The NFL (Audio)

The NFL's Dominance and Controversies

• The NFL is America's favorite sport, with football being more than three times as popular as the next highest sport, basketball, and the Super Bowl is watched by over 100 million viewers every year (1m10s).
• The Super Bowl is the weekend with the fewest weddings planned of the year, and approximately 2/3 of American households watch it (1m29s).
• The NFL has become the most valuable media property in America, with 82 of the top 100 TV broadcasts aired last year being NFL games (1m50s).
• The NFL owners have made bold long-term bets by choosing to divide their revenues equally, a strategy not seen in any other sports league (2m22s).
• The NFL has been involved in several controversies, including the recent on-field collapse of Damar Hamlin, the epidemic of CTE among former football players, and national anthem protests (2m30s).
• The modern fan's relationship with the sport is complicated, with many experiencing cognitive dissonance due to the risks players take and the sport's social issues (2m45s).

The NFL's Racial Imbalance and American Identity

• Despite being a predominantly black player base, with 70% of players being black, there are only two black head coaches and no black owners in the NFL (3m9s).
• The story of the NFL is emblematic of America's past and present, with its greatness and flaws reflecting the country's complexities (3m22s).

The Business of Football

• The episode will focus on the business of football, exploring how the NFL became the most valuable media property in America (4m2s).
• The NFL has its roots in a game of football played on November 6th, 1869, on the campus of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, between 25 Princeton students and 25 Rutgers students (5m11s).
• The game of football in 1869 was essentially "mob football" or "medieval football," with no rules, and the goal was to get the ball to a certain spot on the other side (5m59s).
• The game was popular among public school students in England, and American college kids were trying to keep up with the social elite by adapting it into an actual sport (6m47s).
• The first game had 25 players per team, with a ball that could not be picked up or thrown, and the object was to kick the ball through the opponent's goal for one point (7m23s).
• The game became wildly popular and was codified and formalized amongst the Ivy League over the next 5 to 10 years, but it was also still very dangerous, with deaths and serious injuries common (7m49s).
• In 1905, there were 19 fatalities in intercollegiate football in the US, and a serious injury to Theodore Roosevelt Jr. led to President Theodore Roosevelt calling a summit to adopt major changes to make the game safer (8m20s).
• The game was initially influenced by the English public school system, where it was played as a character-building experience, but it was also seen as a way to keep up with the social elite (7m7s).
• The NFL's history is also influenced by the work of authors such as Michael MacCambridge, who wrote "America's Game," a biography-style history of the NFL (4m37s).
• Peyton Manning's show on ESPN+ is also recommended as a great resource for learning about the NFL (4m26s).

Early Days of American Football

• The NFL has its roots in a game of football played on November 6th, 1869, on the campus of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, between 25 Princeton students and 25 Rutgers students (5m11s).
• The game of football in 1869 was essentially "mob football" or "medieval football," with no rules, and the goal was to get the ball to a certain spot on the other side (5m59s).
• The game was popular among public school students in England, and American college kids were trying to keep up with the social elite by adapting it into an actual sport (6m47s).
• The first game had 25 players per team, with a ball that could not be picked up or thrown, and the object was to kick the ball through the opponent's goal for one point (7m23s).
• The game became wildly popular and was codified and formalized amongst the Ivy League over the next 5 to 10 years, but it was also still very dangerous, with deaths and serious injuries common (7m49s).
• In 1905, there were 19 fatalities in intercollegiate football in the US, and a serious injury to Theodore Roosevelt Jr. led to President Theodore Roosevelt calling a summit to adopt major changes to make the game safer (8m20s).
• The game was initially influenced by the English public school system, where it was played as a character-building experience, but it was also seen as a way to keep up with the social elite (7m7s).
• The NFL's history is also influenced by the work of authors such as Michael MacCambridge, who wrote "America's Game," a biography-style history of the NFL (4m37s).
• Peyton Manning's show on ESPN+ is also recommended as a great resource for learning about the NFL (4m26s).
• The game of American football has a violent history, with many deaths and injuries occurring in its early days, which led to calls for it to be made safer (8m51s).
• Teddy Roosevelt played a crucial role in the formation of the NCAA, as he threatened to outlaw the game if the universities did not take steps to make it safer, leading to the creation of the NCAA to regulate and codify the game (9m29s).
• The NCAA introduced several rule changes to make the game safer, including the abolition of wedge formations and the creation of a zone, which significantly reduced the number of deaths and serious injuries (9m55s).
• The NCAA also introduced the forward pass in 1905, which became a defining element of American football and differentiated it from soccer and rugby (10m48s).
• The introduction of the forward pass added a new level of beauty and strategy to the game, counterbalancing its violence, and made it more popular and romanticized (11m33s).
• Collegiate American football became wildly popular and remains a huge part of the American sports landscape to this day (11m59s).

The Rise of Professional Football

• The NCAA's formation and the introduction of the forward pass laid the groundwork for the modern game of football, but the NFL did not directly follow from these developments (12m10s).
• In the early 1900s, professional teams began to emerge, but they were viewed as second-rate to the college game and were seen as dirty for commercializing the esteemed college game (12m55s).
• Professional football was initially viewed as immoral by many, especially the elite, due to the involvement of money, with the gripe being the payment of players rather than the game itself or how it was played (13m12s).
• The attitude at the time was that football should be an amateur activity for young men, and not a professional sport (13m34s).
• Despite this, professional sports did exist, with baseball being a notable example, and it was a highly popular and lucrative industry (13m59s).
• Baseball was considered the number one sport in America, with Michael McBride describing it as "towering above the sporting landscape like a Colossus" (14m4s).

The Founding of the NFL

• The goal of baseball teams was to make money by selling admission to games, and the sport was widely accepted as a professional activity (14m39s).
• In 1920, the American Professional Football Conference, later renamed the National Football League (NFL), was founded, with the goal of legitimizing professional football in the eyes of Americans (15m1s).
• The founding of the NFL was driven by George Halas, who organized a meeting of team owners at the Jordan and Hupmobile auto showroom in Canton, Ohio, on August 20th, 1920 (15m17s).
• Halas was the employee of the AE Staley starch company, and his main duty was to organize, coach, and play for the company football team, the Staleys (15m40s).
• The team was sponsored by the company, and the sponsorship was deeply rooted in the NFL, with the first team being named after the sponsor (15m55s).
• The founders of the NFL had a plan to legitimize professional football, which included not signing current college players, creating a strict demarcation between the college and pro games, and making the pro game a legitimate and tolerated activity in America (16m48s).
• In the NFL, players cannot be drafted directly from high school; they must complete their junior year of college to be eligible, with the exception of being able to enter the league one year early, a concession made 100 years ago (17m18s).
• The NFL aims to play the game at a high ethical and rules-based standard, unifying different teams and leagues with varying rule books and customs to set an expectation for fans and standardize the game (17m38s).
• The league's third key aspect is the appointment of Jim Thorpe as its president, a strategic move given his leadership of the Canton Bulldogs and his status as a renowned athlete (18m14s).
• Jim Thorpe was a Native American athlete who played college football at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School under coach Pop Warner, leading the team to a national championship against Ivy League powerhouses (19m2s).
• Thorpe's impressive athletic career also includes winning two gold medals in the 1912 Summer Olympics in Sweden, competing in the decathlon for the first time and winning the gold medal, as well as playing professional football, baseball, and basketball (20m20s).
• At the 1912 Olympics, King Gustav of Sweden presented Thorpe with his gold medals, calling him the greatest athlete in the world, to which Thorpe famously replied, "Thanks" (21m1s).
• The Proto NFL was formed in 1920 with 14 teams and gained instant legitimacy due to Jim Thorp being the president and figurehead (21m18s).

Early Challenges and the Exclusion of Black Players

• The league quickly became the biggest professional football league in America, consolidating smaller leagues in the Midwest, but faced stiff competition and an uphill battle in the 1920s and 1930s (21m42s).
• Out of the original 15 teams in 1920, only three franchises endured: the Decatur Staleys (now the Chicago Bears), the Racine Cardinals, and the Green Bay Packers (22m0s).
• The Decatur Staleys became the Chicago Staleys and eventually adopted the name "Bears" after the Cubs, as they played in Wrigley Field (22m22s).
• Professional football faced a stigma in the 1920s, with many considering it to be inferior to college football, as exemplified by a speech given by University of Michigan head coach Fielding Yost in 1922 (22m55s).
• Yost stated that professional football robbed the game of its character-building qualities and ideals, and this sentiment was widely shared at the time (23m10s).
• The NFL also faced challenges due to the small market size of many teams, which were often based in small towns and struggled to make a profit (23m41s).
• The Great Depression and the Dust Bowl in the 1930s made it economically nonviable for small-town teams to survive, leading to many teams folding or moving to larger cities (24m31s).
• The Green Bay Packers were the only small-market team to stand the test of time, while teams like the Chicago Bears and New York Giants were formed and eventually became successful (23m50s).
• Jim Thorp, the first president of the NFL, was a figurehead who served for only a year before being replaced by a real administrator (24m58s).
• The NFL initially had several black players in the league, and it was not a significant issue, with the first NFL champions, the Akron Pros, having a black star player and head coach named Fritz Pollard (25m10s).
• However, in the mid-1930s, after George Preston Marshall became the owner of the Boston Braves, which later became the Boston Redskins and then the Washington Redskins, the league adopted a policy similar to Major League Baseball, excluding black players (25m33s).
• The Redskins were one of the last teams to integrate, not doing so until 1961, largely due to Marshall's racism and the fear of losing his fan base in the South (25m53s).
• The league's status quo continued until after World War II, when America and the NFL underwent significant changes, with the emergence of a new middle class and increased disposable income (26m39s).

