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The National Football League television blackout policies are the strictest television blackout policies among the four major professional sports leagues in North America. Since 1973, the NFL has maintained a blackout policy that states that a home game cannot be televised in the team's local market if all tickets are not sold out 72 hours prior to its start time. This makes the NFL the only major professional sports league that requires teams to sell out tickets in order to broadcast a game on television locally. Although nationally-televised games in the other leagues are often blacked out on the national networks on which the game is airing in the local markets of the participating teams, they can still be seen on the local broadcast TV station or regional sports network that normally holds their local/regional broadcast rights. ==Getting around restrictions== Prior to 1973, all games were blacked out in the home city of origin and on any TV stations located within 75 miles of the team's home city, regardless of whether they were sold out. This policy, dating back to the NFL's emerging television years, resulted in home-city blackouts even during sold-out regular-season games and championship games. For instance, the 1958 "Greatest Game Ever Played" between the Baltimore Colts and New York Giants was unavailable to viewers in the New York City market despite the sellout at Yankee Stadium (many fans rented hotel rooms or visited friends in areas of Connecticut or Pennsylvania where signals of TV stations carrying the game were available to watch the game on television, a practice that continued for Giants games through 1972). Similarly, all Super Bowl games prior to Super Bowl VII in January 1973 were not televised in the host city's market. The policy was in effect when, in 1972, the Washington Redskins made the playoffs for only the second time in 27 seasons. Because all home games were blacked-out, politicians – including President Richard Nixon, a devout football fan – were not able to watch their favorite team's home games. NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle refused to lift the blackout for the NFC Championship Game, despite a plea from United States Attorney General Richard Kleindienst. Kleindienst went on to suggest that the United States Congress re-evaluate the NFL's antitrust exemption. Rozelle agreed to lift the blackout for Super Bowl VII on an "experimental basis", if the game sold-out ten or more days in advance. With the game a sellout, viewers in the Los Angeles area were able to see the NBC telecast of the game. Nonetheless, Congress intervened before the 1973 season anyway, passing Public Law 93-107, which eliminated the blackout of games in the home market so long as the game was sold out by 72 hours before game time. The league will sometimes change this deadline to 48 hours if there are only a few thousand tickets left to be sold; much more rarely, the NFL will occasionally reduce the deadline to 24 hours in special cases. Tickets in premium club sections and luxury suites have been excluded from the blackout rule (indeed modern NFL stadiums have reduced general seating in favor of club seating and luxury suites, as this makes it easier to sell out the stadium and avoid blackouts, and this revenue does not have to be shared with other franchises), as have unused tickets allocated to the visiting team. Alternatively, some NFL teams have arrangements with local television stations or businesses (often sponsors of the team and/or its local broadcasts) to purchase unsold tickets. Teams themselves are allowed to purchase remaining non-premium tickets at 34¢ on the dollar (the portion subject to revenue sharing) to prevent a blackout. Teams can also lift the blackout on their own; this has occasionally been done in cases of stormy weather on game days. The NFL requires that closing off sections be done uniformly for every home game, including playoff games, in a given season. This prevents teams from trying to sell out the entire stadium only when they expect to be able to do so. For instance, the Jacksonville Jaguars closed off a number of sections at their home stadium, EverBank Field, to reduce the number of tickets they would need to sell. EverBank Field is one of the largest venues in the NFL, as it was built to also accommodate the annual Florida-Georgia game and Gator Bowl in college football, and was expanded for Super Bowl XXXIX, even though it draws from one of the smallest markets in the league. The NFL authorized a new rule loosening the league's blackout restrictions during the 2012 offseason. Under the new rule, for the first time in NFL history, the ticket sales provision no longer requires a stadium to be sold out in order for a game to be televised; instead, teams are allowed to set a benchmark of anywhere from 85% to 100% of the stadium's non-premium seats. Any seats sold beyond that benchmark will be subject to heavier revenue sharing. While most teams participate in the new blackout rules, four teams – the Buffalo Bills, Cleveland Browns, Indianapolis Colts and San Diego Chargers – continue to follow the previous blackout rule, as under the 2012 rule modification, the teams would be required to pay a higher percentage of gate fees to the NFL's revenue fund. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「National Football League television blackout policies」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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