FEBRUARY 17-23, 2020 VOLUME 22 ISSUE 43 • $7.95
Brian France Takes Stock NASCAR’s former CEO reflects on his life in motorsports and details his new career as a venture capitalist. PAGE 20 Mirroring national trend, local NBA TV ratings are in decline.
Globetrotting life guides Micky Lawler’s WTA leadership.
Champions 2020: Jim Delany’s B1G college sports impact.
In-Depth: Ski industry gets smarter about who’s on the slopes.
PAGE 6
PAGE 18
PAGE 24
PAGE 34
SPORTS BUSINESS JOURNAL
STATE OF PLAY
,842
TAKING ATTENDANCE
at American es Center in n Feb. 12 for ericks’ 815th utive sellout, which broke the NBA d set by the d Trail Blazers 977 to 1995.
Book On Genesis
A 94-year-old event that has been known as the Los Angeles Open, the Nissan Open and the Northern Trust Open teed off last week for the first time as an invitational. The Genesis Invitational, hosted by Tiger Woods, features a reduced field of 120 players and an increased purse of $9.3 million. The eighth tee box was decorated to honor late Los Angeles Lakers legend Kobe Bryant.
MONEY TALKS
We had a good team, we won the World Series and we’ll leave it at that. — JIM CRANE, Astros owner, addressing the team’s 2017 sign-stealing scandal
RATINGS GAME
” MARK YOUR CALENDAR
YOUTH MOVEMENT
Getty Images (3); @jumpshotmovie/Instagram
FloSports is expanding into baseball with a plan to stream more than 700 college and youth games, giving added exposure to MLB hopefuls.
THE METER MINOR PUNISHMENT
The Mets will not let their Class A St. Lucie players use the team’s $57 million, renovated spring training facility once the parent club vacates it.
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million Average viewers for the XFL’s four games in Week 1 across ABC, ESPN and Fox.
“Jump Shot,” a documentary on basketball pioneer Kenny Sailors, executive produced by Steph Curry’s Unanimous Media, will be released in theaters.
F E B R U A R Y 17-23 , 2 02 0
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3
FORUM reasons, you’ll be able to live with the results.” When I asked the public’s biggest misperception of him, he said, “That I’m probably a micromanager and focus on football decisions.” When I asked his advice to new owners and how these titans of business should handle their initial ownership meetings, he smiled, paused and said, “If you’re really smart, you learn to listen.” Blank seems to listen well, and then goes with his instincts. Not everyone has agreed with his moves, but he seems to remain true to his conviction. His impact on the Atlanta community has been profound and can’t be overlooked, and his willingness to take risks — such as upending the traditional food and beverage pricing model — has been refreshingly innovative. Not everything has hit for Blank during his 18 years in sports ownership, but he still seems out front in many areas and true to his mission of doing the right things for the right reasons.
Arthur Blank’s way, and sponsors share insight on spending ABRAHAM MADKOUR PUBLISHER AND EXECUTIVE EDITOR
A
RTHUR BLANK lives true to his favorite slo-
gan, “There is no finish line.” To the 77-yearold, it represents the push of competition and market challenges, and never being satisfied or becoming complacent. That’s the attitude he brings to his organization, and those close to him speak of his relentless pursuit of innovation and ideation. I sat with Blank at the National Sports Forum in Atlanta earlier this month, where he shared his management principles and philosophy on leading a diversified sports organization. He recalled his initial days of owning the Falcons in 2002, when thenCommissioner Paul Tagliabue told the neophyte owner to visit with Patriots owner Robert Kraft over breakfast when they would both be in New York City. After Blank asked a bunch of football-centric questions, Kraft, who had owned the Patriots for eight years, interrupted and gave him some simple advice. “Arthur, apply the same principles of Home Depot to the Falcons and you’ll be successful.” Blank said that convinced him to follow the core values from his days at “HD” and remain focused on people and culture as the keys to his sports organization. Over 60 minutes, Blank provided interesting perspective for the audience, including how he concentrates on fit rather than an executive’s skill set: “Skill sets you can find and hire for. You can’t replace culture.” He said his decision-making comes down a simple tenet: “You do the right things for the right
THE SPONSOR’S VOICE: There were some interesting insights from the 2020 Corporate Sponsor/Advertiser & Industry Report written by Seaver Marketing Group and Ohio University’s Jim Kahler. The qualitative survey of 25 team/property sponsors and advertisers sheds some light on their approach and philosophy on spending. Here are a few highlights: Of the sponsors, 27% said they plan on spending more money in 2020, while 35% said they plan to spend less. “We are heading into the ‘less is more era,’ they are going to be doing fewer deals,” said Kahler, in analyzing that result. The greatest threats to traditional sponsorship were, not surprisingly, cost (deals are too expensive), sponsorship clutter, a lack of activation, a lack of measurement and poor servicing. Sponsors also chimed in on what they want to see in their sponsorship packages, and the results were what you’d expect: category exclusivity, use of marks and logos, social media assets, official product and service status, access to exclusive content and the creation of new distribution channels. Sponsors were asked to evaluate the properties they have relationships with and the leagues that scored well were the NHL, MLB, NBA and NASCAR. Sponsors cited soccer, college sports and player endorsements as areas of the sports business they were interested in getting involved in, and cited collegiate athletes’ name, image and likeness, sports gambling and declining attendance as trends they are closely monitoring. It’s a small sample size and very qualitative data, but it does provide a rare glimpse into the sponsor’s perspective. Let me know if you’re interested to learn more about the survey. GAMES WITHOUT FRONTIERS: An effort that caught my eye around improving the at-venue fan experience was the Sacramento Kings and Intel exploring new ways for fans to access in-game replays. The Kings hope to introduce an app next season where fans can tap into video streams and choose their own personalized replay views. I grow more and more concerned about attendance, and keep looking for the organizations that will take dramatically bold steps in changing the fan experience — either through cost relief (see Arthur Blank’s effort above) or in offering a killer experience or app. Can we all agree that it’s harder and harder for fans to attend the live event? Who will really step up and make a difference? Abraham Madkour can be reached at amadkour@ sportsbusinessjournal.com.
The entire contents of this magazine are copyrighted by Street & Smith’s Sports Business Journal 2020 with all rights reserved. Street & Smith’s is a registered trademark of Leaders Group Holdings LLC. Reproduction or use, without permission, of editorial or graphic content in any manner is prohibited. Street & Smith’s Sports Business Journal (ISSN1098-5972) is published weekly, with the exception of the first week of July and the last two weeks of December, for $306 a year by Street & Smith’s Sports Business Journal, at 120 West Morehead Street, Suite 310, Charlotte, NC 28202. In Canada $371 per year, includes GST and all other countries $471, includes a one-year subscription and expedited air delivery (GST#139794580). Periodicals postage paid at Charlotte, NC, and additional mailing offices. Street & Smith’s Sports Business Journal is a publication of Leaders Group Holdings LLC. Street & Smith’s Sports Business Journal is an equal opportunity employer. POSTMASTER: Please send address changes to Street & Smith’s Sports Business Journal — Subscriber Services, P.O. Box 36637, Charlotte, NC 28236-6637 FOR CUSTOMER SERVICE CALL 1-800-829-9839 For article reprints, please contact newuser@ sportsbusinessjournal.com or call customer service at 1-800-829-9839.
SBJ/SBD PODCASTS FIRST LOOK & BUZZCAST Check out our First Look podcast every Monday where we discuss the week’s top stories. Also, check out Buzzcast in SportsBusiness Daily’s Morning Buzz, our daily two-minute look at the stories of the day.
THIS WEEK OPINION . . . . . . . . . 43
SPORTS BETTING
MEDIA
LABOR
COMPANY WATCH
FACILITIES
CAREERS . . . . . . . . . 44
8 THE RIGHT FIT
13 NO FIGHT HERE
14 SKY HIGH
15 EVENT DYNAMIC
FACES & PLACES . . 45
CBS Sports and William Hill U.S. each believes it found the right partner in the latest deal linking media and sports betting.
Why UFC didn’t insist that ESPN guarantee minimum marketing commitments during 2018 negotiations.
CAA signs 11-year-old skateboarding prodigy Sky Brown, who will compete for Great Britain at the Summer Olympics.
New company hits its stride using artificial intelligence technology to optimize ticket prices for live events.
16 WHAT’S IN A NAME?
By Bill King
By John Ourand
By Liz Mullen
By Eric Prisbell
CLOSING SHOT . . . 46 Cover image by Michael Strauss
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Historic venues balance tradition and revenue needs as they seek naming-rights partners. By Karn Dhingra
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MAY 20th IN NYC
IS THE SPORTS INDUSTRY’S
Time toShine DON’T BE LEFT ALONE IN THE DARK, VISIT
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PARTNERS
upfront
Numbers Game
NBA’s local ratings dip, matching the national trend, with 14 teams down at the All-Star break. BY JOHN OURAND AND JOHN LOMBARDO
T
HE NBA’S local TV ratings collectively are down dou-
ble digits so far this season, a drop that mirrors the league’s national TV performance. Through Feb. 11, heading into All-Star Game weekend, aggregated ratings on regional sports networks for 27 of the 30 NBA teams were down 13% — a figure that includes Nuggets games on Altitude, an RSN that has been dropped by several distributors in Denver. Overall, 14 teams posted ratings drops (13 of those 14 saw declines of 19 percentage points or more); the other 13 saw increases. Information for Memphis, Toronto and Utah was not available at press time. Nationally, NBA games on ABC, ESPN and TNT were down 12% so far this season. ABC was down 16%, TNT was down 13% and ESPN was down 10% heading into the All-Star break. For the first time in four seasons, a new team will be at the top of the NBA’s local ratings. Golden State Warriors games on NBC Sports Bay Area have been the league’s highest rated for three
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consecutive seasons. But the team has seen a whopping 66% ratings drop (to an average rating of 2.97) this season as it struggles on the court with Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson out with injuries and Kevin Durant now with the Brooklyn Nets. Golden State has the league’s worst record at 12-43. The depleted Warriors have also weighed down national numbers. TNT has flexed out of one of their games already, but has seven more still planned. ESPN has flexed out of six Golden State games, and has two more slated for March. ABC has three more planned Warriors games and has already aired them twice. San Antonio Spurs games on FS Southwest historically are among the best in the league and this year is no different, as the team headed into the All-Star break with the best local ratings in the league (3.51). Still, that figure was down 20% from the same point last year. Milwaukee Bucks games on FS Wisconsin (3.45, up 24%) and 76ers games on NBC Sports Philadelphia (3.32, up 20%) will battle the Spurs after the All-Star break for the league’s best local rating. The Bucks, led by last year’s MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo, had the NBA’s best record at the break, helping to make this season to date the most-watched Bucks season ever on FS Wisconsin. The Sixers, with the NBA’s best home record, are a strong draw in Philadelphia with this year being the mostwatched Sixers season ever on NBC Sports Philadelphia. The best local ratings stories are in Orlando, where Magic
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Getty Images
Injuries have sent the Warriors plummeting on the court, taking away what is typically one of the NBA’s biggest ratings draws.
SPORTS BUSINESS JOURNAL
Midseason highlights AVERAGE RATING
AVERAGE RATING CHANGE
TOP 5
TOP 5
TEAM
RSN
AVG. RATING
CHANGE*
TEAM
RSN
AVG. RATING (CHANGE*)
TEAM
RSN
CHANGE* (AVG. RATING)
Atlanta Hawks
FS Southeast
0.89
+49%
San Antonio Spurs
FS Southwest
3.51 (20%)
Los Angeles Clippers
Prime Ticket
86% (0.97)
+13%
FS Wisconsin
3.45 (24%)
Orlando Magic
FS Florida
82% (0.81)
NBC Sports New England
3.02
Milwaukee Bucks
Boston Celtics
Philadelphia 76ers
NBC Sports Philadelphia
3.32 (20%)
Atlanta Hawks
FS Southeast
49% (0.89)
Brooklyn Nets
YES
0.45
+2%
Sun Sports
FS Oklahoma
3.16 (51%)
Miami Heat
Oklahoma City Thunder
39% (2.86)
Milwaukee Bucks
FS Wisconsin
FS Southeast
0.44
Los Angeles Lakers
Spectrum SportsNet
3.14 (23%)
24% (3.45)
Charlotte Hornets Chicago Bulls
NBC Sports Chicago
1.38
BOTTOM 5
BOTTOM 5
TEAM
RSN
CHANGE* (AVG. RATING)
Cleveland Cavaliers
FS Ohio
2.2
Dallas Mavericks
FS Southwest
1.5
-52% +4% -38%
TEAM
RSN
AVG. RATING (CHANGE*)
Oklahoma City Thunder
FS Oklahoma
51% (3.16)
Orlando Magic
FS Florida
0.81 (82%)
Charlotte Hornets
FS Southeast
52% (0.44)
0.59 (55%)
Washington Wizards
NBC Sports Washington
55% (0.59)
Denver Nuggets
Altitude
0.36
-72%
Golden State Warriors
NBC Sports Bay Area
66% (2.97)
Detroit Pistons
FS Detroit
0.92
-31%
Denver Nuggets
Altitude
72% (0.36)
Golden State Warriors
NBC Sports Bay Area
2.97
-66%
Houston Rockets
AT&T Sportsnet
2.26
Indiana Pacers
FS Midwest
2.78
Los Angeles Clippers
Prime Ticket
0.97
+86%
Los Angeles Lakers
Spectrum SportsNet
3.14
+23%
Miami Heat
Sun Sports
2.86
+39%
Milwaukee Bucks
FS Wisconsin
3.45
+24%
Minnesota T-Wolves
FS North
1.28
-42%
New Orleans Pelicans
FS New Orleans
0.9
-47%
New York Knicks
MSG
0.85
-19%
Oklahoma City Thunder
FS Oklahoma
3.16
-51%
Orlando Magic
FS Florida
0.81
+82%
Philadelphia 76ers
NBC Sports Philadelphia
3.32
+20%
Phoenix Suns
FS Arizona
0.96
+12%
Portland Trail Blazers
NBC Sports Northwest
3.1
-20%
Sacramento Kings
NBC Sports California
1.54
-6%
San Antonio Spurs
FS Southwest
3.51
-20%
Washington Wizards
NBC Sports Washington
0.59
-55%
Washington Wizards
NBC Sports Washington
Brooklyn Nets
YES
0.45 (2%)
Charlotte Hornets
FS Southeast
0.44 (52%)
Denver Nuggets
Altitude
0.36 (72%)
* Compared to same number of games played through Feb. 11, 2019. Comparable data for the Memphis Grizzlies, Utah Jazz and Toronto Raptors was not available. Source: Sports Business Journal analysis of Nielsen data
NBAE / Getty Images
ALL TEAMS
games on FS Florida were up 82% as the team remained in the playoff hunt, and in Los Angeles, where Clippers games were up 86% on Prime Ticket as the franchise benefits for its offseason free-agent signing of Kawhi Leonard and trade for Paul George. Washington Wizards games on NBC Sports Washington (down 55%), Oklahoma City Thunder games on FS Oklahoma (down 51%) and Charlotte Hornets games on FS Southeast (down 52%) have seen notable declines. Outside of Altitude, the Hornets and YES Network’s Brooklyn Nets have the league’s lowest ratings.
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In Washington, the Wizards’ decline started about a year ago after star guard John Wall suffered a long-term injury. The team averaged a 0.73 rating over the last 10 games last year, a trend that carried over to this season. In the Washington television market, national NBA ratings are down 47%, suggesting that it’s not just the Wizards posting poor TV numbers in the nation’s capital. The Pelicans, which saw their ratings fall by 47% on Fox Sports New Orleans, may have a bounce in post-All-Star ratings considering that for the seven games on Fox Sports New Orleans since rookie Zion Williamson’s return from injury, ratings were up 118% versus the average rating for all other games this season. The Nuggets-Pelicans The debut of Zion game on Jan. 24 averaged Williamson has a 2.5 local rating in New given the Pelicans Orleans, making it the a ratings boost. highest-rated Pelicans telecast this season to date and the highest-rated game on the RSN since November 2018. For the seven games since Zion debuted, the RSN has average a 1.8 local rating. Nationally, the ratings heading into the All-Star break virtually ensure that the league will finish the 2019-20 regular season with a viewership drop for the second season in a row. ABC was hurt by lower numbers on Christmas and a slower start for its Saturday night slate. On the positive side, national viewership grew from November to December and again from December to January. And on digital, NBA League Pass subscriptions are up 11% globally compared to last season and unique viewership is up 25%. Streaming viewership via over-the-top services and internet connected devices have also seen big gains. TNT was up 32%, and ESPN was up 41%. In overall digital viewership, TNT was up 16% and ESPN was up 19%.