Post-War Growth and the Rise of the AAFC

• The post-war period created an opportunity for professional football to grow, with returning soldiers and their families seeking entertainment and having more free time and disposable income (26m49s).
• The NFL owners, who had previously subsidized losses, began to see a business opportunity in professional football, with the potential for expansion and growth (27m50s).
• In 1944, wealthy business people from across America expressed interest in adding teams to the NFL, but the existing owners were initially resistant to expansion (28m35s).
• The NFL teams in 1944 included the Chicago Bears, Green Bay Packers, New York Giants, Detroit Lions, Philadelphia Eagles, Pittsburgh Steelers, and the Cleveland Rams, which was owned by Dan Reeves (29m7s).
• The Cleveland Rams was the first Cleveland team that did not shut down but instead moved, and other potential ownership groups in other cities decided to start their own league, the All-America Football Conference (AAFC), in 1944 (29m33s).
• The AAFC was organized by a prominent sports journalist and backed by high-power ownership groups, including a famous Hollywood actor and wealthy businessmen in several cities (29m56s).
• The AAFC had a significant advantage with the legendary Ohio State coach Paul Brown, who reached a deal to coach the new AAFC Cleveland franchise, the Cleveland Browns, after his service in the war (30m28s).
• This marked the first time in the modern NFL that there was a real threat of two professional football teams in the same city, the Cleveland Rams and the Cleveland Browns, which led to a head-to-head war between the two franchises (30m55s).
• Dan Reeves, the owner of the Rams, wanted to move the team to Los Angeles but was unable to get unanimous approval from the NFL owners, which led to the team staying in Cleveland (31m28s).
• The NFL owners were concerned about the financial implications of moving a team and the potential loss of money, which made them hesitant to approve the move (31m49s).
• The war's end and the emergence of the AAFC and the Browns led to a crisis in the NFL, which was exacerbated by the defection of Dan Topping, the owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Yankees, to the AAFC (32m2s).
• In response to the crisis, the NFL owners fired their commissioner, Elmer Layden, and replaced him with Bert Bell, the owner of the Philadelphia Eagles, who was tasked with drafting a competitive response to the AAFC (32m44s).
• The NFL had three main objectives to compete with the AFC: meeting the AFC where they were, which meant being nationwide, especially on the west coast and in California; putting out a superior product with a better game on the field; and doing a better job of telling America about it, which involved going pro and winning fans' hearts and minds (33m15s).
• Dan Reeves and the Rams handled the first and third objectives by moving to California, which was approved by the commissioner, and this move proved to be a good decision as it forced the league to integrate (34m0s).
• The new Browns in Cleveland, led by Paul Brown, drew 6,000 fans for their first home game, which was the same or more than the Rams did for the entire season the year before (34m12s).
• Paul Brown was a well-known figure in Cleveland, having coached at Masselin High School in Canton, Ohio State, and one of the Navy teams, and was recognized for his ability to whip a football team into shape (34m31s).
• Brown's strategy involved making players memorize the playbook, take written tests, and if they failed, they would be kicked off the team, regardless of their skills (34m54s).
• He was one of the first coaches to review film, recognize patterns in plays, and statistically tally what worked and what didn't, making him one of the first modern sports coaches in America (35m18s).
• Brown was also the first coach to start racial integration of the team, recognizing that having the best players was key to winning, and he employed a staff of assistant coaches year-round, which was a new approach at the time (35m43s).
• The AFC was going to be an integrated league from the beginning, which was counter-positioning to the NFL, and the move of the Rams to LA forced the league to integrate due to the LA Coliseum's publicly owned status and the commission's rules (36m17s).
• The LA Coliseum commission allowed the Rams to play in the stadium but only if they integrated their team, which they did, making them one of the first integrated teams in the NFL (36m51s).
• The Los Angeles Rams were skilled at public relations, quickly agreeing to sign Kenny Washington, a former UCLA football star and hero in Los Angeles, which was a significant PR move for the team and the Los Angeles area (37m4s).
• The Rams' strategy was helped by a young intern, Pete Roselle, who would later play a crucial role in the NFL (37m37s).
• The NFL at that time consisted of eight teams, with the Rams having just moved from Cleveland to Los Angeles, while the American Football Conference (AFC) was starting to play with a roster of teams including the Cleveland Browns, New York Yankees, Brooklyn Dodgers, Buffalo Bisons, Miami Seahawks, San Francisco 49ers, Los Angeles Dons, and Chicago Rockets (37m55s).
• The AFC would only last four years but forced the NFL to make changes that were in its best interest, such as promoting competition and equality between teams (38m49s).
• The AFC's existence taught the NFL that the most entertaining games are the most competitive ones, and that having one dominant team can make the game boring (39m5s).
• The Cleveland Browns, led by Paul Brown, were too good and won all four AFC championships, losing only four games in four years, which made the game less exciting (39m32s).
• The NFL learned a valuable lesson from the AFC's experience and made it a core principle to promote equality and competitiveness between teams to ensure exciting games (40m29s).

The NFL's Post-War Business Model

• The current Cleveland Browns are the same franchise as the old Browns, with the same records, while the Baltimore Ravens are a new team that started in the 1990s (40m7s).
• The NFL's business model in the post-World War II era relied heavily on ticket sales and in-person attendance, as television was still in its early stages of development across America (41m15s).
• The league's goal was to ensure that every stadium had a high attendance rate, with the aim of selling 160,000 tickets every weekend, assuming eight teams with 40,000-seat stadiums (42m11s).
• This business model remained in place until 1977, when the NFL began generating more revenue from television than from ticket sales, 30 years after the initial period (42m35s).
• Bert Bell, the newly drafted Commissioner of the NFL, realized that the key to the league's success was to ensure that any team could beat any other team on any given Sunday, preventing dominance by a single team (42m59s).
• Bell pushed this mantra through with the owners, getting them to agree that no team should become too dominant, to avoid a situation like the Cleveland Browns' dominance (43m24s).

Commissioner Bert Bell's Strategies for Competitiveness

• ServiceNow, an AI platform for business transformation, is introducing AI agents that can think, learn, solve problems, and make decisions autonomously, aiming to elevate productivity and potential across businesses (43m43s).
• The NFL, under the leadership of Commissioner David Bert Bell, implemented a new mindset to keep the game competitive, making structural changes to achieve this goal (45m1s).
• The first change was to overhaul the scheduling system, arranging the schedule so that weaker teams from the previous season play each other in the first half, and stronger teams play each other in the first half, to create a more even record for all teams by the midpoint of the season (45m30s).
• This scheduling strategy is still used by the NFL today, creating drama and uncertainty about which teams will win, despite potential talent disparities within the league (46m19s).
• The lack of free agency at the time meant that teams couldn't sign veteran players to improve their teams, so the NFL introduced a draft of college players to bring new talent into the league (46m41s).
• The draft was designed in reverse order of the previous season's standings, with the worst team getting the first pick, to help weaker teams improve their chances of winning (47m21s).
• The NFL draft has become a significant event, with millions of people watching, and has been televised by ESPN since 1979, showcasing the league's reverence for the college game (47m59s).
• The combination of scheduling and the reverse-order amateur draft forms the core of the NFL's strategy, prioritizing the league's competitiveness over individual team interests (48m23s).
• The NFL created a shared pool of ticket revenue, with 60% going to the home team and 40% to the visiting team, which later evolved into a shared pool divided among all teams to promote a shared mindset (48m34s).
• The American Football Conference (AFC) operated for four years before folding, with only three teams - the Browns, 49ers, and Baltimore Colts (now Indianapolis Colts) - joining the NFL (49m14s).
• The dawn of the 1950s saw the rise of television, with TV set sales in America increasing exponentially: 7,000 sets sold in 1946, 14,000 in 1947, and 172,000 in 1948 (49m34s).
• By the early 1950s, there were 25 million homes in America with a television set, marking a significant turning point for the NFL (49m57s).
• The NFL benefited from the AFC's existence, as it forced the league to expand, change, and adopt a more competitive mindset (50m11s).

The Rise of Television and the NFL's Adaptation

• The NFL became the only national league for professional football in America, and the only game in town for national sports television programming, as TVs became widespread (50m32s).
• Baseball, the dominant professional sport at the time, was initially resistant to television, fearing it would cannibalize in-person attendance and stadium revenue (50m55s).
• Football owners also initially resisted television, but had less to lose, as the sport was still an underdog (51m18s).
• Early NFL TV deals were individual local deals that blacked out home games to protect in-person attendance, which was the biggest source of revenue until 1977 (51m54s).
• It took a presidential order from Richard Nixon to end the home blackout policy, but only if home games were sold out (52m21s).
• The NFL lifted blackouts after September 11th, allowing home games to be broadcast even if they weren't sold out, but later reinstated the policy, which is no longer in place today (52m31s).
• In 1950, the LA Rams made an individual deal with Admiral Television Company to broadcast their home and away games, with a clause guaranteeing revenue back to the Rams for any loss in attendance (52m49s).
• The deal was bad for Admiral, as attendance declined by 50% due to the poor quality of the broadcasts, which featured a single camera on the 50-yard line, no microphones, and black-and-white footage on a small screen (53m12s).
• The early days of television saw the industry figuring everything out, with TV set manufacturers, networks, content providers, and sports leagues all learning as they went (53m39s).
• One of the marketing messages of the time was that television brought the game to the viewer, allowing them to stay home and watch, which depressed attendance and led to the development of the phrase "radio wets the appetite, television satiates it" (53m47s).
• This phrase became a problem for baseball, which stuck to it for too long and saw television as a threat to ticket sales, rather than a new revenue stream (54m2s).
• In the 1950s, NFL teams negotiated individual TV deals, with the New York Giants making $200,000 in 1959, while the Packers made only $5,000 (54m36s).
• The NFL continued to experiment with television broadcasts throughout the 1950s, while baseball largely shut down its TV presence (54m50s).
• The league discovered that television broadcasts depressed attendance at home games, but there was strong demand for away games, which became the main model for NFL TV broadcasts (54m58s).
• This model, which only showed away games, was not a blackout in the modern sense, but rather a result of local affiliates only having contracts to broadcast away games (55m25s).
• By the end of the 1950s, the NFL was making over $1 million in TV revenue annually, up from less than $100,000 at the beginning of the decade (55m53s).
• Certain football games, such as the 1958 NFL championship game, drew large audiences on TV, demonstrating the potential for the medium (56m12s).
• The 1958 NFL Championship Game between the Giants and the Colts, led by Johnny Unitas, was a sudden-death overtime win that garnered 45 million TV viewers across the country, including President Eisenhower, marking a national broadcast of the NFL championship game that year (56m21s).

