BAD BOUNCES FOR THE N.F.L.

By STEVE WULF/WASHINGTON

WHAT DOES THE N.F.L. STAND for? That's a question pro football fans are asking in Cleveland, Houston, Chicago, Tampa, Phoenix, Seattle and Cincinnati--all cities whose professional football teams are threatening to leave. It's the same question once asked by fans in Los Angeles, Baltimore, St. Louis, Oakland and New York--all cities whose teams did abandon them in the 1980s and '90s. No Fixed Location? No Fan Loyalty? National Flux League?

What does the N.F.L. stand for? Could it be...greed? How else do you explain the Arizona Cardinals making eyes at Los Angeles just seven years after they moved from St. Louis to Phoenix? How else do you explain Al Davis moving his Raiders back to Oakland after he cost the N.F.L. $50 million in legal fees and damages by moving them to Los Angeles? How else do you explain Art Modell betraying the most loyal fans in pro football by taking his Browns from Cleveland to Baltimore? How else do you explain the blood on the hands of the Baltimoreans who are giving Modell a $200 million stadium in order to replace the Colts, who were spirited away 11 years ago in moving vans bound for Indianapolis? "Baltimore Browns?" wrote columnist Michael Olesker of the Baltimore Sun. "Come on, call 'em The Revenge and make those lowlifes...read the name in the newspapers the rest of their miserable lives and be reminded of what they've brought to a business that once claimed to have some honor."

Despite assurances from Commissioner Paul Tagliabue that the N.F.L. is merely going through some "growing pains," the league is in the midst of a crisis that may reduce it to a television sport played in boutique stadiums in smaller markets. Luxury boxes and personal-seat licenses (the fee patrons must pay for the right to buy season tickets) have thrown loyalty and history for a loss--unless you're a fan who longs for the N.F.L. days of the Staten Island Stapletons and Decatur Staleys. Consider that if the Chicago Bears (who actually began in Decatur, Illinois) move to Gary, Indiana, as they're threatening to, the N.F.L. will have two more teams playing in the state of Indiana than it has in the decidedly major cities of New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. Cities all over the N.F.L. map are being subjected to what Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont said last week are "the extortionate demands of insatiable owners."

Leahy serves on the Senate Judiciary Committee's subcommittee on antitrust, business rights and competition, which last week convened a hearing to explore ways to protect fans and cities from franchise hopping. "If you take a look at the camera banks outside, they outnumber Whitewater and Bosnia," said Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania. True, but the real spectacle outside the hearing room in the Dirksen building was the 200-member Dawg Pound. These avid Browns fans lined up along the wall in the hallway dressed in their team colors and various canine guises. When Tagliabue passed by, they implored him to Save the Browns. "Paul," begged one of man's best friends, "don't let Modell take our team away."

The hearing gave various Ohio politicians--Senators John Glenn and Mike DeWine, Representatives Louis Stokes and Martin Hoke, and Cleveland Mayor Michael White--an opportunity to show how much they care. White promised that "as long as there is no team in Cleveland, there will be no peace." Glenn and Stokes said they would introduce in their respective Houses a bill called the Fans Rights Act, which would 1) grant a limited antitrust exemption shielding a professional sports league from a lawsuit if the league blocks a relocation, and 2) require a team intending to move to give 180 days' notice, during which time the jilted hometown could try to induce it to stay. Houston Mayor Bob Lanier, who is about to lose the Oilers to Nashville, said he simply didn't trust the N.F.L. "The foxes are guarding the chickens," said Lanier, "and while they keep saying, 'We're nice foxes,' I wonder what those feathers are, coming out of their mouths."

Modell declined the subcommittee's invitation to appear. But John Moag, the chairman of the Maryland Stadium Authority that lured the Browns to Baltimore, did testify. Shedding crocodile tears, Moag said, "Marylanders have tremendous empathy for what Cleveland is going through right now. We have been there; we know the pain all too well." Moag went on to say that fan support was no longer enough to keep a franchise. A city requires "political courage" and a business sense of "what professional athletics means to a community's image and pocketbook." In other words, a brand-new stadium with lots of luxury boxes and P.S.L.S.

