A wise man once said “where money is involved–trust no one”. When you research money flows you discover that no where in our society is there a wealthier pool of cash than in the TV-sports-betting complex. And the worst part is: we are all to blame for the sins we’re about to reveal. For the uninformed: providers of goods and services advertise via TV media. Networks operate by selling air time to companies who want to advertise their wares. The more ad money flows into the networks (that is the more ads they interrupt the programming with) the more money they make. A recent golf program had nearly 400 “commercials” or one commercial for every single swing of the club. Baseball games–despite the Commissioner saying he wanted to shorten games—has watched games actually lengthen…not because they haven’t changed rules but because the networks are insisting on more ad time. Because we are addicted to sports viewing networks and advertisers know they have a free rein to brain wash us with the same commercials over and over.
But now we have a new business partner who participates in calling the shots. Enter professional bettors AKA “bookies” who can participate in the charade we call “organized sports”. Think about it…how many times have you turned off a game because the outcome was certain? What happens to the value of the ad dollar to those sponsors when you change the channel? How can the power players guarantee that the value of the ad money will be maximized? Answer: by keeping the game as close as possible for as long as possible. Consider a recent “perfect storm” for networks-advertisers and bookies. The Green Bay Packers and the Cleveland Browns were scheduled to play on Christmas Day. Selling ad time for the game had to be under pressure. Family viewing had to be down. Green Bay was a very heavy favorite. Enter the bookies who set point spreads for the game. Obviously the point spread was large but the bookies knew that Green Bay could cover it. So, right down to the last play of the game, the outcome was hanging in the balance. Final score: Green Bay 24, Cleveland 22. The advertisers were happy because viewership was held to the very end. Networks were happy because they made good on their promise to the ad people that they would do all they could to keep the audience. And bookies were ecstatic because Cleveland covered the point spread and made them rich.
We’re not saying this is actually what happened. We’re simply tossing out to you the possibility. Remember “where money is involved–trust no one”.
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