The NFL's Hesitation to Expand and the Birth of the AFL

• This game was not the Super Bowl, and the NFL still had only 12 teams competing at that time, with many other cities and ownership groups wanting to join the league (56m44s).
• The NFL owners were hesitant to expand, preferring to maintain their tight-knit fraternity and not wanting to let new teams into their "club," despite recognizing the potential for more revenue (57m48s).
• The NFL owners' reluctance to expand led to the birth of the American Football League (AFL), which would eventually compete with the NFL and contribute to the era of national TV contracts (59m11s).
• Lamar Hunt, a young heir to a large Dallas oil fortune, was one of the potential investors who wanted to own a football team but was rebuffed by the NFL, leading him to have a "Eureka moment" on a plane where he decided to create a new league with other interested investors (59m32s).
• Hunt realized that he didn't need the NFL or the Cardinals to start a professional football team and decided to create a new league with other wealthy individuals who also wanted to own teams (1h0m10s).
• In August 1959, Lamar Hunt and several other owners formed the American Football League (AFL) with six teams, which soon became eight, including the Dallas Texans, Boston Patriots, and New York Titans, now known as the New York Jets (1h0m28s).
• The AFL's formation led to a friendly but cautious response from the NFL, with the NFL trying to appear supportive while doubting the AFL's chances of success (1h1m0s).
• The AFL faced a crisis when Bert Bell, the NFL commissioner, died suddenly in 1959, forcing the league to act and leading to a different outcome than the previous American Football Conference (AFC) (1h1m29s).
• Lamar Hunt, the owner of the Dallas Texans, now known as the Kansas City Chiefs, studied the NFL and baseball, meeting with baseball owners, including Branch Rickey of the Brooklyn Dodgers, to develop a strategy for the AFL (1h1m51s).
• Hunt adopted a radical idea from baseball, where all clubs in the league would share revenue from a television deal, and applied it to the AFL by centrally negotiating a national television contract and splitting the revenue equally among all teams (1h2m50s).
• The AFL's innovative approach to television contracts was initially met with skepticism by major networks CBS and NBC, which had existing deals with NFL teams, but found a willing partner in the upstart network ABC (1h3m44s).
• ABC, which did not have a sports division at the time, partnered with the AFL, and a young executive named Roone Arledge played a key role in the partnership, which would ultimately contribute to the AFL's success (1h4m16s).
• In the late 1950s, nationally televised football games became a huge opportunity, with a significant demand for the sport, which was unexpected at the time (1h4m46s).

The Appointment of Pete Rozelle and His Media Strategy

• The NFL initially had individual deals with networks and local stations, but the first nationwide network-wide contract marked a turning point, making football a national event (1h5m44s).
• ABC signed a league-wide five-year TV rights deal with the American Football League (AFL) for $85 million, the largest sports rights TV deal in history at the time (1h6m10s).
• The AFL's deal with ABC put pressure on the NFL, which was without a commissioner and facing an existential crisis due to the AFL's multi-million dollar contract (1h6m56s).
• After 11 days and 23 separate votes, the NFL ownership groups finally agreed on a new commissioner, Pete Rozelle, a 33-year-old general manager of the Los Angeles Rams (1h8m21s).
• Rozelle was a dark horse candidate who proved to be a brilliant choice, growing into an incredible leader and visionary who transformed the NFL into what it is today (1h8m42s).
• The NFL owners had to settle on a compromised candidate for commissioner, who was a young person that most people hadn't heard of, but he embodied everything about America in the 50s and 60s, including young families, suburbs, the West Coast, Los Angeles, television, PR, and advertising (1h8m56s).
• Pete Rozelle, the new commissioner, came from a PR background, which was perfect for the position, as he knew the importance of presenting a polished image and avoiding confusing or mixed messaging (1h9m35s).
• Rozelle's goal was to create a media strategy that would keep the NFL and its teams in the news and on the lips of Americans as much as possible (1h10m1s).
• Before becoming commissioner, Rozelle was the GM of the Rams for two or three years, during which time he made the team the most profitable in the league, despite not being successful on the field (1h10m12s).
• Rozelle set up the first in-house merchandise store for the Rams, which became a huge revenue line, and partnered with Roy Rogers Inc to bring high-quality branded merchandise (1h10m39s).
• As commissioner, Rozelle completely changed the NFL within a year, starting by ratifying an expansion plan to meet the AFL, which included expanding to Dallas and Houston, although the Houston franchise eventually became the Minnesota franchise (1h11m21s).
• The NFL expanded to Dallas with the Cowboys, meeting Lamar Hunt and the AFL head-to-head in Texas (1h12m1s).
• Rozelle moved the league offices from Philadelphia to New York, recognizing the importance of media and advertising, and the need for a more modern approach to running the NFL (1h12m34s).
• The NFL was initially run in an unprofessional manner, with business conducted through phone calls and posted notes, until Pete Rozelle took over and moved the league headquarters to New York to be closer to the television, media, and advertising industries (1h12m49s).
• Rozelle contracted the Elias Sports Bureau to provide professional statistics for the NFL, which helped to distribute game stats and box scores to newspapers across the country (1h13m31s).
• Rozelle cultivated a relationship with Time Inc. and Sports Illustrated to create human stories and arcs around the game, which helped to promote the NFL and establish it as a major sport (1h13m59s).
• Sports Illustrated became a major advocate for the NFL, and in 1963, the magazine named Pete Rozelle its Sportsman of the Year, the first non-athlete to receive the honor (1h14m31s).
• At the time, the NFL was still an underdog, with baseball being the dominant sport in the US, and college football franchises being more popular than NFL teams (1h15m1s).
• Rozelle hired writers in-house at the NFL to craft storylines and send them to reporters, which helped to control the narrative and promote the league (1h15m25s).
• This approach allowed the NFL to control the media relationships and narrative, which is still evident today, with the league maintaining a tight grip on the narrative and limiting access to sideline reporters (1h16m6s).
• Rozelle's efforts paid huge dividends, helping to establish the NFL as a major sport and paving the way for its future success (1h16m27s).

The NFL's Relationship with the Kennedy Family and the Sports Broadcast Act

• The NFL had a significant relationship with the Kennedy family, particularly John and Bobby, who were big football fans, which played a crucial role in the league's future (1h16m42s).
• In 1961, after the AFL signed a $1.3 million per year deal with ABC, NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle convinced the NFL owners to give up their individual TV rights and negotiate a league-wide revenue-sharing deal with a national network (1h17m1s).
• Rozelle successfully negotiated a 2-year deal with CBS at $4.65 million in rights per year to be shared equally among the teams, which was over 3 times the AFL deal (1h18m31s).
• However, the NFL immediately encountered political pressure and an Anti-Trust violation process was initiated by the Department of Justice, which led to the courts striking down the deal (1h18m56s).
• The NFL argued that it was not an Anti-Trust violation since the league was acting as a single entity, but this argument was not successful (1h19m26s).
• The Kennedy relationships proved crucial in resolving the issue, as President John F. Kennedy and Bobby Kennedy helped pass new Congressional legislation, the Sports Broadcast Act, which allowed for national sports contracts on a league-wide basis (1h20m2s).
• The Sports Broadcast Act was passed in 1961, and the day after it was signed, President Kennedy hosted a party at the White House to celebrate the NFL's new Anti-Trust exemption (1h20m28s).
• The NFL is a unifying force in America, promoting teamwork, hard work, and sportsmanship, and its growing popularity is beneficial for the country (1h21m7s).
• The league's presence can boost local economies by creating gathering points, such as stadiums and hotels, and driving commerce (1h21m30s).
• A national TV contract for the NFL would be beneficial for the American economy, and the league's arguments for this hold water (1h21m45s).

