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The New York Giants, an American football team which plays in the National Football League (NFL), have had a long, and at times turbulent financial history. The Giants were founded in 1925 by businessman and bookmaker Tim Mara with an investment of 500 US$, and became one of the first teams in the then five-year-old NFL. Mara passed ownership of the team on to his sons Wellington and Jack after the 1929 Stock Market Crash to insulate the team from creditors. At first the Mara sons owned the team in name only, but they took increasingly larger roles in the organization beginning in the mid-1930s. Tim Mara remained involved in the team's operations until his death in 1959, when his sons assumed full control of the club. After Jack's passing in 1965, his son, Tim, took over his share of the team. Although the Giants were successful on the field in their initial seasons, they struggled financially. A key event in franchise history occurred in the 11th game of the Giants inaugural season. The Chicago Bears, led by star running back Red Grange, came to town attracting a then pro football record 73,000 fans, and giving the Giants a much needed financial influx. The following year, Grange and his agent formed a rival league and stationed a competing team, led by Grange, in New York. Though the Giants lost $50,000 that season, the rival league folded and was subsumed into the NFL. After these initial struggles, the Giants financial status stabilized, and they led the league in attendance several times in the 1930s and 1940s. By the early 1960s, the Giants had firmly established themselves as one of the league's biggest attractions. However, rather than continue to receive their higher share of the league television revenue, the Mara sons pushed for equal sharing of revenue for the benefit of the entire league. Revenue sharing is still practiced in the NFL today, and is credited with strengthening the league. After struggling in the latter half of the 1960s and the entire 1970s, the Giants hired an outsider, George Young, to run football operations for the first time in several decades. The Giants on-field product and business aspects improved rapidly following the hiring. In 1990, Jack Mara's son, Tim, who was struggling with cancer at the time, sold his half of the team to Bob Tisch. This marked the first time in franchise history the team had not been solely owned by the Mara family. In 2005, Wellington Mara, who had been with the team since its inception in 1925 when he worked as a ball boy, died. His death was followed two weeks later by the death of Tisch. The Giants are currently owned by the sons of Wellington Mara and Bob Tisch—John K. Mara and Steve Tisch. An estimate of the franchise's current value places it at $1.2 billion. == Early history and fiscal struggles: 1925–1929 == The Giants were founded in 1925 by Tim Mara, a bookmaker (legal in 1925), businessman, and promoter, with an investment of US$500 after a meeting with league president Joseph Carr, and Harry March.〔(History of the New York Giants ), giants.com, accessed January 12, 2007.〕〔Schwartz. pg. 67〕〔Gottehrer. pg. 25〕 Carr was sent to the east coast to find someone to put a team in a major city there to help the struggling league. Carr contacted Billy Gibson who was the manager of heavyweight boxer Gene Tunney and knew of Mara from Mara's interest in investing in Tunney.〔Pervin. pg. 5〕 Mara decided to spend the $500 on the Giants as opposed to Tunney in a spur of the moment decision,〔Burke, Monte. (Turning $500 Into A $573 Million NFL Team ), forbes.com, August 29, 2003, accessed June 1, 2007.〕〔Gottehrer. pgs. 25–6〕 and started the team with the statement, "an exclusive franchise for anything in New York is worth $500."〔Neft, Cohen, and Korch. pg. 112〕 His son Wellington later said that his father felt that even an empty store in the city was worth that price.〔Pervin. pg. 6〕 Mara purchased the team, despite never having watched a single pro game,〔 saying to the sellers at the time, "Just tell me one thing. Now that I have a franchise, what do I do with it."〔Gottehrer. pg. 26〕 To differentiate themselves from the baseball team of the same name, they took the name "New York Football Giants", which they still use as their legal corporate name. Mara soon realized that his purchase of the team did not yield any players, coaches, equipment, or a home field. March helped him establish the team by taking a job as the team's secretary and handling the personnel decisions, and Gibson served as the team's president. Mara's friends were wary of investing in the team, but he convinced Matty Frank, a real estate investor, and a few other people to invest. Mara rented the Polo Grounds as the team's stadium, and March developed a strategy that hinged on acquiring stars such as running back Jim Thorpe.〔Gottehrer. pgs. 25–7, 45〕 At 37 years old, Thorpe was a shadow of his former self, and his contract required that he only play parts of games during the early parts of the season, until he got into shape. He played only the first regular season game however, before ending his Giants career due to injury.