NBA boss found the Silver lining of social media
BULLS OF THE WEEK
This week’s Variety Sports and Entertainment Summit in Los Angeles revealed another example of why the NBA’s Adam Silver is the most progressive commissioner in all of North American pro sport.
The summit recalled Silver’s reluctance to sue YouTube when many others wanted to and did in the years after its launch in 2005, pointing to his view that getting NBA game highlights out there was simply good marketing.
Twelve years later, YouTube prevails and Silver is the pace bunny for best practices in media rights, social media marketing, artificial intelligence, virtual reality, e-sports and just about every other aspect of high technology in the business of sport.
Speaking of L.A., it was another monster week for the National League’s Dodgers, owners of a .688 winning percentage and remarkable 66-30 record heading into the weekend. Purchased out of bankruptcy protection for US$2 billion in 2012, the Dodgers have replaced the New York Yankees as the biggest spenders in Major League Baseball under the ownership of Guggenheim Baseball Management.
Their payroll of US$255 million includes a ridiculous US$62 million of retained and buried salary from contracts that failed in the early years of the free-spending new ownership. Yet if the Dodgers — valued at US$2.75 billion by Forbes magazine, second only to the Yankees — can maintain this run and win a World Series, no one will question the return on investment.
Meanwhile, no one had a more bullish week than 35-year-old Roger Federer, who rested in the afterglow of his record eighth Wimbledon championship and 19th Grand Slam title last Sunday. Wins this year on the ATP Tour have jacked his career prize money up to US$107 million.
Winning the title in 21 straight sets at Wimbledon means Federer should be among the favourites to win at the U.S. Open next month. If and when that happens, the Federer legend and brand will only grow on the unfathomable milestone of 20 majors. According to Forbes Magazine, that brand translates into annual earnings of about US$64 million a year.
BEARS OF THE WEEK
The Dodgers are currently leading MLB on the field, in attendance and in merchandising. Now all they need to do is find a way to get their games to the vast majority of their fans who have been blacked out by the ugly television distribution dispute between cable company Spectrum and DirectTV, Verizon and other rival TV operators
in southern California. The dispute over Spectrum’s steep $5-per-month subscriber fees limits telecasts of this starstudded team on Dodgers-owned SportsNet L.A. to about 30 per cent of the available market of 17 million people in the market area. That’s quite the disaster considering Time Warner Cable, since acquired by Spectrum, paid US$8.3 billion for a quartercentury’s worth of Dodgers TV rights. It’s the Dodgers deal and Spectrum’s problem, but you would have to think someone will intervene soon for a resolution to a dispute that is now in its fourth year.
The Sport Market on TSN 1040 rates and debates the bulls and bears of sport business. Join Tom Mayenknecht Saturday from 7 to 11 a.m. for a behind-the-scenes look at the sport business stories that matter most to fans. Follow Tom Mayenknecht at: Twitter.com/TheSportMarket