The Landmark TV Deal and the Creation of NFL Films

• The $4.65 million per year deal would grow significantly over time, with a 2500x increase over 62 years, or 250x when adjusted for inflation (1h22m1s).
• Following the landmark TV deal, Pete Rozelle made two significant moves for the NFL, including the creation of a high-quality film of the NFL Championship game (1h22m25s).
• The rights to the game were sold through a sealed auction, which was won by Ed Sabol, a suburban dad from Philadelphia who bid $5,000 (1h22m59s).
• Sabol pitched Rozelle on creating a professional, Hollywood-quality film of the game, complete with montages, cuts, and slow-motion footage (1h23m45s).
• Rozelle allowed Sabol to proceed with the project, which resulted in a revolutionary film that changed the way sports video content was created (1h24m26s).
• The film, made with high-quality film stock from multiple angles, helped to establish the NFL as a leader in sports video content and preserved games that might have otherwise been lost to history (1h25m10s).
• The NFL uses high frame rate cameras and 24 frames per second cameras to capture smooth and beautiful slow-motion footage, creating an extensive archive of the game that other sports do not have (1h25m28s).
• Ed Sabol and his company, which would become NFL Films, intuitively understand the importance of narrative in storytelling, meshing with Pete Rozelle's philosophy that the NFL needs to tell a story and create drama, rather than just showing games (1h25m44s).
• Rozelle's mindset emphasizes entertainment and polish, and Ed Sabol's company embodies this approach, with Rozelle's personality evident in their work (1h26m21s).
• Ed Sabol and his son Steve worked with Rozelle for two years before taking over NFL Films, which eventually became a core in-house division of the NFL, producing high-quality content (1h26m41s).
• Rozelle greenlit the idea of NFL Films, allowing Ed Sabol to run the company as a break-even business, with the goal of promoting the NFL and creating lore and story (1h27m22s).
• NFL Films built a full-fledged film studio, becoming one of the largest customers of Kodak film, and sent full film crews to every NFL game to capture footage for editing and use in various purposes (1h27m47s).
• The motivation behind NFL Films was not to make money, but to raise the stature of the league and put a high-gloss sheen on the product, which is the game on the field (1h28m32s).
• Pete Rozelle also introduced the concept of NFL Enterprises, bringing merchandise and branded opportunities in-house on a league-wide basis, standardizing quality and setting a quality bar for merchandise (1h28m55s).
• The NFL's relationship with fans is crucial, and the league aims to deepen this relationship by providing a great experience, including consistent merchandise quality across teams, to bring in and retain fans (1h29m25s).

Rozelle's Revenue-Sharing Model and the Green Bay Packers

• The NFL is structured in a way that Commissioner Roselle works for the team owners, and he convinced them to give up individual revenue-generating opportunities for equal league-wide revenue sharing, similar to TV revenue (1h29m49s).
• Roselle successfully played the politician with owners, leading them to agree to give up revenue-generating parts of their teams' profit and loss statements for the league to take over (1h30m16s).
• The NFL's revenue sharing model means that teams like the Browns and Packers receive the same amount of money from merchandise sales, regardless of their individual sales performance (1h30m47s).
• The Green Bay Packers have a unique ownership structure, being owned by a publicly owned nonprofit corporation, which allows them to raise money by selling shares to hundreds of thousands of people (1h30m59s).
• This distributed ownership group has kept the Packers in Green Bay, despite capitalist forces and individual whims of billionaires moving other teams (1h31m40s).
• The Packers are the only team that publishes their profit and loss statement, which is available in their annual report (1h32m17s).
• Commissioner Roselle created the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton in 1963, which has become an important part of the NFL's history and legacy (1h32m29s).
• Roselle's efforts were focused on raising the stature of the NFL, and his actions created a flywheel effect that contributed to the league's growth and success (1h32m51s).
• The NFL as a league aims to add a higher gloss to its product to attract more fan interest, which in turn increases TV dollars and raises the level of play among teams, as long as competitive balance is maintained (1h32m56s).

The NFL's Revenue Model and Growth

• In the past, teams were limited by the number of seats in their stadiums, but with the new TV model, there is no ceiling to revenue capacity, allowing for more fan interest, TV dollars, and a higher level of play (1h33m21s).
• The NFL's revenue model, where TV dollars are shared evenly among teams, creates a flywheel effect that improves the product, adds more gloss, and drives more fan interest (1h33m44s).
• The NFL's current annual national revenue is around $11 billion, with an additional $6 billion from local revenue generated by teams, totaling around $17 billion per year (1h34m19s).
• This revenue model has made NFL teams collectively worth around $140 billion today (1h34m39s).
• The NFL's initial landmark deal in 1961, which granted an antitrust exemption, allowed the league to renegotiate TV contracts every two years, leading to significant revenue increases (1h34m48s).
• In 1962, the NFL renegotiated its TV contract with CBS, securing a 2-year, $28.2 million deal, with each team receiving $1 million before the season started, a 3x increase from the previous deal (1h35m17s).
• The TV networks got a great deal from the NFL, with landmark contracts that drove attention, viewership, and advertising revenue, making the NFL a valuable product (1h35m50s).
• The NFL's growth in fan base and viewership outpaced the renegotiation of TV deals, allowing the league to secure better deals over time (1h36m21s).
• Pete Rozelle's first five years as NFL commissioner were marked by significant success, taking the league from crisis to a strong position by the mid-1960s (1h36m38s).
• The American Football League (AFL) was also doing well during this period, unlike in the past, and was able to capitalize on the growth of television and the NFL's success (1h36m57s).
• The American Football League (AFL) was thriving around four or five years after its inception, thanks to television, despite the National Football League (NFL) doing well and having a lot of demand for football on TV (1h37m11s).

The AFL's Success and the Rise of Joe Namath

• The AFL had a "shoot the moon" strategy, wanting to make a big impact and burn hot, which worked well due to the boom of TV in America, allowing them to sign players like Joe Namath to large contracts and turn them into superstars (1h37m30s).
• The AFL's owner, Sunny Werblin, was a media-savvy individual who understood the importance of television and was able to secure a significant deal with NBC after the NFL signed with CBS (1h38m28s).
• In 1964, the NFL signed a huge deal with CBS, but Werblin saw an opportunity for the AFL to sign with another network, knowing that ABC and NBC would be eager to secure a deal for professional football (1h38m34s).
• The AFL signed a 5-year, $37.5 million deal with NBC, which was a significant success for the young league, especially considering the NFL had 14 teams and the AFL only had 8 (1h39m38s).
• The AFL used the money from the NBC deal to sign players like Joe Namath, who became a huge star and appeared on popular TV shows, including an episode of The Brady Bunch (1h40m22s).
• Joe Namath's popularity was immense, with his own talk show and numerous appearances, making him a cultural icon of the time (1h40m55s).
• Joe Namath was the first modern cultural celebrity athlete, transcending sports and football, and appealing equally to men, women, and children (1h41m9s).
• He was a heartthrob, with millions of teenage women in America admiring him, and he knew how to play to the media, wearing white cleats and a mink coat on the sidelines (1h41m27s).
• Namath was the first professional athlete to have a broad cultural impact across all demographics, and he started making movies in the off-season (1h42m4s).
• Before Namath, there were other NFL superstars, but he was the first to have a significant impact on popular culture, earning the nickname "Broadway Joe" (1h42m17s).
• The NFL was initially skeptical about filling a hole in the CBS schedule, thinking sports, especially football, were a male-dominated and brutish activity with limited appeal (1h42m23s).
• However, Joe Namath's success proved that football could be for everyone, attracting a broad audience and paving the way for future NFL stars (1h42m47s).
• Vanta, a trust management platform, is mentioned as a sponsor, automating security reviews and compliance efforts for organizations, making them fast and simple (1h43m22s).
• Vanta is praised for allowing companies to focus on their core products and outsource compliance and trust efforts, which are necessary but do not add value to the actual product (1h43m50s).

