John Kosner spoke to Digiday about the NFL's latest rights deals
Original Article: Digiday, by Tim Peterson, March 23rd, 2021
For the past several years, the National Football League’s next round of broadcast rights deals were seen as the likely tipping point for streaming to overtake TV.
But now that those deals have been announced, they underscore an oxymoronic moment: streaming is overtaking TV, but also that TV is overtaking streaming. “It’s less a revolution than an evolution,” said Patrick Crakes, a former Fox Sports executive and principal of Crakes Media Consulting
The major TV network groups, including Disney, Fox, NBCUniversal and ViacomCBS, retained their rights to air NFL games on their TV networks on March 18. But the 11-year deals also enable the companies to distribute more games on their streaming services to people who do not have traditional TV. And whereas the potential loomed for a tech giant to swoop in and steal rights away from the traditional media companies, in the end only the NFL’s Thursday Night Football package went to Amazon, albeit on an exclusive basis aside from the local TV broadcasts.
As a result, the NFL’s latest rights deals do not appear to represent a watershed moment for the convergence of traditional TV and streaming. But they are — or, at the least, they have the potential be. “To me when all of these games are available to stream and you don’t need a pay-television subscription, that’s when things change tremendously,” said John Kosner, a former ESPN executive and president of Kosner Media.
That moment may not be much farther off. Starting this year, NBCUniversal and ViacomCBS will have the rights to stream their NFL games on Peacock and Paramount+, respectively. Additionally, Disney will air one game exclusively on ESPN+ in 2022 and has the rights to air all of its NFL games on the subscription-based streamer starting in 2023. Fox appears to be the only one of the TV networks not to acquire rights to make games available to streaming-only audiences, though it will air condensed games on its free, ad-supported streamer Tubi. That the networks have acquired these streaming rights puts them in position to retain their positions in the broader TV market as it shifts to streaming.
“It’s very hard to see that the future of any digital distribution won’t be owned by the same established media companies that owned the old” distribution model, Crakes said.
However, while the networks have the rights to stream games to cord cutters, only NBCUniversal has been explicit about actually doing so. Disney and ViacomCBS said they have the opportunity to do so but not that they, in fact, will as soon as they have the option. That leaves open the possibility that the companies could choose to keep their NFL games limited to traditional TV viewers. That would be an odd move considering the networks are reportedly paying more than $2 billion per year — $2.7 billion in Disney’s case — for their NFL rights, per CNBC. But it’s because the networks are paying so much that they may be wary of making the games accessible to cord cutters and severely undercutting their linear TV businesses that effectively subsidize their streaming businesses.
Protecting their linear TV businesses appears to be why the TV network owners were reportedly willing to pay 75% to 80% more money for the right to air NFL games, according to The Wall Street Journal. “For these networks, they’re trying to give life and breath to their traditional channels,” said Eunice Shin, who has consulted for companies including Disney, Warner Bros. and NBCUniversal and is a partner at consulting firm Prophet.
If the TV network owners all were to make their NFL games available to streaming-only audiences, “it’s going to accelerate the decline of pay-TV subscriptions, which already largely subsidizes sports in this country at the moment. That’s going to be an earth-moving moment,” Kosner said.
The earth is moving, though. The pay-TV industry lost 6 million subscribers in 2021, according to research firm MoffettNathanson, and two of the companies that own NFL rights — Disney and NBCUniversal — each reorganized their companies around streaming last year. So, for as much as the latest NFL deals suggest the TV market isn’t changing all that much as streaming takes center stage, it is changing, but the companies involved are largely staying the same. “Ninety percent of [NFL games] are staying with established partners who built new streaming assets,” Crakes said.
The TV network owners’ primary motivation for paying up to retain their NFL rights may have been to protect their legacy linear businesses, but at least a contributing factor was likely that traditional TV’s most prized programming could prove just as valuable in building up their streaming businesses.
Offering NFL games could help the networks’ standalone streamers to contend with the likes of Netflix and WarnerMedia’s HBO Max in the war for people’s streaming subscription budgets. Not only may people be more likely to sign up for Peacock or Paramount+ because of the NFL’s availability, but they may be more likely to stay subscribed.
““Fewer people are going to drop subscriptions from September through February because of the power of NFL programming.””
That power was not lost on Amazon whose acquisition of NFL rights should not be overlooked. While last year Netflix had hits like “Tiger King” and “Queen’s Gambit,” Disney+ had “Hamilton” and “The Mandalorian” and HBO Max had “Wonder Woman 1984,” Amazon Prime Video “didn’t really have a moment. There was just no news about Amazon,” said Shin. That has now changed. Whether it amounts to much by way of drastically increasing Amazon Prime Video’s audience remains to be seen, but it will likely increase the competition among TV networks and streamers for live sports rights overall.
“Amazon’s aggressive move into sports will neither be their last nor are they likely to be the only digital entity to get into sports,” said Kosner. “This might have been the moment that broke the dam a little bit.”
John Kosner on the NHL in Lake Tahoe for Barrett Sports Media
Original Article: Barrett Sports Media, by Seth Everett, February 26th, 2021
Was the NHL’s great success also a great failure?
“You can’t have success if you don’t risk failure,” NHL commissioner Gary Bettman commented to Mike Tirico on Saturday as the sun made the league’s most picturesque outdoor game unplayable.
Instead of a 3 pm eastern time NBC telecast, the last two periods of the game between the Colorado Avalanche and Vegas Golden Knights was moved off NBC to the lame-duck NBC Sports Network at midnight EST. Sunday’s game between the Boston Bruins and Philadelphia Flyers moved from 3 pm to 2 pm to then 7 pm and back to NBCSN.
“I still think it was a big success given how unique it was once the ice situation was squared away,” NESN announcer Billy Jaffe told me. “How majestic it was, is what made it successful.”
The pictures alone were breathtaking. I found myself glued to the television. Unlike the 31 previous outdoor games, no fans could attend. They didn’t even build stands. Television was the only way to expose that scene to the masses.
Saturday’s first period averaged 1.398 million viewers on NBC. The final two periods on NBCSN averaged 394,000 viewers. That’s more than a million fewer viewers after the delay.
“The sunny weather and its impact on the weather was a bad break for the NHL in terms of lost windows and audience on NBC,” said John Kosner, President Kosner Media and former head of digital media at ESPN. “However, the weekend was a spectacle, it generated tons of attention and coverage and did produce very big audiences for NBCSN.”
“I thought it was spectacular,” NHL Network senior reporter EJ Hradek told me. “I think every time they go play an outdoor game there are always risks. I’ve covered almost all of them. I was not at this one, unfortunately, because nobody was really at this one. I’ve been in situations where games are moved and changed.”
Going into the weekend, the NHL’s decision to try to play at Lake Tahoe was one of the more innovative ones I’d seen. Certainly, during the year-long pandemic, it’s one of the most out-of-the-box ideas from any sport. Still, if a million people could not see the end of the game, what was it all done for?
“People will always talk about the sunny weather that delayed the NHL in Lake Tahoe,” said Kosner. “That’s not all bad in my book!”
“We’re in such a crazy unique environment right now that I think anything different is good. It’s worth risk-taking, but it’s also gonna have challenges presented. But I think when it was all said and done, especially the Flyers and Bruins showed itself beautifully.”
The Sunday night game between the Flyers and Bruins averaged 1 million viewers. The afternoon NBC replaced the game with a Washington Capitals-New Jersey Devils that only averaged 750,000 viewers. The debate rages how many more people would have watched a Lake Tahoe afternoon game on that Sunday.
The NHL was being bold in designing this unique event. Previous NHL outdoor games have been held in football or baseball stadiums with over 50,000 people.
“I still enjoyed the pageantry,” Jaffe added. “The whole ‘Mystery, Alaska’ type thing about it. But on the business side, which I’m not really qualified to speak about. I’m sure it wasn’t as much of a success as it could have been.”
One other issue with the event. The Colorado Avalanche uniforms received tons of praise for their version of the “Reverse Retro” jersey that every team has. The Avs wore the logo of their previous incarnation, the Quebec Nordiques. The Nordiques left Quebec in 1995 and became the Avalanche, winning the Stanley Cup in their first season in Denver.
I think the decision to use that logo, and for NBC to put that logo in their graphics is a direct insult to the fans in Quebec. Their team was taken from them. That does not celebrate their history. It rubs salt in the wound.
The Avalanche are not the only team that uses a previous incarnation of the franchise. The Carolina Hurricanes are wearing the Hartford Whalers logo as their Reverse Retro jersey. One Hartford fan told me it reminds him of the departure, a wound that is not fully healed.
I suggested that if the NBA’s Oklahoma City Thunder wore Seattle SuperSonics uniforms for some kind of retro night, there would be a legitimate mutiny in the Pacific Northwest. Relocation is a sad story in sports, and celebrating it, sends the wrong message.
“I mean, it is the same franchise,” Hradek said. “The franchise was sold and moved. I didn’t live in Hartford. I didn’t live in Quebec City. I could only tell you as a hockey fan. I mean, I enjoy seeing those jerseys because I don’t take offense to them, but again, I can’t speak for a fan in Hartford or a fan in Quebec City.”
The Avalanche could have used the old Colorado Rockies, hockey team. That franchise played in Denver but left to go to New Jersey in 1982. The difference is that Denver got a new team. The Wild honor the North Stars, but again nobody is left in the cold.
All in all, I applaud the NHL for trying the Lake Tahoe experience. Unfortunately, it had to hurt to lose a million viewers. If a picture is worth a thousand words then Lake Tahoe can write its own novel.
John Kosner on the Clubhouse App with Sportico’s John Wall Street
Original Article: Sportico, by John Wall Street, February 8th, 2021
Back in late January, Clubhouse—an audio-based social networking startup—confirmed it had closed on a $100 million Series B round (led by Andreesen Horowitz), reportedly at a $1 billion valuation. However, despite the company’s newly minted unicorn status, the invite-only iPhone app remained largely under the radar outside of Silicon Valley circles. That changed on Jan. 31, when an unexpected conversation between Tesla founder Elon Musk and Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev brought Clubhouse into the mainstream lexicon, sparking a secondary market for invite codes in the process (each user receives a limited number of invitations to dole out during the pre-launch period). With the drop-in audio platform gaining momentum—roughly a third of the app’s 3.5 million-plus downloads came within the last week—it seemed like an opportune time to explore if/how Clubhouse is likely to affect the sports ecosystem (the company declined an opportunity to share its thoughts). Conversations with a tech-savvy venture capitalist and a sports media investor/adviser painted vastly differing views on the subject.