+14%
+4% -23%
NBA VIEWERSHIP AT ALL-STAR BREAK (000s) SEASON
ABC
ESPN
TNT
2017-18
4,517
1,706
1,887
2018-19
4,569
1,646
1,536
2019-20
3,858
1,478
1,336
Note: ABC’s figures include the ESPN simulcast figures for the 5 p.m. ET window on Christmas the past two seasons. ESPN’s averages exclude that game.
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UPFRONT
Media deals with sportsbooks strike bet on gambling growth BY BILL KING
ONE YEAR AGO, barely eight months after a bet placed in Delaware marked the
shape-shifting arrival of legal sports betting outside Nevada, Caesars Entertainment and Turner Sports signed the first deal between a sportsbook operator and a sports media property. It was a relatively simple and conservative arrangement, with Caesars providing odds and point spreads for use on Turner’s networks and its Bleacher Report site. Caesars also would build out a Bleacher Report TV studio that would create content emanating inside its Caesars Palace sportsbook in Las Vegas. A week later, Fox Sports announced a far more ambitious entry, a licensing agreement in which it lent its brand to Toronto-based Stars Group, creating Fox Bet, a sportsbook site that would rely on promotion across Fox Sports programming and its social channels. Fox Corp. also took a 4.99% stake in Stars Group.
Since then, nearly every major player in sports media has paired with a sportsbook, under structures falling within the spectrum set by those first two deals. The latest of them, announced last week, has William Hill signed on as the official sportsbook of CBS Sports, where it will be the network’s exclusive provider of odds and point spreads and will be integrated heavily into CBS Sports’ digital platforms, As legal betting expands outside which skew heavily toward Vegas casinos, sports bettors and daily fanmedia companies tasy players. will use sportsbook For a sportsbook like Wildeals to target liam Hill, a storied U.K. brand gamblers on multiple platforms. with little recognition outside Nevada and New Jersey, the mass audience of a major sports network is not only attractive, but perhaps essential. The connection to the CBS Sports digital audience may be even more valuable. “We thought there was a real role for the media companies to play in the sports betting ecosystem and were very interested in doing a deal with a sports media company,” said Joe Asher, CEO of William Hill U.S. “But it had to be the right partner, and it had to be the right deal. Doing a ‘media deal’ for the sake of doing a deal was not where we were. We wanted to do something where we had the right partner and it was going to make economic sense.” The digital piece of CBS’s offering speaks directly to those economics. Long before sports betting was legal, and decades before the birth of daily fantasy, CBS’s Sportsline.com website not only attracted fantasy players, it made money from them, offering pay services that helped players operate their leagues and targeting content toward them. Five years ago, CBS revived the Sportsline brand as a standalone site that includes premium sports betting content, including a picks service it sells for $9.99 a month or $99.99 annually. “It’s part of the heritage of the CBS Sports digital footprint … an audience that has always skewed heavily to sports gamblers,” said Jeff Gerttula, executive vice president and general manager of CBS Sports Digital, the second-most trafficked set of sports sites in the U.S., with more than 80 million monthly users. “We saw that early. We knew how we indexed in terms of our audience and made moves to relaunch the Sportsline brand with our
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Media
Sportsbook
Comment
ESPN
Caesars Entertainment
The exclusive provider of odds and lines across ESPN platforms.
Fox Sports
Stars Group
A sweeping deal created the Fox Bet sportsbook brand, promoted across Fox Sports platforms, with Fox Corp. taking a 4.99% stake in Stars.
CBS Sports
William Hill
As the official sportsbook of CBS Sports, William Hill is the exclusive provider of odds and lines across platforms, with heavy promotion on CBS Sports digital.
Turner Sports
Caesars Entertainment
The exclusive provider of odds and lines across ESPN platforms, with a Bleacher Report branded studio producing content from Caesars Palace sportsbook in Las Vegas.
Yahoo Sports
Bet MGM
The exclusive provider of odds and lines on Yahoo Sports, with links connecting users to sign up with Bet MGM in states in which it operates.
Barstool Sports
Penn National Gaming
Penn took a 36% stake in Barstool, which will put its brand on Penn’s retail sportsbooks and still-to-launch app.
NBC Sports
TBD
The one major sports network that hasn’t done a deal – yet.
Sinclair Broadcast Group
TBD
The owner of the 21 Fox RSNs is interested but has its hands full absorbing its $10.6 billion purchase.
F E B R UA R Y 17 - 2 3, 2 0 2 0
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Getty Images
CHECKING THE ODDS: DEALS BETWEEN SPORTS MEDIA PROPERTIES & SPORTSBOOK OPERATORS
SPORTS BUSINESS JOURNAL
pick service. But as we looked at it, we had to step back. We know the sports betting opportunity in the U.S. is massive, but it’s also something that’s new and we have to be thoughtful in how we approach it. “It was a really exhaustive search to find the right fit for us.”
n n n n Neither Gerttula nor Asher would discuss financial terms or the deal structure. But under the structure of some deals, it can be both a traffic driver for a sportsbook and a direct revenue source for the media company. The deal Bet MGM signed with Yahoo Sports in October not only made MGM the exclusive sportsbook of the site, but also set up Yahoo as a Bet MGM affiliate. Not only does Yahoo Sports use Bet MGM’s odds and points spreads across its site, it goes a step further in states in which MGM is licensed to take sports bets, providing “Bet Now” links that drive users to a Bet MGM registration page. Affiliates often are paid for each registration they drive to a sportsbook site and also sometimes collect a revenue share. The latter is the likely setup between MGM and Yahoo, a sports betting source said. Still another structure emerged in the recent deal that paired Penn National Gaming with Barstool Sports. Penn had an attractive footprint, with 41 casino and parimutuel facilities across 19 states, giving it prime access to sports betting licenses. It had turned some of those into cash flow, selling sub-licenses to four online sportsbook operators. But it didn’t have high brand recognition among sports fans, or a connection to sports betting. Enter Barstool Sports, which through its app and social media has became an online campfire for young males who bet on games even where it is largely illegal. Late last month, Penn announced it was acquiring 36% of Barstool for $163 million, with options to grow that stake to a controlling interest in three years. “We had complementary assets,” said Jeff Kaplan, VP of strategic planning at Penn National Gaming. “We have more licenses than everybody else. We are building a worldclass product with our tech and product teams. And we were set up well from a financial perspective given the [access] deals we were able to sign. But what we didn’t have was the brand that was associated with gambling, as well as the database [of likely sports bettors].”
n n n n
Getty Images
The connections between sportsbooks and media companies began conservatively. Caesars followed its Turner deal with a similar one with ESPN in May, becoming the exclusive provider of odds and point spreads across ESPN platforms and agreeing to open an ESPN-branded studio at the Linq Hotel sportsbook in Las Vegas. But Caesars’ path forward in sports betting hit a speed bump in June, when the company announced plans for a $17.3 billion merger with Eldorado Resorts. The deal, which if it clears regulators will create the nation’s largest casino chain, makes it unlikely that Caesars will make any more major moves in sports betting until William Hill expects the dust settles. Complicating matters, Eldorado comes with a its CBS deal will bring legacy deal that cedes operation of all its casino sportsbooks, added name recognition both retail and online, to William Hill. despite no promotion It’s difficult to forecast how that will turn out. What Caesars is of betting on March doing with ESPN and Turner were easy enough executions. BroadMadness broadcasts.
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er, more integrated relationships are another thing entirely. When the gaming industry gathered for its annual trade show in Las Vegas in October, one of the hotter topics among sportsbooks CEOs was the intersection of sports betting and the media companies, and a game of musical chairs that was well underway. During a break between meetings, DraftKings CEO Jason Robins pointed to the splash his company made as an early mover in newly regulated states as an advantage. Most of that was related to striking deals with regional casinos that control access to the state licenses that the online sportsbooks need. But he also pointed to it as a factor in dealing with the media companies, which likely would offer more favorable terms to the brands that had established market share. “Because of the market access dynamic and also because there are so many partnership discussions happening now with media companies, everybody felt like it was worth spending to get off to a good start, because now the ones who are doing well in the first few markets are the ones in these conversations,” Robins said. “There’s an outsized benefit you get across the rest of the country with the deals you’re able to strike that we gained and others gained. “Look at the deals we were striking before the first football season in Jersey. That was what I was dealing with. Why should we partner with you? And I had to either pay up or we lost the deal. Now, that has totally flipped around.” Interestingly, neither DraftKings nor FanDuel has aligned with a media company in the sportsbook category. Really, that’s not such a surprise. Not only are they the early market-share leaders by a long haul, they also entered the sportsbook business with unrivaled brand recognition and an existing customer base. Of course, neither company has ruled out such an alignment. And suitors remain. The two major players who haven’t done sportsbook deals yet — NBC Sports and regional sports network operator Sinclair Broadcast Group — both have made it clear that they’re bullish on sports betting. NBC Sports already offers free-to-play games tied to its broadcasts and has built out sports betting content on its website. Hungry though Sinclair may be, industry sources said its focus is understandably elsewhere, as it digests and decides the direction it will take the 21 Fox Sports RSNs.
n n n n The most immediate payoff for William Hill from its CBS deal will be the arrival of March Madness. That’s also a reminder that the legalization of sports betting does not mean networks can expect to promote their sportsbook sponsors without restriction. The NCAA has made it clear to CBS and Turner that it wants no promotion of sportsbooks or mention of sports betting during the broadcast of its games, including the NCAA men’s basketball tournament, which happens to be one of the more heavily bet events in U.S. sports. William Hill made sure to close the deal with at least a month remaining until the tournament, hoping to benefit from the profile of the event and the voluminous content CBS Sports digital will crank out across its channels. While this is sensitive ground for CBS, it likely will be able to drive sufficient value for William Hill through the connection to its massive audience, which at times will move from content that must remain hands-off — like games on the March Madness Live app — to spaces the NCAA can’t expect a say in, like handicapping and picks on Sportsline.com. William Hill is banking that bettors who turn to CBS sites for guidance on their bets will increasingly associate its name with a sportsbook rather than a California winery. “The terms of the deal and economics of it are all driven to the fact that at the end of the day we want to acquire customers,” Asher said. “You want to have the right customers. Customers who are engaging with CBS Sports Digital today, we think that’s a great demographic for us to try to utilize.”
F E B R U A R Y 17-23 , 2 02 0
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9
UPFRONT
The Market
Future wild-card teams could have a much different path to a World Series title than the Washington Nationals used in 2019.
A M E AS U R E D LO O K AT T H I S W E E K ’ S HOLDINGS
BUY
Manfred expands reasoning behind proposed playoff system
For all the talk of the lack of minority coaching hires in the NFL this offseason, credit Ron Rivera in Washington for making progress by hiring Jennifer King as the first African American woman to coach in the league. King had been an intern with the Carolina Panthers the past two years and played women’s pro football.
WHILE ROB MANFRED stopped short
SELL BY
UNDER WATER Under Armour lowered its sales estimates and said it expects a $50 million to $60 million loss in Q1 after reporting a $15 million loss in Q4. With 600 stores in China closed because of the coronavirus, the company still likely has more short-term pain ahead, and its stock could drop even further than the 18% it was down after its earnings report.
HOLD
GAMES-MANSHIP? NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly said “we aren’t even close” to having a decision about the league’s players taking part in the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, suggesting it could be discussed during the ongoing labor talks. Those discussions will take place this week as the NHL and NHLPA look to reach an agreement to extend the current CBA until at least 2025.
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MLB POSTSEASON FORMATS
of calling playoff expansion inevi1903-1968 1969-1993 table in the next few years, the MLB One pennant Two division commissioner believes the proposal winner from each winners from each that could add as many as four teams league league to baseball’s postseason, and incorporate other outERIC PRISBELL side-the-box elements, would be best record would pick. The two “really good” for a remaining wild-card teams would sport angling to atplay each other. All series in that tract viewers in an round would be best-of-three, and increasingly comall games would be hosted by the petitive entertainment landscape. team with the better record. “We have work to do with the playMLB’s TV deals with ESPN and ers association, and we have work Turner expire after the 2021 season, to do on the plan,” Manfred told and having more postseason games Sports Business Journal last week to offer would be attractive to potenat an event in Kansas City. “But I tial television partners. think it’s a plan that has real merit.” The report detailing the proposal The plan, first reported by the New prompted mixed reaction among fans York Post and deemed by many as a on social media and strong criticism radical potential change, would see from some players. Outspoken Cin14 of MLB’s 30 teams reach the playoffs, Percentage of teams in the 2020 postseason with the club with MLB 33.3% (10 of 30) the best record in NFL 37.5% (12 of 32) each league receiv- NBA 53.3% (16 of 30) ing a bye in the wildMLS 53.8% (14 of 26) card round. The 51.6% (16 of 31) most dramatic ele- NHL ment would be a live playoff selection TV show — similar cinnati Reds pitcher Trevor Bauer to the unveiling of the men’s NCAA tweeted that Manfred is “a joke” and Tournament bracket — where teams that the plan is “absurd.” would select their opponents on the When asked about his reaction to last day of the regular season. the feedback, Manfred said: “We’re Under the proposal, the division constantly in the process of looking winner with the second-best record at our game, looking at our sport, in each league would get first pick trying to make sure that we examine from among the three wild-card ideas that can keep us as competitive teams with the worst record. Then as possible in a really competitive the division winner with the thirdentertainment environment. When-
1994-2011
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Three division winners plus the top second-place team from each league
Three division winners plus the top two nondivision winners from each league
ever you talk about change in baseball, you’re going to have polarized points of view. People get used to the change over a period of time, and if in fact this moves ahead, I think people will get used to it. And at the end of the day, they will realize it’s really good for the game.” One concern is that by having almost half of MLB reach the postseason in a given year, it may dilute the 162-game regular season and have some teams with marginal records in the playoffs. Manfred cautioned that some details of the proposal could change and that specifics remain fluid. MLB enters a new decade looking for ways to energize the sport. Attendance during the 2019 season dropped for the fourth straight year. MLB will institute new rules this season in hopes of improving pace of play — including a three-batter minimum for relief pitchers — which also has been at the forefront of Manfred’s mind. And like all sports, baseball is aggressively trying to find new ways to attract a younger audience. Tony Clark, executive director of the Players Association, issued a statement that said, “Expanding the playoffs in a sensible way is something worth discussing when part of a much more comprehensive conversation about the current state of our game.”
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MOVING THE BALL
SPORTS BUSINESS JOURNAL
UPFRONT
NASCAR’s Verizon deal to help get tracks up to speed Fans at some tracks will soon have access to much-faster 5G service.
THE MASSIVE SIZE of NASCAR racetracks has always
and Talladega as priority venues. He declined to disclose the size of the investment Verizon will make at the tracks. All of those tracks fall under International Speedway Corp., which is owned by NASCAR. Neeb noted that Verizon’s investment will benefit the entire industry beyond just fans. For example, improved Wi-Fi and download speeds should help sponsors as they activate on the midway with data collection devices, and it should help concession sales with quicker point-of-sale transactions. He said the improved service should help fans become the sport’s own evangelists by being able to post
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made wireless service a challenge, but executives involved in the sport’s new deal with Verizon are hopeful that era is coming to an end. NASCAR and the wireless carrier last week announced their new partnership, which will start with upgrades to track Wi-Fi systems and eventually incorporate BY ADAM wireless 5G technology. NASCAR STERN had been looking for a new wireless carrier since Sprint left the sport as title sponsor of the Cup Series following the 2016 season. Craig Neeb, NASCAR’s executive vice president and chief innovation officer, said the sanctioning body has decided it needs to spend a significant amount of capital to improve the wireless aspects of the fan experience. “To have that permanent infrastructure will make [wireless service] much easier and much more consistent and reliable than it had been in the past,” Neeb said. He added it’s an ideal partnership in that it helps solve a challenge for the sport while providing Verizon with a large platform to tout its 5G service. “It really became a win-win for both parties.” Neeb said that fans will start noticing upgrades this year, identifying Daytona, Darlington, Richmond
more content, more quickly, while at races. In addition to upgrades at the track, Verizon will do some traditional sponsorship activation in the sport as part of the new deal, including at track and on broadcasts. CSM Sport & Entertainment works with Verizon on its motorsports marketing. Vickie Lonker, Verizon’s vice president of product management, noted that this is a unique project for her company because NASCAR tracks are often so much larger than football stadiums or basketball arenas. “We’re partnering with NASCAR to modernize their infrastructure because we know their fan experiences and in-venue experience are somewhat limited because signal strength and ubiquitous service is a challenge in most of the locations — so first and foremost this is about modernizing that Wi-Fi experience.” Verizon’s most recent major deal in motorsports was as title sponsor of the IndyCar Series, an agreement that ran through 2018. The company has focused most of its efforts on its NFL sponsorship, which it expanded last year. Verizon had sponsored the NBA since 2015, but was replaced by AT&T in 2019.
