysburg or Ben Franklin's Philadelphia.
More than America's favored sport, football is religion here... and Steelers
fans a congregation as devout as the local Mennonites whose horse-drawn buggies
still roll through Lancaster County.
Yet, from its highrise pulpit in New York ---
not the nearby old York, where the Continental Congress once adopted the
Articles of Confederation and established the first government of the United
States of America --- descends the NFL like a priest during Lent, cloaked in
robes of, you guessed it, purple.
How quickly, though, do NFL executives lose
their religion, converting from priests to popularists like a boardroom full of
contemporary blue-suited Pilates, absolving themselves of allegations of
partisanship when confronted on the issue.
They're just following forty-year-old rules,
they claim, albeit rules drawn by their own hand. The NFL, inseparable from its
television contracts, doesn't live in a world of cities and towns, only
"markets." In a perfect world, each team has its own autonomous
"space", free from interference. In the real world, like the NFL's
hometown of NYC, multiple local team competition is stemmed by inter-divisional
segmentation --- the New York Jets belong to the AFC, while the football Giants
hail from the National Football Conference. (Disregard the irony that both
teams actually play in New Jersey, or we'll never get anywhere.)
In the surreal world of Central Pennsylvania,
the NFL discounts geographical location altogether, in a veiled but transparent
attempt to assist a prodigal Baltimore franchise in re-establishing their
footing. In this city, no one can blame fans for being hesitant to trumpet the
return of football, after the way in which they were so unceremoniously stood
up in the middle of the night twenty years ago by Bob
"it's-not-you-Baltimore...really-it's-me" Irsay and the now Indy
Colts.
WHP-TV Channel 21, the local CBS affiliate based
in the state's capital of Harrisburg, is the licensed broadcaster of the NFL's
American Football Conference games to Pennsylvania's middle earth. WHP would
love nothing more than to accomodate Pittsburgh fans' feel for Steel every
Sunday afternoon; poll results have shown that the Black and Gold outnumber
Ravens fans in the area nearly four to one (other estimates have indicated a
greater discrepancy, nearly 80% to 20%, but we'll give Tagliabue's team the
benefit of the doubt). Of course, ratings are what ultimately drive every
station's broadcast agenda and it's ratings which dictate WHP's pro-Steeler
stance: Pittsburgh games deliver numbers between 5.0 and 7.5 among the
preferred 25-54 male demographic, while Baltimore often limps in between 1.5
and 3.5. Higher ratings equal higher revenue; both the fans and the affiliate
benefit. It all seems so simple.
None of that makes any difference to the NFL.
Under their system, WHP is a victim of locality, falling squarely in the shadow
of the city of Baltimore a scant seventy-five miles (and one Mason-Dixon line)
away --- compared to Pittsburgh, which lies a continent-stretching two hundred
miles in the distance. By rule, any station whose broadcast range is within 75
miles of a given team must televise the away games for that team, even if it
conflicts with audience preference and, apparantly, whether or not the team
even resides in the same state.
CBS, not surprisingly, was quick to reiterate
that this is the NFL's rule, not theirs. "Long standing contractual NFL
broadcasting policies," began a statement from their Orwellian-sounding
Audience Services Department, "dictate that any station whose signal
reaches to within 75 miles of an NFL stadium is designated a mandatory must
carry market for away games. This is designed to establish the consistent
availability of a team's games on the same stations when a fan can not actually
go to a game.
"The Harrisburg market has always been a
mandatory market for teams playing in Baltimore and ratings histories indicate
that there are fans of both clubs in the market." Funny, their own
affiliate has testified that every poll conducted by the station has revealed
an overwhelmingly pro-Pittsburgh preference. WHP's position on the subject seems
credible, given published reports that the station was flooded by "several
hundred phone calls and over 2,000 emails" from disgruntled viewers
expecting to see Pittsburgh's nail-biting victory over the Raiders on kickoff
weekend, who instead were subjected to watching the Ravens being blown out by
the rival Cleveland Browns.
"We," as in CBS Channel 21, continued
the statement, "were obligated to air Sunday's (Ravens) game on WHP. When
the Ravens are at home, we can put a different game on including Steelers games
as we understand that there is also a substantial Steeler fan base in the area.
It is possible to obtain one time only waivers from a team to air a different
game in a mandatory market but it is rare and only possible if a station is
supportive of that club."
To their credit, WHP-TV did all they could by way of commiseration with the Steelers faithful, going as far as to provide their viewing constituency with an avenue to voice their complaints, by publishing a direct telephone line to CBS (the number was disconnected by the end of the first day) and the NFL offices in New York (callers are immediately routed to voicemail, which may or may not actually be monitored by anyone).
It's clear that WHP-TV is not the bad guy here.
Truth be told, as much as Steeler fans may cringe at the assertion, neither are
the Ravens. No, it is the institutionalization of the NFL and the
pseudo-omniscient and vulgar commercially-driven arrogance which precludes it
from operating its franchises on any other terms than as products to be
marketed, popularized and sold that is to blame.
The Pittsburgh Steelers, unlike the Baltimore
Ravens, have long served the NFL's marketing machine well in this regard,
providing a steady revenue stream of merchandise sales that regularly places
them at or near the top of the NFL's most-profitable franchises. It's high time
the NFL showed their thanks.
Until then, the situation for Steelers fans in
Central Pennsylvania will remain stickier than shoo-fly pie but, unfortunately,
not nearly as sweet.
Keep the Steelers on the air in Central PA!
Visit http://home.att.net/~wgt11
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