The Teflon League: NFL Revenues and Viewership Are Up.
Currently, the NFL is the 11th most important private company in the USA according to Fortune, and has the highest revenue of any sports league worldwide.
While critics contend that something needs to be done about the various issues surrounding the NFL, it's hard to conclude that those issues affect viewership. The NFL currently dominates attendance per game, viewership, and revenue.
In an experience economy, the NFL puts out an extraordinary product.
In Part 2, I talked about normalizing your habits and picking consistent, normalized metrics. This doesn't just work at the gym; it applies to life and business as well.
Today, I want to explain how and why this helps. To do so, we will talk about controlling your arousal states.
Chemically, most arousal states are the same. Meaning, the same hormones and neurotransmitters that make you feel fear also can make you feel excited. They affect your heart rate, respiration, etc. ... Though, the outside stimuli you experience likely determines how you interpret what is happening.
In most situations, a heart rate of 170 beats per minute is an indicator of extreme danger (or an impending toe-tag). If I felt my heart racing like that in a meeting, it might trigger a fight or flight instinct. I prefer conscious and controlled responses. So, I train myself to recognize what I can control and to respond accordingly.
One way I do that is by being mindful of heart rate zones during exercise.
My goal is to get as close to 170 bpm as I can, then stay in that peak zone for as long as possible.
Here is a chart showing a Fitbit readout of a recent exercise session.
As you can see, every time I reach my limit ... I get my heart rate back down. It becomes a conscious and controlled learned behavior.
It's a form of biofeedback; it's not only gotten me better at controlling what happens after my heartrate reaches 170 but at identifying when I'm close even without a monitor.
Now, when my heart rate is at 170 bpm(regardless of the situation), I don't feel anxious ... I think about what I want to do.
This is a very useful tool.
It's the same with trading ... Does a loss or error harsh your mellow – or is it a trigger to do what you are supposed to do.
Getting used to normalized risk creates opportunity.
When you are comfortable operating at a pace, or in an environment, that others find difficult – you have a profound advantage and edge.
Even if I'm not an expert in a field, based on context and patterns, I quickly see the big picture – and recognize the bottlenecks and leverage points that impact transformative results.
A scrambled cube presents an insurmountable challenge to newbies. It almost seems that there are infinite possibilities ... and most lead towards chaos and failure. In reality, a Rubik's cube is pretty easy to solve if you understand a few simple algorithms (and match the positions of a couple key blocks in relation to the decisions you need to make next).
As more people learn to solve standard cubes, the game evolves. There is new generation of "Cubers" that attempt to find new creative situations to add difficulty, solve it faster than the next person, or try crazy variations of the cube that barely resembles the original.
As a side note, I was a little surprised to see the "Internet" on the list as source itself. Darwin would be somewhat comforted to see that people don't trust everything they see on the internet.
The following chart is a bit outdated (it's from 2014), but it's a good study with diverse leanings. It presents the trust levels of various news sources by ideological group.
Which of your news sources do you follow? Were they as trusted as you expected?
Another question worth asking yourself is "Am I getting an idea of what the other side is thinking?" In trading, I always want to understand what the other side sees.
Finally, let me know if there are resources you think I should look at.
Could there be a second Cold War? Or, is there really a chance someone pushes the button?
Regardless, it's just another green tick mark on the doomsday clock according to the "Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists" who post a yearly update to our doomsday clock (and have for 70 years).
The Doomsday Clock is a globally-recognized model of our planet's health and safety - but who knew it was an actual thing based off of a range of factors?
Now - they want you to donate, and so there's a level of fearmongering, but they do provide some solid data on nuclear stockpiles, global temperature differences and more.
You can see their full article on this year's prediction here.
And if you're actually worried about North Korea - even if they now have the ability to hit the U.S., I think we need to be asking if they have a real desire to do so?
North Korea thrives off of the status quo - keeping people placated with propaganda and love for their glorious leader.
Despite how it may seem sometimes - It's unlikely Kim Jong Un is trying to start a war with America. It just isn't smart.
But, we know that emotion is not often based on logic.
When your doctor tells you that you are fat, it is easy to discount (because you pay them to tell you that). When your massage therapist tells you that you are getting fat, you've got to listen (because they're trying to be nice to get a better tip).
Well, for the past two months, I've been getting back into fitness.
I used to be a competitive athlete. So, exercise was about gaining an edge and competing better. In a sense, that is still true (just on a different field). Now, I work out to stay healthy, fit, and vital while managing the challenges of running a company, navigating an overbooked calendar, and traveling every week (I flew about 140,000 miles last year – and have flown about 5 million miles on American).
This is about focusing on the right things so you can best measure progress.
Normalizing your habits and picking the right metrics isn't just a habit for the gym. It's a habit you should pick up in life. If you don't set the right measuring stick you'll always be unhappy or underperform.
Plan forward – but measure backward ... you have to make sure you're not so focused on the horizon that you don't track what you've accomplished.
Normalizing the result makes this easier and better.
In running, for example, it is the time it takes me to finish one mile, while never going above 170 heart beats per minute.
Meanwhile, in trading, we do this by comparing different opportunities based on a constant risk level (for example, the expected return for the next day of $1M, assuming a 1% maximum drawdown). It doesn't matter what market we trade, or how many trades the system makes ... we can make a fair comparison and get better insights about performance.
NFL - Boom or Bust
Are you ready for some Football?
This chart may explain why my foreign friends prefer a different form of "football" ... It shows how many Super Bowl Championships each region has.
The regular season is about to start, and the buzz is building ... but, not all of it is good.
Violence ... drugs ... concussions ... There has been a lot of bad press surrounding the NFL lately.
The Cowboys, alone, have somewhere between 4 to 7 players (depending on appeals) subject to miss games due to league suspensions for misconduct.
The Teflon League: NFL Revenues and Viewership Are Up.
Currently, the NFL is the 11th most important private company in the USA according to Fortune, and has the highest revenue of any sports league worldwide.
via howmuch
While critics contend that something needs to be done about the various issues surrounding the NFL, it's hard to conclude that those issues affect viewership. The NFL currently dominates attendance per game, viewership, and revenue.
In an experience economy, the NFL puts out an extraordinary product.
Long term may prove to be a different story, however. Each year there are less high-school football players and more competition.
I guess we'll see.
Regardless ... "How About Them Cowboys!"
Posted at 03:52 PM in Business, Current Affairs, Games, Just for Fun, Market Commentary, Sports, Television | Permalink | Comments (0)
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