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NEW YORK 2020 18 - 21 May
BIG CITY, BIGGER IDEAS Leaders Week New York is back to unite the US and Europe’s most senior sport business executives in the heart of Manhattan. The world is changing and sport has to change with it. The fight for consumer attention is greater than ever, the media landscape continues to transform, and the availability of new tech creates fresh opportunities. At every event across Leaders Week you’ll find industry pioneers exploring the trends impacting the future of the sport.
Visit leadersinsport.com/LWNY to find out more.
SPORTS BUSINESS JOURNAL
THE INSIDERS SPORTS M E D I A
No need to fight: Why UFC didn’t ask ESPN for guarantees on how much it would promote the sport
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V NETWORKS TYPICALLY include minimum
marketing guarantees in any rights deal they cut with a league or a conference. These commitments spell out exactly how much the networks should promote a given league or conference — and where those promotions should run. In 2018, though, when the UFC negotiated its deal with ESPN, UFC executives did not ask for any minimum marketing commitments. I’ll let Endeavor president Mark Shapiro explain. Endeavor bought the UFC in 2016. “This is something that I BY JOHN OURAND l e a r n e d f ro m [ f o r m e r N BA Commissioner] David Stern. We were fighting in the negotiation room about how much marketing we should get, and I just remembered that when I was with ESPN and we first got the NBA in 2002, I was having the same kind of arguments with Adam Silver at the
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Calling the good and the bad: ESPN’s approach to XFL coverage
negotiating table. At one point, David interrupted and said, ‘Forget it. We’ll take something else. We don’t need a minimum marketing commitment from ESPN.’ I thought that was a huge win for us, and I didn’t know if he was going to hit me with anything bigger. He said, ‘For what you guys are paying, you’re going to have no choice but to market my brand and my teams more than anything else on your network.’
And he was right. “I recalled that when we were negotiating this time on the other side of the table with ESPN. I said, ‘We don’t need one. Your whole goal is to drive ESPN+ subs, and you’re going to have to promote ESPN fights as well.’ The prelims are on ESPN. The goal is to get people to watch the prelims on ESPN and then use ESPN as a barker channel or a megaphone to promote ESPN+. We dropped the ask. So far, we have collectively managed it to perfection.” Shapiro said the numbers prove that his strategy is correct — so much so that he said he has received several calls from friends in the business wondering what UFC had to give up in the negotiations in order to secure so much marketing from ESPN. The Jan. 18 UFC pay-per-view card that featured Conor McGregor against Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone resulted in 1 million PPV purThe UFC knew ESPN would chases and 500,000 market the new subscribers. sport heavily Shapiro said to push ESPN+ ESPN+ sold 50,000 subscriptions, pay-per-views in including for Conor one minute. McGregor’s “It’s the UFC Jan. 18 match. that is driving sign-ups by every metric we look at,” Shapiro said. “It’s not even close. There are a lot of niceto-have [properties] on the platform. But UFC is appointment viewing.” John Ourand can be reached at jourand@sportsbusinessjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @Ourand_SBJ and read his twice-weekly newsletter.
ESPN’s Lee Fitting says he’d like to see reporters talk more to players and coaches after things don’t go according to plan.
A QUICK GLANCE at an XFL telecast shows
how different the game presentation is on television than your typical NFL or college football game. Sideline reporters are on the bench asking coaches about plays they just called or getting a player who just scored a touchdown on camera. ESPN’s vice president of production, Lee Fitting, had a surprising answer when I asked him how he expected those interviews to evolve. He wants to spend more time interviewing players who just messed up. On ABC’s Saturday game on Feb. 8, sideline reporter Dianna Russini interviewed DC Defenders kicker Tyler Rausa soon after he missed a 35-yard field goal in the first half. He later made a 55-yarder. The next day, sideline reporter Pat McAfee interviewed St. Louis BattleHawks special teamer Steve Beauharnais after he misplayed a punt. Learning that the goat’s audio is equally as intriguing as the hero’s is something that evolved in a day, Fitting said. “We’re not going to be perfect. At times, it’s going to be a little rough and a little raw. I think that’s OK. In the social media world now, access to professional athletes on their own Instagram or Twitter feeds is raw.
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There’s an appreciation for that. Some rawness in our telecast is OK. That’s not something that we have always embraced. With this, we are. Rawness is cool. Rawness is real. If everybody is not perfect, that’s OK.” PULL THE PLUG ON TECH IN MLB?
In the wake of MLB’s sign-stealing scandal, there’s a thought by at least one club manager to take all technology out of the
dugout, ESPN analyst Tim Kurkjian said on a panel at the University of Maryland earlier this month. KURKJIAN: “I had a manager tell me that we should put a marshal in every dugout, and you are not allowed to leave the dugout during a game unless you are accompanied by a marshal. He was serious. “Maybe we should just turn off all the monitors and all the televisions during the games. Maybe the players should not be allowed to go look at their at-bat on an iPhone or on video equipment. … Given the harshness of the penalty, I think that’s going to be a bit of a deterrent in itself.” — J.O.
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THE INSIDERS LABOR AND AGENTS
Sky high: CAA signs prodigy as Olympics nears
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AA SPORTS has signed 11-year-old multisport
■ FIRST ROUND SIGNS NFL
athlete prodigy Sky Brown, who will compete for Team Great Britain in park skateboarding in this summer’s Olympics, positioning her to be the youngest athlete in the Tokyo Games. Lowell Taub, head of global sports endorsements, and agent Lis Moss will represent Brown. She was formerly represented by Abrams Artists Agency. Brown continues to be managed by Amy Neben at Select Management Group. Prior to joining CAA Sports, Brown already had BY LIZ MULLEN deals in place with Team USA official partner Nike, GoPro and IOC global partner Samsung. CAA Sports is nearing additional endorsement agreements with another IOC global partner, as well as a Team Great Britain sponsor, both of which will be announced in the coming weeks, Taub said. Brown is multi-talented as she skateboards and surfs competitively, dances and acts. She won the inaugural “Dancing With the Stars: Juniors,” which aired on ABC in 2018, and took the bronze medal at the World Skateboarding Championships in Brazil in September 2019. “For this Olympic cycle, she is solely focused on park skateboarding,” Taub said, but added surfing may be in her future. “In 2024, in Paris, when she’ll be a bright 16-year-old, it is possible she could pursue both [surfing and skateboarding at the Olympics], but time will tell,” Taub said. Brown was born in Japan to a Japanese mother and a British father and has dual citizenship. She could have competed for Japan, but recently chose to compete for England’s national team. She epitomizes the diverse interests and multiple pursuits of the generation known as Gen Z, Taub said. “Sky has the ability to break the mold of what a Gen Z athlete and entertainer can be,” Taub said. “And I think that really speaks to her fans and to the brands.”
DRAFT PROSPECTS: First
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Round Management has signed a large group of prospects for this year’s NFL draft, including Auburn cornerback Noah Igbinoghene, a projected first-round pick. ESPN draft analyst Todd McShay had him ranked No. 29 last week on his mock draft. Rob Rang, NFL draft analyst for Field Level Media, said Igbinoghene has a shot at the first round. The cornerback is expected to do well at the NFL combine, which could improve his stock and bring him more media atSky Brown will be only 12 when she competes in skateboarding in Tokyo. tention, Rang added. “Igbinoghene is one of the more intriguing athletes in a terrific cornerback Brown will turn 12 on July 12, and the Olympics class,” Rang said. “He is not as tall as scouts would begin on July 24. prefer, but Igbinoghene checks all of the other boxes, ■ OCTAGON SIGNS NHL PLAYERS, PROSPECT: Octaincluding terrific agility, balance and speed, as well gon Hockey has signed several NHL players, inas savvy and physicality to endear him to coaches.” cluding Edmonton Oilers defenseman William NFL agent Malki Kawa represents Igbinoghene. Lagesson and a top NHL draft prospect, forward The agency also represents Missouri defensive Jan Mysak. tackle Jordan Elliott, Miami defensive end TrevMysak, 17, who is ranked in the top 10 of interon Hill, and South Carolina State offensive tackle national skaters on the NHL Central Scouting reAlex Taylor, all NFL combine invites. port, played against men on HC Litvinov in the Additionally, the firm represents Kansas quarCzech Extraliga league, and transferred to the terback Carter Stanley, Norfolk State safety Nhyre Hamilton Bulldogs of Canada’s Ontario Hockey Quinerly, Syracuse defensive tackle KJ Ruff, League earlier this year. “Since coming over, in Alabama State center Carl Thompson, Miami denine games, he’s had nine goals,” said Allan Walsh, fensive tackle Chigozie Nnoruka and Florida Atco-managing director of Octagon Hockey. lantic safety Da’Von Brown. Lagesson, 23, who is from Sweden, was drafted Agents Kawa, Peter Ariz and Shawn O’Dare by the Oilers in 2014. represent the players. Walsh also recently signed New Jersey Devils Liz Mullen can be reached at goalie Louis Domingue; Alexis Gravel, the top lmullen@sportsbusinessjournal.com. Follow her on goalie prospect in the Chicago Blackhawks orgaTwitter @SBJLizMullen. nization; and Los Angeles Kings forward Matt Luff.
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SPORTS BUSINESS JOURNAL
PORTFOLIO COMPANY WATCH
Event Dynamic ‘rolling’ into Year 2 after gambit pays off NSIDE HIS seventh-floor office in downtown Dallas, Event Dynamic CEO Robert Smith on this mid-winter afternoon is a blur of activity: forwarding emails from franchises, fielding a call from a ticketing industry executive and pointing to a wall where the company’s 2020 goals are scribbled. He takes a breath and turns to add one more team sticker to the back wall displaying all the logos of his quickly expanding list of customers. “We are rolling,” Smith said. The growth of Event Dynamic in less than one year comes at a time when executives face mounting attendance issues across almost all sports. Event Dynamic is the first in the ticketing industry to successBY ERIC fully use its patent-pending artificial intelPRISBELL ligence technology to optimize ticket prices for live events — for professional teams, colleges, racing, etc. — in pursuit of maxiig mizing revenue and increasing attendance. Since launching in the spring of 2019, Event Dynamic has grown its com md pany from five to 20 employees (including 13 developers) and signed more than 25 customers. Smith said he expects his company to price over $100 million of inventory in 2020. Confidentiality agreements with its customers — which h e include several national championship-winning college football or basketball teams — prohibit public disclosure e. But its first customer, the New York Mets, agreed to discuss how Event Dynamic helped them during a 2019 season in n ewhich they saw an 8.4% increase in attendance. Lou De Paoli, the Mets’ executive vice president and chief revenue e g officer, said Event Dynamic’s technology is positioning itself as the “future of the pricing business for tickets.” ” AI is increasingly finding its way into various aspects of the sports business landscape, from streamlining con ng cessions to enhancing the fan experience to now optimizing ticket prices. Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban said d S during last month’s CES conference in Las Vega s that businesses that don’t embrace AI will soon be eQ Founded: Spring 2019 come dinosaurs. Q Total employees: 20 (inSmith (right) came to a cluding 13 developers) e similar conclusion three Q Headquarters: Dallas d years ago when he watched Q Top executives: n a “60 Minutes” episode on Robert Smith, CEO and AI. While the episode’s founder; Travis Apple, CRO, focus was how AI benefits Partner; Jay Harig, VP of Sales, mthe medical field, Smith im Partner; Andrew Robinson, g mediately started thinking Director of Technology; Aly about what the technology exandra Bishop, Director of g could do in the ticketing Marketing and PR e industry. While his degree Q Clients: 25 from Missouri was in fiid nance and banking, he had d spent some seven years as the founder and CEO of Sold Out Sports, where he made millions of dollars selling missat priced tickets for a premium on the secondary market. Wha e if, he wondered, instead of spending 90% of his own time y weighing several factors — a team’s success, weather, day of the week — to price tickets, he could create AI models unique to a team’s circumstances that factor in countless d more variables to price tickets? And what if they could build their own technology to do it all in real time? d “Computers don’t eat, they don’t sleep. If you could
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EVENT DYNAMIC
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[make a product] and quantify with computers what I was doing with my mind, you could add a tremendous amount of value,” said Smith, 42. “Then you’d have truly efficient ticket pricing in ways that allow teams to maximize revenue and in real time. We are the next evolution.” The Mets used the technology in beta mode for much of the 2019 season so they could see a proof of concept. It’s been live since September and will be in place for the 2020 season. While many pro and college teams dynamically price now, the process of changing ticket prices is still very manual and human based. “So why not take advantage of some of those opportunities with a better tool, like Event Dynamic has built, that not only makes recommendations but it learns using machine learning and artificial intelligence to understand where the market should be going to price your tickets effectively?” piece ff i l ?” DePaoli D P li said. id “The “Th most important i i is that the pricing changes are automatically integrated into our ticketing system, so there is literally very little, if any, human interaction needed. That is a big plus for us.” One chief revenue officer for a franchise that worked with Event Dynamic in 2019 — and saw a rise in attendance — said the technology was very beneficial. Event Dynamic does not buy or sell any tickets, but instead uses its technology to ensure that tickets are priced properly so that they have the best chance of selling. For example, if a team starts a winning streak (which increases demand) or the weather changes to an ominous forecast (which decreases demand), the technology accounts for those factors immediately and triangulates countless data points to predict the optimal price of those tickets. And the more historical data it can consider, the more the technology can learn in order to produce more precise price points. “It’s totally fluid, and it’s multidimensional in a way that the exact same thing will probably never happen again — too many factors,” Smith said. “We’re talking billions of possibilities, like the Rangers playing the Yankees on a certain Tuesday in a certain month and you factor in the weather. You’re literally playing multidimensional chess, which is why nobody has been able to solve this problem before.” There’s no upfront cost to teams. Event Dynamic doesn’t e a r n a ny t h i n g until it builds out the model, prices the tickets and those tickets
clear the market. Smith said one of the misconceptions about Event Dynamic is that it primarily raises ticket prices. More often than not, he said, it actually lowers inventory prices. Jay Harig, Event Dynamic’s partner and vice president of sales, said he spends three days a week on the road, meeting with more than 10 teams during each trip and connecting with 10 others during the week. The company is also in talks with prominent European sports franchises. From pricing tickets manually on the secondary market in recent years, he knows that teams, artists and rights holders “couldn’t possibly do what Rob and I do on the market themselves,” Harig said. “They need technology like ours. I think this is a space ready for some kind of eruption.”
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PORTFOLIO SPORTS FACILITIES
Iconic venues balance tradition and revenue needs as they seek namingrights partners. BY KARN DHINGRA
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ANY ICONIC stadiums and arenas that have historically
been off-limits to naming-rights agreements are now in the market seeking such deals and the revenue that could ensure their continued existence in the 21st century. It’s a sign of the times that these venues are looking for unique and creative ways to increase revenue to bring their amenities up to modern-day standards. But it takes a delicate balance between honoring their heritage without alienating nostalgic fans who would rather leave things alone. Spectra has been hired to secure multiyear naming-rights deals for two such venues: the Cotton Bowl in Dallas and Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium in Memphis. The Cotton Bowl, built in 1930, is home to one of the most storied college football rivalries in the country — the annual Texas-Oklahoma game, held during the Texas State Fair. The Liberty Bowl, built in 1965, is home to University of Memphis football. The venues are owned by their respective cities, which have hired Spectra. “Both venues can expect to fetch a mid-to-high six-figure dollar range [per year], depending on what the final assets are, give or take,” said Liam Weseloh, Spectra’s vice president of partnerships. “The deals are a work in progress; there’s a lot of work that goes into pitching these behind the scenes, so we’re through
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a couple different layers that are critical to getting the deals closed, and at sort of the evaluation process.” Weseloh declined to disclose potential partners but said they’ll be names that are recognizable on the national or regional level. “They’re the big advertisers in sports and entertainment venues, banking, insurance, automotive, so we’re going down the path with several partners in each of those categories.” Both venues will likely take a different approach to how the naming-rights deals are crafted. “You will probably still see the Cotton Bowl name out in the front, and then a secondary naming-rights partner coming after it,” Weseloh said. “So it may be a ‘Cotton Bowl presented by, powered by,’ something along those lines so the brand would come after the Cotton Bowl name.” The Liberty Bowl, which also serves as a memorial to Memphis citizens who served in World War I, World War II and the Korean War, plans to continue honoring those veterans but will likely have a more traditional rename, Weseloh said. “We want to make sure they are somehow recognized either in the name or in other areas, so there you would probably see a little more of a traditional rename of the facility, where it may be a brand stadium with other components going back to honor the fallen veterans,” Weseloh added.
