The NFL goes to Brazil as part of global push

The Philadelphia Eagles face the Green Bay Packers Friday night in São Paulo, Brazil. It’s the NFL’s first regular season game played in South America and is part of a larger push to globalize the league. 

The NFL is by far the most lucrative sports league in the U.S. So, why is it courting new fans overseas? 

“Because they want to stay that way,” said Rick Ridall with Temple University’s School of Sport, Tourism and Hospitality Management.

The NFL could eventually run out of room to grow in the U.S., he said. “So they’re kind of sprinkling the bread crumbs around and really gauging interest in their product.”

There are international games this year in São Paulo, London and Munich. The NBA and the MLB already have a global footprint.

People have more access to infrastructure needed to play those sports, according to Kenneth Shropshire, an expert on the business of sports at Wharton.

“Football, there’s a lot. Football,” he said with a chuckle, “you got this field with these lines and the goal posts.”

For potential fans, Shropshire said the sport’s less-than-intuitive rules make it a tough sell. And the NFL is looking to gain ground in markets where global football — what we call soccer — is already king. 

“There’s some thought that that could translate to a new sport if it can catch fire,” Shropshire said.

In São Paulo, people seem willing to give it a shot: the 49,000 tickets to Friday’s game sold out in just a few hours.