When has something gotten to the point of “too much” and “too far”? How about televised sports marketing? No boundaries seem to apply.
Watching sports on television harms viewers’ health and financial well-being. It’s primarily because broadcasts are heavily saturated with predatory commercials promoting sports betting, alcohol, and unhealthy foods, targeting impressionable adults and underage children.
I began holding that belief as a youngster watching TV baseball games that featured commercials hawking beer and tobacco. And I held that stance long before research indicated that alcohol use in teenage years carries with it a variety of health risks. Underage drinking also contributes to a range of acute consequences, such as sexual assaults, alcohol overdoses, and deaths—including those from motor vehicle crashes.
TIME graphic accompanying an article on how sports apps “are ensnaring college students”
If alcohol use were the sole concern. Today we can add gambling to the list. A 2023 Newsweek article reported that the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual listed ‘gambling disorder’ in the same category as heroin and opioid addictions. Some studies found that as many as 19 percent of problem gamblers attempt suicide, the highest rate of any addiction.
Today’s reality is that televised sporting events hawk junk food, alcoholic beverages, and gambling just as much as they show touchdown passes, jump shots, and slap shots.
Sydney Sweeney ad for the sports prediction market platform Novig has sparked widespread backlash over the sexualization of women in sports (photo, LA Times)
I see that as a major issue across all sports sponsors, college and pro, and across the sports field. But I will say that (at least for me) the Lords of Baseball know how to go low. No longer do “dirty old men in raincoats” have to go to X-rated movie houses to get their kicks. Turn on the TV, and they’ll see sexualized ads featuring Sydney Sweeney promoting a gambling prediction market. Megan Fox hawks a male enhancement product in a manner that’s close to soft porn.
I’m forced to watch, and impressionable kids are watching, too. It’s all to make a buck, and it’s expanding in today’s “anything goes” world of sports marketing.
Anyone who has followed the trend line about the connection between sports and “sin” products should not be surprised that sexualized commercials have received the seal of approval from the moguls who control the business of sports.
–Baseball trading cards in cigarette packs were introduced in the late 1800s, and the nexus between tobacco companies and baseball continued until cigarette advertising on televised sports events was outlawed in 1971.
–Beer also became associated with professional baseball in the late 1800s, while gambling commercials exploded into a multi-billion-dollar TV empire following the legalization of sports betting in 2018.
Atlanta Braves star Dale Murphy has publicly criticized the airing of adult-themed commercials during hours when children are watching. But their criticism has as much impact as a raindrop in the ocean.
As a former reporter and editor for many years before transitioning to the public relations business, I have always opposed government regulations regarding what can appear in print or be said on television. But that does not mean that I believe that anything goes. I believe commercials that hawk products proven to be unhealthy and addictive should be allowed to air only after 10 p.m., when most impressionable youngsters are no longer glued to a TV set.
I believe government action is needed to accomplish the above because, with few exceptions, sports business moguls care only about money.
Next February, the annual rite celebrating unhealthy and addictive commercials will again take center stage. It’s also known as the Super Bowl, when millions upon millions of viewers are riveted in front of televisions for hours on end.
Team owners, advertising agencies, brands, and networks have too much say and sway in what we see on our TV screens, and for one, I think it’s gone too far. It makes you wonder if there are any limits to the seemingly endless quest to turn a buck.
