Super Bowl – folkets lag mot nåt annat

I finalen i den US-amerikanska sporten amerikansk fotboll möts i år Green Bay Packers och Pittsburgh Steelers. Packers är det framgångsrikaste laget genom tiderna i den amerikans fotbollens proffsliga. USA:s populäraste och folkligaste lag och har en publik på varje hemmamatch som ungefär motsvarar den lilla hemortens befolkning. Vad mer är, laget ägs av folket i staden och USA så jag citerar en del av ett inlägg jag skrivit tidigare:

Det andra skälet är det som skiljer ut Packers från andra amerikanska storklubbar inom idrotten. Packers ägs av fans i hela USA och invånare i Green Bay. Det är ett kollektivt ägt lag, nästan som en förening av svenskt snitt (även om det är organiserat som ett aktiebolag som inte ska vara vinstdrivande):

Of all the reasons that make the Green Bay Packers and their story so incredible and unique, the most significant is simply this: The team is literally owned by its fans.

Presently, 112,120 people (representing 4,750,937 shares) can lay claim to a franchise ownership interest.

Shares of stock include voting rights, but the redemption price is minimal, no dividends are ever paid, the stock cannot appreciate in value, and there are no season-ticket privileges associated with stock ownership. No shareholder is allowed to own more than 200,000 shares, a safeguard to ensure that no one individual is able to assume control of the club.

[…]

Today, an annual meeting of shareholders is held in July. The event returned to Lambeau Field in 2006 after several thousand people were turned away from the 2005 meeting at the nearby Resch Center. As a means of running the corporation, a board of directors is elected by the stockholders. The board of directors in turn elect a seven-member Executive Committee (officers) of the corporation, consisting of a president, vice president, treasurer, secretary and three members-at-large. The president is the only officer who receives compensation. The balance of the committee is sitting gratis.

Shares of stock cannot be resold, except back to the team for a fraction of the original price. Limited transfer of shares (ie., to heirs and relatives) is permissible.

Based on the original ‘Articles of Incorporation for the (then) Green Bay Football Corporation’ put into place in 1923, if the Packers franchise was sold, after the payment of all expenses, any remaining funds would go to the Sullivan-Wallen Post of the American Legion in order to build ”a proper soldiers’ memorial.” This stipulation was enacted to ensure that the club remained in Green Bay and that there could never be any financial enhancement for the shareholder. The beneficiary was changed from the Sullivan-Wallen Post to the Green Bay Packers Foundation on the basis of a shareholder vote at the November 1997 meeting.

Packers är helt enkelt ett lag i min smak.

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Läs även andra bloggares åsikter om Green Bay Packers, Pittsburgh Steelers, Amerikansk fotboll, GAIS, USA, Idrott, Sport

PS. Samtidigt får vi inte glömma att GAIS spelat sin först match för året. DS.

Uppdatering 110207 : Green Bay Packers vann Super Bowl, GAIS lär tyvärr inte bli svenska mästare i fotboll.