One of the teams that could most benefit from the new blackout rule still hasn’t decided whether and to what extent it will be used.
Earlier this week, Dolphins spokesman Harvey Greene told PFT that the team has not yet made a final decision on reducing the minimum number of non-premium seats that must be sold for each home game from 100 percent to as low as 85 percent.
“We are making our final, formal submittal on August 9,” Greene said via email.
This implies that an initial, less-than-formal submittal was made on July 15, the initial deadline for invoking the ew rule. As it turns out, the league office is using a two-tiered process, with the first deadline rendered meaningless by the second one.
The Dolphins have sold roughly 6,000 season tickets since the draft, making it smart to take as much time as possible, so that the best possible decision can be made as to the final percentage.
The last piece of information will come on August 8, the day after the first episode of Hard Knocks debuts on HBO. The day-after reaction at the box office will allow the bean counters to make their best guesstimate as to the number of empty seats that the Dolphins can expect this year.
It’s important to make an informed decision. If a team overshoots its chosen percentage, another 16 cents per dollar must be shared with the rest of the league for every ticket sold beyond the minimum.