Hey, remember last year when the NFL decided to lay the smack down on Super Bowl parties at churches? No? Here, lemme refresh your memory, with some quotes from the AP story that led up to the Super Bowl last year:

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — The NFL has nixed a church’s plans to use a wall
projector to show the Colts-Bears Super Bowl game, saying it would
violate copyright laws.

NFL officials spotted a promotion of Fall Creek Baptist Church’s
“Super Bowl Bash” on the church Web site last week and overnighted a
letter to the pastor demanding the party be canceled, the church said.

Initially, the league objected to the church’s plan to charge a fee to
attend and that the church used the license-protected words “Super
Bowl” in its promotions.

Pastor John D. Newland said he told the NFL his church would not
charge anyone and that it would drop the use of the forbidden words.

But the NFL objected to the church’s plans to use a projector to show
the game, saying the law limits it to one TV no bigger than 55 inches.

The church will likely abandon its plans to host a Super Bowl party.

“We want to be supportive of our local team,” Newland said. “For us to
have all our congregation huddled around a TV that is big enough only
for 10 or 12 people to watch just makes little sense.”

NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said the league’s long-standing policy is to
ban “mass out-of-home viewing” of the Super Bowl. An exception is made
for sports bars and other businesses that show televised sports as a
part of their everyday operations.

“We have contracts with our (TV) networks to provide free over-the-air
television for people at home,” Aiello said. “The network economics
are based on television ratings and at-home viewing. Out-of-home
viewing is not measured by Nielsen.”

Ah yes, now you remember. Well, guess what? The NFL is back at it again this year, as you’ll see…after the jump.

Today’s Washington Post contains much the same story as last year, as it highlights a group of pastors and other churchpeople who have been scared into submission by Greg Aiello.  Here’s a little taste:

Immanuel is among a number of churches in the Washington area and elsewhere that have been forced to use a new playbook to satisfy the NFL, which said that airing games at churches on large-screen TV sets violates the NFL copyright.

Ministers are not happy.

“There is a part of me that says, ‘Gee, doesn’t the NFL have enough money already?’” said Steve Holley, Immanuel’s executive pastor. He pointed out that bars are still allowed to air the game on big-screens TV sets. “It just doesn’t make sense.”

And a bit more:

On the legal flip side, the NFL’s big-screen ban could end up landing the league in trouble.

John Whitehead, president of the Rutherford Institute, a Charlottesville civil liberties group that focuses on religious freedom issues, is threatening to sue the NFL on behalf of an Alabama church that wants to host a big-screen Super Bowl party. He is also seeking sponsors for federal legislation to exempt churches from the ban.

“It’s ridiculous,” Whitehead said. “You can go into these stores now and buy 100-inch screens. The law is just outdated.”

Seriously, NFL, could you look ANY more ridiculous than you have this year? First, you  squish the SopCast thing, depriving a whole 300-500 people of the chance to watch out-of-market games (AND the commercials) on a 3-inch screen that buffers every 10 seconds. Now, you continue this gestapo-like crackdown on churches showing the Super Bowl?

The NFL may think that its protecting its hundreds of million dollars a year in TV revenue by taking these steps,  but in reality, what they’re doing is failing to adapt to the present-day media marketplace. For such an image-conscious league to act in such a byzantine fashion, when they instead have the chance to turn it into a positive PR situation, is really kind of baffling. Is it some kind of shock to the NFL that people enjoy watching the Super Bowl in groups? Hasn’t the NFL itself been a major proponent of people having Super Bowl parties that last the whole day? Don’t those parties normally contain multiple people? What happens to your precious Nielsen ratings then?

Stupid.