Do You Think Fantasy Sports Leagues
Should Pay Royalties to Professional Leagues and Players?
Did you know that roughly 36 million people play
fantasy sports in North America and the average amount spent per player is one
hundred dollars, which means fantasy sports is roughly a 3.6 billion dollar
industry. Fantasy sports leagues consist of participants who act as owners to
build teams that compete against each other based on the statistics generated
by real players on professional sports teams. Fantasy sports have been around
long before the internet existed and scores would have to be manually
calculated by a leagues commissioner. Now with the internet, there are several
sports sites available where points are automatically calculated for the
league. With more and more people playing fantasy sports a question keeps
coming up, should fantasy sports leagues pay royalties to professional leagues
and players? With any argument there are always two sides, the people that are
for paying royalties say that fantasy leagues are benefiting from the hard work
of professional sports teams and athletes. The people that are opposed to this
say that the professional athletes already make enough money and that their
names and statistics are public knowledge and they should not receive any
royalties. I am definitely one of those people who say they should not receive
royalties.
One of the biggest things that bother
me is, Major League Baseball or MLB and other sport leagues and their players
make entirely too much money already and now they are going after not only the
sites that offer fantasy sports but the people who are playing. “The average
salary of the NBA is 5.15 million, MLB is 3.31 million, and NFL is 1.9 million”
(Dorish). If you think that athletes or the people paying them need more money
then you are crazy. Fantasy sports are helping the sports world, not hurting
it. “You
say Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez and Albert Pujols are exploited because they're
bought and sold in fake transactions in a fake construct? Well, how much of
their chunky (and very real) salaries are owed to all that fakery? Without
fantasy ginning up interest in their game, do they still command the numbers
they command?” (Smith). I could not agree with this any more and I know without
the fans, most professional athletes wouldn’t make any money and would probably
be flipping burgers ant some fast food chain somewhere. I personally have a
friend who five years ago had no interest in any sport until I talked them into
playing fantasy baseball and now he goes to at least ten games a year just
because he knows the players and what is going on, and that’s just baseball.
Now he is also playing fantasy football, buying jerseys and just spending money
that directly helps sports. If more people were like him, and I’m sure there
are a bunch out there that are, then that can only mean one thing, fantasy
sports helps real sports.
The next reason that leagues should
not pay any royalties is, the names and stats of the professional athletes is
public knowledge. They knowingly put themselves in that position and in my
opinion cannot say that their names or stats cannot be used. “Those stats are public domain. They must be. If
they're not--if the courts ultimately decide they aren't simply because money
changes hands among the fantasy nerds who use them--we'll all be paying A-Rod's
salary, eventually. The National Pastime not only won't
belong to us anymore, we'll be paying MLB a fee every time we use the phrase
"National Pastime"” (Smith). I am a huge fan of baseball and think that
it is “The National Pastime” and if we had to pay more than we already do just
because of the greed of the players and management I think I would lose a
little of my love for the game. There have been a few instances where this
issue has gone to court. The case before the high court--Major League
Baseball Advanced Media v. CBC Distribution and Marketing--was a high-stakes
battle between professional athletes and fantasy sports businesses. Ultimately
the case involved striking a balance between free-speech guarantees and the publicity
rights of famous people (Richey).
I just don’t understand how it is any different reading the stats in the
newspaper just for the information or calculating them to compete against other
people to see who knows the most about a sport. CBC went to court, arguing that it
didn't need a license to operate a fantasy baseball league using publicly
available information about players. The courts agreed (Richey). So in this case MLB was trying to go after
the companies that create the sites available for playing fantasy sports and
they lost. I think this is a good thing because they were trying to get this
company to pay for using the stats and names of players.
The last reason that I think that professional teams
and athletes should not receive is because a lot of the time fantasy sports are
just played for fun. It’s not just that they want the people playing fantasy
sports to pay them but they are going after the sites that design the leagues
online. Their argument is that the sites need to pay to use the information.
They should not have to pay for information that they are just organizing for
the public to use for free. That’s right I said free, most fantasy sites are
free of charge and only make money on advertising. Even if there is money
involved, the owners of the fantasy teams spend quite a bit of time on their
teams and deserve to make whatever money they earn. I know that in my leagues I
spend about 10 to 15 hours a week all year round, just getting ready to play
each matchup and outside of the year just as much time getting ready for the
next year.
I
think that the main argument for paying royalties to players and leagues is
that people are benefiting from the hard work of the athletes and teams. I
agree that people are benefiting from their hard work, however I think that
they should be able to. I know for a fact that I have more than doubled the
money that I have invested in fantasy sports over the last ten years and I
believe I deserve it. So, the main argument is they should get money from us
because we make money off of them. If you turn things around, the only reason
they are in the position they are in is because the fans of the game work hard
at their jobs so they can afford to go to games and buy their favorite apparel
to support their favorite teams and players. A recent study by the National
Sporting Goods Association (NSGA), shows that Americans 16 years and older
spent more than $8 billion on sports logo apparel (Guigotti). So really the
teams and players are also benefiting from the hard work of the people who
support them. Should fans get paid royalties or get kickbacks because they
benefit from our hard work. If that was the question people would think it’s
absurd because it makes no sense and I agree. If it makes no sense on way than
it doesn’t the other way also.
In
conclusion, I do not feel that professional sports teams or athletes should be
paid royalties from fantasy sports players, leagues, or sites. I feel that I made
a good argument of this, whether it is the fact that the athletes and teams
make too much money already or that the information used is public knowledge. I
also feel that I proved that the argument for paying them royalties because
people are benefiting from them is not a valid argument. I hope after reading
all that I had to say you can develop your own opinion on this topic. I just
hope you choose the right side.
Works Cited
Smith, Ben. "Baseball
Squeezing Fantasy Geeks Dry." Journal Gazette (Fort Wayne, IN). 15
Aug 2006: 6.B. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 10 Dec 2013.
Richey, Warren. "High
Court Rejects Fantasy Baseball Challenge." Christian Science Monitor.
03 Jun 2008: n.p. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 10 Dec 2013.
Dorish, Joe. "Average Salaries in the NBA,
NFL, MLB and NHL." Yahoo Sports. Yahoo, 12 Nov. 2011. Web. 10 Dec.
2013
Guigotti, Daniel. "How Much Americans Spend
on Sports Each Year." Bad Credit Loans Approved by Capcreditcom.
Forbes, 2013. Web. 11 Dec.