Our Take: Peter Rojas (partner, Betaworks Ventures) has long been a believer that social audio can play a prominent role within the existing media landscape. Back in 2015, he invested in a mobile voice-messaging app called Unmute that served a similar function (but was just a bit ahead of its time). He says the ease with which creators can produce audio-only content, and the ability for both the audience and creators to go in depth on topics, differentiates the platform from other creator-driven social networks in the marketplace. Of course, audio-only channels are well-suited for deep conversations because “it can be easier for audiences to listen in to longer, more nuanced conversations when they can do it in the background of something else they are doing, like driving or working out,” Rojas explained. By contrast, “You don’t necessarily want to sit and watch a two hour YouTube video of people discussing something,” he said.
Considering people love to talk about sports, one would think there is a use case for social audio. But John Kosner (founder, Kosner Media) remains skeptical that a drop-in audio app is the “best format” for fans to consume sports-talk programming:
““Podcasting is a more efficient way to find what you want to find out, when you want to find out, and there is virtually an unlimited supply of podcasts.””
Remember, Clubhouse conversations aren’t always going to be taking place at a convenient time, and you can’t fast-forward through them. Old-fashioned AM radio also still exists (the business remains healthier than one might think) and serves the older fans’ need for real-time, in-depth discussion. Kosner did acknowledge “Clubhouse is relatively new, so obviously it will add product features and capabilities.”
Rojas, on the other hand, doesn’t see Clubhouse as a competitor to existing media channels. He says podcasts, radio and social audio are not mutually exclusive, and each can serve a purpose. “Platforms that open [access] up to people who didn’t have the ability to participate before are expanding the media ecosystem. It’s a different audience and different dollars in a lot of cases; and I would never bet against people finding more time to consume the media content they love.”
While it remains to be seen if sports fan will regularly make the time for social audio consumption on top of everything else, Clubhouse does appear to be chasing different dollars than those playing in the podcasting or radio space. Unlike those advertising reliant businesses, Clubhouse plans to drive much of its revenue via subscriptions (presumably to schedule shows hosted by engaging voices) and ticketed events (think: Musk-Tenev chat). The company will retain a percentage of the revenue generated by their creators, no different than Patreon or Substack. The company’s latest round of funding will in part be used to establish a “creators fund”—money to entice talent to participate on the platform.
Reaching critical mass (think: 100 million active monthly users) will help Clubhouse retain creators once they are on the platform. But Kosner said: “It’s not clear how [the platform] scales or gets to a level that really makes it an important part of the sports ecosystem”—even with plans to make invites more widely available and introduce an Android app. The former EVP of digital at ESPN sees the transition from “digital in-crowd” to average Joe as a difficult one to make (there are also moderation issues that need to be addressed). “It’s more likely [the app] serves just a certain small segment of sports fans and is not a big factor in sports anytime soon,” he said.
Rojas balked at the suggestion Clubhouse’s current exclusive nature would be a long-term headwind for the company. “A lot of these [social networks] started as sort of insider, Silicon Valley [apps],” he said. “Twitter started out that way too. The audience ends up expanding.”
In addition, Rojas said, “The sense of proximity and immediacy offered by Clubhouse is really, really powerful.” But considering the rise of the social audio platform has come in the midst of a global pandemic (launched in April ’20), it’s fair to wonder—as Kosner did—“how much of the popularity is because we’re stuck in our homes and have time on our hands. When people are going back out and [regularly interacting with others] will something like [Clubhouse] be as popular?” The answer may determine whether the app will end up playing a prominent role in sports.
Considering the buzz around Clubhouse (see: Clubhouse Media Group, a totally unrelated company, saw its stock price rise as much as 117% on Feb. 1), it is no surprise there are “fast followers” positioning themselves as “Clubhouse for sports.” Even if social audio catches on in sports, it remains to been seen if whether it’s best suited to be verticalized around specific communities (like LockerRoom) or constructed as a broader platform where users can seek out the specific type of content or community they’re interested in (like Clubhouse). It’s possible both platforms could find a dedicated following—though Clubhouse undeniably has more momentum right now.
And as Rojas said, “Momentum has a way of compounding itself.”
Netflix of Sports hasn’t arrived but…
Original Article: Sports Business Journal, by Ed Desser and John Kosner, January 18th, 2021
In the five years since Ed wrote “Handicapping the Netflix of sports” ( SBJ, 3/28/16 ), streaming has boomed: Disney+, HBO Max and Apple TV+ have joined Netflix and Amazon and “over-the-top” is now materially affecting traditional cable. As predicted for sports, BAM and Disney…
John Kosner Quoted in Sportico Regarding Dan Le Batard’s New Venture
Original Article: Sportico, by Eben Novy-Williams & Corey Leff, January 24th, 2021
The first priority for Dan Le Batard’s next media endeavor—a project he’s launching with his former boss, one-time ESPN president John Skipper—is to secure a distribution deal for his audio empire.
Those negotiations will likely be bolstered by something he took with him from ESPN. As part of his severance from the Disney unit, Le Batard negotiated for the RSS feed to his podcast, according to multiple people familiar with the talks. It’s allowed the talk show host to maintain continuity with his followers, without requiring them to re-subscribe to a new show.
Le Batard also negotiated the use of the oceanfront Miami Beach studio where he recorded for ESPN, the people said. A representative for ESPN declined to comment on the arrangement. Le Batard also declined to comment when reached by phone.
The RSS feed, in layman’s terms, is the podcast’s connection to its audience. When listeners subscribe to a podcast on iTunes or Spotify, they’re committing to have new shows delivered to their phones via the RSS feed. By retaining it, Le Batard was able to maintain his loyal—and sizeable—audience. He’s also kept the 23,000-plus reviews that give his podcast a valuable 4.8-star rating on iTunes.
While the specific terms of his negotiations with ESPN are unknown, having the pre-built audience and data associated with it should help as he begins talking to distribution partners. That said, it likely won’t make or break a deal, said John Kosner, a media consultant and former ESPN executive.
“Dan Le Batard is a very popular talent. He’s been on television and radio and podcasts for a long time,” Kosner said. “If he had no rights to anything, I still think he’d get a significant distribution deal. But this definitely strengthens his hand.”
ESPN theoretically could have kept the RSS feeds and used them to boost the following of another show. That would have run the risk of alienating Le Batard’s avid fans and potentially backfiring if listeners found themselves subscribed to a podcast they didn’t want.
Le Batard wasted little time putting the RSS feed to work. Just one day after his final ESPN show last week, he was posting new episodes of “The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz” to his existing subscribers. As of Thursday morning, the show was No. 1 on Apple’s sports podcast chart; a separate Le Batard offering is No. 10.
Skipper and Le Batard plan to build a new personality-driven media company that could cover a variety of topics, starting with sports, according to someone familiar with the plans. It’s unclear when exactly the venture will get off the ground, but Skipper will remain in his role as executive chairman of sports streaming service DAZN while working on the new venture.
A former Miami Herald columnist, Le Batard spent nearly a decade at ESPN, where he became one of the company’s most popular and visible personalities. He had a presence on ESPN’s TV, radio and podcast platforms, and at the time of his departure, he was making $3.5 million per year, according to Sportico sister publication Deadline.
Frequently outspoken, Le Batard clashed with his bosses toward the end of his tenure, first over the company’s policy not to directly address political matters, and later over the abrupt firing of his long-time radio producer. Both sides have described his departure as amicable.
Le Batard is the latest media personality to leave a major network and launch his own venture. Those hosts have more leverage now, Kosner said, because there are other ways for fans to interact with them.
“Modern talent negotiations are all skewed by the fact that powerful talent have their own independent social media following on places like Twitter and Instagram, and that’s their property not their employer’s,” Kosner said. “Whether you’re Stephen A. Smith, or Bill Simmons, or Dan Le Batard, that’s a valuable asset that you have going forward, and it weakens the positioning of your current employer.”
The Fourth Quarter of Sports Media, Part I
Original Article: John Wall Street, by Ed Desser and John Kosner, January 8th, 2021
The advent of electronic sports media’s “first quarter” started a century ago, first as radio game recreations from press reports in 1920, and then as live on-site play-by-play (boxing and Pirates-Phillies baseball) in 1921 on KDKA in Pittsburgh. In the second quarter, broadcast TV ascended, with live sports becoming national weekend daytime and local primetime TV staples in the 1960s and ’70s. The third quarter came via cable TV, adding huge programming volume and bringing to fruition in 1979 the previously unthinkable notion of a 24/7 sports network: ESPN.
Today, as platforms like Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon lead entertainment, and now have higher penetration of broadband than pay TV, we are entering the sports media’s “fourth quarter” and its impending inclusion into the new mainstream—emphasis on stream.
With the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) taking place virtually next week for the first time, we thought this would be the perfect opportunity to look out into the digital future and project what the next phase will look like. First, let’s recap the scores….
ESPN+ is the highest-profile sports streamer today. Amazon has invested in top brands like NFL and EPL rights. New streaming entrants FloSports and DAZN bought up niche sports and boxing, respectively, while fuboTV offers a streaming package of multiple linear sports and entertainment networks. However, none has yet become a true aggregator (think cable TV for the past 40 years), and we do not believe any single entity or platform will—at least for the next decade. Instead, we see a confluence of factors leading to a multiverse of sports viewing options for the remainder of the 2020s.
