NFL comes to London

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I wondered about that myself. My actual line of thinking was, "I wonder which team the crowd will root for?" Normally it would be easy - the New York teams are always popular. But the Dolphins have a very solid fan base as well - even if this particular season happens to be a down year for them.

Actually, I think the time they picked is just fine. The normal time slots for games are in the afternoon. Most east coast games start at 1:00 P.M. in the eastern time zone, while most west coast games start at 4:30 P.M. in the eastern time zone. The game in London will start at 6:00 P.M. London time, which is 1:00 P.M. in the eastern time zone. So it's actually being played exactly when it would normally be played, as Miami and New York are both east coast teams.

 

Another thing with this is - what happened for the season ticket holders? I'd hate for my club to play a match abroad after I'd spent a lot of money for a season ticket.

 

season tickets are only good for home games not away games

 

Well yeah.. but when you have 2 teams, one team plays away and one at home. This game WOULD have been played in Miami, or wherever. I don't know about you but I'd be pretty miffed if I had bought a Miami Dolphins season ticket at the start of the season, and now one of those games is abroad, so you miss it, after spending god knows how much.

Yeah? You with me now?

 

i understand you but thats not how it works over here. you have your psl(permanent seat license) which isn't permanent as you have to pay it every year & then you have the right to buy a ticket for each home game in that assigned seat.

we have a really screwed up system.

 

You have it all wrong - and I already answered most of this. First of all, yes, Miami was considered the home team. There are normally 10 home games per team per year (2 preseason games and 8 regular season games). People who purchased season tickets paid 9/10 of the value they normally would have had to pay, as they are only going to get 9 home games instead of 10.

Now, onto PSLs - you obviously don't own one, as you would know it is a ONE TIME FEE. From NFL.com:

You still pay for your tickets every year, but the license - which is the expensive part of becoming a season ticket holder - is a one time fee. After purchasing the PSL, you "own" the seat so to speak, and you can sell your season tickets to others at any price you wish, and cannot be charged with "scalping" the tickets. Many fans do just that - they sell a couple of their season ticket games each year, and the money they make from those couple of games pays for the season tickets for the rest of the year.

London didn't get a very good game at all, but that's the type of game you usually get when the entire thing is played in pouring rain. More often than not, they are low scoring affairs with not much offense.

 

obviously YOU dont have one, which i do at bank of america(formerly ericsson) stadium. technically the yearly fee isnt a fee. you have to purchase a set number of home game tickets each year or you can forfeit your psl. now this may be something that is only done at this & the other 2 privately financed stadiums in the nfl (most aren't privately financed)
and no , you CANNOT sell your ticket for more than(in my state) $3 over face value or you are guilty of scalping. the only LEGAL way to charge more is to sell it as a package deal, which typically includes a hotel room for a set number of days. doing it that way you can charge whatever you want.
learn the law before spouting off again aldeth

 

martaug - I probably shouldn't be discussing NFL policy with a Panther fan at the moment. You were probably present for the humiliating loss yesterday and are in no mood for this, but what the hell...

First of all, I was talking specifically about the Dolphin fans season ticket holders (that's what Barmy asked about), so unless Bank of America Stadium has taken a 1000 mile trip south, their rules really aren't what I'm talking about. (You don't seriously think I was suggesting that ALL teams were paying 9/10 of their season ticket prices this season, were you?)

I still maintain - despite your contrary howlings - that the psl is a ONE TIME FEE. You pay for your season tickets every year - I've never said otherwise - but you do not pay for your yearly tickets with the psl price on top of that. I can't believe you're arguing this with me. If you have a psl you know that those things cost around $1500 per seat - and you don't pay $1500 in psl fees on top of the cost of season tickets every year, unless the Panthers do things completely differently from the rest of the nfl, which I'm sure they don't. If you're arguement is simply that the "fee" is the cost of the season tickets - well no kidding! I never suggested that once you pay the psl fee you get free season tickets for the rest of your life.