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Selling rights to a piece of history
SPORTS BUSINESS JOURNAL
Spectra; Getty Images
Teams and universities have to work harder in the namingrights process for an existing venue, especially one with an iconic name, said Erik Judson, CEO of JMI Sports, which recently handled a $4.1 million, 14-year naming-rights deal between Central Bank and Rupp Arena, the longtime home to University of Kentucky basketball. The downtown Lexington venue was renamed Rupp Arena at Central Bank Center. Traditionalists get to keep the name they are familiar with while Central Bank still gets key branding. “There has to be greater sensitivity … in order to mitigate what could be some concerns,” Judson said. “But if done well, if stakeholders are involved, if people recognize that’s an important economic consideration for the athletic departments in the universities, I think these naming-rights deals are not only just accepted, but they can be embraced.” An example of a naming-rights deal that went sour over sensitivities was the University of Southern California’s agreement with United Airlines to rename the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, which opened in 1923. The initial 16-year naming-rights deal for $69 million, announced in 2017, would have renamed the stadium “United Airlines Memorial Coliseum” and helped fund USC’s $315 million renovation of the nearly 100-year-old stadium. Opponents argued against the name change because the stadium was built by the city of Los Angeles and California as a memorial to World War I soldiers. In 2019, USC renegotiated its deal with United Airlines to name only the field at the stadium for 10 years. Financial terms of the revised deal were not disclosed. “I don’t know enough about the diligence that was done there; I imagine it was exceptional but … that’s not just a stadium that just had USC football,” Judson said. “The fact that it had so many other things beyond USC might have changed and might have raised the bar. It’s not just about USC football, it’s about so many other things.” As part of the revised deal, Los Angeles news outlets reported that USC would honor local veterans with support for former military service members attending the university and a new memorial at the Coliseum to honor veterans. AJ Maestas, founder and CEO of Navigate Research, which was commissioned by the city of Memphis to find how much corporate sponsors would be willing to invest in the Liberty Bowl, said backlash against iconic venues rebranding is generally short term. “There is a negative impact, but people tend to get comfortable with a new name within two or three years,” Maestas added. “Generally speaking, on average, we think too much is made of the idea of a name changing, especially when you consider the revenue potential.”
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far left:
Don’t look for the Cotton Bowl name to go away, but a sponsor will soon have its name attached for the home of the Texas-Oklahoma rivalry game. above: The Liberty Bowl, however, is expected to have a more traditional rename that comes with such deals. below: USC and United Airlines had a fight on their hands with an initial deal to rename the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. A new deal was later struck that involved only naming the field.
Maestas said corporate naming rights, especially for iconic college venues, can also be an exceptional value, as opposed to getting a gift from a donor. “We recommend our clients not take a one-time, in-perpetuity gift unless it is at least 20 times larger than the current annual value of a corporate name,” Maestas said. “The reason is that corporate names and the market for those grow at roughly 6% a year now. Over the last 25 to 30 years, it’s actually over 7% a year.” The University of Memphis invested $2 million in video board upgrades for the Liberty Bowl in 2019, which followed a $3 million upgrade to the stadium’s locker room in 2018. It’s looking to put funds from a naming-rights deal into further improving the stadium. “One thing that a lot of people think might be going on is that this is an opportunity for whoever the owner of a building is, in our case the city of Memphis, to put more money in their pockets,” said Mike Legg, director of partnerships for Spectra for the Liberty Bowl and Fairgrounds. “But a lot of places do these sorts of deals … because they want to use what a corporation invests in putting their name on the place to invest in renovating it.” Spectra, which took over management of the Cotton Bowl and adjacent Fair Park in January, is looking to revive live entertainment on the grounds of the Texas State Fair and believes selling a naming-rights deal will help fund that growth. “Everything we do in Dallas goes back into Fair Park,” said Joe Skenderian, Spectra’s director of partnerships at Dallas Fair Park. To sell naming rights for the Cotton Bowl, Spectra has relied on the venue’s history and regional significance, Skenderian added. “So being part of that and working with the city and the parks board and all of the events that make up Dallas Fair Park, and everything that is historical about Cotton Bowl Stadium, is really the story that we are crafting to tell and to bring partners on board,” Skenderian said. “And it’s everything, from straightout advertising to the TV rights, to everything traditional that you’re going to see, plus community engagement, and that’s a big part of what we do at these venues.” Jason Kohll, CEO of Professional Sports Partners, a Houstonbased sports marketing firm that brokered the naming rights for Birmingham, Ala.’s Protective Stadium, said he was interested in how naming rights for older iconic venues like the Cotton Bowl and Liberty Bowl will be valued. “If a new stadium is being built in one of the major leagues or even college athletics, you have some history,” Kohll said. The size of the stadium’s media market, attendance numbers for the team, information about the economy, population and the amount a naming-rights deal sold in a comparable market are generally available, he added. “This is a little different because they’re two stadiums that have been around for a long time. Who do you comp them against?” Kohll said. “The Cotton Bowl, I would say, is one of the harder comps because it hosts Texas-OU, which is one of the biggest games in college football each year. You have a media value because of its location, but there are not a lot of games played there, so it’ll be very interesting to see what it ends up selling for.”
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PORTFOLIO MICKY LAWLER the time’s prevailing views on gender. On a trip back to the Netherlands, Lawler’s father, who worked for Philips electronics, stopped in a Peruvian airport to buy himself and Lawler’s younger brother Rolex watches. “So, what about me?” she asked her dad. “And he goes, ‘Yeah, yeah, you’re gonna get a Tudor.’” From PR rep on the Rolex is one of tennis’ men’s tour to player biggest corporate backers, agent to WTA presiand many years later at a dent, Micky Lawler’s Rolex sponsorship event for international life has helped guide her its more wallet-friendly decisions. Tudor line of watches, Lawler said she retold that story with the polite caveat: She would never own a Tudor watch because of that comment from her past. “There are so many funny stories that now you think, ‘Wow that was really absurd. Dad, what were you thinking?’” she said. In her mid-20s, Lawler began working for the precursor to the ATP Tour, which meant spending 11 months of the year jetting around the globe. In 1988, she joined Octagon, becoming the only female agent in the men’s game. Her first client was a young Italian hotshot named Alberto Mancini, who went to bat for her during a press conference when asked why his agent was a woman. “Because she’s the best in the business,” he answered. “I’ve never been so grateful, thankful and just ecstatic as that day, when, as a young kid, he said that,” said Lawler. Despite regular challenges from pro other cultures,” Lawler said of her sports’ male hierarchy, Lawler’s selffamily’s travels. “It was very difficult belief hardened. As she neared the at times, but I tell you I would not finish line of a big apparel deal for change it for the world. That’s the Mancini in London, her agency deimpact that it had on cided to send an unme, it opened my eyes.” tested Harvard grad Lawler’s childhood — a man — to assist. exposed her to women’s Lawler successfully n Name: Micky Lawler inequality in different bucked, demanding at n Position: President, WTA n Location: St. Petersburg, Fla. cultures and settings. the very least to have n Education: American University of She remembered being some say in who was to Paris; University of Delaware awestruck by the mothhelp her, if and when n Experience: Media liaison, Men’s er of a childhood friend she asked for help. International Professional Tennis Counwho was the president Lawler often could take cil; managing director, Tennis and Global of Chrysler’s Argentina advantage of being a Initiatives, Octagon division, exuding power novelty in the industry. n Best business advice: “Be overly fair despite being constant“There was a curiosto the individual until it becomes unfair ly surrounded by men. ity factor that helped to the overall team.” She threw lavish parsometimes,” she said. ties for her children “So, it was easy to get that Lawler was thrilled to attend. meetings and people would listen. But There were very few actual interaconce they opened the door for you to tions with the businesswoman, Lawlcome into a meeting, man, you’d beter said, but her success “showed me ter be ready to back it up. And I was from a very early age what could be very aware of it. What I do is going better. I’ve always been very sensitive to have an impact on others that come to that. Your gut tells you, ‘hmm, this right after me.” is not entirely fair.’” Lawler gradually gravitated toward Her own family was not immune to the women’s game, first serving on
A Life Of Learning T
HERE IS A SLIGHT but noticeable tinge of accent in Micky
Lawler’s English. When asked about it, Lawler, the president of the Women’s Tennis Association, said she has an accent in each of the five languages she speaks (Dutch, French, Spanish, German and English), multilingualism from spending the formative years of her life on four continents. Lawler was born in the Netherlands, where she spoke Dutch at home. Her family moved to Colombia before her first birthday, then lived in BY BRET MCCORMICK Argentina, Bolivia and East Africa. She AND JOHN REYNOLDS went to college in France and later the United States at the University of Delaware. Lawler studied her mother’s quiet strength as she managed the family’s many moves, and absorbed her father’s pragmatic and direct way of living, all while borrowing bits from the varying cultures into which she was immersed. That included coming to terms as a 3-year-old with why a Colombian school teacher said she — a non-baptized Protestant — was not a child of God like her Catholic classmates. “The impact it had on all of us was we became very adaptable, very empathetic, very sensitive to other ways of doing things in
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MICKY LAWLER
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Micky Lawler draws on her lessons from a transient childhood and experience on the men’s tour to guide the WTA to growth and adaptation on the court and off.
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IN HER OWN WORDS MICKY LAWLER talks about Shiseido’s sponsorship of the WTA Finals in Shenzhen, China, and what it means to her: “It is really hard to pick out one or two [brand partners] because they all have a story to tell. From a new partnership that is very exciting to me, I would have to highlight the Shiseido investment in the WTA Finals at the end of the year. “The reason why is because Shiseido is this Japanese beauty brand. And I have known this company because my mother was a faithful user of their products since I was a child.
Lawler (right) has pushed the expansion of events into Asia, including having the WTA Finals in Shenzhen, China, in 2019.
And Lawler, a mother of three, was influential in the WTA relaxing its ranking system and attire rules to avoid affecting players that were either pregnant or returning from pregnancy. That kind of progress would have been unimaginable for even someone as worldly as Lawler back when she was a rookie press agent for a precursor to the ATP, the Men’s International Tennis Council, 35 years ago. She remembers her relief that she worked for the men and not the WTA when a busy press room of journalists cleared after the men’s tennis players left and a top women’s player came in. “And I think back to that with regret,” she said. “Of course I was Lawler (right) is active in addressing young. I had it in my DNA that you issues for women need to look for security and be risk in sports, as she averse. Now, I look back and think did at this panel ‘Why did I not see incredible potendiscussion in New tial in the women’s game?’” York in 2019.
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“But once they opened the door for you to come into a meeting ... you’d better be ready to back it up. ... What I do is going to have an impact on others that come right after me.” the WTA’s board for 11 years, starting in 2003. She was named WTA president in 2014, and the tour’s changes during the last decade reveal some of her life’s influences. A focus on pushing into new regions has seen the WTA add a total of eight tournaments in China, Hong Kong and Thailand during the past six years; the tour now spends the final two months of the season primarily in Asia. Events in Latvia, Turkey, Germany, the U.S. and Australia also joined the WTA calendar in the past two years. It fits that the globally reared Lawler helps pilot an organization that hosts tournaments in 29 countries for players from 84 nations. Lawler pushed women in sports forward with her trailblazing work as an agent. She’s paving the way again at the WTA, where 80% of the tour’s corporate management team is led by women. The tour has thrived accordingly. A global audience of 700 million watched WTA action in 2019, as $180 million in total prize money was doled out to women’s tennis players. That included the 2019 WTA Finals’ record $14 million prize money pool, emblematic of a 109% increase in WTA prize money during the past decade. Lawler was also involved in the WTA inking global sponsorship deals with Porsche and Shiseido, a partnership with SAP that put the tour at the front of the data analytics pack, and new rights agreements with Tennis Channel, Amazon Prime and Chinese online video platform, iQiyi, that led to the massive increase in global TV exposure.
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“And they have a very compelling story. So they are all about the substance of a woman. They are so into promoting the substance of a woman inside as being what drives her outer beauty. They are trying to change this culture of female perfections as you see in magazines. “We did a lot of work with them. They want to see performance on the court. They want to see a woman who is sweating. They want to deliver the message that women can be everything. That they don’t have to choose to be just a mother or just a worker. “It is a real story of empowerment. And they walked the walk in Shenzhen, and they did a beautiful job of not just slapping their logo on a wall. They did a great job of educating the players and every stakeholder that was there. “I loved how they worked and bought the partnership to light. “I think it [the Finals in Shenzhen] was a success. It generated a lot of interest. Shenzhen is in a pivotal moment in history where it is growing incredibly fast. It is the tech hub of China. “I think the marriage is right. Of course, we are going to keep growing and keep doing better and better. We have learned a lot of lessons. Even about ticket sales and Chinese culture of how the Chinese don’t go out during the week because they have a rigorous work schedule. So the weekends are very busy, the weeks could be busier. So we need to focus and adjust the times maybe.” — John Reynolds
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Brian France’s Next Chapter The former NASCAR chairman and CEO reflects on the mistake that led to his departure and looks toward the opportunities ahead with his newly launched investment firm.
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has around $350 million in capital to work with. France’s plan is to amid controversy, Brian France is getting back in the game, have Silver Falcon invest in challenger brands across verticals inspeaking out for the first time on his tenure in the sport cluding health care, restaurants and sports, and in some cases create and revealing the launch of a private investment firm. new brands. France, the former chairman and CEO of NASCAR, was Above all, France, 57, says he’s at peace with how things played out at the helm of America’s top racing series for 15 years starting at NASCAR during his tenure. Though he said he misses the in 2003 and culminating in the summer of 2018 when he was people and strategic decisions he was a part of at NASCAR, removed following a DWI arrest in Sag Harbor, N.Y. he’s supportive of the vision his uncle is implementing. He BY ADAM The arrest generated national headlines, and France took a clearly has the comportment and attitude of a man not lookSTERN leave of absence and withdrew from public view for more than ing back, but ahead, ready to help underdog companies punch a year, a time he called necessary for personal reflection and above their weight in the same way he said NASCAR did durhealth. NASCAR, a privately owned company controlled by ing its rise in the late 1990s and early 2000s. the France family, replaced Brian with his uncle, Jim France, “It was a very unfortunate situation and bad judgment on temporarily at first in a move that eventually became permanent. my part,” he said, in his only comments specific to the incident on the In an exclusive sit-down interview with Sports Business Journal last day of his arrest. “But you know what? It gave me a chance to take a month that marked his first public comments in nearly two years, Brian break. I was already looking at what I was going to do to play a different France spoke about his past, proudly touted accomplishments under role in NASCAR anyway, so it accelerated that and gave me a chance to his watch, bluntly addressed criticism that he wasn’t fully engaged as focus on my health and taking care of myself a little bit.” NASCAR CEO, and revealed for the first time that he was already workQ Q Q Q ing on his exit from the sport at the time of his ouster. He also discussed his new business, Silver Falcon Capital, a direct Walking into SBJ’s offices in Charlotte, France looked relaxed, wearing investment firm fully underwritten by France that is the fulcrum of his return to the public spotlight. A source said that Silver Falcon CONTINUED ON PAGE 22
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THE STORY BRIAN FRANCE a gray suit and blue-striped dress shirt and no tie. He sipped a Starbucks coffee, occasionally drumming his thumbs on the lid to make a point during the interview. He said that in early 2018, his family decided to consolidate the NASCAR industry in an effort to jump-start efficiency and transformation. The sanctioning body ultimately purchased International Speedway Corp. for $2 billion, a deal that closed last October, but France said there were other avenues to go about consolidation. He did not further clarify them, but industry executives have long predicted that the sport will eventually consolidate all of its tracks into one entity. There was also widespread speculation throughout 2018 that the France family was exploring a possible sale of NASCAR. It was working with Goldman Sachs to pursue possible suitors, but nothing became of that. NASCAR President Steve Phelps said earlier this month that NASCAR is not for sale. France said it was around this time that he contemplated stepping down from his leadership role. He said he was actively talking to and identifying potential replacements before his ouster, but didn’t specify who. NASCAR declined comment on the topic, and it could not be determined through industry sources how serious these discussions were. Ultimately, Jim France took over, and Brian said he remains in close touch with his uncle, among other NASCAR executives. Jim France attends NASCAR’s races nearly every week, which is a stark difference from Brian, who received heavy criticism over the years from some industry members and fans for rarely being at the track at a time when many felt the sport needed public demonstrations of leadership. In reflecting on his leadership, France proudly stressed what is easily his greatest accomplishment — signing multiple media deals such as the 10-year, $8.2 billion agreements with Fox Sports and NBC Sports that last through 2024 and solidified NASCAR’s standing in the sports industry. He also was the architect of many of its groundbreaking sponsorship agreements, and the sport continues to benefit from the billions of dollars’ worth of revenue from deals he helped orchestrate. While pointing to that, he was also eager to defend his leadership style and push back on the perceptions that he wasn’t actively engaged in the day-to-day efforts around the sport.