Then there was poor Tagliabue, who explained to the Senators that while there were a number of reasons for the rash of franchise shifts, the main culprit was the 1982 court decision allowing the Raiders to move from Oakland to Los Angeles. "Right now," said Tagliabue, "antitrust law, as it applies to internal commitments among members of sports leagues, is being interpreted in a way that is ripping leagues apart." When the Senators were through with him, Tagliabue subjected himself to the entreaties of the media, most of which went like this: "Commissioner, what do you say to the people of [choose one] Cleveland/Houston/Baltimore/Nashville?"

THE COMMISSIONER, A THOUGHTFUL, decent man, has a lot to worry about, what with the Balkanization of his league, Dallas owner Jerry Jones' cutting his own marketing deals, a salary-cap system that pleases nobody and one of his referees' asking a star quarterback for his autograph before a game. An early-season prediction by Minnesota Vikings owner Roger Headrick seems to have come true. Responding to Jones' ambush marketing scheme, Headrick said, "You've got chaos; you've got bedlam; you've got...baseball." But there is one aspect of baseball that Tagliabue would love to have: its antitrust exemption. Major league baseball, in part because of that exemption, hasn't had a franchise move since the Washington Senators went to Arlington, Texas, in 1972. Since then, the N.F.L. has faced 10 moves, counting Cleveland, Houston, Chicago and the two New York City teams to New Jersey. As far back as 1964, N.F.L. Commissioner Pete Rozelle argued that an antitrust exemption was necessary to safeguard "the league's ability to take measures which ensure survival of its weaker franchises."

The threat of an antitrust suit stopped the league from blocking the Rams' move to St. Louis last year, and even now--talk about chutzpah--Al Davis is suing the N.F.L. for trying to prevent his move back to Oakland. So while the N.F.L. is willing to send its lawyers up against those of Jerry Jones, it won't line up over the old antitrust ball with Modell. "Given the current court precedents and the possibility of treble damages in a case decided by a jury in an interested locale," says Tagliabue, "we would be foolish to go to court over a franchise move."

Modell's desertion hurts the N.F.L. in so many ways. For one thing, the owner of the Browns for 35 years had always been a respected member of the league's Establishment. For another, the Browns have consistently had the highest TV ratings in the N.F.L. and one of the highest attendance figures. But most painful of all, Modell is taking with him a heritage built by Paul Brown, Marion Motley, Lou Groza and Jim Brown. "It's a dart to my heart," said Dante Lavelli, the Browns' Hall of Fame end who owns a furniture store in suburban Rocky River.

Cleveland was stunned when Modell made his surprise announcement at a Nov. 6 press conference in Baltimore. "I'll never forget the kindness of the people and the fan support over the years," said Modell. "But frankly...I had no choice." Modell was heavily leveraged in Cleveland, and he didn't want to sell the team because he wanted to pass it on to his son. But he harbored some resentment against the city for giving new playgrounds to the baseball Indians and the basketball Cavaliers. Still, local voters hoped Modell would change his mind two days after the announcement when they overwhelmingly passed a sin-tax proposal that would have provided $175 million for the renovation of ancient Cleveland Stadium.

But Modell hasn't changed his mind, and in recent weeks things have got ugly in Cleveland. A bomb threat kept the owner away from the last two home games. He has been hanged in effigy and likened to a pig and one of the Three Stooges. Fans, meanwhile, have taken their anger out on the players, who are going nowhere on the field.

Much to Modell's chagrin, he has not been welcomed with open arms in Baltimore. Local columnists have publicly expressed their guilt, and some writers and talk-show hosts are already calling for the head of his coach, Bill Belichick. But it's only poetic justice. An N.F.L. owner once said, "We can't hopscotch franchises around the country. We have built this business on the trust of fans. If we treat that as if it doesn't count, it isn't going to wash." The owner who said that was Art Modell.