Sport & Story Daily April 11, 2024

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April 11, 2024

Good morning! Coach Cal Era Begins

John Calipari Officially Hired as Arkansas Men's Basketball Coach
Well, it’s pretty anticlimactic at this point, but it’s now official. Per ESPN, Calipari, 65, signed a five-year contract starting at $7 million per season -- less than the $8.5 million he was making with the Wildcats. The deal, announced Wednesday, includes a $1 million signing bonus and $500,000 retention bonuses each year of the contract, plus incentives for making the NCAA tournament and advancing deep into the tournament.
^espn.com

In Olympic First, Track Gold Medalists to Get $50K in Paris
As FOS’ Eric Schiffer reports, gold medalists will net $50,000 in Paris, World Athletics said Wednesday and was reported via FOS, making it the first sport to pay out prize money at the Olympics, which has typically been an amateur event. Silver and gold payouts reportedly are coming in the 2028 Summer Games.
^{frontofficesports.com}

Masters Making Way for PGA Tour, LIV Stakeholders to Discuss Future
During a press conference Tuesday morning and then covered by FOS, defending Masters champion Jon Rahm said he had hoped his move to LIV would expedite negotiations between the PGA Tour and the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, but he admitted his influence is minimal. “Unfortunately, it’s not up to me,” he said. But later in the day, Rahm spoke one-on-one with Rory McIlroy—perhaps the Tour’s biggest supporter in the battle with LIV—for several minutes on the driving range. He also made nice with Tour members Tony Finau and Tom Kim before heading out to a practice round with European Ryder Cup teammate Nicolai Højgaard. 
^{frontofficesports.com}

Your Vision Insights: The Impact of MLB Game Attendance on Sponsorship Consideration

Brands activate with teams due to the ability to tap into the emotions fans have for their favorite clubs and the way they garner presence and affiliation across TV broadcasts, social/digital media, onsite, and everywhere in between.

Vision Insights examined the impact that game attendance has on the likelihood of an MLB fan considering purchasing a sponsor’s products/services due to their partnership. What we saw is that consideration increases from 28% to 67% when going from an MLB Fan who attends no games in a typical season to MLB fans who are season-ticket holders.

That is an increase of 139%. So, the number of games a fan attends is linked to how receptive they will be to sponsors.

NBA BOG Meetings to Hit on Media Deal, T'Wolves
The NBA’s Board of Governors meetings conclude today with an afternoon Adam Silver press conference that is expected to focus on national media rights negotiations and the acrimonious T'Wolves sale.

Sources said the meetings, which began Monday, were expected to provide in-depth updates on the league’s exclusive negotiating window with incumbent media companies Disney and Turner. That window ends on April 22, whereupon the NBA will certainly begin talks with Amazon, Apple, Google/YouTube TV, Netflix and NBC/Comcast.
^{sportsbusinessjournal.com}

Masters Ratings Will Show if Golf Fans Have PGA Tour-LIV Golf Fatigue
As Barrett Sports Media’s Mark Kreidler writes, “The PGA’s ongoing fight with the Saudi-backed LIV Golf – and it’s still a fight, even though the two sides announced 10 months ago that they’d work on combining forces – sure feels like it has begun to exhaust fans of the sport.”

“Ratings are down,” PGA Tour vice president Laura Neal told reporters recently. “Can we link that directly to the conflict and fans being fatigued and annoyed or bored, or whatever you might say? Simple answer is, yes-ish. But there’s more to it.”
^{barrettsportsmedia.com}

ComScore: ESPN in Feb. Leads in Digital, Social
As reported by SBJ’s Austin Karp, “ESPN maintained its top position among sports outlets on digital and social media platforms in February after a record-setting January, per new data from comScore. ESPN Digital has now held the No. 1 spot in the U.S. sports category for two straight years now. There was 103.4 million unique visitors across its outlets for February, tops in sports, but lower than the 121.7 million to start the year.”
^{sportisbusinessjournal.com}

Messi or Not, MLS Teams Make Big Plans For Inter Miami
Inter Miami won the 2023 Leagues Cup in a shootout win over Nashville FC with Messi coming in as a sub. The team’s valuation has skyrocketed to over a billion dollars, a 74% increase over the last year, according to Sportico’s MLS valuations. Ticket prices at the newly renamed Chase Stadium doubled (if not tripled) in price. Ares Management Corp. (NYSE: ARES) closed on a $75 million preferred equity stake investment in the franchise two weeks after Messi debuted.
^sportico.com

New Tennessee Women's Basketball Coach Kim Caldwell Embraces High Expectations
As Yahoo! Sports’ Ian Casselberry writes, “Athletic director Danny White provided an incentive in Caldwell's contract to achieve that goal, putting a clause in the agreement that would make her the highest-paid coach in women's college basketball if she wins a national title.” Casselberry also notes, “Caldwell's five-year contract will pay her a $750,000 annual salary. That figure ranks her seventh among SEC coaches. South Carolina's Dawn Staley and LSU's Kim Mulkey earn more than $3 million each.”

"I did that because I wanted y’all to see that," White said, per the Knoxville News Sentinel's Mike Wilson. "I did that before I knew who we were hiring. I didn’t know if we were going to spend multi-(millions), seven figures on a new coach or if we were going to spend what we spent."
^{sports.yahoo.com}

More Proof That Now Is the Time to Invest in Women’s College Hoops
As The Athletic’s Richard Deitsch tweeted, “This is from Nielsen— it highlights how historical this women's Tournament was as far as interest. I know I've said this on this site a thousand times: There's $$$ sitting there for companies, outlets, individuals if they invest (smartly) in women's college basketball. Let's see.”
^twitter.com

Can Michigan Break Georgia’s NFL Draft Record? Plus, Which Freshmen Can Make an Impact?
The NFL Draft will take place from April 25-27 in Detroit, leaving college fans wondering how their team(s) will do. As The Athletic’s Jayna Bardahl reports, “Georgia set the record for the most NFL Draft selections from a single program with 15 picks in 2022.”

Bardahl goes on to note, “The buzzy topic surrounding Georgia’s record-breaking class was recruiting. Twelve of the Bulldogs’ picks were four- or five-star prospects out of high school, per the 247Sports Composite. Coming off a national championship and that draft class, Georgia seemed untouchable.”
^{theathletic.com}

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