In entertainment, AT&T launched HBO Max, Comcast unfurled Peacock, and Disney has built the first true Netflix challenger with Disney+ (after consolidating Hulu and Star from Fox). CBS was early with All Access, but streaming remains a relatively small side business for CBS and Viacom, and essentially nonexistent at Fox. Meanwhile, Netflix expanded its domination during COVID and now claims 195 million non-sports global subscribers. Netflix has not only redefined the streaming viewer experience; critically, it has done so at price points that for now undercut the rest of the entertainment industry. Otherwise, it’s hard to imagine that Disney+ would price itself at $7.99 (as of this March), especially with first-run Disney movie content. Or that HBO Max would be bringing blockbuster Warner Bros. movies direct to subscribers in 2021 at no extra charge. Or that each of these services would be subsidized and magnified through wireless carrier bundles (T-Mobile, Verizon and AT&T, respectively). The super low (to zero) prices for high-end entertainment fare create a significant challenge for high-priced sports content purchases by streamers going forward.
In sports, ESPN/ABC, Fox/FS1, Warner/Turner, CBS/CBSSN, and NBC and its cable channels still remain the kings of live major U.S. properties, holding the pay TV bundle together.
However, that bundle is fraying:
Cord-cutting continues unabated. Another 5 million subs exited in 2020;
More than one-third (37%) of the 121 million U.S. TV homes have cumulatively eschewed or abandoned traditional pay TV;
Cord-shaving, or cutting back on service, has further eroded the penetration of expensive top sports networks, shrinking available audiences;
Virtual MVPDs (like YouTube TV, fuboTV and Hulu Live) no longer pick up the slack;
COVID-19 stopped sports cold last spring and posed formidable challenges upon their return—no crowds, scrambled schedules and huge additional expenses (though with some production-efficiency savings);
According to Roku’s 2020 study, 28% of cord-cutter households ranked the loss of live televised sports as their top reason for cutting the cord;
Entertainment streaming services filled the void with extended free trials and special events such as Hamilton on Disney+ on July 4;
Perhaps most important, a generation of younger viewers who have grown up with smartphones (an entertainment ecosystem in their pocket) has accelerated the bundle’s decline by being “nevers”—new households that have never had linear pay TV.
Sports media’s third quarter is ending with a level of uncertainty we’ve never seen before. Besides the NFL, there are no sure things. Perhaps that is why we expect essentially one last “traditional” rights acquisition cycle, where the “surviving” sports TV networks reach for still-richer NFL agreements to maintain relevance and boost their own asset value, with consolidation likely to follow.
But in making bigger and bigger rights commitments, the leading networks will find themselves in a paradoxical trap. The digital platforms that command the most attention from young sports fans—YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, Snap and increasingly TikTok—pay practically nothing in rights fees. None carry live games, and all flaunt fairly comprehensive highlights on their platforms (both through league deals and user-generated content). Going forward, those paying the most (ESPN, Fox, Warners, NBC and CBS) will have the least financial flexibility to invest in new approaches necessary to attract young audiences, who are less likely to watch live three-hour game “marathons.”
For over three decades, the traditional pay-TV bundle powered non-gate revenue growth for pro and college teams on a scale never before experienced. But on Dec. 10, 2020, at a four-hour Investor Day presentation, the biggest beneficiary of traditional bundle economics, the Walt Disney Co., laid out an unequivocal path forward: streaming. Disney is effectively betting a world-renowned $325 billion company on it. We may look back at that date as the demarcation between the old and the new sports media worlds.
In Part II of this series, we will look at what we expect the fourth quarter of sports media to look like. How will the MVPD bundle morph? What moves are the linear stalwarts of the industry likely to take in their next acquisitions? Will a new bundle emerge, or will the business further disaggregate? How will sports fans navigate the new world’s options and alternatives? What benefits are in store for tomorrow’s fan in return? Look for those answers here next Friday.
Desser, a senior media executive at the NBA for 23 years, founded Desser Media, a sports media consultancy that provides valuation, negotiations and expert witness services. Kosner was the senior digital executive at ESPN for 20 years. In addition to managing Kosner Media, a digital and media consultancy, he is an investor and advisor in sports tech startups. Together, Desser and Kosner ran NBA Broadcasting in the 1980s and ’90s.
Marvel’s Avengers Lend Home to Kosner and Calemzuk for $250 Million SPAC Buildout
Original Article: Sportico, by Eben Novy-Williams, December 24th, 2020
Longtime media executives John Kosner and Emiliano Calemzuk are part of a group aiming to raise $250 million for a special purpose acquisition company.
The group’s filing says 890 5th Avenue Partners will look to invest in an area specific to the expertise of its management team, which includes veterans in media, technology and telecommunications. It specifically mentions sports media, sports betting, esports and fitness platforms as potential targets. The address is a reference to the fictional Avengers Mansion, where many of Stan Lee’s comic book characters lived.
“There are several market verticals we have identified which are undergoing unprecedented levels of disruption in an extraordinarily accelerated timeframe due to a variety of trends, making them attractive pools for business combination candidates,” the group said in a filing.
Those trends include the growing amount of time consumers spend on new platforms, the rush to create and distribute content at a faster rate and the myriad ways digital technology is upending social media, interactive entertainment, gaming and education. Earlier this month Kosner co-authored a Sportico op-ed that hit on some of these same themes.
The group’s filing says it is targeting companies with an enterprise value between $750 million and $2 billion. It says it doesn’t have a specific target, nor has it had any substantive discussion about any specific acquisitions.
This is the latest sports-adjacent SPAC to reveal its intentions to raise money and pursue an acquisition, a phenomenon that Sportico has tracked all year (click here for our SPAC Primer). There are at least 40 SPACs that are sports focused or led by sports executives, and collectively, they’ve raised or seek to raise over $16 billion in total capital.
The group’s executive chairman is Adam Rothstein, co-founder of Disruptive Technology Partners and Disruptive Growth, a pair of Israeli investment funds focused on technology. He is also a sponsor of Roth CH Acquisition I Co., a SPAC in the process of acquiring plastics recycling company PureCycle Technologies. Rothstein declined to comment.
Kosner led ESPN’s digital media from 2003 to 2017. After leaving ESPN he and NBA commissioner emeritus David Stern launched Micromanagement Ventures to invest in sports and technology start-ups. Kosner also runs his consultancy, Kosner Media.
Calemzuk, who will be the group’s CEO, spent 14 years at 21st Century Fox/News Corp, including leadership of the group’s scripted and non-scripted television shows and as president of the Fox Television Studios. Since leaving the company in 2012, he’s helped Time Inc. build its digital video strategy, participated in a $400 million SPAC led by Jeff Sagansky and Harry Sloan–the two investors who later took DraftKings public–and is currently an executive at ecommerce and payments platform MercadoLibre.
John Kosner on Sports Podcasts with Sportico’s John Wall Street
Original Article: Sportico, by John Wall Street, December 16th, 2020
SPORTS PODCASTING GENERATES INVESTOR INTEREST WHILE TURNING TO MONETIZATION QUESTIONS
Yesterday, Axios reported that Blue Wire, a sports podcasting network, had raised $5 million in Series A funding (the company did not respond to a request for insight on the valuation). The investment round, led by Dot Capital (Bettor Capital, Side Door Ventures and Forty5 Ventures also participated), comes just 10 months after Blue Wire announced it had closed on $1.2 million in seed money (that round was also led by Dot Capital).
Over the last twelve months, venture capital has been steadily flowing into the sports audio ecosystem (see: Spotify’s $196 million acquisition of The Ringer). But “there is much more attention [being paid by investors to the sports podcasting space] than there are revenues [being] generated against it,” cautioned Kosner Media president John Kosner, who wondered how investors plan to achieve a return on their investments. “There’s too much supply and too few buyers. [The space] feels overcrowded at the moment and other than Spotify, there aren’t any real confirmed [acquirers].” In addition to Blue Wire, Barstool Sports, The Ringer, ESPN, The Athletic and Sports Illustrated are all producing sports podcasts.
Our Take: Blue Wire is working to become the go-to platform for athletes (A Touch More with Megan Rapinoe & Sue Bird), teams (the Baltimore Ravens’ Black in the NFL) and sports media talent with a following (Haley O’Shaughnessy, formerly of The Ringer) to host and monetize their audio content. Its network currently includes 140 topical and regional podcasts designed for the next generation of sports fans. “We’re making a bet that the future is individual shows about individual teams a few times a week, not three hours [each day] of some 60-year old radio buffoon yelling about stuff they don’t even know about,” said Blue Wire CEO Kevin Jones.
As someone who started his career in sports radio—a notoriously underfunded business—it’s exciting to see so much investor enthusiasm for “sports radio 2.0” (as Jones called sports podcasting). But Kosner suggested the current boom is less about the demand for hyper-local sports programming and more about the greater technological shift occurring.
“You have this explosion of audio content [including podcasts, books, news articles, apps like Clubhouse] all being driven by the mass adoption of Apple’s AirPods and smart speakers from the likes of Amazon, Google and Apple,” he said.
For perspective: In 2019, Apple generated more revenue in AirPod sales than Twitter and Snapchat took in, combined.
While historically there hasn’t been much money within the sports radio business (at least relative to other media channels), Kosner believes that has more to do with the medium “never really being viewed as a premium buy compared to TV and the internet” than a lack of advertiser interest in the listener demographics. “There could be money made in sports podcasting if a new personalized, targeted advertising [market] were to take hold,” he said (think: what Facebook and Google do for mobile ads).
But Bettor Capital founder (and former Barstool Sports head of strategy & corporate development) David VanEgmond “fundamentally disagrees” an ad marketplace is needed for podcasting businesses to achieve meaningful revenues. “If you listen to [Barstool’s Pardon My Take, which is among Apple’s top podcasts], there is not one programmatic ad read,” he said. “It’s all organic. It’s all integrated. It’s all about execution. If [a podcast] can deliver for sponsors and make advertising feel a part of content as opposed to a break, then there is a strong ability to monetize.”
It should be noted that the average Blue Wire podcast listener listens for 45 minutes at a time. “The completion ratio for podcasting is really impressive,” Jones said, “and brands are starting to recognize it.”
VanEgmond acknowledged that the balance of Kosner’s concerns about the industry were valid, but he remains excited about the long-term opportunity sports audio presents.
““Podcasting as a medium is seeing significant growth in advertising dollars. I believe advertising in and around sports will continue to increase. [Blue Wire] has the infrastructure in place to go from 140 podcasts to thousands of podcasts. When you add up the collective scale, this is a business that can generate material advertising revenue. The backdrop of monetization here is very good.””
