Beating TV blackouts is “no longer part” of the Jaguars’ sales and marketing strategy, according to Ashley Gurbal Kritzer of the JACKSONVILLE BUSINESS JOURNAL. Team President Mark Lamping said, “I just don’t believe the long-term success of this franchise is in rallying the community to avoid a blackout. I don’t think it is. It’s not sustainable long term if every year you’re saying, ‘Our No. 1 goal is to just avoid blackouts.’” The change comes as the Jaguars “launch an internal reorganization” which creates “three new positions, dividing up the ticket sales duties that previously were under” Senior VP/Sales & Marketing Macky Weaver. Those positions include VP/Ticket Sales Chad Johnson, of Dallas-based Legends Sales & Marketing. Johnson will remain an employee of Legends, jointly owned by the Yankees and Cowboys, but will be “completely integrated into the Jaguars organization.” The two other new positions, the Senior VP/Corporate Partnerships and the Senior VP/Fan Experience, will report directly to Lamping. The Jaguars several times last year “requested a 24-hour extension to sell enough tickets to avoid a blackout.” Lamping said, “We need to go beyond that and build a base that gives us a certain level of certainty. We need to get there and not have to rally the entire community just to keep the game on TV” (JACKSONVILLE BUSINESS JOURNAL, 6/1 issue).
PR PROBLEM: In Jacksonville, Gene Frenette wrote the Jaguars were “blindsided” Sunday by the news that first-round draft pick Justin Blackmon was arrested in Stillwater, Okla., for an aggravated DUI just as the team was “building some early offseason momentum under new coach Mike Mularkey.” The Jaguars also “just began a team caravan to various outlying cities to try and create momentum for season-ticket sales, and Blackmon is scheduled to be among the players in attendance on Friday's tip to Waycross, Ga.” It has not been confirmed if he will attend (JACKSONVILLE.com, 6/3). Frenette wrote Blackmon “embarrassed the Jaguars’ organization with an incredibly stupid lapse in judgment.” There is “never a good time for a public relations disaster, but this was especially bad as the Jaguars struggle to fill those EverBank Field seats" (JACKSONVILLE.com, 6/3).