The Merger of the NFL and AFL

• The platform connects to various services via APIs, eliminates manual reviews, and provides real-time security reviews, making it a valuable tool for organizations (1h44m21s).
• The NFL and AFL were in a heated competition to sign top college athletes, with the NFL starting a "babysitting program" to keep them from signing with the AFL, essentially a kidnapping program where agents would take the athletes to secret locations to pressure them into signing with the NFL (1h45m39s).
• The leagues were not respecting each other's drafts, with teams signing players drafted by the other league, and contracts for rookies quickly rose to nearly a million dollars, causing problems across the league (1h46m19s).
• By 1966, the NFL owners realized the AFL was not going away and began a delicate dance of negotiation, with some owners forming side deals with AFL team owners, leading to a multi-tiered negotiation process (1h47m5s).
• A group of influential NFL owners approached Commissioner Pete Rozelle in 1966, urging him to start merger negotiations with the AFL, citing the out-of-control draft situation and high contracts as a threat to the league's survival (1h47m51s).
• Rozelle, who initially wanted to continue fighting the AFL, agreed to move forward with merger negotiations, using his ability to please everyone and find solutions that work for all parties (1h48m21s).
• The Cowboys' GM, Tex Schram, was sent by NFL Commissioner Pete Roselle to secretly negotiate a merger with Lamar Hunt, the owner of the Kansas City Chiefs, in early 1966 (1h48m33s).
• The main condition for the NFL was that Roselle would remain the commissioner of the combined league, which Hunt was open to discussing (1h49m21s).
• The negotiations between Schram and Hunt were informal, with no written notes, and the other owners were not aware of the talks (1h49m29s).
• The NFL side chose to negotiate directly with Hunt, rather than with the AFL commissioner, Joe Foss, who was seen as a lame duck and did not have the respect of the AFL owners (1h50m12s).
• The AFL owners fired Joe Foss and replaced him with Al Davis, the owner of the Oakland Raiders, who was seen as a more aggressive leader who could negotiate a better deal with the NFL (1h50m41s).
• Al Davis was known for being a tough and untrustworthy negotiator, with a reputation for being willing to do whatever it took to get the best deal for the AFL (1h51m36s).
• The key players in the negotiations were Pete Roselle and Tex Schram on the NFL side, and Al Davis and Lamar Hunt on the AFL side (1h51m15s).
• The negotiations were delicate, with the NFL side having to balance their desire for a merger with the risk of the other owners rejecting the deal (1h50m5s).
• The NFL fires the first shot in the new war by breaking the gentlemen's agreement, with the Giants poaching a veteran kicker from the Bills in the AFL in May 1966, which makes sense as the Giants are the most harmed by the presence of the Jets in their city (1h53m4s).
• The other NFL owners are apoplectic at Giants owner Wellington Mara for throwing away the agreement over a kicker, with the owner of the Colts criticizing Mara's decision (1h53m36s).
• When Davis gets the news that the gentlemen's agreement has been broken, he smiles and says that the AFL will now sign all the players and destroy the NFL, which will come begging to the table (1h54m11s).
• The New York Times asks Davis for his comment, and he responds that he anticipated the probability and will answer in action, not words (1h54m45s).
• Davis decides to send a targeted message by signing the Rams' quarterback, Roman Gabriel, away from the team, escalating the situation from a kicker to a quarterback (1h55m27s).
• The NFL makes another tactical error by not responding to the signing of Gabriel, leading Davis to unleash all-out war and direct the AFL teams to sign all the quarterbacks in the NFL, which is an economically negative move (1h56m4s).
• Davis's plan is to force the NFL to come to the table and negotiate a merger, but this move will likely lead to a costly and damaging war between the two leagues (1h56m28s).
• Lamar Hunt was in secret negotiations with Tex Schramm and Pete Rozelle for a merger between the American Football League (AFL) and the National Football League (NFL), while also trying to stop Al Davis from signing the 49ers' quarterback (1h56m32s).
• Al Davis instructed the Oilers' general manager to sign the 49ers' quarterback, but Lamar Hunt intervened and told the general manager to stand down, however, Davis eventually told the general manager to sign the quarterback anyway (1h57m1s).
• The signing of the 49ers' quarterback gave the AFL leverage in the merger negotiations, and Al Davis told Lamar Hunt that he was his "best weapon" in the negotiations (1h57m46s).
• The merger agreement was announced on June 8th, 1966, and it was a true merger, with all AFL teams joining the NFL, and the promise of adding at least four new teams and cities (1h58m6s).
• The merger included a single common college draft, starting immediately, and the players were not happy about the change, as it affected their contracts and treatment (1h59m25s).
• Pete Rozelle would remain the commissioner, and Al Davis would go back to running the Raiders, which was fine with him (1h59m37s).
• The AFL franchises collectively paid the NFL owners $18 million to join the league over a 20-year period, which was a significant victory for the AFL, considering the NFL's larger TV contracts and apparatus (1h59m51s).
• The merger also led to the formation of AFL films, and NFL films hired twice as many people to film every single AFL game, starting immediately (2h0m25s).
• The initial asking price for the AFL teams to join the NFL was $50 million per team as franchise fees, but the final agreement was much lower, at $18 million over 20 years (2h0m49s).
• The NFL and AFL merger resulted in each team receiving $18 million paid over 20 years, thanks to Al Davis' negotiation efforts (2h1m3s).
• The $18 million did not go to all NFL teams, but rather to the Giants and the 49ers, as they were the most affected by the merger, with the Giants receiving more due to Joe Amoth's presence in their city (2h1m27s).
• The merger led to the modernization of the NFL, with the requirement that teams with stadiums smaller than 50,000 seats needed to either build a new stadium or expand their existing one (2h2m20s).
• As a consolation prize for the AFL, they were allowed to bring their records over to the merged league, whereas the AFC's records did not count as NFL records (2h2m41s).
• The NFL publishes a 1,000-page PDF of historical data, including scores and games, every year, which is also available in physical form through NFL Enterprises (2h3m0s).
• The merger announcement in June 1966 seemed to clear the way for the next few decades, but the law of the land in the United States posed another challenge, requiring Congress to pass a law in October to allow the merger and grant another antitrust exemption (2h3m44s).
• The law was signed into effect by Lynden Johnson, and it addressed a different antitrust issue than the previous exemption, as the merger of two competing organizations created a monopoly (2h3m56s).
• Pete Rozelle, the NFL commissioner, sought help from his friend David Dixon to break the logjam in the committee and eventually found his way to a North Louisiana Congressman (2h4m40s).
• The New Orleans Saints came into existence due to a quid pro quo between House Majority Leader Hale Boggs and NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle, where Boggs would pass a law allowing a merger if Louisiana received an NFL team (2h4m55s).
• Rozelle promised Boggs that he would do everything in his power to make the New Orleans franchise happen, and they shook on it, finalizing the deal (2h5m48s).
• The NFL required a perfect storm of post-war America, technology, and the growth of television, as well as cooperation from the US government, to become the league it is today (2h6m7s).
• The merger between the NFL and AFL was approved by Congress, but it wouldn't take effect until 1970, during the 1966 season (2h6m24s).

The Creation of the Super Bowl

• Rozelle and his counterparts saw the opportunity to create a new major sporting event, the World Championship Game, which would be the first of its kind in the TV era (2h6m43s).
• The game was tailored to be a national television event, and the TV contracts for the NFL and AFL were rebid, with CBS and NBC each paying $1 million for the rights to broadcast the game (2h7m57s).
• Both networks also pledged to spend $1 million each in promoting the game, which was unprecedented in media history (2h8m40s).
• The game ended up having a 79% share of American TV, with an incredible number of viewers tuning in to watch the event on both CBS and NBC (2h8m50s).
• The AFL-NFL World Championship Game, later known as the Super Bowl, was watched live by over 65 million people and was the largest television event in history at the time, with the LA Coliseum being the venue, although only 63,000 people attended the game live, which was only 2/3 of the stadium's capacity (2h9m5s).
• The game was a groundbreaking live television event, and despite the low attendance, it didn't matter as the event was still a huge success, with everyone involved making a profit (2h9m41s).
• Pete Roselle and the NFL deliberately created a television event, including Media Week, which featured interviews and press conferences, to take the pressure off the coaches and players and to draw attention to the NFL (2h10m28s).
• The commissioner's press conference on the Friday before the Super Bowl was designed to discuss league business and draw attention to the NFL, with news about the league's changes for the next year being released to the public (2h10m42s).
• The NFL hosted parties, events, and concerts for their partners, TV partners, advertisers, and the press during the week leading up to the Super Bowl to add to the event's gloss and sheen (2h11m9s).
• Pete Roselle's directive to the NFL staff was to ensure that every media person and partner left the Super Bowl saying it was better than the World Series (2h11m29s).
• The Packers dominated the Chiefs in the game, validating the NFL teams' superiority complex over the AFL, and went on to beat the Raiders in Super Bowl 2, showcasing their dynasty under Vince Lombardi (2h11m42s).
• The game was later formally called the Super Bowl, a name that was initially proposed by Lamar Hunt but hated by Pete Roselle, who saw it as a placeholder name, but it eventually stuck (2h12m21s).
• The narrative leading into Super Bowl 3 portrayed the old NFL teams as "real football" and the AFL teams as inferior, with the Colts being 19-point favorites against the Jets (2h12m55s).
• The Colts, led by Johnny Unitas, were seen as the epitome of the old NFL, while the Jets, led by "Broadway Joe" Namath, represented the AFL (2h13m13s).
• During media week, Joe Namath guaranteed an AFL victory, which added to the drama and excitement of the event (2h13m51s).
• A famous photograph of Namath at the pool during media week, surrounded by cameras and women, further fueled the hype (2h14m2s).
• The Jets ultimately won the game, delivering a huge upset and the first AFL victory over the NFL (2h14m28s).
• The Colts' owner, Carol Rosenbloom, was devastated by the loss, but NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle saw it as a positive development for the game (2h14m40s).
• The outcome of the game highlighted the paradox of the NFL, where drama and competition ultimately benefit everyone involved (2h15m15s).
• The debate between old and new owners continues, with the original owners prioritizing football and the new owners focusing on building a larger entertainment business (2h15m39s).
• The next year, the Chiefs beat the Vikings, ending the pre-merger Super Bowl series tied at 2-2, which was seen as a positive outcome for the newly combined NFL (2h16m29s).