Kosner acknowledged that if the company develops a strong network of local market team podcasts it would be “a logical acquisition target for somebody—no question.”
Given its focus on local and regionalized content, VanEgmond called sports betting a “huge opportunity” for Blue Wire and the balance of the sports podcast business. “[Blue Wire has] two very strong Detroit Lions podcasts,” he said. “So when the Michigan market opens for sports betting, to think they would be very valuable assets for [sports betting operators within the state] is probably right.” Remember, sports-talk radio and sports podcasts have proven to be effective channels to market a sports betting product, and operators are only going to be spending more money. Added VanEgmond: “FanDuel and Draftkings spent [in the range] of $200 million each in the second half of this year, and fierce competition is beginning with BetMGM and other competitors beginning to grow their spend substantially as more states turn on.”
Monetizing the podcast network via advertising may be the lowest hanging fruit, even if podcast advertising remains in its nascent stages. But Jones sees the greatest upside for the business as developing original series—the plan is to do 8 to 10 a year—and the prospect of turning the storytelling into feature films, as Wondery has done: “Our bet is people are going to read less and listen to stories more over the next decade, and we’re going to build some of the best ones.”
John Kosner is quoted regarding the SEC’s decision to leave CBS for ESPN
Original Article: Alabama.com, by John Talty, December 10th, 2020
After being announced as the next Southeastern Conference commissioner in March 2015, Greg Sankey immediately started thinking about his conference’s next media rights deal.
ESPN had the majority of the SEC’s rights locked up through 2034, but the fate of the SEC on CBS package, considered the crown jewel of college football, had long been a source of intense speculation within the sports TV industry. For years, CBS benefited from one of the sweetest deals in sports TV, paying a mere $55 million annually to get the SEC’s weekly top game plus the SEC Championship.
After losing long-trusted TV advisor Chuck Gerber, who passed away that same year, Sankey opted to take his time and do his due diligence. In 2018, the SEC hired Evolution Media’s Alan Gold and CAA’s Nick Khan to guide the conference through the future media landscape. He consulted trusted deputies Charlie Hussey and Mark Womack as the senior SEC leadership weighed all of their options.
After years of consideration, Sankey and the SEC came to the conclusion it was time to go all-in with ESPN.
In a deal announced Thursday, though agreed to nearly a year ago, the premier package in college sports is leaving CBS for ESPN starting in 2024-25. Exact terms of the 10-year deal were not released though sources told AL.com the agreement is for upwards of $300 million annually, a massive increase from CBS’ price.
A key component of the deal will be a weekly SEC game on ABC, giving the league a much-desired broadcast platform once it leaves CBS. That will include a regular late afternoon kick like the SEC on CBS time slot but also the ability to feature the games in primetime for ABC’s Saturday Night Football. The strategy will be to “put the biggest games in the biggest places in front of the most people,” Burke Magnus, ESPN’s executive vice president of programming and scheduling, told AL.com in an interview.
RELATED: Winners and losers of SEC football leaving CBS
Magnus and his ESPN colleagues eyed the top SEC game package for years, waiting for their chance to pitch their plan to the SEC. Sources told AL.com last year landing the entire SEC inventory had long been a major priority for the company. Magnus had buy-in and support from his boss, ESPN president Jimmy Pitaro, and the big boss, former Disney CEO Bob Iger, to pursue a deal. When the conference indicated in 2019 it was ready to have that discussion, Magnus said, “We were ready when the phone call came.”
Beyond the massive cash component, a big selling point was the scheduling flexibility that would come with the SEC only having one scheduling partner. Magnus described it as a “one plus one equals three dynamic” where having every football game helped ESPN offer better distribution and exposure that no other entity could offer the SEC. One expected benefit is the league could schedule game times much further in advance without having to wait on CBS’ game of the week pick.
The opportunity to maintain a traditional broadcast spot plus the flexibility that comes with ESPN, the SEC Network and ESPN+ was too good for the SEC to pass up. Starting next year, ESPN+ can also air one non-conference game per school and up to two non-conference basketball games.
“All of those were important elements of this conversation and led us down the path to decide that the affiliation with the Disney brand, with ABC and ESPN, was going to be the right opportunity for our future,” Sankey told AL.com.
One of the looming questions over the deal will be if it will take until 2024 to go into effect. After ESPN closed in on acquiring the SEC rights last year, there was considerable industry speculation that it would also try to buy out CBS early from its contract with the SEC. According to sources, that desire hasn’t gone away, but no high-level discussions have taken place to this point. Magnus didn’t deny there was interest, though he pointed out it was “entirely outside of our control.”
“We’re not anticipating necessarily, but this partnership is so important to us that if there was an opportunity to discuss something in that regard, we’re open to that conversation,” Magnus said. “But only if it’s a positive development for all the parties.”
Sankey added, “CBS obviously continues to be an important relationship for the SEC and has been for many years, and even in this odd year of 2020, that remains. Our focus has been on the three years remaining in our agreements...and that’s really how we’ve looked at the situation, both at present and as we go forward.”
Once the deal goes into effect, it’ll be a significant financial boon for all 14 SEC schools. The SEC schools, which received more than $45 million last fiscal year, will receive at least an additional $15 million from this new deal alone. For ESPN, it will finally get the chance to televise every game it wants, from the Iron Bowl to Florida-Georgia, that CBS had picked for itself for the last two-plus decades.
“I think increasingly the media business is about must-have content,” John Kosner, president of Kosner Media and a former ESPN executive, told AL.com. “Not just having a lot of stuff, but having the stuff everyone wants to watch. The SEC games every week that CBS had are examples.”
John Talty is the sports editor and SEC Insider for Alabama Media Group. You can follow him on Twitter @JTalty.
John Kosner is quoted in SBJ profile of Bit Fry Founder & CEO Ben Freidlin
Original Article: Sports Business Journal, by Eric Prisbell, December 7th, 2020
The company’s first game brings athletes from multiple sports together on The Rink. Photo: Courtesy of Bit Fry Game Studios S even years ago, Ben Freidlin set about making an improbable vision a reality: trying to create an unlicensed baseball video game set in the 1920s…
John Kosner Quoted About Sports Betting Integration on TV Broadcasts
Original Article: Front Office Sports, by Michael McCarthy, October 19th, 2020
The NBA doesn’t know yet when it will tip off its next season. But one thing is certain: TV networks and media companies will increasingly experiment with more “alternate” game telecasts focused on sports betting.
During the 2019-20 season, the league teamed with TNT, Bleacher Report, The Action Network, and Yahoo Sports to experiment with live game telecasts or streams that featured expert gambling analysis, betting lines, and discussion of the odds.
During TNT’s coverage of the NBA Western Conference Finals, the network offered betting-minded viewers an alternate livestream feed called “TNT Bets.” It was hosted by B/R’s Cabbie Richards, Kelly Stewart, and Tim Doyle. The sports betting-focused feed was available to cable and satellite subscribers through the Watch TNT website.
Meanwhile, NBA Digital offered fans a dozen “NBA BetStream” telecasts this August via NBA TV and NBA League Pass. Presenting partner BetMGM provided real-time betting lines and stats. Even if consumers didn’t have access to NBA TV through their cable providers, they were able to buy BetStream through a direct-to-consumer subscription on NBA.com.
Chad Millman, the chief content officer at The Action Network, said these alternate telecasts are “exactly” what leagues and TV networks should be testing as sports TV audiences continue to fragment.
“They should be thinking about alternative broadcasts. They should be thinking about hyper-focusing on very engaged audiences,” said the former ESPN executive. “It’s only going to be more relevant — regardless of the pandemic situation.”
Scott Kaufman-Ross, the NBA’s head of fantasy and gaming, said he wants to create a more integrated experience for fans interested in live, in-game wagering.
“We view these telecasts as a great way to engage on a deeper level with our fans who are watching the game through a sports betting lens. This was a beta test. We wanted to learn from it,” said Kaufman-Ross about the BetStream games.
“We also worked with different influencers across Bleacher Report, The Action Network, and Yahoo Sports to experiment with different approaches and different expertise to learn what works best,” he added. “That will help our strategy as we go forward.”
Other networks have previously tested gambling-driven telecasts. NBC Sports Philadelphia experimented with a 10-game “BetCast” slate of Philadelphia 76ers games during the early stages of the 2019-20 season.
Even if they’re not doing it yet, most networks believe sports betting will be an important part of their future programming mix, according to John Kosner, president of Kosner Media.
“You will certainly see the acceleration of second screen and second channel integration with betting information because there’s a point of view that it’s coming — and that’s what fans want.”
“You will certainly see the acceleration of second screen and second channel integration with betting information because there’s a point of view that it’s coming — and that’s what fans want,” Kosner said.
The COVID-19 pandemic is not over. As more U.S. states legalize mobile betting, and the weather turns colder, sports betting is poised to “accelerate” among locked-down consumers this fall, predicted Kaufman-Ross.
Especially if the state of New York — which has over 19 million residents — finally legalizes mobile betting, instead of forcing gamblers to travel across the Hudson River to neighboring New Jersey.
“We feel a lot of our fans are consuming NBA content through the lens of sports betting. So we want to make sure to engage our fans where they are,” he said.
“We’ve often said we see sports betting as more of a pull than a push,” he added. “So if fans want sports betting content, we want to give it to them. If they don’t, it’s not necessarily something we’ll force on them. We think an alternate telecast is a great example of how we can accomplish that.”
The NBA’s alternate media partners are waiting to hear when the next season will tip-off, with recent comments pointing to a January-March 2021 start time. Once that decision is made, they’re ready to roll with more alternate sports betting telecasts.
The Action Network’s BetStream experience “went really well,” Millman said. He’s looking forward to serving some of the NBA’s most rabid fans next season.
“If you’re betting on the NBA, you are watching the NBA. You know every player. You’re betting not just on totals but on quarters and halves and player props,” he said.
“There are literally dozens of markets that the folks who are watching these games are betting on,” Millman added. “It just brings a different level of drama and insight.”
A spokesman for B/R confirmed the media outfit is interested in working on more TNT Bets projects next season. “It is definitely a path we are pursuing for the future,” he said.
