Commercialization is the process of introducing a product to either a mass or niche market. Owners, often, encourage such commercialization because it helps to expose their team or sport to larger audiences, which will help generate revenue. Commercial sport is something not all people are comfortable with or like. I think that it has its place within professional sports alone. But we are seeing it more and more at the college level with Div. 1 NCAA Men’s Basketball and Football. At an elite amateur level, like colligate sport, I think is where commercialization is a bad thing because it takes away from what amateur sport is really about which is participating in athletics while learning. However, the same cannot be said about professional sports. In elite sport, I think that it is almost a required concept. It’s something that is necessary for the survival of the sport itself. Without commercialization, teams wouldn’t be able to pay the players the salaries of their contracts …show more content…
I believe commercialization comes along and has to be present once you make sport into a business. It is has to. Athletes, coaches, and owners today make millions of dollars more than some wealthy business owners. However, there are critics of sport commercialization that believe commerce corrupts sport. The Corruption Thesis according to Simon on pg. 190 of Fair Play: The Ethics of Sport: “We can understand corruption to mean that the values internal to sport, such as those of fair competition, sportsmanship, and perhaps the mutual quest for excellence, are being or already have been undermined by the growing commercialization of sport.” While in class, I didn’t quite agree with the idea that commercialization could completely corrupt sport with a more attuned understanding of the Corruption Thesis; I now understand how it could and where many critics of sports commercialization are coming
Can cheating be an excuse for the phrase; survival of the fittest, or is it an epidemic moral corruption? Since the advent of modern competitive sport, winning has always been the bottom line. Honesty, honour and fair play have taken the backseat. The purpose of the essay May The Best Cheater Win, by Harry Bruce, is to inform how cheating has become widespread and accepted in America. Sports are an integral part of American culture and indeed an entire industry exists because of these competitive sports. The result of these competitive sports has led to the moral corruption of most athletes, as they would do anything to win. Harry Bruce discusses the distortion of right and wrong that has penetrated all levels of sports, from children's league to regional division. He confidently informs his reader that organized sports not only "offer benefits to youngsters" but "they also offer a massive program of moral corruption".
Professional sports, like most of our popular culture, can be understood only partly by through its exiting plays and tremendous athletes. Baseball and football most of all are not only games anymore but also hardcore businesses. As businesses, sports leagues can be as conniving, deceitful, and manipulative as any other businesses in the world. No matter what the circumstances are, it seems that Politicians are always some how right around the corner from the world of sports. These Politicians look to exploit both the cultural and the economic dimensions of the sports for their own purposes. This is what is known in the sports industry as “playing the field”.
Over the last several years, it has become undeniable that any kind of sport can, and will, be sensationalized and commercialized by the people from the great companies like “Coca-Cola, Pepsi Cola, and Marlboro” (1667). These companies have hundreds of thousands of dollars budgeted each year to pour into sports in the form of sponsorships, advertising, etc. Once the sponsorships are introduced into a sport, it is exactly the kind of thing that will push an athlete out of competition. An athlete will find himself in a “make-it or break-it” situation. If an athlete receives a sponsorship, then the money is free flowing for equipment, testing, training, etc – anything that the athlete wants or needs to aid in putting him...
sport as the people's last resort for economic stability with a high price to pay; morals and
Another argument would be capitalism with athletes and commercials, Zirin explains how sports was suppose to be pure and untouched by the outside world but have been defile by commercialism. Zirin stated "It seems only commercialism is capable of making sports safe for politics...more than anything else, I 'll argue it is corporate power and fear of a backlash from sponsors that drive the anti political attitude that we find in our sports culture and make athletes afraid to rock the boat." Commercialism involving sports athletes shows how the big corporate power have control over athletes from taking a political stands against something that impact a certain group, which limit their say on a issues but their goals is to present their product and not say a word that involve
Zimbalist, Andrew S. Unpaid Professionals: Commercialism And Conflict In Big-Time College Sports. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1999. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost). Web. 27 Mar. 2014.