The Super Bowl and the NFL's Growing Dominance

• The NFL integrated TV negotiations for the 1970 season, resulting in a 4-year contract with a combined value of $156 million, or $4 million per year, with CBS airing NFC games and NBC airing AFC games (2h16m52s).
• The NFL realized they didn't have to sign just one contract, instead having separate packages for the AFC and NFC, and potentially creating more (2h17m34s).
• ABC, who had been out of the NFL picture for several years, was interested in sports and started discussing a potential deal with the NFL (2h18m8s).
• Pete Rozelle and Art Rooney started brainstorming ideas, with Rozelle believing that football could do well in a prime-time slot, despite the conventional thinking that sports were not suitable for prime time (2h18m34s).
• The idea for a single Monday night game with high production values was born, offering many advantages, including a national event that could be watched by everyone, unlike the Sunday games which were often concurrent and limited by local affiliate restrictions (2h20m3s).
• This moment in 1970 marked the point where the NFL eclipsed baseball as America's favorite sport, making it the perfect candidate for a sports prime-time experiment (2h19m36s).
• The NFL broadcasts on Sundays were considered non-events for viewers who didn't have a favorite team playing, and from a production standpoint, CBS and NBC had to dilute their resources by sending multiple TV crews across the country (2h20m56s).
• The broadcasts, except for the Super Bowl, were of poor quality, with limited camera angles, and announcers who didn't provide much commentary, relying on the fact that viewers were watching the game (2h21m28s).
• The NFL games lacked modern features such as transitions between camera angles, music, sound effects, microphones, analysis, sideline reporting, lower thirds, and graphics (2h22m10s).
• The vision for Monday Night Football, led by Roone Arledge and ABC, aimed to change this by providing a more engaging experience, with the goal of increasing revenue for the NFL (2h22m30s).
• Just as the deal was about to be signed, NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle revealed that the league had partnerships with CBS and NBC, and the package had to be offered to them first (2h22m45s).
• Rozelle's move was seen as a strategic one, as he knew that NBC and CBS wouldn't take the package, and he wanted to ensure that the NFL didn't leave any money on the table (2h23m11s).
• ABC eventually secured the exclusive rights to Monday Night Football for $8.5 million per season, a significant increase from the previous deal, which was $40 per season for 15 times more content (2h23m43s).
• The deal was seen as a good investment for ABC, as they would only have to produce one game on Monday nights, which would be nationally broadcast across all their affiliates (2h24m23s).
• A football game that aired that season was watched by 60 million US households, a viewership level comparable to the Super Bowl, and it was considered a weekly holiday (2h24m58s).
• The NFL invented more football, including Monday Night Football, which was a game-changer for the league, creating new revenue streams and changing the way games were broadcast (2h25m27s).
• The NFL began to recognize the value of televising games nationally, even if it meant blacking out the home market, as it brought in more money and exposure (2h25m52s).
• Monday Night Football introduced several innovations that are now standard in NFL broadcasts, including cameras at field level, cameras on people's shoulders, and cameras on the 20-yard lines (2h26m39s).
• The broadcast featured a three-man booth with action-oriented commentary, and Howard Cosell's unique style of narration, which injected himself into the story of the broadcast (2h27m13s).
• The dynamic between the commentators created a sense of charisma and friendship, making the broadcast feel like a hangout with the announcers (2h27m52s).
• Monday Night Football increased the number of cameras used to cover a game, from four to nine and eventually 17, and invented the parabolic microphone coverage and split-screen technology (2h28m7s).
• The production team consisted of 40 engineers and 20 production people, who worked together to create a show business-like experience for viewers (2h28m28s).
• The NFL introduced interviews with cheerleaders to add sex appeal to the game, and also used green screens for the first time, which is amusing to watch today due to the obviousness of the superimposed backgrounds (2h28m36s).
• The three-man booth for Monday Night Football needed more space than was available in the Press Box, so a custom room was built in the hallway, and a green screen was used to superimpose the field behind the commentators (2h28m50s).
• The use of replays was a revolutionary innovation that would go on to be a key feature of sports broadcasting, including ESPN's SportsCenter program (2h29m26s).
• Before Monday Night Football, there was no dedicated program for watching sports highlights, and the only way to watch football was on Sundays (2h30m9s).
• The NFL had a team called NFL Films that captured high-quality footage of every game using great camera angles, which was then used to create highlight reels (2h30m45s).
• Between Sunday and Monday, the NFL Films team would create a highlight reel from the previous day's games and send it to the city where Monday Night Football was being broadcast, where it would be played at halftime with commentary from Howard Cosell (2h30m56s).
• The highlight reel was often being prepared and sent to the broadcast location within 24 hours, which is a remarkable logistical achievement (2h31m34s).
• The way that the rights to sports broadcasts are structured today, including the inclusion of highlights as part of the Monday Night Football package, has its origins in the logistical arrangements of the NFL in the past (2h32m15s).
• The NFL's broadcasting rights are currently divided among several networks, with one network having the rights to AFC games on Sundays, another to NFC games on Sundays, Amazon having Thursday Night Football, and ABC, ESPN, and Disney having Monday Night Football, while NFL Sunday Ticket is a separate set of rights (2h32m27s).
• The rights to NFL footage for SportsCenter are bundled with the rights to Monday Night Football, which is the origin of highlights, and this is likely why ESPN is invested in keeping the Monday Night Football package (2h32m43s).
• The value of the Monday Night Football package is significant for Disney and ESPN, particularly for SportsCenter, making it more valuable than any other bidder (2h33m24s).
• The NFL's trajectory was set by the 1970s, with the addition of Sunday Ticket and Thursday Night Football over the years, but the core product remained the same (2h33m47s).

Monday Night Football and its Innovations

• In 1973, President Nixon intervened in the NFL's broadcasting policies, calling Pete Rozelle to request that playoff games be aired locally, but Rozelle refused, citing concerns about gate revenue (2h35m4s).
• Nixon then went to Congress to draft legislation, known as the blackout ban, to force the NFL to broadcast away games locally, which was passed due to Rozelle's denial of the president's request (2h35m29s).
• The White House tapes, including Nixon's conversations about the NFL, are available and provide insight into the president's involvement in the league's broadcasting policies (2h35m50s).
• Pete Rozelle's refusal to air playoff games locally was seen as a mistake, and the NFL eventually got as much exposure as possible, which was the right decision (2h36m5s).
• The NFL's revenue line is heavily influenced by TV rights, which fuels the growth of the league and its continued fandom, similar to how Disney wants consumers to engage with their content to drive sales and revenue (2h36m10s).

The NFL's Continued Growth and Challenges

• The NFL's growth trajectory in the 70s, 80s, and 90s was largely driven by its partnership with television, leading to increased viewership and revenue (2h36m46s).
• The focus will be on strategic moments that created the conditions for the NFL's business today, rather than going through the entire timeline, as some events like the USFL and team relocations do not contribute to the league's current state (2h37m0s).
• The league's focus on the "gate" and stadium experience changed with the introduction of bigger stadiums and luxury amenities, which became a significant source of local revenue for teams (2h37m39s).
• The revenue splits in the NFL are becoming more localized, with teams making more money from stadium sponsorships, luxury suites, and local merchandise sales, which may erode the "league-first" mentality (2h38m13s).
• The salary cap, introduced in 1993, helps maintain competitive balance in the league despite revenue divergence among teams (2h39m10s).
• The introduction of free agency and the salary cap in 1993 marked a significant shift in the NFL's business model and impacted the leverage of teams and players (2h39m15s).
• Stat Sig, a company mentioned, has experienced significant growth, shipping live product experiments to over 1.2 billion end users in the past month (2h39m56s).
• Stat Sig processes approximately 130 billion events per day, supporting massive data volumes and executing huge statistical jobs across the whole corpus to compute experiment results for customers (2h40m27s).
• The infrastructure required to support these data volumes is substantial, with 1.7 million events per second, which is 200 times more throughput than Visa's 8,600 transactions per second (2h40m56s).
• Stat Sig has added many important AI companies as customers, including Microsoft, Alassian, and Anthropics, along with companies like Notion and Brex (2h41m12s).
• The company has expanded its product offerings, now providing a full-fledged product understanding platform with dedicated feature flagging, warehouse, native experimentation, and product analytics (2h41m37s).
• In 1993, the NFL and the Players Association negotiated a collective bargaining agreement that introduced free agency for players who had been in the league for four years, in exchange for a salary cap (2h42m5s).
• The salary cap is based on a fixed percentage of the league's revenue, which is currently 48.8%, making players partners in the league's success, although the revenue is not evenly distributed among all players (2h43m41s).
• The NFL previously had a rule, known as the Rozelle rule, which prohibited free agency and required teams to reimburse the player's original team for a negotiated amount, hurting players' ability to earn money and move teams (2h42m26s).
• The Rozelle rule also allowed for compensation in the form of draft picks, which added friction to signing new players (2h43m11s).
• The 1993 collective bargaining agreement changed the dynamics of player movement and compensation in the NFL, allowing for more freedom and higher earnings for players (2h43m21s).
• The NFL salary cap is a fixed amount that teams must pay to players, which is close to 50% of the league-wide aggregate revenue, including local revenue from all teams (2h44m24s).
• This system can create an imbalance between teams with high local revenue and those with low local revenue, as the fixed amount may be a larger percentage of the smaller team's revenue (2h44m49s).
• The collective bargaining agreement and the introduction of free agency in the NFL marked a new era for the league, with the salary cap initially based on shared revenue but now including all league revenue and local revenue (2h45m27s).
• Local revenue is growing as a portion of overall revenue for top teams, from 12% in 1994 to over 30% today, posing a threat to the NFL's revenue-sharing model (2h46m0s).
• The NFL is the largest single media business in the world, with an annual revenue of $18 billion expected to grow to $25 billion by 2027 (2h47m17s).
• The NFL's TV contracts are worth billions of dollars, with CBS, Fox, NBC, Disney, and Amazon paying large sums for broadcasting rights, and YouTube TV recently acquiring the rights to NFL Sunday Ticket (2h47m34s).
• The NFL's Sunday Ticket is a lucrative business, allowing the league to resell content that has already been produced by networks like CBS, FOX, and NBC, with the exclusive right to bundle and sell it directly to consumers for $2 billion (2h48m27s).
• The NFL also generates revenue from its Films Division, estimated to be a couple hundred million dollars, as well as licensing rates, particularly from video games like Madden (2h49m14s).
• The latest Madden licensing deal with EA was reportedly worth $1.6 billion for a five-year period, with $600 million going to the players, and the remaining amount to the NFL (2h49m30s).
• Fantasy football has played a significant role in the NFL's rise to dominance, with around 30-40 million people in the United States participating each year, driving conversation, viewership, and advertising revenue (2h50m43s).
• The NFL's Sunday Ticket package was designed to cater to two main audiences: bars and restaurants, and fantasy football enthusiasts, who are willing to pay a premium to watch all games live (2h51m24s).
• Sports betting has also become a significant force in the NFL's revenue growth, with legalization expanding across states, and the league generating revenue from fantasy and betting-related activities (2h51m45s).
• The NFL is a popular sport for betting, with 46 million Americans, or 18% of betting-age US adults, betting on the NFL this year, and this number continues to grow (2h52m20s).
• The NFL generates more betting activity than any other sport in the US, with 81% of sports bets placed on NFL games, compared to 50% for the NBA and 44% for Major League Baseball (2h52m39s).
• The NFL does not currently generate significant revenue from betting, but this is expected to change in the future (2h52m49s).
• On average, about two-thirds of an NFL team's revenue comes from shared national revenue, while the remaining one-third comes from local revenue (2h53m6s).
• However, some teams, such as the Dallas Cowboys, are very successful at generating local revenue, while others, such as the Buffalo Bills and Detroit Lions, struggle in this area (2h53m19s).
• The Cowboys generated over $1 billion in revenue last year, while the Lions made only $450 million (2h53m43s).
• The NFL's revenue breakdown by product is: 61% from media (mostly TV), 10% from general seating, 10% from premium seating, 10% from sponsorship and advertising, and 9% from other sources (2h54m11s).
• The NFL has a complicated relationship with its players, as the sport has been linked to chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a brain condition caused by repeated subconcussive hits to the head (2h55m13s).
• CTE can cause shorter lifespans, immense physical harm, and devastating mental and emotional symptoms, including suicides (2h55m20s).
• The NFL settled a $1 billion lawsuit to pay out victims and families of CTE (2h55m49s).
• The NFL conducted research into the long-term effects of concussions and other head trauma from playing football in the 1990s, but they sat on the data for a long time and initially claimed there was no provable link between head injuries and long-term damage (2h56m43s).
• The NFL didn't acknowledge the link between head injuries and long-term damage until 2016, which was a major trust-breaking moment for the league (2h57m10s).
• The issue has affected the NFL's audience, with some people feeling guilty about enjoying football, and has also had a cultural impact, such as LeBron James stating he doesn't want his son playing football (2h57m38s).
• The direct impact of the issue is limited, but the second-order effects are significant, including a decline in youth football participation, with statistics showing a 5% decline per year from 2010 to 2012 (2h58m12s).
• The decline in youth football participation is part of a broader trend of declining interest in all youth sports, which is also attributed to factors such as video games, social media, and the pandemic (2h58m24s).
• The NFL's popularity is declining among future generations, with only 23% of Gen Z saying the NFL is their favorite professional sports league, compared to 33% of the broader population (2h59m10s).
• The NFL's revenue is currently twice that of basketball, but the trend of declining interest among Gen Z is a concern for the league's future (2h59m25s).
• The NFL's handling of the concussion research and its impact on players has been widely criticized, with many seeing it as a betrayal of trust (2h59m56s).
• The NFL's approach to controlling the narrative would have been more effective in the past, but the dawn of the social media era made it difficult for the league to manage the conversation around issues like concussions (3h0m2s).
• The NFL wields significant influence over its broadcast partners, which can impact how the league is discussed in the media, and this influence can be used to punish critics (3h0m42s).
• The NFL's strategy of controlling the narrative would have worked better 30 years ago, but the rise of social media has made it harder for the league to manage the conversation (3h1m31s).