John Kosner Appeared on Two Panels for SIGA Sport Integrity Week
Wednesday, September 9th: “ESPORTS: THE FUTURE, NOW!”
Thursday, September 10th: “SPORT INTEGRITY, TECHNOLOGY & INNOVATION: THE NEXT BIG THING”
For more information on the Sports Integrity Global Alliance, visit their website.
Kosner: “An Unforgiving Time” for Digital Sports Media Start-Ups
Original Article: Sportico, by John Wall Street, August 4th, 2020
Defector Media and the Local Media Consortium (think: an alliance of local media outlets) announced their respective plans to enter a crowded digital sports media landscape last week. Defector Media, a content co-op formed by 18 former Deadspin writers and editors, will launch a podcast later this month; their website will follow in September. The content and tone of the brand is expected to resemble that of the outlet the group collectively quit last year.
The Matchup, an effort by the Local Media Consortium to give sports fans access to more news about their favorite teams, will get started by making local publications available to all readers (their destination site will launch in ’21). A subscription to any one of the consortium’s individual publications will give the subscriber access to sports content from all of the outlets (without any additional cost).
The two companies intend to take vastly different approaches to the business (Defector will be subscription-based, while The Matchup will rely on advertising). But John Kosner (President, Kosner Media) says that “fundamentally, it’s an unforgiving time for either to enter the marketplace.” Existing competition aside, “the generation coming of age prefers video to print” (so any audience built threatens to age out over time), and much of the current generation of fans is pre-occupied with recovering from COVID-19, finding work or home-schooling their kids to allocate additional time and money to more sports content.
Our Take: The former CEO of a prominent sports media outlet said there is “enormous value”—from the fan perspective—in having access to the 2-5 articles/week that they might want to read but currently can’t because they reside behind a paywall (and it’s unrealistic to subscribe to each publication individually).
The former chief executive we spoke to called The Matchup “a death sentence” for The Athletic, another outlet operating on a ‘subscribe to one market, get the rest free’ model. That’s because despite having raised +/- $140 million in venture capital, it lacks the resources Google has (Google Media Initiative is funding The Matchup) and has significantly greater operating costs. While The Athletic has to fund its expansive network of writers, “the technology, the app, the marketing and the promotion [of all the content], all Google has to do [to put out a comparable product] is build the technology and the distribution opportunity, and they win. They’re building a publishing company without having to incur any of the costs.” If Google can get The Matchup to scale, it’s reasonable to assume sports won’t be the last digital media vertical the tech giant enters (think: news, business).
If there’s a reason to believe The Matchup is going to fail, Kosner says it’s because “there is no future in ad supported media”—not with a few outlets controlling the bulk of ad dollars (think: Facebook, Google, Amazon, YouTube, Snapchat). Brands have also stopped spending with newspapers over the last decade (see: advertising revenue is about 1/3 of what it was in 2008). But the former CEO we spoke to didn’t see that as a problem. They said advertisers wouldn’t look at The Matchup’s offering as “spending money on newspaper advertising. [Instead], they will look at it as spending ad dollars on a digital audience and trust that Google Adwords is able to funnel a certain amount of guaranteed money towards them.”
While the two c-level executives we spoke to didn’t necessarily see eye-to-eye on The Matchup, there was a consensus on Defector Media’s prospects: Neither believes the company is positioned to thrive in the current media environment. While Kosner readily acknowledged Deadspin did some fine reporting in its day and that several talented journalists have worked for the company, he isn’t convinced that the brand has a large enough following to operate on a subscription model. He pegged the entirety of their audience (i.e. those willing to read their free content) “probably in the hundreds of thousands of people—not in the millions.”
Defector had 10,000 subscribers (self-reported) sign-ups within the first few days. While that may sound like a lot, $960K in gross revenue ($8/mo.) obviously isn’t nearly enough to sustain a digital publishing company with 20 employees and real ambitions. The former CEO we spoke to isn’t expecting “that number to go up in any significant way from here, [either].” They said, “There’s a reluctance among consumers to sign up for paid products (only enhanced by the recession), and I just don’t see the former Deadspin crew—who lack relevance on an individual basis—[being another subscription most people would be willing to pay for]. If you told me that it was Bari Weiss, Andrew Sullivan and a bunch of big names were [pursuing this model, they would have a greater chance at success].”
It’s important to remember that “the media environment is also vastly different now [than when Deadspin was at its peak].” Kosner explained, “When Deadspin started in 2005 it was unique, and they had their own voice. Today, [that voice] is not particularly unique. In fact, a website with [the Deadspin] name still exists, trying to do some of the same things [this group wants to do].” The former CEO agreed, adding that the company no longer has a clear role in the sports media ecosystem. “They won’t be as high-minded journalistically as The Athletic,” They said. “They won’t be as deep and in the know as ESPN. They won’t be as much of a utility as Bleacher Report or as funny to enough people as Barstool. If someone really wants to read snark around sports, and they’re right wing they’ll read Outkick and if they’re left wing they’ll read Awful Announcing.”
Perhaps the biggest problem Defector Media faces is that some of its talent will inevitably bring more value to the outlet than others (think: revenue, attention)—a recipe for disaster when everyone is being compensated equally (or close to it). The former CEO explained, “The second somebody starts doing way better than the others, my guess is they fight, they split up and those who are doing great just make the move over to Substack.” Retaining top talent is always going to be a challenge.
Covid-19 Has the Power to Break the Sports World
Original Article: Covid-19 Has the Power to Break the Sports World, by Joe Nocera, July 22nd, 2020
“Staging sports right now is precarious and unprecedented,” said John Kosner, a sports business consultant and former ESPN executive. After decades of growth and prosperity, he added, “it is sports’ first existential crisis.”
Networks Fear NFL-Less fall
Original Article: AXIOS, by Mike Allen, July 8th, 2020
9. Networks fear NFL-Less fall
Inside an "NFL on Fox" production truck. Photo: Michael Abdella/Detroit Free Press via Reuters
While all major sports scramble to rescue their seasons, the networks are fixated on the NFL, which accounted for 41 of the 50 top-rated telecasts of any kind in 2019, the WashPost's Ben Strauss writes.
Why it matters: The NFL accounted for 39% of all ad revenue for Fox last year, 24% for CBS, 21% for NBC and 17% for ESPN (including ABC playoff simulcasts).
"It’s practically the only thing on the minds of the networks," John Kosner, a former ESPN executive who is an industry consultant, told the Post.
"If you lost an NFL season, you’re looking at a financial hemorrhage."
For TV networks, losing NFL season would be catastrophic
Original Article: The Washington Post, by Ben Strauss, July 2nd, 2020
Throughout the spring and into the summer — without the NBA playoffs and baseball’s opening weeks — the sports world has continued to feel the steady drumbeat of the NFL. The league opened free agency as usual, providing news-making moments such as Tom Brady signing with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and then its April draft went off without a hitch, delivering boffo ratings for ESPN.
For the TV networks and sports media outlets that cover the league, this has been most welcome. But as the calendar flips to July, with NFL training camps set to open at the end of the month, doubts have surfaced about the viability of football season. Novel coronavirus cases are spiking in states across the country. Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said football players may need to be in a bubble environment for the season to be played. Los Angeles Rams Coach Sean McVay wondered aloud how teams will be able to both play and take precautions.
“I mean, we’re going to social distance, but we play football?” McVay said during a recent media appearance. “It’s really hard for me to understand all this.”
While there remains plenty of optimism the NFL will play — somehow, someway — networks are fixated on the league’s fall schedule given its dominant position as America’s most valuable television property. They are invested, of course, in the planned returns of Major League Baseball, the NBA and other sports, but none carry the importance of the NFL, which accounted for 41 of the top 50 rated telecasts of any kind in 2019. The lack of certainty has led to uncomfortable conversations among executives.
“It’s practically the only thing on the minds of the networks,” said John Kosner, a former ESPN executive who is an industry consultant. “If you lost an NFL season, you’re looking at a financial hemorrhage.”
All four networks that broadcast the NFL — CBS, ESPN, Fox and NBC — declined to comment on contingency plans or how they are thinking about the 2020 season. But a senior ESPN employee recently lamented that there is no fallback plan even worth considering if the NFL cannot play, because nothing can replace the content or revenue that comes with it, according to a person with knowledge of the discussion. At Fox Sports, at least one executive has told an employee that no NFL season would mean trouble for the network, according to multiple people familiar with the discussion.
No network is more dependent on the NFL than Fox, which pays more than $1.5 billion each year for two NFL packages: one on Sunday afternoon and the other on Thursday night. The NFL, including pre- and postgame coverage, accounted for nearly 40 percent of the minutes spent viewing the network last year, according to research firm MoffettNathanson.
For the league’s other broadcast partners, the NFL’s share of minutes viewed was smaller but still a hefty 10 to 13 percent last year. ESPN pays roughly $2 billion for “Monday Night Football,” CBS pays roughly $1 billion for its Sunday package, and NBC pays $950 million for “Sunday Night Football.” All bring in massive amounts of advertising for their NFL games.
Data compiled by advertising measurement firm iSpot illustrates how valuable the league is in terms of ad dollars. Last football season, CBS raked in roughly $1.5 billion in NFL advertising, which represents nearly 25 percent of the network’s total advertising haul for 2019 (not including the Super Bowl). NBC collected shy of $1.5 billion, also more than 20 percent of the network’s ad dollars for last year.
Fox was the most reliant on the NFL, bringing in nearly $2 billion from the league’s games last season, not including the Super Bowl — an amount that would be 40 percent of the network’s overall ad revenue from 2019. Additionally, advertisers that buy into NFL games often also must buy packages for other programming across a network’s schedule.
The NFL numbers at ESPN were somewhat less significant — around $500 million and less than 20 percent of its advertising revenue — but they don’t come close to capturing the importance of NFL highlights and discussion segments to the 24-hour cable network’s studio programming. ESPN is also the network that is likely to be affected most by a canceled or shortened college football season, which is considered by health experts to be at greater risk than the NFL because of its lack of a central authority, varying testing policies and uncertainty over whether students will be able to return to campus this fall. ESPN and its Disney-owned broadcast partner, ABC, received more than $1 billion in advertising revenue from the sport last year.