“I’m going all over the country meeting people and looking at ideas, and I’m doing it with some people who I enjoy doing business with. That was a fun part when I was at NASCAR — building the brand side of it, the commercial side of it out.”
“I understand that kind of criticism, but there is no other spor ts league that gets any criticism like that,” said France, of the time he spent at the track. “I’ve always found that a bit interesting that no one else asks another commissioner how many football games or practices he made.” While many in the sport felt France seemed removed from the responsibilities of leadership, France believed that based on the goals he set for the company and his focus on the commercial side, his physical presence at the track was not required on a weekly basis. He took exception to criticism that his absence at the track meant NASCAR wasn’t communicating enough with the industry, noting that NASCAR formed unprecedented councils for tracks, drivers, teams and car manufacturers on his watch. France said that while Jim France attends more races to match up with his goals, “[It] didn’t match up with mine, so I had to take the criticism on my way to managing the commercial side.”
n n n n France was bought out of his ISC shares as part of NASCAR’s purchase of the track operator, according to public documents, and it’s unclear if he has any other equity in the sport. France declined to disclose that, and a spokesperson would only add that France “maintains a close working relationship with all members of the NASCAR executive team and the ownership group.” France harbors no ill will toward the sport and said he is still “incentivized for the industry to do well as it is now, and that’s in any number of ways.” After being charged with DWI, France said, he received support from many friends and colleagues in the NASCAR industry, which reflects the family atmosphere that pervades the sport. He singled out team owners Roger Penske, Rick Hendrick, Joe Gibbs and Felix Sabates, and drivers Kevin Harvick, Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon as people who reached out to him and offered support. He would plead guilty to the charge and was ordered to perform 100 hours of France relished NASCAR’s underdog status in 1999 when, as senior VP, he cut a new media rights deal. He was joined then by Fox’s David Hill (left), NBC’s Dick Ebersol and Turner’s Mark Lazarus.
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community service and undergo alcohol counseling until his sentencing date, now set for June. Paul Brooks, the longtime confidant of France and former NASCAR executive who is now a partner at Silver Falcon Capital, said that in the weeks following the incident, he encouraged France to focus on his future both personally and professionally. It was during this time, over the period of a year, when France set up Silver Falcon. The other partner in the venture to be announced so far is former NASCAR executive Austin Tate. “Our focus around that time was all about looking at what opportunities are next — he was already in a transition, so we were well in the throes of planning what we were going to be building with Silver Falcon Capital,” said Brooks. “It was certainly an awkward transition for many reasons, but it all has played out well. And it’s nice when you can look at the future and see big opportunities and focus your time and attention on that.”
n n n n These days, France splits his time between residences in all of the cities where Silver Falcon is based: New York, Los Angeles, Orlando and Charlotte. He travels every week as he looks for new companies to invest in — to the point that he is still having to manage his work/life balance, but not nearly to the extent he did during his NASCAR days. France said Silver Falcon is making anywhere from $5 million to $50 million investments in companies. He said he is fully funding Silver Falcon for now so that he doesn’t have to worry about shortterm returns. France proudly uses his background at NASCAR to frame the ethos of Silver Falcon. On the company’s new website, it touts: “We know what it’s like to be an underdog! Against big odds, we took a small, regional sport and grew NASCAR into a multi-billion-dollar global sports entertainment property.” France has set up a new LinkedIn account, where he’s listed as a “business executive with more than 20 years of experience in the sports industry,” who “implemented new marketing, safety and environmental initiatives that helped establish NASCAR as one of the most successful organizations in sports and entertainment.” Companies listed on the website as ones in which Silver Falcon has invested operate in five different verticals: food and beverage consumer packaged goods; health and wellness; product development; restaurant and retail concepts; and sports/content/ entertainment. Included among those are Urban Plates, which France described as a healthy option challenger to Panera Bread; food allergy startup Ukko; and
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healthy-food vending machine company Farmer’s Fridge. Also listed on the site is Silver Falcon’s sole current sports investment, 704 Games, the NASCAR video game licensee which has long counted France as an investor. France first invested in Urban Plates in 2014, before Silver Falcon Capital was established, according to Saad Nadhir, the co-founder and CEO of Urban Plates. Nadhir said the capital from France has helped the company expand, and France’s background has helped Urban Plates with marketing and branding objectives. He also praised how France was not looking for a quick flip. “[The investment] really helped us expand significantly — we’ll be at 25 restaurants by the end of this year,” said Nadhir. “Brian and Silver Falcon,
to intellectual property and commercial growth. He also gets “a real thrill from working with young entrepreneurs.” His motivation on what industries to get involved with draws from his time in sports. On top of health/ wellness, which has a clear connection to sports, Brooks noted that France has experience in, for example, the restaurant industry via founding and owning several restaurants in Florida.
n n n n France said he is interested in investing in sports, but it’s not the core focus of Silver Falcon. He said he has been presented with opportunities to invest in sports companies but, “the timing and opportu-
game-day experience, but he said this “was an often-misunderstood point that got made — that I was more interested sometimes in other sports [than NASCAR].” Still, he is open to investing in sports because, “I understand it very well and understand which leagues are on the France received criticism for not attendupswing and have ing more races, but good, bright fuhe says he felt his tures, and others time was more usethat may not.” ful working on the France says he commercial side of the business away still watches races from the track. and he planned to be at last weekend’s Daytona 500. As for the question of whether the France family will ever sell NASCAR, France says he hopes not — but with a caveat. “I don’t [see the family selling] – but I think the idea is, ‘Can we lead a sport?’ You’ve got a very fast-changing media landscape, a more-competitive-than-ever sports content landscape as well, and we know the racing business well. I’m always looking for, ‘How are we structured to compete well?’” said France. “As long as we can stay structured to compete well in this situation and deliver — because we’ve got stakeholders like everyone else; drivers, owners, sponsors, media partners, you name it — as long as we are delivering value for them, then my hope would be that the family will continue to do it.” But on this day in Charlotte, all of that seemed far removed from Brian France’s day-to-day life. Instead, he was a man looking refreshed and content, ready for one more big run in his professional life. Doing it his way, and with the people he’s eager to be with. “I’m going all over the country meeting people and looking at ideas, and I’m doing it with some people who I enjoy doing business with,” said France. “That was a fun part when I was at NASCAR — building the brand side of it, the commercial side of it.” It’s this sort of development of not just businesses, but also executives, that intrigues and motivates him, and it’s what he feels he brings to the table most for companies he’s investing in beyond pure cash. “The biggest thing is I know how to spot talented people and help make them the best version of themselves. I do this with a lot of young people. When I go through the list of people that worked alongside me in the last 20 years to help us build NASCAR, it’s a phenomenal list of people, and they’re all running big investment firms and sports leagues,” said France, citing Patron Technology CEO Marc Jenkins, XFL President Jeffrey Pollack and Roc Nation coCEO Brett Yormark, among others. “I have a deep appreciation for starting small and ending big, and the people it takes to get there.”
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“It was a very unfortunate situation and bad judgment on my part, for sure, but you know what? It gave me a chance to take a break. I was already looking at what I was going to do to play a different role in NASCAR anyway, so it accelerated that and gave me a chance to focus on my health and taking care of myself a little bit.” they have been there any time we needed them. If we needed to pick their brain on strategy, they would be there, but without being micro managers. They respect that we know what we’re doing, and they respect us in the decision-making process.” France said he was interested in getting into the investment capital space because of his experience in building brands and dealing with issues related
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nities haven’t been right yet.” France’s interest in stick-and-ball sports was always the subject of much speculation within NASCAR, with some fans and industry executives convinced he wanted to purchase an NFL team or other franchise. France does not hide his love of sports and said he is voracious follower of the business, routinely attending events to observe the
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‘I Wanted To Make An Impact’ After 40 years as The Commissioner, 30 at the Big Ten, JIM DELANY reflects on a career filled with impactful decisions, innovative leadership and the first major conference cable network. BY MICHAEL SMITH
in his new Nashville condo, flipped on the TV and put up his feet on the ottoman in the living room. Clemson and LSU were about to kick off in the national championship game of the College Football Playoff last month, and Delany, the most influential figure in the past four decades of college athletics, was chilling at home, content to let college football’s marquee event play out in New Orleans without him. “I’m not the commissioner anymore,” Delany said over dinner recently at The Southern in Nashville. “He’s not the commissioner anymore,” his wife Kitty added. It’s going to take some time to sink in. A new era is beginning without him. For the past 40 years, Jim Delany has been the commissioner, first at the Ohio Valley Conference for a decade and then at the Big Ten for 30 years. No one in college athletJim Delany, relaxing ics has had a hand in more on his Nashville balmajor decisions or wieldcony, plans to consult, ed more influence on a travel and visit friends range of transformationin retirement.
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it was time to retire. He had contemplated stepping al issues. Delany’s notorious competitive streak down three or four other times before, but there and love of a good debate often put him at the forewas always a challenge confronting college athletfront of enormous change. ics that he was eager to take on. Finally, he decided, Delany has been an innovator, overseeing the it was time for other voices to be heard. creation of the Big Ten Network, and a guardian, His retirement became official at the end of 2019, staunchly protecting the traditions of the Rose Bowl and Delany decided he would and the bowl system as the CFP give college sports a chance to took shape. By always being a breathe without him, one of the step ahead of the competition, reasons he and Kitty decided to especially on the media front, This is the third installment stay home instead of going to he steered the Big Ten to revein the series of profiles for the the CFP championship. nue heights no other conference 2020 class of The Champions: He’s not going totally cold could touch — $759 million in Pioneers & Innovators in Sports turkey on college sports, though fiscal 2018. Business. This year’s honorees — Delany is consulting with “The job of commissioner has and the issues in which they Indiana on its athletic director changed so much over 30 years, will be featured are: search, and he told new Big Ten and Jim has adapted and evolved Date Champion Commissioner Kevin Warren right along with it,” said Fox that he’s a phone call away. Sports President Mark SilverFeb. 3 Marla Messing But Delany’s unquenchable man, who worked side-by-side Feb. 10 Tommie Smith curiosity, the trait that made with Delany to launch BTN in Feb. 17 Jim Delany him a visionary and trendset2007. ting commissioner, will almost Feb. 24 Jon Spoelstra Q Q Q Q certainly take him in new direcMarch 2 Marvin Demoff tions in this next phase. While CONTINUED ON PAGE 26 March 9 Jim Steeg Last year, Delany, 71, decided
The Champions
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IM DELANY settled into his favorite chair
CHAMPIONS: JIM DELANY
he’ll consult on occasion, there are other things he wants to do while he’s still in good health, like climb to the Mount Everest base camp, write a book and go visit Roy Kramer, the former SEC commissioner that Delany grew to admire deeply. “For the last 30 years, there’s always been something cooking, something around the corner,” Delany said. “I didn’t go to the Big Ten to shuffle JIM DELANY papers. I wanted to make an imn Age: 71 pact. There’s been n Hometown: Newark, N.J. n Resides: Nashville a lot of change n Career: Commissioner, during that time, Big Ten Conference, 1989but we slayed 2019; Commissioner, Ohio s o m e d ra g o ns Valley Conference, 1979-89; along the way.” NCAA Enforcement,1975-79 n Education: North At some point, Carolina, B.S., Political Delany likely will Science; UNC Law School miss attending n Sports: UNC basketball Big Ten meetings under coach Dean Smith, or the back-and1967-70 n Family: Wife, Kitty; sons, forth banter with Chance, Newman other conference commissioners. He’s a serial debater, say those who have been in the room with him, a byproduct of growing up in a family with five children where “the First Amendment was vigorously respected around the dinner table,” he said.
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“You could say the sky is blue, and Jim would say that it’s not as blue as you think,” Northwestern AD Jim Phillips said. “He would sometimes take a contrarian point of view, just to get you thinking about a different perspective. He could do that because he’s so smart and well-read.”
Returning to Nashville after 30 years, Jim Delany is enjoying his revitalized downtown neighborhood.
at the Ohio Valley Conference in the 1980s, and he’s intrigued by signs of its growth in the 30 years he’s been away.
“For the last 30 years, there’s always been something cooking, something around the corner. I didn’t go to the Big Ten to shuffle papers.’’ JIM DELANY
For now, Delany is energized by a new life in a new city, even if Nashville is in the middle of SEC country. They chose to settle there because Kitty is a Tennessee native and Nashville is where they met in the 1980s. Delany enjoys his walks around the revitalized part of the city near his condo, which is within sight of Nissan Stadium across the Cumberland River. He takes great pleasure in discovering hidden gems like the Hermitage Café, a little diner that’s been there forever, or the Pinewood Social, a new spot overlooking the river. Delany lived in Nashville during his 10-year run
Later this year, one of his two sons, Newman, will get married, adding another chapter to this new life. Delany adapted quickly as a conference commissioner, getting out front on conference TV channels, media contracts, diversity initiatives, expansion and scheduling trends. So it’s no surprise to any of his friends that he’s adapting to change quickly in retirement as well. “He still has another chapter to write,” said Jon Barrett, Delany’s longtime friend and attorney. “Jim is still very curious. He reads everything. That’s CONTINUED ON PAGE 28
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CHAMPIONS: JIM DELANY Delany’s relationship with Scott and his days growing up in Newark’s melting pot were driving forces for him as a commissioner when it came to promoting diversity. He succeeded in increasing the number of Big Ten female student athletes, administrators and sporting events televised on BTN, while also mentoring minority ADs such as Michigan’s Warde Manuel, who credits Delany with making diversity a priority before other conferences did. “It doesn’t just happen,” Manuel said. “Jim made it important, not just in the conference office, but from campus to campus.”
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why I think he’s got so much to offer. He has this incredible memory, and he just draws from it.”
n n n n
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n n n n Delany is happily retired now, but he’s still looking ahead at the busy future of college sports.
one who used to tell Jim and his four siblings, “No victims, no bullies.” “So, you were not encouraged to come home and complain,” Jim said. Delany recalls scuffling with a big-
After graduating from law school and a four-year stint at the NCAA in enforcement, Delany was attracted to an opening at the Ohio Valley Conference to be the commissioner in 1979, even though he had little confidence he could get it. Knowing that he was competing for the job against much more experienced athletic directors in their 50s, Delany, then 30, forged a plan that he
ger boy across the street when his mother opened the front door. Seeing that the bigger boy had young Jim down on the ground, his mother shouted, “Everything OK?” After Jim said it was, his mother replied, “OK, figure it out,” and closed the front door. She also was the one who encouraged her five children to dream big and “be a full participant in life,” Jim said. Those lessons later inspired Delany’s willingness to take a risk and set the trend instead of following it, whether it was launching a conference cable network, expansion or creating job opportunities for minorities and women at the Big Ten. By the time Jim got to St. Benedict’s Prep in Newark — he was the third generation of the Delany family to go through the high school — it was evident that he was favoring basketball. Delany was all-city in Newark and with that came recruiting attention his senior year. “My father always said of basketball, ‘Use it, don’t let it use you,’” Delany said. Delany signed with North Delany played on two Final Four teams at UNC. Carolina, which had a strong hoped would intrigue the younger New York-New Jersey pipeline in the members of the search committee, 1950s and ’60s. In his signing class like Murray State President Constanwere two New Yorkers who influenced tine Curris, who was in his late 30s. Delany’s life — Charlie Scott, the first Delany was allotted one hour to African American scholarship athlete meet with the committee, but when at UNC, and Delany’s roommate Eddie he entered the room, he told the comFogler — and have been his friends CONTINUED ON PAGE 30 for more than 50 years now.
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Martin Cherry; Getty Images
Understanding Delany’s tough but fair-minded leadership style starts with his childhood in New Jersey, where there was no such thing as a victim or a bully. Delany grew up in Newark during the 1950s and ’60s, the son of a coach and history teacher. Frank Delany, who excelled as a basketball and baseball student athlete at Seton Hall, became a high school basketball coach in Newark’s inner city. Most of his teams were made up of African American boys, and it was common for Jim’s dad to bring them home for spaghetti dinners. The area around Delany’s home was a melting pot of immigrants from Italy, Portugal, Scotland, Ireland and Israel. They formed a working-class neighborhood where sports like backyard basketball and skate hockey were a way of life growing up. Delany’s mother, Marion, was a teacher of sorts at home. She’s the
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Delany’s vision led Big Ten to add Rutgers PRIOR TO BECOMING Rutgers’ athletic director in
Jim Delany (left) and AD Tim Pernetti were all smiles in 2012 when Rutgers was announced as a Big Ten school.
said Pernetti, who was Rutgers’ AD from 2009 to 2013 and is now executive VP at Endeavor. Rutgers accepted an invitation to join the Big Ten in 2012 and began league play in 2014. Most agree that it was a reach — the Scarlet Knights
have struggled competitively. But Delany remains bullish on them long term. “When Jim speaks about media, everybody listens,” Pernetti said. “He had credibility and political capital that cascaded across everything he did.”
