Rick Burton
Rick Burton, the David B. Falk Endowed Professor of Sport Management in the Falk College, authored an op-ed for Yahoo! Sports titled “NFL Crimes: Female Execs May Hold Key to Reducing Arrests.” Burton, who serves as the University’s faculty athletics representative to the ACC and NCAA, is an expert on sports and society.
Given the recent NFL annual college draft, Burton writes about a study completed by Syracuse faculty that predicts which NFL teams have the greatest potential for arrests and off-field problems. Syracuse’s Mary Graham, professor of sport management, Bhavneet Walia, assistant professor of public health, and Chris Robinson, a sports law attorney and former undergraduate student, recently published their research in the Journal of Organizational Behavior, titled “Women Executives and Off-the-Job Misconduct by High-Profile Employees: A Study of National Football League Team Organizations.”
Burton writes that the study found that whether an NFL team had a “critical mass” of female executives (two or more) was the greatest statistical variable predictor of NFL arrests. The research team looked at police arrest data from 27 NFL teams over a 12 year period and unpacked nine potentially significant variables. These findings, Burton says, are significant and likely helpful for many top NFL teams. However, he writes that the results may not be accepted well by sports executives who feel they are often under fire. “The sports industry is always under massive scrutiny, and entities like the federal government remain curious whether league leaders are sufficiently proactive,” Burton writes.
Burton also says that intersections between race and policing cannot be diminished, as conversations about Black athletes who have suffered social injustices throughout their careers must be heard, as Graham, et al, recognize in their paper. Ultimately, Burton says it is easy for some to “suggest arrests in pro sports are destructive,” but he believes that this research is both economically and socially beneficial for the future of many NFL teams.
To read his essay in its entirety, visit Yahoo! Sports.
Syracuse University media relations team members work regularly with the campus community to secure placements of op-eds. Anyone interested in writing an op-ed should first review the University’s op-ed guidelines and email media@syr.edu.