The NBA and MLB are more important to regional sports networks. The entire MLB season and playoffs delivered less than $700 million to national broadcasters ESPN, Fox, Turner and MLB Network in 2019. The entire 2018-19 NBA season and postseason accounted for a total of roughly $1.5 billion for ESPN, ABC, Turner and NBA Network, according to iSpot.
Since the pandemic began, ESPN, Fox and NBC have asked top talent to take pay cuts as they treaded water waiting for sports to return. Current and former executives predicted far more draconian developments without an NFL season — from layoffs to severe cost savings to networks being forced to take out large loans. One former Fox executive predicted studio shows would be hit the hardest.
“As the recent COVID-19 data points turn more negative, we are growing increasingly worried that the scheduled return of all sports in the coming weeks and into the fall will be impacted in different ways, leading to more pain for our media companies,” read a MoffettNathanson report published in late June.
In the longer term, said David Hill, a former president of Fox Sports, missing an NFL season hurts the broadcast networks in their battle for relevance against streaming services such as Netflix. Their main advantage in that struggle, Hill said, remains the NFL, and sports continue to be one of the key drivers for consumers paying for cable packages. According to MoffettNathanson, traditional paid TV subscriptions fell by 1.8 million in the first quarter of this year as the pandemic hit and live sports were mostly canceled. It was the highest-ever rate of cord-cutting in a single quarter.
“The NFL is absolutely key because it plays into the essence of what the network is,” Hill said. “It’s becoming the only way that networks can talk to consumers. If families are sitting in their living rooms watching the streamers — and they’re not turning on the networks for the NFL — there’s going to be less awareness in anything they’re doing.”
Regardless of whether the NFL season goes ahead, the league’s broadcast agreements are set to expire in 2021 and 2022, meaning the same networks will have to pony up what many observers expect to be large increases in rights fees — potentially as much as double the current figures, some industry insiders believe — even as they are potentially scrambling to patch budget holes for the current year. This week, Fox ended its broadcast agreement with the U.S. Open golf tournament several years early, a move that indicates a further commitment to its core properties, the biggest of which is the NFL.
“If you miss the NFL season, I think it makes the networks even more desperate to sign it again,” Hill said.
Still, alongside the simmering concern about what a lost season might do to the networks is the hope for what a season could mean. Given the high ratings for the draft, plus the possibility that fans won’t be allowed to attend games and people could still be limited in what they can do outside, there remains the chance 2020 could be a banner year for NFL broadcasts.
Hill said that, for whatever uncertainty exists now and in the coming weeks, he believes the NFL will find a way to play its season.
“It’s one of the very rare, absolutely must-have items,” he said. “And I would imagine that everyone being locked inside would be good for them, too.”
Is A Superstar Exodus From Traditional Media Coming?
Original Article: John Wall Street, by Howie Long-Short, June 9th, 2020
The New York Post recently reported that Jason Whitlock is “believed to be looking into starting his own direct-to-consumer business.” Unable to come to terms on an extension with Fox Sports, the former Kansas City Star columnist is said to be considering the possibility of “sidestepping traditional media” in favor of trying his hand as a standalone media outlet. It remains to be seen if Whitlock ultimately ends up launching his own endeavor (he told Front Office Sports that he had conversations with Jimmy Pitaro about rejoining ESPN prior to the pandemic), but with the tools needed to be successful widely available (think: email distribution, social media platforms, video and podcast capabilities), the roadmap set (see: Bill Simmons, Joe Rogan) and Coronavirus bound to negatively impact talent budgets across the industry it begs to wonder if other high-profile sports media personalities will look to launch their own platforms at the expiration of their current deals.
Our Take: John Kosner (Kosner Media) foresees a superstar exodus on the horizon “in part because top talent will have no choice but to examine what they could do [in a D2C capacity] moving forward.” The former ESPN EVP of digital/print media explained that as the established players’ own businesses continue to shrink (think: post-COVID economy in the short-term, cord-cutting in the long-term), their budgets for talent are going to decrease accordingly. When high-paid talent comes up on the end of their contracts, they'll likely have to decide between taking a salary reduction or launching their own digital outlet (or both).
““The Sports Illustrated of the future might be a collective of the most influential voices.””
Transformational talent (the D2C model only works for those on the A-List) no longer needs to work for an established media company with readily available D2C channels enabling them to both push out content and build a following. In fact, a prominent C-Level executive at one sports network suggested that remaining employed with a legacy player could actually hold capable individuals back from achieving a major financial payday. He cited Bill Simmons, who was reportedly earning ‘just’ $3 million/year at ESPN before leaving for HBO in 2015, as an example of a personality who brought significantly more value to his/her employer than he/she was being compensated for. The Ringer founder managed to parlay his brand and podcast empire into a $196 million payday back in February (Spotify bought the company).
If the D2C movement gathers steam Kosner suggested it could result in the creation of a new content bundle. “The Sports Illustrated of the future might be a collective of the most influential voices - each with their own digital subscription service - who could make more money packaged together then they could if they were each a standalone.” Customers would have the ability to personalize their individual package with their choice of different "experts".
Simmons, Dave Portnoy and Joe Rogan have all managed to experience tremendous success in the emerging D2C space, but that doesn't mean what they've done can be easily replicated. As Kosner reminds, “those men are personalities and there aren’t a lot of other examples of individuals who have built valuable media companies within the sports world." That's because aside from being hard work, it’s difficult to monetize digital media with the likes of Facebook and Google dominating ad budgets.
Subscription is the only viable business model for most in the digital space (few have the audience size needed to monetize existing platforms the way Rogan has), so a new media co. will likely need to generate content people would be willing pay for if it's going to be successful. That's easier said than done. Kosner said to build a paid subscriber base the outlet needs "to be in the business of telling the audience something they don’t already know (i.e. consumers are not paying for hot takes), be able to do it consistently and deliver the insight on platforms the audience cares about” (see: podcasting).
It reasons to believe there are media personalities who believe because they’ve managed to accumulate “tremendous follower numbers on platforms like Twitter and Instagram” that they could/would be capable of launching a widely profitable D2C subscription service. But it’s important to remember that none of those social media followers are paying for the content produced and as Kosner said it’s “not trivial to convert people who are used to being served content for free into paid subs; particularly when some - or all - of the personality’s best contributions are available for free elsewhere” (like on Twitter and IG).
If top-end talent ends up deciding to take salary reductions Kosner believes it could come with some additional freedoms (as opposed to the exclusive terms the legacy players currently enjoy). The tech and media investor said he“could see a scenario where the media personality remains with a traditional outlet to do television at a reduced salary (as that is where much of the advertising value lies), but they’re allowed to take their digital presence elsewhere” (and monetize to the best of their ability). The sports media exec we spoke to agreed and mentioned Pat McAfee and Clay Travis as examples of individuals already pursuing that path. “[Those guys] are selling their services almost as if they were individual studios.”
ABC, ESPN Could ‘MegaCast’ Raiders Vs. Saints in Las Vegas
Original Article: Front Office Sports, by Michael McCarthy, June 3rd, 2020
Circle “Monday Night Football’s” Week 2 telecast during the NFL’s upcoming 2020 season. Not only will it be the Las Vegas Raiders’ first home date, but the September 21 game will also mark ABC’s first regular-season NFL telecast in 15 years.
On the 50th anniversary of “Monday Night Football,” Walt Disney Co. sister networks ABC and ESPN will both televise the Raiders vs. New Orleans Saints.
Broadcast network ABC could televise a straightforward simulcast of ESPN’s telecast. However, ESPN may “MegaCast” that evening’s “Monday Night Football” game the way it offers more than a dozen alternate watching options for the CFP National Championship Game, said sources.
That means ABC and ESPN could employ different teams of announcers, different camera angles, or different coverage approaches, for the same NFL game.
ESPN’s telecast, for example, would feature the regular announcing crew that calls every game. ABC’s coverage, on the other hand, might offer viewers the opportunity to hear the home team’s local radio announcers call the game. In this case, it would be Brent Musburger, the play-by-play voice of the Raiders.
Or ABC could offer viewers the ability to watch the game from different angles, such as the popular SkyCam view above and behind the action on the field.
Having a single media partner offer alternate game telecasts on sister networks would mark a radically new approach for the NFL.
For decades, ESPN, CBS, NBC, Fox and NFL Network offered one announce team and one telecast per game, giving viewers no other choice if they wanted to watch the game.
One of the few exceptions is during ESPN’s annual season-opening “Monday Night Football” doubleheader, which requires two broadcast crews. This season, ESPN will again employ different announce teams on Sep. 14, which will feature the Pittsburgh Steelers at New York Giants and Tennessee Titans at Denver Broncos.
Besides the CFP National Championship, Disney has been MegaCasting the NFL Draft for several years, noted former ESPN executive John Kosner.
ESPN offers the traditional X’s and O’s version of the Draft with guru Mel Kiper and Trey Wingo. ABC, on the other hand, takes a more college football-centric approach with Kirk Herbstreit and the “College GameDay” crew. Kosner called using that same approach for live games as a “differentiating opportunity for ESPN.”
“Even if there’s a ‘one size fits all’ game call that serves the majority of viewers, an event of the magnitude of ‘Monday Night Football’ lends itself to a broader audience approach,” he said.
Gus Ramsey, the former ESPN producer turned program director at the Dan Patrick School of Broadcasting, thinks plenty of viewers would watch an alternate call by Musburger. Or other different studio shows on the Las Vegas Strip and inviting entertainers to stop by to turn the game into more of a spectacle. Or even have its fantasy sports expert Matthew Berry host a fantasy football-focused telecast.
“Let’s start with the premise, and it’s a fair one, that not everybody is necessarily in love with the broadcast team – regardless of who it is or who it might be. So maybe on one channel, you get the home radio team. On the other, you get the visiting radio team. Then you simulcast them along with the game,” said Ramsey.
READ MORE: Why ESPN Bets The House On College Football ‘MegaCast.’
The NFL has made some inroads into multiple telecasts of the same game.
