When news came out about just how badly week seven of the N.F.L. went from the Conservative Daily Post, many had assumed that the worst was over. The league was at rock bottom, so unless they started digging, they could get no lower. Well, it appears that those in the beleaguered league have shown up with shovels in hand because that is just what is happening, as the Sporting News reveals today.

They write that the “NFL’s once-golden network TV numbers continue to drop” as the network itself now suffers as badly as the ratings on other stations. The sports giant “averaged 15.1 million viewers through Week 7,” Nielsen reports.

That is a downturn of “5.1 percent from 15.87 million viewers during the same period last season and off 18.7 percent from 18.35 million viewers during the same period in 2015” Since the channel (in most markets) needs to be added onto packages and is not standard, this is going to devastate the company, which Commissioner Roger Goodell did nothing to fix at the latest meetings!

Numbers show that the league is taking it from both sides of the kneeling debate, too. The largest number of people tuning out (by FAR) are those loyal to the U.S. who are protesting the anthem’s disrespect.

However, just behind that is the loss from those who side with Colin Kaepernick and who demand that he gets to play again. This group of people are those who clearly don’t watch the game very often because the famous kneeler was one of the biggest letdowns in the league’s recent history.

To put it mildly: HE WAS TERRIBLE.

The National Football League’s leadership has not forced the kneeling to stop and already sports pundits are talking about how this is helping the game of baseball as fans simply leave football to its own waste.

Even more embarrassing for the network is that they have employed a “nothing to see here” approach to the disrespectful protesting and simply won’t show it as it happens. This little scheme seems to have done nothing to stop the bleeding caused by the boycott, however.

The Sporting News does proclaim that “the Cowboys, the Steelers, and the Super Bowl-champion Patriots are rebounding from early-season struggles,” but with even the Pat’s buying into this scam, it won’t last.

Nor should it. As long as there is dishonor happening under a lie about inequality from a field full of black players who were made rich and loved by many white people, there is no reason to tune in.

Sources: The Conservative Daily Post – The Sporting News