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2009, Tim Pernetti reached out to Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany to ask a very bold question: If the Big Ten expanded, would Rutgers, then a member of the Big East, get a real look? Pernetti, a former media executive before going to work for his alma BY MICHAEL mater, knew that Rutgers held one SMITH significant advantage over every other expansion candidate — access to the New York TV market. Delany’s response was firm and to the point. He told Pernetti that Rutgers had a single-digit percent chance of being invited to the Big Ten. “Well, that’s good enough for me,” Pernetti replied. Over time, Pernetti’s calls to Delany became more frequent. He’d call Delany early in the morning when the commissioner was usually on the treadmill, and talked about how Rutgers’ TV market would boost the Big Ten Network’s audience. “Jim’s ability to see the vision, even if it’s through someone else’s eyes, really makes him unique,”
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CHAMPIONS: JIM DELANY left:
Like Roy Williams (left), Delany learned life lessons, and how to win, from UNC coaching legend Dean Smith. right: Delany was frequently center stage for the Big Ten, this time surrounded by league institutions Joe Paterno (left) and Tom Osborne in Chicago in 2010. below: Delany, speaking on a panel with ACC Commissioner John Swofford (right) at SBJ’s Intercollegiate Athletics Forum, was a champion for change and women’s sports. far right: A bronze football from the Rose Bowl honors Delany’s Big Ten leadership.
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congratulations jim delany on your tremendous career we look forward to the big 10 continuing its extraordinary growth as a leader in collegiate athletics. skol!
mittee that he needed just 20 minutes to make his pitch. “I’ll take the job on a one-year deal for $30,000,” Delany said he told the Ohio Valley Conference committee. “I can learn this job in a year. And look at it this way: If you’re going to make a mistake, make a young one, not an old one” because the older mistake will probably have a longer contract and cost more money. Delany’s tactic worked. He was paged at the Nashville airport by someone from the committee telling him that he had gotten the job. Delany canceled his flight and stayed in Nashville. It was a turning point in his career. Delany began to forge his reputation
way onto a couple of NCAA committees, including men’s basketball in the late 1980s. Once the committee discovered how prepared he was and how well he knew the game, Delany was named chairman, a rare feat for the commissioner of a mid-major conference. Dave Gavitt, then-commissioner of the Big East, and Vic Bubas, then-commissioner of the Sun Belt, were two of Delany’s mentors, and they championed him as a committee chair, a position that ultimately helped him get the Big Ten job in 1989.
n n n n It’s hard to imagine now, but the early years at the Big Ten were espe-
“Jim was the kind of player coach [Dean] Smith loved. He was smart, tough, but he didn’t need to score a lot to make a difference.”
as a media expert at the Ohio Valley Conference by creating a syndicated package of Friday night games at midnight, a package that ESPN eventually acquired. Delany also made his
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cially difficult. Delany tackled issues that were thorny, like expansion to add Penn State and increasing the number of female student athletes. Academic standards were toughened
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AP Images
DAVID CHADWICK Delany’s teammate at UNC
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and scholarships for football and men’s basketball were reduced as part of an NCAA reform initiative. Think about discussing that news with coaches in the Big Ten, like Indiana’s Bobby Knight or Michigan’s Bo Schembechler. “It wasn’t a strategy for a long-term tenure,” Delany said. “That kind of tension and conflict is a good way to make enemies.” Delany can’t pinpoint a seminal moment that turned around his perception by the league’s athletic directors and coaches. “It wasn’t a home run; it was just a bunch of singles and doubles.” Delany, undeterred by the early pushback, forged ahead with the addition of a seasonending Big Ten basketball tournament and the Big TenACC Challenge, two against-the-grain ideas that didn’t generate a consensus among the Big Ten coaches. “There was a lot of pushing and shoving, so to speak, in those early days,” said Big 12 Commissioner Bob Bowlsby, who was the AD at Iowa for the first 15 years of Delany’s tenure. “Some of the longtime coaches tested him. He might have had some bumps and bruises along the way, but he persevered.” Delany stayed on the road constantly in those
first few years, visiting presidents and athletic directors in an effort to get everyone working together. It wasn’t as sexy as conference expansion or starting a network, but the work he did to bring the conference closer was probably as important as anything he accomplished for the Big Ten’s longterm health.
“Jim was really smart in the way he transformed conferences from being service organizations into business enterprises.” KARL BENSON former Sun Belt commissioner Decisions in more recent years, like the addition of Maryland and Rutgers, were made easier because of the equity Delany had earned. “It’s hard to stay in one place. You’ve got to move, you’ve got to grow,” Barrett said of the league. “Jim did that masterfully. Change is hard for some people, but it’s necessary to stay relevant. To see the Big Ten now, in terms of its footprint, the new institutions, the financial success, it’s well-grounded to meet any challenges that come its way.”
AP Images; Shana Wittenwyler; Martin Cherry
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CHAMPIONS: JIM DELANY CONTINUED FROM PAGE 31
In a story that’s made the rounds over the years, Delany opted to start the Big Ten Network after ESPN made what he perceived as a low-ball financial offer for the conference’s media rights. ESPN exec Mark Shapiro infamously told Delany about starting a network, “That would be a roll of the dice.” To which Delany responded, “Consider them rolled.” The travails associated with launching BTN in 2007 were a testament to the job Delany did to keep the conference unified. That wasn’t easy, especially when an Ohio State game on BTN couldn’t be seen on local cable in Columbus in the beginning. Delany, a dogged defender and hard-nosed competitor as a player who helped North Carolina reach the Final Four in both his sophomore and junior seasons, brought that same toughness with him into the commissioner’s chair. Those in the conference were struck by his determination as he drove from one Big Ten market to another to lobby for the network to gain more carriage. But like his mother said, there will be no victims and no bullies. “Figure it out,” his mother told him. And that’s just what Delany did for the past four decades as the commissioner.
n n n n Even though he’s retired now, Delany still has a habit of looking around the corner. What he sees signals more change for intercollegiate athletics. There’s a fork in the road coming, he said, “and
After 40 years, Jim Delany is ready to let others step forward to address the future of collegiate athletics.
he says it won’t look like it does now, especially when athletes begin monetizing their name, image and likeness rights. “People have talked about spinning off football and basketball, maybe licensing them to a third party and the institution letting them use the sta-
motivated; others will maintain more of an educational mission, hence the looming fork in the road. That most likely will be an issue for others to resolve. “I’m not the commissioner anymore,” Delany
“Jim can stay as busy as he wants consulting or speaking. Who wouldn’t want to go hear him speak?” EDDIE FOGLER UNC teammate and roommate and longtime friend dium and the marks,” Delany said. “Other people might go all in on employees and unions.” Some institutions will be more commercially
reminds. Thirty years ago, he went to the Big Ten to make an impact, and that’s exactly what he did.
Martin Cherry
everybody is not going to take the same road.” The commissioner isn’t sure how football and basketball will be administered in the future, but
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Stories about the Commissioner ESPN EXECUTIVE BURKE MAGNUS and former ESPN
exec John Wildhack, now the Syracuse athletic director, have been embroiled in a number of tense media rights negotiations with Jim Delany over the years, only to find an invitation to play golf with the former Big Ten commissioner in the days afterward. Magnus and Wildhack typically played against Delany and his attorney, Jon Barrett. The matches were a healthy way to recover from intense negotiations. Even then, Delany didn’t give many putts. “We’d go at each other pretty good at the negotiating table, but it never was personal,” Wildhack said. “After the deal was done, we’d get on the phone and recount things and have a pretty good laugh. “I told him the conference room at the Big Ten office should be renamed the ESPN/Disney room because we spent a hell of a lot of money in that room over the years. But one of the results from banging heads so many times is that a bond develops and there was a unique friendship there.”
n n n n
n n n n Delany wants to win, in TV contracts ... and softball.
until Delany’s team took the lead. And he always found a way to win the staff scavenger hunt. “He’s the most competitive person I’ve been around,” Fallen said. “He always wins.”
Patriot League Commissioner Jennifer Heppel worked two stints at the Big Ten office and was always impressed with his level of preparation and knowledge. If Delany had an interview scheduled, “he’d not only know the issue, but he’d know the reporter’s position on it as well,” she said. “You didn’t go into a meeting with him unprepared.”
n n n n
n n n n
Delany was not heavily recruited when he signed to play basketball at North Carolina. The son of a legendary high school coach in Newark, N.J., Delany used his toughness and defensive intensity to become a good player. “I was 5-11, but I thought I was 6-3,” he said. “He was always a fighter, just real feisty,” said UNC teammate Charlie Scott. “If you set a screen on him,
Delany is known as a voracious reader. Here’s his recent reading list: “Dog is Love” — Clive D.L. Wynne “The Sympathizer” — Viet Thanh Nguyen “Man’s Search for Meaning” — Viktor Frankl “Talking to Strangers” — Malcolm Gladwell — Michael Smith
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Anyone who has spent time with Delany knows how competitive he is. Wendy Fallen, a longtime associate commissioner at the conference, said that competitive streak showed up even at staff events. Softball games would go as long as 13 innings, or
he’d probably run through you, not around you.” After playing a reserve role as a sophomore, Delany thought about transferring, but instead he initiated a meeting with coach Dean Smith. Delany expressed his opinion that he should be playing more. It was a big step for a 21-year-old. And he did eventually become more of an impact player in his junior and senior seasons. “I learned a lot from coach Smith about attention to details, being part of a team and understanding how a team is structured,” Delany said.
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IN DEPTH WINTER SPORTS
Capitalizing on the aspirations of skiers, resort companies use multi-destination pass programs to attract new visitors and learn all they can about them. BY TOM KELLY
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S
KIING HAS long been one of the most aspira-
tional outdoor activities. Since the birth of ski areas across America 70 years ago, millions have dreamed of sitting by a fireside at Stowe or Sun Valley after a day on the slopes. Today, that “mom and pop” industry has come of age, with a revolution in its business model and mountains of data to create a personalized customer experience. Over the past decade, American ski resort companies have grown through acquisition and strategic partnerships, while, at the same time, enhancing their bottom line with vertical integration of lodging, food and beverage, retail and even transportation, all contributing to the $72 billion winter sports industry. The leader is Colorado-based Vail Resorts, which now owns 37 resorts in 15 states and three countries, including four of the top five most visited in America. Its pioneering, low-cost Epic Pass, launched in 2008, is a full-season pass that includes skiing and snowboarding at over 60 resorts in eight countries. (See related story, Page 40) Its chief rival is another Colorado business, Alterra Mountain Company, which came into being only two years ago. It now boasts skiing and snowboarding, at 15 owned
resorts, 41 destinations — including Aspen Snowmass — in 12 states and across five continents through its Ikon pass. Utah’s Powdr, with 11 resorts, and Michigan-based Boyne Resorts, with nine destinations, are also leading players. Boyne, a noted innovator dating to 1947, has a portfolio including Big Sky, Montana, along with Sugarloaf and Sunday River in Maine. Powdr owns Vermont’s Killington, Copper Mountain in Colorado, Snowbird in Utah and Oregon’s Mount Bachelor, plus Woodward action sports venues at several resorts. While multi-resort pass programs were not new in the ski industry, Epic and Ikon broke the mold. Where in the past skiers may have paid upward of $2,000 for a season pass to a single resort, now they could ski the world for a third to half. Suddenly, aspiration became reality. Epic and Ikon offer different levels of passes, with both offering a blend of unlimited skiing at some resorts and fixed number of days at others. “It’s the ski world’s version of pioneers going west,” said Rusty Gregory, a veteran of California’s Mammoth Mountain, who now serves as chief executive officer of Alterra. “People have this dream in their mind, and they’re going to places they never thought they would go.”
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Deer Valley Resort
Grooming a new
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business model While resorts continue to sell single-day, single-resort tickets, multi-resort pass programs have been the key to scaling the industry nationally. “The old ski industry model was like stadiums — each in its own market with loyal clientele. Every year, we just raised prices,” said Chris Diamond, a resort leader whose books Ski Inc. (2016) and subsequent Ski Inc. 2020 document the dramatic shift. “What the ski industry discovered is that the resort business is scalable, while the stadium business really is not.” Powdr, Boyne and others took on Vail with competing pass products through strategic partnership, such as M.A.X. Pass and Mountain Collective. The period also saw a wave of acquisitions, including a blockbuster 2017 deal. KSL Capital Partners and Henry Crown & Company, owners of Aspen, added assets of Intrawest to their growing portfolio, leading to the formation of Alterra. The new pass programs lock in business up front, protecting resorts from the dynamics weather can have on outdoor venues. And they create loyalty, with pass holders now able to hopscotch around the country trying resorts they had only dreamed of in the past.
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THE DATA STORY Central to the success has been exploitation of data to improve and customize the guest experience, and to create a more personal marketing message. “In the past, you ran ads with a great photo of powder, and that was the advertising program,” said Vail Resorts President and CEO Rob Katz. “With technology changes, we now have all of this information. It became clear that to market the pass and the broader experience, we couldn’t do it in the traditional way.” How do resorts collect data on guests on mountains as large as 7,000 acres? Access portals at lift terminals utilize antennas to read RFID passes. The technology has been around for a quarter century, but its use in recent years has grown considerably. “It started over fraud prevention,” said Mike Bisner of Axess, a leading supplier. “But the cherry on top is all about data — aggregating information about how guests use their area. Resorts have now embraced the idea and deployed the resources.” Resorts now know exactly where their guests ski to better understand traffic impacts. They can also build profiles — where they like to CONTINUED ON PAGE 36
TOP 10 STATES/STATE GROUPINGS FOR SKIER VISITS, 2018-19
STATE
2018-19 SKIER VISITS
PCT. CHG. FROM 2017-18
Colorado
13,793,767
14.0%
California
6,646,723
21.9%
Utah
5,024,268
21.8%
Vermont
4,173,237
5.6%
New York
3,563,824
1.2%
Pennsylvania, New Jersey*
2,687,667
-1.1%
Michigan
2,207,900
1.7%
New Hampshire
2,146,048
7.0%
Washington
1,983,072
0.2%
Montana
1,864,416
8.2%
*States with fewer than three ski areas are combined with other states. Source: 2018-19 NSAA Kottke End of Season Survey
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IN DEPTH WINTER SPORTS ski, how often and ability level based on ski runs they frequent. The National Ski Areas Association has rallied its members to utilize data. “Data technology can accelerate what we’re doing in the industry,” said NSAA President and CEO Kelly Pawlak. “The ROI on investment in data is just as strong as investing in a new chair lift.” With this new marketing push, the relatively flat number of total skiers and snowboarders in America seems to be changing. Last season, 10.3 million people purchased lift tickets, according to NSAA, the highest ever and a whopping 1.2 million more than 2018. Together, they accounted for 59.3 million skier visits, the fourth largest annual total in history. CONTINUED FROM PAGE 35
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U.S. SKIER VISITS Source: 2018-19 NSAA Kottke End of Season Survey
59.8m
Average snowfall at ski areas was down 41 percent during the 2011-12 season, a 20-year record low.
60.5m
59.3m
58.9m
59m
57.6m
57.3m
58m 57m
56.9m 57.4m
57.1m 56.9m
56m 54m
55.1m
54.4m
53m
56.5m 54.8m
55m
53.6m
52m
52.2m
51m 50m
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lopes bu cess to s
ith valu resorts w
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’04-’05
’05-’06
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’12-’13
’13-’14
’14-’15
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Axess
ss Skiers pa
ski lifts gates at
Month” over the past decade have worked. Now, the industry is increasing its attention on retention. “We’ve had this longtime model for growth, and the focus has been on beginners,” Pawlak said. “We took a step back and looked at the big picture. Yes, we need more kids in the sport. However, there are a ton of people in other core segments who have lapsed. We said, ‘why aren’t we focusing on that, too?’” Pawlak has been meeting with resort leaders and CONTINUED ON PAGE 38 looking for ways to cap-
CONTRIBUTING FACTORS Another factor in the rising skier visits is the access to diverse lodging that meshes well with young millennial audiences. “Airbnb may be the biggest contributor to the increase in skier days at western resorts,” said Boyne Resorts President and CEO Stephen Kircher. “It’s opened up bed base that we would never have imagined would be filled.” The growth of passes, combined with increasing bed base and good snow conditions, is creating crowding at some resorts on popular days. Innovative programs like “Learn to Ski and Ride
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IN DEPTH WINTER SPORTS
5 EXECUTIVES TO KNOW
Compiled by Tom Kelly
RUSTY GREGORY
Chief Executive Officer Alterra Mountain Company
JOE HESSION
Chief Executive Officer Snow Operating Working at a New Jersey ski area, Hession saw a better way to teach newcomers, forming his own company, Snow Operating, in 2012. His innovative Terrain Based Learning Program is a highly acclaimed teaching tool, having been used at 55 resorts nationwide. This past December, he opened America’s only year-round indoor ski area at a New Jersey mall.