The NFL's Structure and Leadership

• The commissioner of the NFL is not responsible to the fans or customers, but rather to the owners, and their primary job is to act in the best interests of the owners (3h2m19s).
• The commissioner is hired by the owners and can be fired if they do not do what the owners want, and their role is to speak for and act on behalf of the owners (3h3m8s).
• The NFL is a thin layer on top of 32 individual teams, each of which is a large business in its own right, and the league's tax filing status as a non-profit or for-profit entity has little impact on its operations (3h2m38s).
• The teams are responsible for their own finances and taxes, and the NFL's net income is relatively small, with most of the revenue being distributed to the teams (3h2m52s).
• Roger Goodell, the current commissioner, makes over $40 million a year to do what the owners want, and his role is to act in the best interests of the owners (3h3m4s).
• The NFL front office, granted power by the owners, negotiates revenue share deals with the Players Association and TV networks, which are their largest expense and revenue stream, respectively (3h3m52s).
• Historically, the NFL was composed of young, enterprising owners who were competitive and passionate about football, but as they aged and passed away, their descendants took over, leading to a more stagnant and traditional leadership (3h4m16s).
• Colin Kaepernick's decision to kneel during the national anthem in 2016 was a radical act that sparked controversy and offense among some, but was understood by many in the NFL, particularly given that 70% of the league is black (3h5m1s).
• After the 2016 season, Kaepernick became a free agent but was not signed by any team, leading to accusations of blackballing by the NFL, which was never explicitly confirmed but was likely the case (3h5m39s).
• Kaepernick filed a grievance and eventually reached a confidential settlement with the NFL, which was seen as a major media mess that could have been avoided (3h6m0s).
• The NFL's handling of the situation was in contrast to the NBA, which has embraced social media and allowed players to have their own platforms and voices, promoting the league through their individuality (3h6m20s).
• The NFL's approach was more controlling, with a focus on owning the message and limiting player voices, which ultimately backfired in the case of Kaepernick, who became a national icon for his protest (3h6m37s).
• The NFL's mishandling of the situation was emblematic of their failure to understand the social media era and the power of player voices, which ultimately amplified Kaepernick's protest and made him a national headline (3h7m30s).

The Colin Kaepernick Controversy and the NFL's Social Media Strategy

• The NFL has experienced significant growth in revenue and team values since the 1980s, with revenues increasing to $1 billion a year from TV deals alone and a huge amount of revenue from diversified sources, including Google and Amazon, which pay close to $4 billion a year (3h8m35s).
• Despite the growth, the NFL has been criticized for mishandling situations, which has led to a decline in inspiration and a sense of one train wreck after another (3h8m8s).
• The Lindy effect suggests that the NFL will continue to be successful and grow in revenue despite its problems, with football being bigger than it has ever been (3h8m33s).
• The NFL's revenue is almost assuredly going to grow at a healthy clip, with people continuing to love and watch football (3h9m2s).
• However, there are risks to the NFL's long-term success, including the younger generation's preferences and the league's inability to figure out international expansion (3h9m59s).
• The NFL has struggled to gain international interest, with attempts such as NFL Europe and home marketing agreements failing to gain traction (3h10m18s).
• In contrast, basketball has won the social media era and has a robust international presence, with the NBA's popularity growing rapidly among young people and internationally (3h10m7s).
• The NFL's lack of international presence is a concern, especially compared to baseball, which has a robust international presence, and basketball, which is the second most popular sport in the world and growing rapidly (3h10m40s).
• The NFL has a unique marketing strategy where teams can advertise in specific countries, such as the Cowboys in Mexico, to build affinity with fans based on ethnic groups or proximity (3h11m10s).
• The NFL's international expansion strategy is questionable, and it's unclear how the league can continue to grow its fan base, as the average viewership of games has been up and down over the last 20 years (3h11m46s).

The NFL's International Expansion Challenges

• The NFL's flywheel, which relies on increasing fan reach and engagement, is no longer spinning faster, making it challenging to grow the fan base (3h12m23s).
• College football has fueled the growth of the NFL, providing a free development system for players and creating storylines that benefit the league (3h12m43s).
• The NFL benefits from the NCAA's development of players, as they can draft players with established storylines and fan recognition, unlike other sports leagues that have to pay for farm teams (3h12m56s).
• College football's revenue is increasing, with the Big 10 signing a 7-year deal worth $1 billion per year, and the SEC deal worth $300 million per year, but it's still much smaller than the NFL's $12 billion aggregate media rights (3h14m2s).
• As college players start to get paid more, it will be interesting to see how the business of college football evolves and if it changes its position in the landscape (3h14m40s).
• The NFL has a unique relationship with its players as a supplier and with networks as a customer, which led to a cycle of negotiations for revenue and player contracts, but they seem to have switched to a new approach by signing a decade-long collective bargaining agreement with the players in 2020 and renegotiating media rights in 2022 (3h14m58s).
• The NFL's new approach allows them to lock in pricing with suppliers before the media deal is finalized, which is a clever business decision but may not be beneficial for the players (3h15m43s).
• Despite the media deals increasing in value, the average viewership has remained relatively stagnant over the past two decades, with the kickoff game having around 20 million viewers in 2002 and again in recent years (3h16m14s).
• The reason for the increase in media rights value despite stagnant viewership is unclear, but possible explanations include scarcity value, as live football is one of the few events that can reach a large audience across demographics (3h16m59s).
• Another possible explanation is that networks are willing to pay more for the rights because they have limited other content that people want to watch, giving the NFL an advantage in negotiations (3h17m47s).
• The NFL's strategy of having networks compete for the rights until their margins are zero, allowing the NFL to capture more of the profit pool, is likely to be successful regardless of changes in the media landscape (3h18m19s).
• The NFL has a unique business model where they reallocate profit to different parts of the supply chain, with most value accruing to the content creator, and this model has led to massive combinations of media companies to afford generating margins (3h18m55s).
• The airline industry is a comparable example, where no one was willing to pay for a better experience, leading to mergers among airlines to achieve massive scale, and similarly, media companies distributing NFL content have merged to afford generating margins (3h19m8s).
• Companies like AT&T, DirecTV, NBC/Universal, and others buying NFL rights are massive combinations that can afford to generate margins, but the economics of buying NFL rights and selling ads against them are likely worse than they used to be (3h19m24s).
• The NFL relies on broadcast partners to do the work and pay guaranteed money, while the NFL keeps all the profit and can resell the content multiple times, without having to film games, have broadcast trucks, or market directly to consumers (3h20m1s).
• The NFL has outsourced and commoditized tasks like filming, broadcasting, and advertising, allowing them to keep the vast majority of profits and shift the balance in their favor (3h20m38s).