〔Gottehrer. pg. 28–9〕 His absence would severely hurt the team's monetary outlook for the season.〔Gottehrer. pg. 30〕 Although the Giants were successful on the field in their first season, going 8–4 in 1925,〔(History of the New York Giants ), Giants.com/history, accessed July 17, 2009.〕 their financial status was a different story. According to football historian Barry Gottehrer:〔Gottehrer. pg. 11〕 Overhadowed by baseball, boxing, and college football, professional football was not a popular sport in 1925. Mara had to spend $25,000 of his own money during the season just to keep the franchise alive,〔(New York Giants ), profootballhof.com, accessed June 4, 2007.〕 and close friend and future New York state Governor Al Smith even implored him to sell the team.〔Schwartz. pg. 68〕 Mara needed $4,000 a game to cover his own outlays and $2,000 to $6,000, depending on the team, to pay the visitors to break even.〔Gottehrer. pg. 32〕 He slashed ticket prices, and gave out over 5,000 free tickets a week.〔Gottehrer. pg. 29〕 Although he used some moderately successful promotional gimmicks, such as having several players from the visiting Kansas City Cowboys dress up in his cowboy outfits and ride horses around New York City to promote that weeks game,〔Gottehrer. pg. 33〕 his struggle continued until the eleventh game of the season when Red Grange and the Chicago Bears came to town attracting over 73,000 fans—setting a pro football record.〔Neft, Cohen, and Korch. pg. 52〕 The game attracted such attention that 20,000 fans had to be turned away at the gates.〔Watterson. pg. 154〕 This gave the Giants a much needed influx of revenue, and perhaps altered the history of the franchise.〔(NFL History: 1921–1930 ), NFL.com/history, accessed June 4, 2007. * Carroll. pg. 126〕 The team could have benefited even further, but Mara refused to raise ticket prices for the game.〔Gottehrer. pg. 35〕 The Giants went 8–4–1 in 1926,〔 and withstood a challenge from an upstart American football league led by a team featuring Grange. Grange and his agent had formed the American Football League and placed their flagship team, the Yankees, in New York.〔 According to a story by ''The New York Times'' published at the time, the Giants lost over $50,000 during the season.〔(Pro Football Here to Stay, Says Mara; Giants to Play Next Year Despite Losses -- Game Also to Remain at Ebbets Field. ), ''The New York Times'', December 19, 1926, accessed June 4, 2007.〕 Grange's league lasted one season however, and was subsumed into the NFL.〔 The Giants were so desperate to make money they allowed star Duluth Eskimos running back Ernie Nevers back into a close game after he was injured, even though by the rules they had the right to disallow his re-entrance, to please fans who had come to see him. The Yankees were subsumed into the NFL the next year and played most of their games on the road to avoid direct competition with the Giants. They folded in 1928, one year after Grange went back to playing for the Bears.〔Gottehrer. pg. 49〕 The Giants paid a total of $21,000 in player salary in 1926, including paying all player expenses during the season, and player salaries ranged from $1,500 to $3,000.〔 According to March, the attendance for the season was nearly equal to the 274,500 the team reported in their inaugural season. However, home attendance for games at the Polo Grounds dropped from 25,000 to 15,000 a game.〔 The team's attendance on the road was significantly higher in their early history—the team averaged 57,000 in their three road games in 1925.〔〔 Mara replaced Gibson as the team's president before the 1927 season. He told March to spend whatever he felt necessary to build a championship caliber team.〔Gottehrer. pg. 50〕 March overhauled the roster and the team finished 11–1–1, while winning its first NFL championship. They barely broke even financially however, and the team was still giving away as many as 4,000 tickets a game.〔Gottehrer. pgs. 53–5, 58, 61〕 Mara decided to reduce costs the following season, and instead of traveling first class, the Giants drove to games in a used bus, and stayed at local YMCAs instead of hotels. The team had to push the bus once for several miles when it broke down, and players had trouble sleeping at the Y. They won only four games, and Mara lost $40,000.〔Gottehrer. pg. 62–4〕 Before the 1929 season, Mara purchased the entire squad of the rival Detroit Wolverines, including star quarterback Benny Friedman, a team which had finished in third place the year before. The rosters of the two teams were combined under the Giants name and this led to immediate improvement as the Giants finished 13–1–1.〔New York City Sports Commission. (Giants History ), ci.nyc.ny.us, accessed June 4, 2007. 〕 Friedman's arrival in particular boosted tickets sales to an average of 25,000 a game, which more than covered the expense of his high salary ($10,000). The team made an $8,500 profit on the season.〔Neft, Cohen, and Korch. pg. 78 * Gottehrer. pgs. 70, 72〕 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「Financial history of the New York Giants」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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