The league already tri-casts “Thursday Night Football” on broadcast TV on Fox, cable TV on NFL Network, and digital on Amazon Prime Video and Twitch. Amazon’s streaming coverage does not feature Fox/NFL Network’s “Thursday Night Football” announce team of Joe Buck, Troy Aikman, and Erin Andrews.
Instead, Amazon hired Hannah Storm and Andrea Kremer to deliver an optional feed to Fox’s coverage to more than 200 countries in 2018. They’re the only female crew to call live NFL games.
In 2017, the NFL signed a one-year streaming deal with Amazon, which owns Twitch, worth $50 million. Amazon and the NFL signed a two-year extension the next year at a rate of $65 million per season. This spring, the two sides signed a three-year extension worth over $200 million.
Meanwhile, both ESPN and Fox Sports offer separate, Spanish-language versions of “Monday Night Football” and “Thursday Night Football” on ESPN Deportes and Fox Deportes.
Before the kickoff of the 2019 season, Brian Rolapp, the NFL’s executive vice president of media, said the league was “certainly open” to more alternate video/audio/digital feeds as more viewers migrate from linear to digital platforms.
“You see what we’re doing on ‘Thursday Night Football.’ We’re not only distributing 11 of those games on Amazon Prime but they’re also on Twitch (a platform for gamers),” said Rolapp.
On Monday, NFL spokesman Alex Reithmiller said the league’s stance hadn’t changed.
The NFL will continue to “experiment,” mostly around “Thursday Night Football” which the league uses as a laboratory for new programming ideas, according to Riethmiller.
MegaCasting “Monday Night Football” could help ESPN down the road too.
ESPN’s $2 billion a year “Monday Night Football” contract expires after the 2021 season. MegaCasting could give Disney more ammo as it enters contract negotiations.
As a broadcast network, ABC reaches more homes and viewers than a cable network like ESPN. Bringing the bigger ABC into the mix would help ESPN reach cord-cutters and cord-shavers who have dropped their cable TV packages.
There’s also been speculation Disney wants to shift “Monday Night Football” to ABC from ESPN. Or acquire a second NFL TV package for ABC, which will feature better games and flexible scheduling.
Getting viewers comfortable watching live NFL game coverage on ABC again is a strategic way to do it. ABC televised the first “Monday Night Football” game between Joe Namath’s New York Jets and the Cleveland Browns on Sep. 21, 1970.
As MegaCasting becomes more popular, look for other media and digital companies to experiment with alternate video/audio feeds and more interactive elements, predicted Kosner.
“I expect NFL broadcasters will move aggressively in this direction.”
“Amazon has pioneered two women in a booth for ‘Thursday Night Football.’ The NFL attracts a significant Hispanic audience; Twitch has featured the popular streamer Ninja around Detroit Lions games,” Kosner said. “There are many, many ways to go. I expect NFL broadcasters will move aggressively in this direction.”
READ MORE: NFL Embracing MultiCast Approach To Live Game Coverage
After reassigning Booger McFarland and Joe Tessitore to new duties, ESPN still hasn’t announced its “Monday Night Football” broadcast crew for 2020. So the decision on whether or not to MegaCast Raiders-Saints is still a ways off.
An ESPN spokesman indicated specific broadcast plans for Raiders-Saints will be announced closer to the start of the NFL season. ESPN declined to comment on NFL rights negotiations.
The NFL’s average viewership grew 5% during the 2019 season to 16.5 million average viewers per game. The league generated 47 of the top 50 most-watched shows on TV. ESPN scored its most-watched NFL season since 2015 averaging 12.6 million viewers, up 8% over the year before.
Sports Leagues are Preparing for an Era Without Fans
Original Article: Axios Sports, by Kendall Baker, May 13, 2020
At the turn of the century, futurist Watts Wacker predicted that sports stadiums of the future would essentially be sound stages optimized for TV, rather than coliseum-like structures built to seat thousands of fans.
Why it matters: Prior to the coronavirus, things were already moving in this direction, with teams building smaller, more intimate venues in response to declining attendance and changing viewing habits.
And now, as we transition from the No Sports Era to the No Fans Era, Wacker's prophecy has become reality — albeit under circumstances he could never have anticipated.
The state of play: Our sports-less odyssey is nearing its end, but fans won't be packing stadiums any time soon, meaning a return to normalcy is still months away.
According to a FiveThirtyEight/Ipsos poll of more than 1,000 Americans, only 24% of respondents said they would be either very likely or somewhat likely to attend a sporting event right now if government restrictions were lifted. 58% said they would be "not at all likely."
When asked what condition would make them feel comfortable attending a game, respondents overwhelmingly answered "the development of a COVID-19 vaccine," which isn't likely until 2021 at the earliest. And 27% said even a vaccine wouldn't do the trick.
The big picture: For athletes and coaches, empty stadiums will create a surreal environment that lacks the energy and noise that fans provide.
"There's a reason why people say fans play such an integral role in the process of the game. When you don't have fans and that atmosphere, it becomes flat. And it becomes a lot of forced energy and a lot of moments you are trying to create instead of it creating it for you."
— Diamondbacks pitcher Luke Weaver, via USA Today
As for the broadcasts, fanless games will likely accelerate changes already in development, sports media consultant and former ESPN executive John Kosner tells me. And some of those changes could be permanent.
"We will see the use of new technologies come to the fore, with things like augmented reality used to cover empty seats and actual crowd noise pumped in from fans watching remotely," says Kosner. "All to bring sight, sound and emotion to the otherwise drab proceedings."
"You already see elements of fan interactivity on Twitch and in gaming — now we could see that take hold on traditional sports telecasts. More trivia, social media integrations, the option to choose the next guest."
"What makes me optimistic is that we'll come up with some good ideas here that will be part of the 'new normal' once we get to the other side, and that we'll come out of this dark period with a greater appreciation for how important fans are."
Go deeper: How sports media is handling the coronavirus outage
A New Reality Powered by AI
Original Article: Sports Business Journal, by Eric Prisbell, April 13th 2020
The challenges ahead for the sports industry will expedite the growth and impact of artificial intelligence, the result of technology meeting demand.
n the morning of Jan. 8, Mark Cuban likened the global pursuit of unlocking artificial intelligence’s full potential to the 20th century space race, enlightening a packed ballroom of entrepreneurs and media and industry leaders at CES 2020 in Las Vegas with an AI endorsement as clear as it was declarative.
The Dallas Mavericks owner said that businesses that don’t embrace AI will soon become dinosaurs. AI will separate the haves from have-nots who “might as well rip out all the computers in your office and throw away your phones,” he said. And, Cuban added, if you don’t use AI now, “you’re the equivalent of somebody in 1999 saying, ‘Yeah, I’m sure this internet thing will be OK, but I don’t give a shit.’”
Three months later, Cuban’s words resonate with even more urgency. The world has been turned upside down amid the COVID-19 pandemic, thrust into a historic health and economic crisis that promises to dramatically alter all aspects of life for the foreseeable future. While the priority is saving lives and curtailing the virus’s spread, sport is a multibillion-dollar, multifaceted industry that will rely heavily on AI-powered solutions as it confronts a plethora of broad challenges in the uncertain months ahead.
“Before coronavirus, artificial intelligence and technologies such as computer vision and machine learning have been changing sports,” said John Kosner, the former longtime ESPN Digital executive who invests in and advises a portfolio of tech startups. “After coronavirus, they will transform them. It is all going to be so integrated into the sports experience, an indispensable part of the mix.”
Kosner is among those who believe that the sports world will be pressed to create “premium versions of themselves,” including high-end content like advanced statistics, customized highlights and immersive experiences (VR/AR), to begin to try to make up for lost gate revenue. These technologies will be used to create innovations to attract and engage fans.
Industry leaders will seek to create more self-serve experiences for those either unable to return to sporting venues and health clubs because of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, or unwilling to because of the psychological impact of what they are enduring. Then there are unknown elements, such as how much discretionary income fans may have once live sporting events return, that will need to be factored into decisions by leagues, teams and sports businesses.
The sports world’s future is foggy. But AI’s potential in sports is “pretty close to endless,” said Andrew Robinson, the CTO for Dallas-based Event Dynamic, which uses AI to optimize ticket prices for teams. “The real power that AI is able to bring to bear is the ability to analyze data so much faster than what a human could do and in a retrainable way that can constantly learn, evolve and get better.”
Technologies such as machine learning, computer vision and deep learning, among others, all fall under the umbrella of AI, which remains in the early stages of benefiting the sports ecosystem even as more organizations have hired data scientists, developers and others in business intelligence roles. The sports business’s recovery from the global pandemic will accelerate AI’s impact — and perhaps vice versa as well — the result of an emerging technology meeting opportunity and demand. And according to those who invest in, develop and lead AI-powered businesses, the outcome is expected to be revolutionary.
“It’s going to have significant impact,” said Keith Bank, a Chicago-area veteran of the venture capital industry and CEO and founder of the firm KB Partners. “A lot of AI things that have originally been used maybe by the elite athletes and organizations, teams and leagues are going to filter down to the everyday person. There’s going to be a whole new wave of companies that take what has happened over the last month and figure out ways to hopefully capitalize. Where people work is going to change. Where people view sports is going to change. The way people view sports is going to change. There’s going to be a sea change. There’s going to be some long-lasting and permanent innovations that come from this.”
HOW CONTENT IS MADE
If live sporting events return before fans are allowed in venues, an emphasis will be placed on enhancing the broadcast. Kosner envisions the potential of live video shots of fans and influencers watching the game at home being interspersed into the live game broadcast to liven up what otherwise would be a game devoid of crowd noise.
Consider the possibilities unlocked by a company like Kiswe, which essentially is a television truck and control room in the cloud. It has enabled the NBA to personalize international broadcasts with live games in local languages. It also has worked with NBA TV (a joint venture between Turner and the NBA) to produce “FrontCourt,” offering a marquee game of the night with alternative talent that includes athletes, coaches and celebrities. With the need now for remote productions, they are helping NBA TV to produce “GameTime,” “Hardwood Classics” and more for digital and linear television.
“While the traditional model is that the truck makes the broadcast for the audience,” Kosner said, “we are moving to a model where the audience makes content for the game.”