Finally, as far as not being able to sell your ticket for more than $3 over face value: That's probably true if you're dumb enough to show up at the stadium the day of the game in an effort to scalp your tickets. Most people I know who have season tickets use the internet to sell their tickets - ebay most commonly, but I've seen stubhub used as well - and then they mail their tickets to the purchaser. The sale and purchase are done annonymously - which is why no one ever gets caught for scalping. Heck there are people who have purchased hundreds of season tickets at some stadiums - for the explicit purpose of selling them for more than they paid for them to turn a profit.

I have bought and sold tickets to games this way - I don't have season tickets at Bank of America stadium though, so I can't speak specifically to your issue. If you don't have a single person who owns dozens if not scores of psls at Bank of America stadium and sells them at a hefty profit (which for most stadiums is around $300 for a $75 tickets) then you are in the minority.

 

The game is like... 10 SECONDS FRENZIED ACTION!!!... (....5 minutes walking around...).... 10 SECONDS FRENZIED ACTION!!! ... (...5 minutes walking around....).

Really stoppy starty, and no chance to get any rhythm or flow into the game.

Not that I'm huge on the rules of the game, or anything near an expert, but I think the game could be improved by abolishing the '4 downs' rule; and refrain from stopping the game every time someone gets tackled... the same should carry on. You'd get more action, more chance for a flowing game, and less boredom.

 

thats okay, the panthers had a very small chance against the colts. the colts have a big fight coming up next week.(undefeated NE)
my psl was like $5ooo when i got it in'99 & when they come available now they sell from the stadium for $20000. if you dont buy the season ticket package(which is now $960) for 2 years in a row, they have the right to revoke your license.
remember that BoA stadium is one of the few privately financed stadiums & is a bit different from the publicly finance stadium
the biggest psl holder i now of is bank of america, they have like 300 seats.

 

I just feel bad that it was such a crappy game. Miami just stinks to high heaven. The fact that the Giants didn't destroy them makes me question how good they are.

 

yeah, i hope the game next week between ind & ne isnt a blow out. like the world series between the rockies & the sox, i was hoping for a good back and forth 7 game series not a 4 game sweep

 

omg! $20K!?!? It must indeed be different with privately owned stadiums. I do know that psl fees do increase with time, and I have not checked recently what the prices were for Ravens Stadium or Heinz Field (the ones I'm familiar with). However, as recently as a couple of years ago, a psl could be had for around $1500.

Two mitigating factors:

1. The weather stunk. It poured the entire game. Whenever the weather is that bad, it makes for tough days for most offenses, so it's not that surprising that we had a 13-10 game.

2. The field turf is designed for soccer - not American football. ESPN had an interesting piece on that. The grass grown on those fields is specifically used because it is more slick - it allows a soccer ball to easily skid across the surface. Rain only makes a slicker than normal surface more slick. That's good for soccer, but bad for football.

 

haha, the noisebleed seat psl's are $3ooo dollars & $430 for tickets. i got lucky and bought mine from a business owner i knew who was moving out of state. they were already up to like $7500 from the stadium at that time, so i felt i was getting a deal. i didn't know i had to buy the tickets at least every other year, as i run hot & cold on my dedication to the game. sometimes i watch everygame i can & sometimes i wont watch a game for months. most of the time my brother & whoever the gf is that week uses the tickets(man, he's such a whoredog!)

 

I agree, but, then again, cricket is like that too.

 

I feel sorry for the ravens. Go Packers!

 

By the way... you ruined our pitch! Having our field ploughed by 20 stone Americans in fancy dress really wrecked it! Don't think we'll be doing that again any time soon....

 

Just to correct Barmy up there, the have been plenty of footballers caught using doping. The most famous ones being Edgar Davids and Frank De Boer. Juventus was also under a several years long investigation for having systematically doped their players. There is very very little testing in football and for example steroids wouldnt benefit the players that much so I doubt it is highly widespread but be sure that it exists.

 

Yeah, Barmy, football really tears up a field. Some baseball teams over here share their stadiums with football teams and the same thing happens; makes the field almost unplayable for the baseball teams.