Instructors at the new Big Snow American Dream in a New Jersey mall just outside of Manhattan give a lesson.
ROB KATZ
Chairman of the Board of Directors and Chief Executive Officer Vail Resorts Since taking over as CEO in 2006, Katz has revolutionized the entire industry’s business model, growing Vail Resorts to become the world’s largest ski resort company. Overseeing acquisitions plus growth through vertical integration of the business, Katz has been responsible for building Vail Resorts to 37 resorts in three countries and a market cap of over $10 billion.
KIRSTEN LYNCH
Executive Vice President, Chief Marketing Officer Vail Resorts A veteran consumer brand marketer with the Quaker division of PepsiCo, Lynch joined Vail Resorts in 2011. She has been largely responsible for engineering a data-based approach to marketing and enhanced guest experience that has driven both her company and the entire ski industry to new heights.
JON RUCKER
President, USA Winter Sports Head/Tyrolia In a decade with the Austrian Head/Tyrolia, company, Rucker doubled U.S. sales and market share, emerging as a new generational leader and an advocate of programs to grow the sport. He enjoys wide acclaim across both the equipment and resort industry, and is the first to sit on both the SnowSports Industries America and National Ski Areas Association’s boards. He joined Head/Tyrolia in 2009 and was named president for USA winter sports in January 2019.
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ture the 8 million lapsed skiers she feels have left the sport in the past decade. Tom Grabowski, CEO of Six Degrees Analytics in Charlotte, is a passionate skier who has spent his career spinning data to help NFL and NCAA venues fill seats. “Driving season-pass sales is no different than what we did with NFL and NCAA venues,” he said. What he found was a low retention rate of season-pass holders — around 63% compared to season-ticket numbers in the NCAA and NFL that were pushing 85%-95%. Today, programs like Burton Chill, SOS Outreach and Share Winter are bringing the sport to young, more diverse audiences and tracking conversion. While working at New Jersey’s Mountain Creek, Joe Hession saw an 80% dropout rate. He partnered with Burton to develop snow features that took gravity out of the equation. “It was like sliding down the hill into a catcher’s mitt,” he said. “Even though you didn’t know how to stop yet, you had no issue!” Today, Hession’s company, Snow Operating, has put its Terrain Based Learning Program into 55 resorts. In December, Hession opened the first year-round indoor ski area in America, Big Snow American Dream, in New Jersey just minutes from Manhattan. “People initially thought we were crazy,” he recalled. “Since opening in December, the attitude is super positive. People find it cool — different than anything they’ve seen.” On Big Snow’s first chairlift were Olympic champions Kelly Clark, Red Gerard, Donna Weinbrecht and Lindsey Vonn. The opening generated 2 billion media impressions. Skier visits are up 60% from projections after two months. Hession is hoping to top 400,000 visits in Year 1 — all
on just four acres. Powdr has taken another innovative step, leveraging its acquisition of the Woodward experiential sports company by building both indoor centers and on-snow terrain parks at many of its resorts. “When [Powdr founder] John Cumming went to Woodward and stepped on campus, he could feel the magic,” said Powdr Co-President Justin Sibley of the acquisition. “It’s the demographic we were missing in the ski business. If we can take this magic and bring it to the mountain, we can solve the demographic problem.” A new 66,000-square-foot Woodward indoor facility along I-80 in Park City, Utah, adjoins a 125-acre ski area and tubing hill and is quickly becoming a flagship venue for the company. In a sport reliant on Mother Nature, the industry has embraced climate change initiatives, which also resonate with their younger demographic market. Vail Resorts has embarked on a net zero initiative for 2030. Aspen began green initiatives in its operations in 1997. Today, under Auden Schendler, vice president for sustainability, it is one of the most highly respected resorts for its sustainable programs and active leadership. Amid the business evolution sweeping the industry, its leaders are cognizant of the core reason people like to ski. “The heart and soul of skiing comes from social interaction — the sharing of the experience, whether on the hill or in a bar,” said Alterra’s Gregory. “Going to mountains, like the beach, is where you go to find the best version of yourself.” Tom Kelly is a Utah-based writer. He spent 32 years working for U.S. Ski & Snowboard, retiring in 2018 as vice president, communications.
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Big Snow American Dream
A longtime ski industry leader who served in executive and ownership roles at California’s Mammoth Mountain, Gregory was a lead architect behind the scenes in the formation of Alterra Mountain Company. He brings extensive on-the-snow experience as a resort operator at one of the nation’s largest areas, formally joining the new Alterra team as CEO in January 2018.
SPORTS BUSINESS JOURNAL
Industry changes rally equipment sector DESPITE FLAT numbers of skiers over the
past decade and diminished wholesale prices and market size, endemic equipment companies have a newfound optimism about the future. BY TOM Multi-resort season passes, and a strong snow season in KELLY 2018-19, are resulting in growing numbers of sport participants, and with it, stronger sales of skis, boots, clothing, goggles and more. The ski equipment industry grew up in the European Alps, where family companies blossomed into global brands. Today, industry companies have integrated, often spreading their brands across multiple product types. Consolidation has brought many brands together, plus fostered growth for large scale aggregators like Amer Sports, with notable ski lines including Austria’s Atomic and France’s Salomon brands. The venerable Rossignol brand, which dates to 1907 in France, continues to be a global leader. Vermont-based Burton, founded by the late Jake Burton Carpenter, pioneered lifestyle marketing around marquee athletes such as Shaun White to literally create the market for snowboarding. Today it remains the dominant global brand. As an industry based on manufacturing, supply chain dynamics and changing consumer behavior, companies face challenging swings. Both the market size and wholesale prices have shrunk. But growth in the resort world is helping forge a new direction. “The evolution of pass products is changing the pattern of the dedicated skier,” said Jon Rucker, USA winter sports president of the Austrian company Head/ Tyrolia. “Today, equipment sales are directly proportional to skier visits — five years ago I wouldn’t have said that.” “The phenomena of Epic and Ikon is giving access to a broader range of people — making the sport more affordable,”
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said Francois Goulet, Group Rossignol president, North America, of the innovative season passes from the two leading resort companies, Vail Resorts and Alterra Mountain Company. “We need to watch if it is bringing in new participants or increasing the frequency.” Buoyed by good snow conditions, overall sales in 2019 saw a 4% dollar volume uptick to $556 million, with specialty shops accounting for 58%. Internet sales continue to grow, but are only 11% of the total. The number of participants in snowboarding, which saw a precipitous climb in the 2000s, has declined, dropping from 39% to 34% since 2011, primarily on the continuing rise of skiing. But snowboarding saw its biggest boost of participants in a decade with 9.4% growth in 2019. Sales of cross-country skis have been flat. But a series of good snow years and enhancement of snowmaking resulted in a 30% boost in skier visits last year, according to Cross Country Ski Areas Association Director Reese Brown. Sales of gear for backcountry skiing climbed 81% in two years, with the sector now worth over $64 million. “Our company really looks at the way the consumer consumes the sport. And there are some really profound changes,” said Mike Adams, Amer Sports’ vice president of winter sports equipment. Adams acknowledged that specialty shops account for the majority of sales, with general sporting goods stores going away. “Equipment is being acquired closer to the point of use,” he said. “We’re losing specialty stores in some city markets.” Goulet of Rossignol added that rental and demo was becoming a more important factor for companies. While Rucker also cited some city-based specialty stores closing, he was bullish on those that remain. “There are many very good specialty stores across the country,” he said. “We want those stores
to be healthy. We also want to recognize that everyone who buys a pair of skis is also going to buy a lift ticket at a resort.” Under the new leadership of Nick Sargent, Snowsports Industries America, the industry’s equipment trade association, sold its annual Snow Show to Emerald Expositions to focus more on education and research for its members. That move resulted in a single trade show with Outdoor Retailer’s Outdoor + Snow Show every January in Denver, burgeoning to over 1,000 exhibiting brands (290 new) with 10,000 buyers and over 800 media. Long viewed as a trade show company, SIA is leading its industry in a new way. With a growing sales market in China, SIA has been heading trade missions to generate new markets. Climate change has become more of a focus, engaging SIA members with their Washington delegations. The association also is broadening its reach, welcoming resorts into its fold as well as partnering with the National Ski Areas Association, Outdoor Industry Association and others to help grow the sport. SIA is drawing a closer direct engagement on growth through an aggressive Generation Snow initiative. SIA and its member brands are providing funding to the nonprofit Share Winter Foundation, supporting programs to bring and sustain 100,000 new participants by 2028. In 2019, Share Winter reached 38,000 youth in 21 states. Head/Tyrolia’s Rucker has been a key in galvanizing broader support from both sides of the industry. “Entry to the sport and retention of skiers in the sport need to coexist,” he said, citing an 18% probability that a new skier will become a long-term participant. “Three or four years ago things were trending in a bad direction,” Rucker said. “But today I see a really optimistic future in America.”
MARKETCAST SPORTS POLL The following are results from the MarketCast Sports Poll taken in January. The poll includes more than 2,000 senior-level sports industry professionals spanning pro and college sports, brands and agencies.
Would you say the number of people that go skiing and snowboarding over the last five years has … Increased 23%
Stayed the same 49%
Decreased 18%
Not sure / No response 10%
Investing in which of the following would be the best way for a winter sports resort to grow its number of skiers and snowboarders? Developing all-inclusive concepts 36%
Discounted youth ski schools / programs 20%
Social activities 15%
Live entertainment 11%
Summer season value-adds for paying customers in the winter 5%
Not sure / No response 13% Source: MarketCast in conjunction with Sports Business Journal. MarketCast provides research and analytics to fuel fandom for brands and properties in sports, media & entertainment. Visit marketcast.com.
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IN DEPTH WINTER SPORTS
LING
With a $10 billion market cap, Vail Resorts has grown through acquisition and a marketing strategy built on consumer data via its revolutionary Epic Pass program. BY TOM KELLY
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pair of World War II veterans got together to build a small ski area along Gore Creek on Vail Mountain in Central Colorado, opening with a small gondola and two chair lifts. That operation, known today as Vail Resorts, is now the largest ski company in the world with a market cap of $10 billion. Long regarded as one of the most desirable mountain destinations in the world, Vail Resorts over the past two decades has grown its footprint well beyond Colorado through strategic acquisitions. One of the largest came last fall when Vail acquired Peak Resorts and its 17 ski areas across the Midwest and New England. At the core of its recent success has been a reliance on data, both for innovative CRM-based marketing and enhancements to its guests’ experiences. In 2006, Vail Resorts board member Rob Katz took on the chief executive role and began looking for a different way of doing business. “Early on we looked at challenges our industry was facing — how we could protect the business from the ups and downs of weather,” he said. “The industry had oriented itself around guests buying lift access in real time [same day they were skiing]. Maybe there was a way to provide a discount to our guests if they brought stability to the broader community.” That thinking led to the Epic Pass in 2008, a deeply discounted season pass offering skiing or snowboarding at multiple resorts that was sold only preseason. In the past, most season passes were expensive and perceived to be only for locals. That paradigm is changing. Epic Pass triggered a wave of countermeasures from competitors, most being alliances between resorts to create comparable programs. Katz has welcomed the competition as a means
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of growing the entire industry as opposed to just grabbing more market share. “The sense we had was that the escalation would have happened faster,” he said. “But at that time there were a lot of resorts who didn’t feel it was the right way to go. We’ve been very happy to see other passes so we’re not the only one carrying the load.” As the Epic Pass picked up momentum, Katz saw the additional benefit it provided — first-party data. “When you bought the pass, you gave us your information,” he said. “Resorts really didn’t know who was skiing and when. It became clear that to market the pass and the broader experience, it just couldn’t be done in the traditional way.” HARNESSING THE DATA VAIL’S ABILITY to fully leverage its newfound data assets came with the hiring of a new chief marketing officer in 2011. Kirsten Lynch, longtime CMO of the Quaker Oats division of PepsiCo, made a lifestyle decision to move to Colorado. She and Katz came across each other. “Kirsten was a huge turbo boost,” Katz said. “She had experience from larger marketing companies and knew how to drive decisions. We were anecdotal marketers. Then we made this big pivot to understanding our guests better — personalizing the message.
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Justa Jeskova
SCA
SPORTS BUSINESS JOURNAL
Vail Resorts acquired Whistler Blackcomb in British Columbia in August 2016.
VAIL RESORTS SNAPSHOT QUICK FACTS
TOP EXECUTIVES
Publicly traded since 1997 (NYSE: MTN) with present market cap of around $10 billion z 37 owned and operated resorts across 15 states and three countries, including four of the five most-visited resorts in the U.S. (see list/map) z Epic Pass offering access to over 60 resorts z 55,000 employees z 1.2 million advance purchase passes expected for 2019-20 season, a 22% increase in units sold compared to last year z $2.27 billion resort revenue FY2019 z Pass revenue over last 10 years (FY08-FY18) has grown an average of 18% year over year z $1.2 billion invested in capital improvements in last decade z $14 million donated to 350 resort community nonprofits during 2018-19 season
z
Robert Katz, Chairman of the Board of Directors and Chief Executive Officer z Patricia Campbell, President, Mountain Division z Michael Barkin, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer z Lynanne Kunkel, Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer z Kirsten Lynch, Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer z James O’Donnell, Executive Vice President, Hospitality, Retail & Real Estate z David Shapiro, Executive Vice President, General Counsel & Secretary z Timothy April, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer z Bill Rock, Senior Vice President, Mountain Division z Pete Sonntag, Senior Vice President, Mountain Division
z
SUSTAINABILITY COMMITMENT Sustainability Pledge: Commitment to Zero, with zero net operating impact by 2030 across all 37 resorts including zero net emissions, zero waste to landfill, and zero net impact on forests or habitat. z 11 million pounds of waste diverted from landfill during 2018-19 season z $5 million spent on energy-efficiency projects over the last two seasons z 400+ low-energy guns to produce man-made snow z Enabling the development of a new wind farm, coming online this year, which will address nearly 100% of 2019 North American electricity use by generating comparable new energy into the grid. z
1 resort 2 resorts
“My consumer packaged goods marketing background provided a foundation of strong analytical skills and an appreciation for how data can really enable a company to be consumer-centric,” Lynch said. “So while the vision for Epic Pass has remained consistent, we have been able to unlock growth through guest segmentation, targeting and personalization.” To make trip decisions today, travelers have a wealth of data at their disposal. “A guest’s decision to visit one of our resorts is a high-involvement purchase decision based on their desire to experience something incredible, which is unique to every individual,” Lynch said. “It is a complex purchase, taking months in a typical guest journey, including dreaming, planning, and booking, involving airfare, lodging, lift tickets or a pass, ski school, dining and more.” The use of first-party data allows Vail to draw the guest into an experience that is personally relevant to them. Lynch CONTINUED ON PAGE 42
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RESORTS
NORTHEAST Stowe Mountai Resort, Stowe, Vt. z Okemo Mountain Resort, Ludlow, Vt. z Mount Snow, Dover, Vt. z Hunter Mountain, Hunter, N.Y. z Attitash Mountain Resort, Bartlett, N.H. z Wildcat Mountain Ski Area, Gotham, N.H. z Mount Sunapee Resort, Newbury, N.H. z Crotched Mountain, Bennington, N.H. z
ROCKIES Vail Ski Resort, Vail, Colo. z Beaver Creek Resort, Beaver Creek, Colo. z Breckenridge Ski Resort, Breckenridge, Colo. z Park City Mountain Resort, Park City, Utah z Keystone Ski Resort, Keystone, Colo. z Crested Butte Mountain Resort, Crested Butte, Colo. z
MID-ATLANTIC WEST Heavenly Mountain Resort, South Lake Tahoe, Calif. z Northstar California Resort, Truckee, Calif. z Kirkwood Mountain Resort, Kirkwood, Calif. z Stevens Pass Resort, Skykomish, Wash. z
Liberty Mountain Resort, Fairfield, Pa. z Roundtop Mountain Resort, Lewisberry, Pa. z Whitetail Resort, Mercersburg, Pa. z Jack Frost Ski Resort, White Haven, Pa. z Big Boulder Ski Area, Lake Harmony, Pa. z
MIDWEST Wilmot Mountain Ski Resort, Wilmot, Wis. z Afton Alps, Hastings, Minn. z Mt. Brighton, Brighton, Mich. z Alpine Valley Ski Area, Chesterland, Ohio z Boston Mills, Peninsula, Ohio z Brandywine, Peninsula, Ohio z Mad River Mountain, Valley Hi, Ohio z Hidden Valley, Eureka, Mo. z Snow Creek, Weston, Mo. z Paoli Peaks, Paoli, Ind. z
(not shown)
CANADA z
Whistler Blackcomb, British Columbia
AUSTRALIA Perisher Ski Resort, New South Wales z Falls Creek Alpine Resort, Victoria z Hotham Alpine Resort, Victoria z
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IN DEPTH WINTER SPORTS utilizes predictive modeling to segment, target and influence guest behavior. It drives revenue but also long-term loyalty. Technology use is changing the guest experience, even at snowy outdoor venues. Vail looked at Apple stores, where there are no cashiers, and started asking, “Why do we need a ticket window?” While those windows do still exist, roving staff now meet and greet arriving guests face-to-face for mobile ticket fulfillment. “Everyone in the industry should look at other people and what they’re doing,” Katz said. That approach led Vail to watch how other companies were leveraging artificial intelligence to provide real-time information to guests. Last season, Vail Resorts introduced Emma as the first digital mountain assistant. Emma is a text-based interactive response system where guests can send real-time questions about ski runs, lift line waits, restaurants and more. “I love Emma,” laughed Lynch. “It’s been fun to watch her get smarter as more guests interact with her.” Emma also is directly connected with EpicMix, Vail’s mobile app that provides on-mountain information. EpicMix, launched in 2010, also tracks ski data for users including number of runs and vertical feet skied — both important benchmarks to skiers — and rewards them with digital pins and other incentives, all the while providing Vail with information on their guests’ preferences. CONTINUED FROM PAGE 41
But amid the buzz about Epic Pass and the innovations in use of data, Katz takes the most pride in what his company has done in developing a leadership pipeline. “When I came in as CEO I saw a mismatch. There was so much passion in the industry, but it wasn’t providing a pathway of traditional approaches to move people up,” he said. “Today, I see the leaders of our 37 resorts, including eight women, and most of them came through our own talent pool. That holistic system we’re building will really benefit future generations. “As big as the Epic Pass has become, and I’m proud of that, this piece will be our company’s biggest legacy.”