Jeff Volk, Deltatre’s head of business and revenue, Americas, said AI will help “put the power in the viewer’s hands.”
“We are moving to a model where the audience makes content for the game.”
“We know sports fans want to be able to shape a viewing experience that meets their tastes and needs,” Volk said. “What is exciting about the world of sports is that fans consume our programming predominantly live, and they always want more: more data, more interactivity, more customization. The data have shown that fans are hungry for this type of innovation, and we know they’ll pay more for personalization options. In fact, 72% of sports fans view personalization as ‘important’ and 71% of sports fans crave ‘deeper immersion’ when watching live games.”
StreamLayer allows video stream viewers to interact with the content, from social media to merchandise to in-game wagering.
Along those lines, the Chicago-based company StreamLayer, founded in mid-2018, has developed video overlay technology that sits on top of any video stream. By clicking on the icon in the lower right-hand corner — whatever network logo that icon may be — the user calls up a menu displaying ways to interact with that video while still watching that event. It’s a transparent layer that allows a viewer to see social media feeds and chat with friends, buy merchandise or tickets, or even gamble on live action.
“It’s a way to make available to viewers all the interactive components an especially younger generation wants,” said Bank, whose KB Partners is the lead and largest investor in StreamLayer. “They can’t sit through a three-hour baseball game. They want to be doing other things. We believe it’s the wave of the future. It provides a much more engaging consumer experience. It provides all kinds of new revenue channels for rights holders. There’s also a gamification piece to it.”
The ability to personalize content is also one element of MLB’s announcement last month that Google Cloud is now its official cloud and cloud data and analytics partner. That will lead to reinventing Statcast, the automated tool for analyzing player movements and abilities. Chris Marinak, MLB’s executive vice president for strategy, technology and innovation, has been bullish on the potential of computer vision to revolutionize the viewing experience for fans. In a lengthy interview before the pandemic shut down sports, he painted a picture of cameras set up throughout the ballpark tracking everything, not just where the ball went.
“But also how fast did someone go, and not just how fast did they move their body but how fast did they move their foot, their arm, their arm angle, their bat, their glove,” Marinak said. “You’re going to have an infinite level of data and information around what’s happening on the field. That’s going to revolutionize how fans consume sports. It’s going to be who turned the quickest double play and why, who has the best footwork at second base. Those types of things will be data points that you’ll be able to get immediate access to.”
ANSWERS ARE IN THE DATA
Businesses use AI to train a machine to do a task that was previously done by humans. For the Tel Aviv-based WSC Sports, that includes revolutionizing the creation and distribution of video highlights. It eschews the manual process by using AI to personalize content for fans and customize it to geographic regions. Achieving this in real time, the technology uses audio and visual cues to pinpoint key moments in a game to curate highlights.
The NBA has been using this technology since 2014. Bob Carney, the league’s senior vice president of social and digital strategy, calls it a “game-changer” for the NBA, adding that it takes only a few minutes now to create more than 1,000 highlight packages.
What’s next for WSC Sports is more personalized highlight packages. Leagues may begin to roll out highlight packages as licensed products tailored to fans’ individual preferences. Does a fan prefer a 70-second highlight clip or a two-minute clip? Does she want to see all the behind-the-back passes that led to baskets on a particular night of games? That could be possible as well.
Kosner has been advising WSC Sports to understand the value of its metadata, not merely what it produces. “Don’t just think about all these projects and things you’re enabling, but what is it that you know?” he said. “What’s the perfect duration for a condensed game? Does it vary by sport, by country? Insights like these are made possible by these technologies and are priceless. Companies collecting the data are the ones who are going to understand it.”
One company that understands the increasing value of its data is Boston-based Whoop, a favorite of PGA Tour players — including Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas — that tracks key measurements including heart rate variability, resting heart rate and sleep staging to help members of its service optimize their performance and overall well-being. Whoop’s memberships range from $30 a month for a six-month commitment to $18 for 18 months, and hardware is included in the price.
Most importantly in these unprecedented times, Whoop announced on April 1 that data collected via its wrist-worn Strap 3.0 from hundreds of self-identified COVID-19 patients who are Whoop members would be part of a study by CQUniversity in Australia, in collaboration with the Cleveland Clinic.
Data collected by Whoop’s wearable technology (below), used by golfer Rory McIlroy, will be used in a study of COVID-19 in Australia and the U.S. The company has found that measuing respiratory rate can be an early signal of the disease’s symptoms.
Since early March, members have been able to toggle on COVID-19 as an option to indicate they have the virus. When members make note of that, they are given the option to fill out a survey about their symptoms. Each day they have COVID-19 toggled on (indicating they still feel symptoms), they receive a shorter check-in survey in the app to provide any updates on their condition.
After seeing hundreds of people respond in the first 24 hours — and many more since — the company asked permission to use the data for research purposes. In the individuals’ data examined, the company has seen that an elevated respiratory rate — effectively the number of breaths per minute — could be a specific precursor to COVID-19 symptoms.
Earlier this year, Whoop, founded in 2012, became the first wrist-worn wearable device to validate the accuracy of its respiratory rate during sleep in a third-party study conducted by the University of Arizona and published in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine.
“Our goal at Whoop is to provide as much thought leadership and research as we can around COVID-19,” said Will Ahmed, the company’s founder and CEO. “It’s all hands on deck across humanity to fight this virus and beat it. Anything that can be a potential indicator should be on the table. We believe respiratory rate may be an early indicator, and that may be something organizations can use to help predict this thing in light of the fact that we [the United States] are short on tests and we are trying to figure this thing out as fast as possible.
PERFORMANCE ASSISTANCE
If there is a premium on more and better personal data related to health and performance, the best wearables and performance-related technologies will be in high demand.
Consider ShotTracker, which uses sensors on basketballs to provide valuable shooting data in real time. The data informs assistant coaches via iPads during games and, in turn, can enhance television broadcasts with data related to shooting tendencies and the motion of players. As sports betting moves toward legalization in more states, the data could also be used in venues among fans to inform microbets during games because there is sub-second latency.
During the 2019-20 season, ShotTracker enjoyed a partnership with the Mountain West Conference, enabling it to be used in all men’s and women’s basketball conference games, where statistics were used both during games by coaches as a teaching tool and during broadcasts to inform viewers.
Dan Butterly, the MWC’s senior associate commissioner, called the technology an “unbelievably great product if you want to improve in basketball, not just shooting. With the number of statistics available, our coaches have said that players look at it even more than they do because [the players] want to improve.”
ShotTracker also had partnerships with several other marquee men’s basketball teams this past season, including No. 1-ranked Kansas, No. 5 Baylor, Big Ten co-champion Wisconsin and BYU, which led the nation in three-point shooting. Those programs used the system in practice, but not games because not every team in the respective leagues had a partnership.
The emerging smart apparel industry could be the post-pandemic answer for those reluctant to return to health clubs, personal trainers and even physical therapists. Asensei, founded in 2014, won an award for most innovative fitness company at the Fitness & Active Brands Summit in Los Angeles last December because of its unique technology. Its smart apparel is infused with a network of sensors for full-body motion capture combined with a connected coaching app that turns biomechanic data into real-time coaching insights. The technologies give Asensei sport-specific understanding of posture and movement by embedding motion capture capabilities directly into sports apparel, allowing Asensei to guide, monitor and correct biomechanics.
Asensei CEO Steven Webster said that even prior to the multitude of stay-at-home orders nationwide, millions of people were already watching fitness content on screens and devices. But his technology helps ensure people work out correctly and safely.
“Without what Asensei calls Connected Coaching, connected fitness is still just a spectator sport,” Webster said. “It’s basically the same thing that Jane Fonda introduced to the world in 1982. Consumers want to be guided through workout programs, while also being corrected on their technique and form. And overnight, not only has the need become more acute, it has become a need shared by the entire at-home sport and fitness market, not just a percentage share of it.”
HOW WILL FANS RETURN?
In such uncertain times, it will be critical for teams and leagues to have strong and efficient lines of communication with their fans, which is where chatbots and virtual assistants come in. Satisfi Labs, the AI-powered knowledge management platform, has more than 200 clients in sports, entertainment and tourism, including more than 100 in professional and college sports. In mid-March, it trained its chatbots to understand and provide answers to countless questions by fans regarding COVID-19 and topics related to it, such as ticket refunds.
ShotTracker uses sensors on basketballs to relay information to coaches and broadcast partners about players’ shooting tendencies and motion.
That technology will be increasingly critical for teams as fans seek information related to when fans will be permitted back into venues, what medical protocols may be in place and any changes that will be enacted regarding social distancing, concessions or ticketing policies. Don White, the CEO of Satisfi Labs, said an increasing number of people realize that the feedback teams traditionally have received from surveys represents only a fraction of what they could get if they could aggregate “what is already flying through their walls every game.”
“I think that is the future,” White said in an interview just before the pandemic grew. “If I were going back to school I’d be focusing heavily on data science, and I believe the sports industry is the perfect place. Data is your life. Data will never go away. There’s never going to be less of it. That’s an industry you can bet on.”
One company especially eager for games to return and to return with fans in venues is Event Dynamic. The company, which launched last year, is the first in the ticketing industry to successfully use its patent-pending AI technology to optimize ticket prices for live events across professional and college sports in pursuit of maximizing revenue and increasing attendance. The company incorporates almost countless factors — winning/losing streaks, weather, the opponent, bobblehead nights, etc. — to ensure that tickets are priced so that they have the best chance of selling.
When games return, the challenge will be also factoring in the potential short-term hesitance of families to return to mass gatherings and the possibility of diminished discretionary income, which could vary by market. Robinson, the company’s CTO, said their algorithm will react on its own to the change in demand. And right now, no one can quantify that level of demand.
“We know there is a lot of uncertainty but we also know that if you go three or four months down our road map, our technology is that much more powerful, and we’re still building,” said Robinson, later adding, “We already believe that our algorithms will adapt and adjust faster than everyone else’s anyway. Our product was built to react to changes in demand. ... I think the difference between the winners and losers coming out of this is, one, you’ve got to survive [as a business]. Two, after you get to the other side, what do you look like?”