The Reasons Behind the Increasing Commercialism of the Olympic Games The Olympic Games is a world wide event, held once every 4 years. It is the most important event amongst the elite athletes of today. It is viewed on television by billions of people across the world, by satellite transmission (started in Tokyo in 1964). This worldwide viewing attracted sponsors as they realised that by supporting the Olympics their product would be advertised on every product sold, as they would be the 'official sponsor'. The advances in technology has played a fundamental role in the increase in commercialism, as large sums of money are put forwards for television rights over the Games from companies such as Sky, the BBC and ABC.
Mitten, Matthew J., James L. Musselman, and Bruce W. Burton. "Targeted Reform of Commercialized Intercollegiate Athletics." San Diego Law Review 47.3 (2010): 779-844. Academic Search Complete. Web. 17 Nov. 2013.
The Current Scale and the Economic Importance of the Sports Industry Over 100 years ago the scale of the sports industry has increased gradually. Not all sports have followed in the same path or footsteps. A slow increasing level of control has been affecting the sports industry since 1960Â’s. Mainly standardisation and commodification of sport. More money has been put into the industry equivalent with the efforts that the sports organisations have put in, to increase their potential at the professional end of the scale, and the voluntary end they remain sustainable.
First, to understand and discuss the idea of deviance in sports one must ask the question what is deviance? The Random House College Dictionary defines the word deviate as characterized by “deviation from an accepted norm, as of behavior; a person or thing that departs from the accepted norm or standard”. Alex Thio, the author of Sociology A Brief Introduction Third Edition defines deviance “as an act that is considered by public consensus or by the powerful at a given place and time to be a violation of some social rule”. In today’s society we find the word deviance to mean different things to different people, this is due to people having different opinions on whether an act violated a social norm or not. In the world of sports deviance is viewed differently on the playing field than if it were seen in the streets of a city or small town. In Jay J. Coakley’s Sport in Society Sixth Edition, Coakley states, “what is normal in sports may be deviant outside of sports”. “Athletes are allowed and even encouraged to behave in ways that are prohibited or defined as criminal in other settings”. “For example, much of the behavior of athletes in contact sports would be classified as felony assault if it occurred on the streets”. To better understand this, most sociologist like to use the Alternative Approach rather than the Absolutist or Relativist approaches. Coakley illustrates that the Alternative Approach states: “Deviance Can Be Negative or Positive”.
Without the competitive nature and passion for the game what is left? It game becomes a have to instead of I want to. That is why a lot of people prefer to watch college sports over professionals. If you start paying the student athletes, then it changes the whole dynamic of the game being played.
Sports are one of the most profitable industries in the world. Everyone wants to get their hands on a piece of the action. Those individuals and industries that spend hundreds of millions of dollars on these sports teams are hoping to make a profit, but it may be an indirect profit. It could be a profit for the sports club, or it could be a promotion for another organization (i.e. Rupert Murdoch, FOX). The economics involved with sports have drastically changed over the last ten years.
On 25 October 2013, the Football Federation of Australia (FFA) suspended the coach and four players for breaches of the FFA’s National Code of Conduct (Southern Stars players and coach banned by FFA following criminal charges for alleged match-fixing. ABC News Online, 25 October. The stakeholders in this example are the players and coaches, as well as the communities whose interest lays here in the sport being disrupted as well as any results being set aside. Policy Goal To lessen the appeal and availability for corruption, if the stakeholders interest lays with the community if you add an aspect of shaming to those who commit these forms of corruption and use the sporting community in association with the other stakeholders ie the secondary
While sports for the spectators are merely entertainment, the economics of the industry are what drives businesses to become involved. Sports have become more of a business entity rather than an entertainment industry due to the strong economic perception of the over all industry. There are several instances in which economics may contribute to the effect on the sports industry, such as: the success of a team, the price of a ticket, the amount of money an athlete will make, and the amount of profit a team will make. The success of an...
Møller, Verner. The Ethics of Doping and Anti-Doping: Redeeming the Soul of Sport?Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2009. Print.