Vail Resorts
CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY WHILE THE Epic Pass may have helped Vail’s business stability against weather, long-term climate change remains an important focus for the company. Katz has set a “Commitment to Zero” target of 2030 for Vail Resorts to be net zero in its impact on the environment. As an example, Vail Resorts has invested in a wind farm in Nebraska that will contribute more to the grid than the company’s entire North American consumption when it comes online this year. In its resort towns, Vail also has sought to be a good community partner. Its EpicPromise program contributed $8.6 million in 2019 to sustainability or youth causes through local nonprofits.
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OPINION
Message of female empowerment needs action beyond surprise tactics
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HAT HAPPENS WHEN companies use female empowerment to sell products? Sometimes you get a Super Bowl commercial like the one Secret commissioned. In case you missed it, the one-minute spot takes place in a packed football stadium. The game is on the line. The “Secret kicker” prepares for a crucial field-goal attempt. The ball sails through the uprights. The crowd goes wild. Then, the kicker and the holder remove their helmets to celebrate the win. The big reveal: They’re women! They’re actually two players on the U.S. women’s national soccer team — Carli Lloyd BY SHIRA and Crystal Dunn — in football SPRINGER uniforms. When fans see that two women pulled off the big play, they’re shocked into silence for a moment then cheer wildly again. The tagline “Let’s kick inequality” appears. The commercial received mixed reviews. Some saw the spot as an awareness-raising vision of what’s possible. Many others thought the message boiled down to: Surprise! Female athletes are just as good as male athletes and worthy of attention. That message doesn’t reflect the current state of women’s sports. Female athletes no longer have to prove themselves worthy, especially not against male athletes. Their talent shouldn’t be a surprise. In the arenas where Lloyd and Dunn excel, their talent is more awe-inspiring than what the commercial staged. Lloyd and Dunn played before packed stadiums en route to the U.S. winning the 2019 Women’s World Cup. Plus, 82 million fans worldwide watched the final on television. If you want to kick inequality in women’s sports today, then you need to find ways to give female athletes more pay, more sponsorship money and more respect. No surprise there, either. And, sorry, dressing Lloyd and Dunn in football uniforms for a Super Bowl commercial doesn’t come close to doing any of that. It actually raises awareness about a troubling trend: Companies pushing female empowerment in advertising, but not taking action to
inequality?” The print ad featured Lloyd and Dunn in their football uniforms with helmets in hand. It also offered another big reveal. In a paragraph at the bottom of the ad, beneath some social media praise for the Super Bowl commercial, Secret announced a partnership with the WFA. That partnership means the league will have its national championship televised for the first time. That’s a big coup for a league many sports fans don’t even know exists. “Hopefully, we can capitalize on this and it’s kind of a tipping point,” said Allison Cahill, the Renegades quarterback. “I like to think it only takes one, one big noteworthy sponsor, to spread our message to an audience that hasn’t received it.” What exactly is that message? “Yes, we are challenging that tradition [of football as a men’s sport], but not because we are trying to make any kind of statement,” said Cahill. “We just love the sport of football Boston Renegades QB Allison Cahill led her team to consecutive WFA titles. and play it for all the same reasons that men do.” athletes. The company reduced the contracts of Of course, that message doesn’t get out unless women who were expecting. Female athletes afpeople know about the league and watch its games. fected by Nike’s punitive maternity policy bravely That’s true for so many women’s sports, especially pointed out the hypocrisy in the New York Times. sports that don’t get the cyclical attention that comes What needs to happen when companies use female to soccer or basketball or ice hockey. That makes empowerment to sell products? Their message needs the Secret partnership not only a potential tipping to match their actions inside and outside of corpopoint for women’s football and the WFA, but for rate headquarters. And there needs to be action. other lesser known women’s sports and smaller You can’t be all about empowerment in a Super leagues. If companies want to attach their brands Bowl commercial, then to female empowerment through women’s sports, not support women’s there are plenty of partners out there. They are tackle football. Someready and waiting. Pick one. where along the line Companies need to be accountable to their messagSecret realized that. ing around female empowerment in meaningful, visShortly after the Super ible ways. Otherwise, it’s empty, inauthentic Bowl, Wyn Dominy remessaging that won’t sit well with sports fans or ceived an email from consumers or athletes or all of the above. See Nike: Secret. It read: “We want In the face of criticism, the sportswear behemoth to talk to you ASAP.” changed its maternity policy so it better supports its Secret reached out to Dominy because she’s direcsponsored athletes through pregnancy and afterward. tor of operations for the Women’s Football Alliance One change Secret might consider for its next (WFA). She also owns the Mile High Blaze, the Super Bowl commercial: Featuring women’s football league’s Denver-based team. The WFA is a fulland paying WFA players to star in it. contact women’s football league that started play Shira Springer (saspring@bu.edu) covers stories at in 2009. The top division features eight teams from the intersection of sports and society for programs on across the country, including the two-time defendNPR and WBUR, writes a column on women’s sports ing champion Boston Renegades. Secret emailed for the Boston Globe and teaches journalism at because it wanted to directly support the league. Boston University. Last week, a new Secret ad asked, “Still sweating
Samantha Goresh
If you want to kick inequality in women’s sports today, then you need to find ways to give female athletes more pay, more sponsorship money and more respect. fight inequality and be part of the solution. Or, even worse, publicly signaling they’re all in on empowerment and privately holding women back. Remember Nike’s “Dream Crazier” commercial about female athletes pushing the boundaries of what’s possible and ignoring the naysayers? It celebrated the ambitions and accomplishments of female athletes with the tagline “It’s only crazy until you do it.” It was a powerful message. But the message was at odds with how Nike treated its pregnant
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CAREERS On the Move
Changing places and positions around the industry
Colleges Cleveland State University promoted ROBERT HELLER to senior associate athletic director for resource development; BRANDON LONGMEIER to assistant athletic director for the Viking Fund; and CARRIE NEVILLE to assistant athletic director for ticket sales and operations, and hired JUSTIN MULLOY as assistant athletic director for marketing and promotions and BILLY HARTMAN as interim assistant athletic director for communication. Florida A&M University named MICHELLE HARPER associate athletic director for student athlete welfare and competitive excellence. Harper was assistant athletic director for academic support and senior woman administrator at Southeastern Louisiana University. Longwood University hired BRIAN RUSHING as director of marketing and fan engagement in the athletics department.
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Rushing was director of athletics broadcasting and marketing at Belmont Abbey College. Morgan State University promoted TERRANCE LOLLIE to associate athletic director for administration and student success, CHAD ALLEN to director of studentathlete development and hired LYDELL SARGEANT as associate athletic director for development and revenue generation. Sargeant was assistant athletic director for development at UCLA. The University of Tennessee announced that ZACH STIPE is resigning as director of football communications. Vanderbilt University named CANDICE STORY LEE interim vice chancellor for athletics and university affairs and interim athletic director, replacing MALCOLM TURNER, who resigned. Wagner College promoted JENNIFER SANSEVERO to
associate athletic director for equity, inclusion and compliance and senior woman administrator and hired KATIE RUSSELL as associate athletic director.
Lacrosse The National Lacrosse League hired KATIE LAVIN as vice president of marketing.
Media Combat sports streaming service FITE hired BEN HALABI as senior vice president, international business development.
Nonprofits Swim Across America promoted RYAN BAUCOM to vice president, marketing.
Olympics USA Curling hired JEFF PLUSH as chief executive officer. Plush is the former commissioner of the National Women’s Soccer League. To have your personnel announcements included in “On The Move,” please send information to careers@sportsbusinessjournal.com.
Motorsports NASCAR promoted BEN KENNEDY to vice president, racing development; JOHN MARTIN to vice president, media and event technology; PATRICK ROGERS to vice president, marketing services; and CHRIS SCHWARTZ to vice president, media properties.
120 West Morehead Street, Suite 310 Charlotte, NC 28202 Tel: 704-973-1400 www.sportsbusinessjournal.com Subscription Information: 1-800-829-9839 President / CEO. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . WHITNEY SHAW Leaders Group CEO. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . WARREN THUNE Publisher / Executive Editor . . . .ABRAHAM MADKOUR
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FACES & PLACES
FUTURESMART CHALLENGE Former Boston College and Boston Celtics standout Dana Barros (left) made a special appearance alongside actor Hill Harper (right) at the MassMutual Foundation’s FutureSmart Challenge on Feb. 5 at TD Garden to talk to students from the Greater Boston area about making smart educational and financial choices.
Michael Loccisano / Getty Images for HBO; Boston Celtics; Milwaukee Bucks; Gregor Vasil / SNY; Michelle Farsi / MSG Sports; Brita Meng Outzen; Courtesy of Jeff Volk
‘ALI & CAVETT’ PREMIERE EVENT Dick Cavett; director Robert Bader; and Jesse Weinraub, director, HBO Documentary Films, attended the New York premiere of HBO Documentary’s “Ali & Cavett” on Feb. 4 at The Warner Media Theater.
TEAM UP FOR CHANGE The Milwaukee Bucks and Sacramento Kings hosted Team Up for Change, a summit aimed at addressing social injustice, on Feb. 10 at Fiserv Forum. The featured panel included, from left, Marc Spears, senior NBA Writer for ESPN’s The Undefeated; Milwaukee Bucks SVP Alex Lasry; Milwaukee Bucks co-owner Marc Lasry; Sacramento Kings Vice Chairman Paul Jacobs; and Sierra Health Foundation President and CEO Chet Hewitt.
SNY CONNECTICUT ICE FESTIVAL Former New York Rangers goaltender Mike Richter joined SNY President Steve Raab for the inaugural SNY Connecticut Ice Festival at Webster Bank Arena in Bridgeport last month. Richter dropped the puck for the championship game (Sacred Heart University vs. Quinnipiac).
A NIGHT FOR CONNOR’S CURE GIRLS & WOMEN IN SPORTS DAY Madison Square Garden celebrated Girls & Women in Sports Day on Feb. 5 by honoring female sports pioneers as the New York Rangers took on the Toronto Maple Leafs. From left: Marissa Miglietta, field marketing manager, and Cathy Chavenet, integrated marketing director, New York region, Dunkin’ Brands; Danelle Morgan, dance captain of the Radio City Rockettes; mini bull rider Najiah Knight, who is attempting to become the first female PBR competitor; NWHL Deputy Commissioner Shelly Picard; and MSG Network personality Monica McNutt.
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HOT STOVE COOL MUSIC BUSINESS PANEL From a panel at the annual Hot Stove Cool Music Business of Baseball Lunch on Feb. 7 at the Seaport Hotel in Boston: Cleveland Indians pitcher Aaron Civale; The BASE President Robert Lewis Jr.; Boston Globe baseball writer Alex Speier; Roger Clemens; Baseball Hall of Fame writer Peter Gammons; Bernie Williams; Craig Breslow, Chicago Cubs director of strategic initiatives for baseball operations; and ESPN baseball analyst Tim Kurkjian.
Global Sports Ventures Studio hosted New York Venture Community Sports and WWE for an invitation-only event to benefit Connor’s Cure on Feb. 6 at R/GA headquarters in New York. From left: LeagueApps President Jeremy Goldberg; WWE Chief Brand Officer Stephanie McMahon; WWE and ESPN personality Charly Caruso; Jeff Volk, Deltatre SVP, head of business and revenue and commercial lead, Americas; Paul Levesque, WWE EVP of talent, live events and creative; Kosner Media President John Kosner; Convergence Sports & Media President Tom Richardson; consultant Joe Favorito; Courtside Ventures partner Deepen Parikh; and CAA executive Asher Simons.
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CLOSING SHOT Team USA upset the four-time reigning Olympic champions from the USSR in the semifinals before beating Finland for the gold.
‘Do you believe in miracles?!’ Forty years ago this week, the U.S. stunned the hockey world by knocking off the Soviet Union en route to winning gold at the 1980 Olympics. The performance provided one of the most iconic moments in Olympics history and was a feat matched only by the work that went on to develop the team off the ice. HERB BROOKS had asked Craig Patrick
about helping him coach the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team before, but by the time he asked again in May 1979, Brooks only had one day to make up his mind. Brooks needed Patrick in St. Paul, Minn., to begin on-ice and training camp preparations for the future months. Patrick said yes, embarking on a journey that would give him a rinkside view of one of the most significant moments in American sports history. Nine months later, the upstart group of Americans pulled off the “Miracle on Ice,” upsetting the heavily favored Soviet Union team, 4-3, in the Olympics semifinals on Friday, Feb. 22, 1980. As the 40th anniversary of that magical night approaches, the 73-yearold Patrick — who became a Hockey Hall of Famer largely for his work as an NHL GM — remembered Brooks saying that the group of ragtag college
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kids didn’t like each other. For years, they had competed against one another for the NCAA championship; tempers would be high as they selected the team. But Brooks, who died in 2003, had a plan. “The only way I can think of
tioned sports team on the planet that year,” said Patrick. Despite that hard work, the chance of winning a gold medal seemed impossible after the U.S. was drubbed 10-3 by the Russians at Madison Square Garden four days before the
“My heart was in my mouth the whole way.” making them a team is for me to really push hard, not be their friend and have them unite against me,” he told Patrick at the outset. “Your job is going to be to keep the peace together.” And, said Patrick, “That’s how it played out.” The seven-month stretch consisted of 65-plus exhibition games in the U.S. and abroad. But there was a benefit from all that preparation. “At the end of the day, they were the best condi-
Olympics kicked off in Lake Placid, N.Y. Patrick said that some of the Russian players from that semifinals match eventually told him how surprised they were that the U.S. players could skate with them. The U.S. did more than that, tying the score early in the third period and then taking a shocking 4-3 lead on a goal by Mike Eruzione with 10 minutes remaining. From then on, Patrick remembers, “my heart was in my
mouth the whole way.” As the final seconds ticked down on ABC’s delayed broadcast, those watching heard Al Michaels shout, “Do you believe in miracles?! Yes!” The victory brought more awareness to hockey in the United States, and would one day inspire the Disney movie “Miracle,” but with the team nestled in the Olympic Village, and with no access to newspapers and televisions, the players and coaches were shut off from the outside world. They had no idea what their victory meant for the country until they later visited President Jimmy Carter at the White House. “Naturally, there was the immediate high on the ice, and it carried into the locker room for a moment,” Patrick said. “It sunk in right away, though. ‘We have the gold medal game to play.’ Everybody got real again. It wasn’t over.” The team won the gold two days later with a 4-2 victory against Finland.
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