The NFL should become the title sponsor of NASCAR

NASCAR has a problem.  The problem is actually not that they are losing their title sponsor.   In less then two years Sprint is going to be kicking NASCAR to the curb.  Sprint is saying that the payback is small for the amount of money they are putting into NASCAR.  It is probably extremely difficult to determine the actual benefit that they are getting.  Other than asking everyone that has a Sprint phone if they got it because they heard about the plans through watching NASCAR.  I am sure they have some number but who knows how they got them.  So it is understandable that they are taking this sponsorship out of their advertising.

I am sure that there are only a few companies that can afford to be the title sponsor.  So that brings up the question: What should NASCAR do for a title sponsor?

I have the answer.  The NFL

There are several things that NASCAR has going against it.  The season is too long and the chase finishes up right when the NFL season is getting very interesting.  The final race of the NASCAR Schedule is November 22 at Homestead in Miami.  That is week 11 in the NFL.  Think about that almost three quarters of the way though the NFL season and NASCAR is just finishing up a season that started in February.  If you are a fan of both sports and you have a choice of watching the final race of the season or watching NFL teams fight for a playoff spot what are you going to do?  I know the choice I am making.  NFL on the screen and if I remember I will check the race standings on line but not actually watch the race.  That does not work out to a very nice rating for NASCAR at a time when the ratings should be near their highest.  I know it would be difficult to get rid of some of the races.   But something really has to be done.

This is where the NFL would come in.   It is difficult to find the exact numbers that the NFL and NASCAR are worth.  In 2013 the NFL has revenue of about $15 Billion.  It has a target to grow to $25 Billion by the year 2027.  When you think about it those are crazy numbers and show the absolute dominance of the sport at least in the United States.  The revenue of NASCAR is difficult to find.   From what I can find the numbers tend to point to being worth anywhere between $3 and $5 Billion.  So it is a fraction of what the NFL is worth.  The bigger telling story is where the TV ratings fall.  In 2013 NASCAR did not place any event in the top 50 most watched sporting events.    If you go by Cable only NASCAR placed only two events int he top 50.  The Daytona 500 was 8th with 9.9 Million viewers and the Subway Fresh Fit 500 (Phoenix) was 41st with 4.1 Million viewers.  (full top 50 sports viewing numbers here) Both of these races were held in the early part of the season.  Not one of the Chase races came anywhere near cracking the top 50 mark in viewership.  The numbers have dropped so much for NASCAR that the tracks are starting remove seats that they had built in the late 1990’s into the mid 2000’s when fan interest was at an all time high.

Why is NASCAR losing all this interest and drawing lower TV ratings?  It is a difficult question to answer.  It is probably a combination of many things.  They were never really as popular as they wanted you to believe.  When there numbers were at their height they were still not drawing the numbers that the NFL, MLB and even the NBA were drawing.  Now NASCAR is trying to get back to numbers that they never really reached.  By adding the Chase and then modifying it so quickly they are tying to created excitement.  The problem is that it mostly confused people and it is still scheduled at a time when they have no chance to increase their numbers.  The NFL and College Football are in full force.  The only fans that are going to watch NASCAR at that point are the true die hard fans and even that it questionable.  When you think that you are bigger than you are it is very difficult to see the truth.  NASCAR is making a good amount of money but it really could be more.

This is where the NFL would come in.  The NFL has mountains of cash.  They have the fan base and they have the power.  The way I see it there is two ways that the NFL and NASCAR could do this.  The first would be that the NFL replaces Sprint as the title sponsor of NASCAR.  Think of that the NASCAR champion now wins the NFL Cup.  Crazy but it really could work.  The other way that this could go is that the NFL just buys NASCAR outright and runs it as a separate business under the NFL umbrella.  The possibilities there are endless.  One strategy that  sounds good to me would be that they match the NASCAR Champion with the Super Bowl Champion.  So the first place finisher would have the Logo of the Super Bowl champion on their car and so on down the line the 32nd place finisher in NASCAR would have the logo of the last place team in the NFL on their car.

Both Sports would benefit from this.  There would be many opportunities for cross promotion to get fans interested in both sports.  The NFL would have the power to work with the tracks so that the schedule could be rearranged so that the NASCAR Champion is being crowned at a much earlier time in the year.  There would probably still have to be some cross over but if NASCAR can crown a Champion in September it would be much better than crowning them in November.

Just one thought about what NASCAR could do to solve a few of their problems.  As a fan of both sports.  Football always wins when it comes to my event watching.  What would you do if you were the head of NASCAR?