The NFL's Relationship with College Football

• Amazon's deal with the NFL for Thursday Night Football has underperformed expectations from an economic perspective, with Amazon having to make good with advertisers due to low viewership, as many people prefer watching the NFL on TV rather than streaming it (3h21m18s).
• The NFL Players Association has negotiated for half of the revenue, which is a significant portion of the pie, indicating that the packaging component of the NFL, including talent, coaches, and storylines, is a valuable aspect of the business (3h22m7s).
• The NFL has successfully shifted some of its value upstream to its suppliers, rather than letting it collect in the packaging component, highlighting the significant value added by the NFL and its partners beyond the players (3h22m20s).
• The NFL's product is sports entertainment, which goes beyond the game on the field played by the players, and this broader product is a key factor in the league's success (3h23m2s).
• The NFL is an 8 billion a year revenue business, but it owns more mind share than its revenue would suggest, with a larger role in people's lives than its revenue would indicate (3h23m25s).
• The NFL's revenue is comparable to that of companies like General Mills, Adobe, and Halberton, but its share of mind is significantly higher than these companies' products (3h23m43s).
• General Mills generates a significant portion of its business from advertising time on NFL games, highlighting the importance of the NFL to other companies' revenue streams (3h24m1s).
• Networks are likely to continue paying more for NFL rights until it becomes non-economic for them to do so, at which point they will be deeply invested and find it hard to recover (3h24m13s).

The NFL's Business Model and Future Outlook

• Buying a professional sports franchise 10 to 15 years ago was an incredible trade, with the average NFL team value increasing from 1.2 billion in 2012 to 4.5 billion today (3h24m39s).
• The scarcity value of NFL teams, with a finite number of teams and high demand from potential owners, is a key factor in their increasing value (3h25m10s).
• Owning an NFL team is seen as a status symbol, with durable value, and a way for billionaires to "flex" on other wealthy individuals, but this increase in value due to social signaling and desirability may be a sign of a valuation bubble (3h25m28s).
• The NFL team valuations are considered safe and have likely reached a plateau, with no expected increase beyond $8 billion in the near future (3h26m28s).
• The average revenue multiple of an NFL team increased from 4X to 8X between 2012 and 2022, which is a multiple expansion that may be more durable and justified (3h26m50s).
• The narrative around cord-cutting 10 years ago suggested that linear broadcast television, including live sports and football, was dying, but the NFL has proven to be fine in a post-linear TV era (3h27m30s).
• The NFL has successfully transitioned to digital distribution without building its own technology, distribution, or direct relationship with the audience, instead outsourcing these aspects (3h28m6s).
• The NFL has struggled with social media strategy, with its top players having significantly fewer followers compared to NBA players, such as LeBron James, who has over 100 million followers (3h28m38s).
• The NFL's approach to social media is antithetical to the NBA's, with the NFL controlling the message and taking away the players' voice, which is reflective of the sport's team-oriented nature (3h29m19s).
• Despite these differences, the NFL remains a successful business and is "totally fine" in terms of its financials and adaptability (3h29m43s).
• The NFL has been successful in creating parity among teams, making the league highly competitive, and has also managed to create a narrow band of player compensation, although it's not equal pay among players (3h29m54s).
• The NFL has the most equal pay structure compared to other leagues like the NBA and MLB, where superstars like LeBron James make significantly more than the top NFL players, including sponsorships (3h30m40s).
• The NFL has smoothed the curve of player compensation more than other sports, but this also means that NFL players have limited opportunities to build wealth and businesses outside of their direct endorsements (3h30m57s).
• LeBron James is already a billionaire and is expected to become a multi-billionaire after his playing days are over, thanks to his influence and secret deal with Nike (3h31m35s).
• The NFL has a cornered resource, being the only game in town for professional football, which gives them a significant advantage in terms of earning long-term differential profits (3h32m30s).
• The NFL's cornered resource is one of the most clear-cut examples of this power, and it's why the fight with the AFL was worth it, as it allowed the NFL to have the greatest players on Earth playing in one league (3h32m44s).
• The NFL was able to experiment with a new business model of TV as the primary revenue source during the Rosel era, which gave them an advantage over Major League Baseball (3h33m5s).
• The NFL's "for the greater good" mindset is more challenging to maintain with larger, more established franchises that have been around for over a hundred years, making it difficult for them to compromise on their interests (3h33m46s).
• The NFL's branding power is limited because there isn't another game in town, and alternative leagues like the XFL and USFL are not considered good football, which is why people don't care about them (3h34m23s).
• The NFL's antitrust exemption can be seen as a form of process power or cornered resource, which allows them to maintain their dominance in the market (3h34m49s).
• The government's issuance of antitrust exemptions to the NFL is seen as a way to enable the league to grow and become as big as possible, which is perceived as good for the country (3h34m58s).
• The NFL needs to maintain healthy relationships with the government and current political parties, which may have played a role in their thought process, particularly in cases like the Kaepernick controversy (3h35m8s).
• The NFL benefits from scale economies in the sports entertainment aspect of their product, which allows them to produce high-quality games that would be costly for startup leagues to replicate (3h35m27s).
• The NFL generates significant revenue from broadcasting rights, with the average broadcast partner paying around $44 million per game, which enables them to afford high production costs (3h35m50s).
• The NFL's value creation and capture are significant, with the league generating substantial revenue from various sources, including broadcasting rights and taxpayer-funded stadiums (3h36m26s).
• Taxpayer-funded stadiums are often not beneficial to the local community, with research suggesting that they are at best break-even, unless part of a larger economic redevelopment project (3h36m35s).
• The NFL has become increasingly extractive of networks, players, and communities, with teams being particularly extractive, although players seem to have a better deal than they had in the past (3h37m6s).
• The NFL is extremely good at value capture, generating $18 billion in revenue each year and owning a significant amount of mind share, with the ability to re-sell the same media rights multiple times (3h37m22s).
• The NFL's revenue is not that much compared to other companies, but it's possible that there's unquantifiable consumer mind share that exists on top of the revenue generated, such as the enjoyment of Super Bowl parties or sharing exciting moments with family and friends (3h38m2s).
• The NFL's value is also reflected in the fact that US presidents often become deeply invested in the league's activities, and the fun and camaraderie that comes with watching and playing football is hard to put a price on (3h38m22s).
• The trading value of NFL teams is also unique, with buyers doing "net present happiness value equations" rather than purely economic value calculations, valuing the teams more like scarce beachfront property than cash-flowing businesses (3h38m45s).
• The NFL has evolved from its early days, with players now recognizing they are employees and coworkers rather than sworn enemies, and are more likely to show camaraderie and respect for each other, even across team lines (3h39m28s).
• This shift in mindset is a positive development for the game, allowing players to better advocate for their rights and fair treatment in a business that demands a lot from them, both physically and emotionally (3h40m9s).
• The NFL has also moved away from its early ideals of manhood and character-building, where opponents were seen as enemies, and now acknowledges that players are entertainers above all else, with a focus on putting on a show and creating a positive experience for fans (3h40m36s).
• The NFL's business model has been in place for decades, with players only recently recognizing the true nature of the business, although they may still be taken advantage of in some ways (3h41m12s).
• The institutional complex surrounding football, from Pop Warner to college, emphasizes the game's importance and epic struggle, which can be misleading (3h41m29s).
• The long-term impacts of football on players are tragic, with seven players from the 2001 Patriots Championship team having passed away between the ages of 35 and 50, and 24 team members experiencing symptoms of football brain injuries (3h41m49s).
• Many players, including those from earlier eras, were unaware of the risks associated with playing football and may have made different decisions if they had known (3h42m19s).
• The NFL's future is uncertain, with potential drawbacks including declining youth participation, player safety issues, and failed international expansion (3h43m3s).
• However, some argue that the NFL's staying power and cornered resources will allow it to remain a successful and growing business, despite its challenges (3h43m26s).
• The legalization of sports betting in the United States is expected to generate significant revenue for the NFL, although the exact impact is unknown (3h43m52s).
• The NFL's business model and cultural significance are complex and multifaceted, with both positive and negative aspects (3h44m10s).
• The NFL produces great entertainment content and has high-quality play on the field, despite having problems on various levels (3h44m39s).
• The game and the NFL's business will likely be fine, regardless of individual opinions (3h44m58s).
• The playoffs and the Super Bowl are highly anticipated events, with some viewers experiencing mixed feelings and cognitive dissonance (3h45m8s).
• The movie "The Menu" is recommended for its entertainment value, being described as "unbelievably fun" and "beautifully shot" (3h45m23s).
• "Payton's Places" on ESPN+ is also recommended, with its nostalgic value and engaging content (3h45m30s).
• The Acquired community has a Slack channel with over 14,000 members, where discussions can be continued after the episode (3h45m43s).
• The Acquired team has a merchandise store and is working on new projects, including Acquired Enterprises (3h45m46s).
• A recent interview with Megan Reynolds from Ultimeter is available on the Acquired LP show, discussing building a capital formation function at an investment firm (3h46m5s).