Game Plan sports business conference live updates

Pickleball has exploded in popularity across the globe, and it’s estimated that more than 36 million people played the sport last year.

That quick rise has led many to speculate about what that means for other paddle-based sports, mainly tennis.

But for tennis star Nick Kyrgios, the answer is pretty simple: “I love it.”

Kyrgios noted the difficult challenge that many face when they try to pick up tennis later in life, a difficulty curve that is not seen in pickleball comparatively. He also noted the benefit of people of all ages and skill sets playing a sport.

“What’s good is just genuinely getting more people active and playing,” he said.

Stuart Duguid, the top tennis agent who cofounded the EVOLVE agency in 2022 with Naomi Osaka and represents Kyrgios, said that even when he’s talking to brands about tennis, the end of nearly every single conversation turns its focus to pickleball.

“No one wants to miss out, everyone wants to know about it,” Duguid said.

Last year, Kyrgios and Osaka became co-owners of a Major League Pickleball team in Miami, alongside other investors like Patrick Mahomes.

Duguid said some of that excitement around the sport and growing amount of investment in it comes from the energy around the sport live, especially compared to the atmosphere at a tennis match.

“I went to an event in Arizona, and it was unbelievable; the energy was electric, music was playing,” he said. “People were having a good time and it’s something we have to do in tennis in many ways.”

But while it remains to be seen if pickleball can maintain its momentum or if padel can also replicate its success, Duguid said tennis is not losing out.

“All these sports are bringing more people in, which is only good for tennis,” he said.

–Ian Thomas

Tennis pro Nick Kyrgios accomplished a feat only two players ever did: he beat Rafael Nadal, Roger Federal and Novak Djokovic the first time he played all three.

And he didn’t even grow up paying much attention to the sport. Vince Carter and the NBA stars were the guys he loved. He was “stumbling” on the court against the greats at the start, and now with some hindsight what stands out to Kyrgios isn’t so much his rare feat but the “immortal” feats of the top three players of the current, sort-of ending tennis generation. Federer has already retired and it is Nadal’s last year, though Djokovic is still in his prime, even at 36.

“They’ve just dominated,” he said.

Stuart Duguid, co-founder of tennis agency EVOLVE, said as the three greats are replaced by a new generation, there is a chance that the winner’s list gets more diverse and that helps to elevate the sport, but the recent results from the women’s game, where there have been many more winners of recent Grand Slams, doesn’t back up that idea yet. What a new men’s tennis star like Carlos Alcaraz may have as an advantage is the chance to make serious money outside the sport itself, Duguid said.

And he may need it, according to Kyrgios. “Carlos Alcaraz gets the 274th-best NFL salary and he’s the best player walking on the planet,” he said.

Alcaraz is a level above everyone else, according to Duguid, and there has “never been a better time to be him,” he said.

He noted that Federer made the most money he ever made in his last two deals and the players coming in now with so much potential and runway will have many opportunities.

But no one will touch what Nadal, Federer and Djokovic have done on the court, according to Kyrgios.

“They are cemented there. We won’t see what those three have done, I think, ever again,” he said.

Each won at least 20 Grand Slam titles.

Alcaraz, in the view of the only player to beat all three of those greats first time out, may get to 10 or 15 Grand Slams, Kyrgios said, but he added, “what those three guys did is immortal.”

—Eric Rosenbaum

The Premier Lacrosse League is set to announce a sports betting partnership with FanDuel, said co-founder Paul Rabil, a deal where the PLL could look to be creative about some of the ways you can bet on sports.

Due to the structure of the PLL — it’s a single-entity league where the players have equity — Rabil said it gives the league “more agility” in a sports betting deal where it could potentially work closely with an operator like FanDuel to be “imaginative” with its approach, especially around prop bets.

For example, Rabil said, there could be a way that fans could bet on metrics related to on-field biometrics tracking — he used the example of betting on the heart rate of an NFL kicker as they walked out for a game winning field goal.

Rabil joked that in his case, perhaps there could be a prop bet based on the amount of singing he does on the field.

–Ian Thomas

How women’s sports is changing the equation in sports business has been a focus of Game Plan, from WNBA NY Liberty owner Clara Wu Tsai on the exponential growth opportunity to the next big media deal for women’s soccer.

But Lexie Brown, a star with the WNBA’s LA Sparks, said the biggest change of all may be the women’s sports league Athletes Unlimited. Athletes Unlimited, of which Brown is a founding member, is a league to promote women’s sports in the United States, including professional softball, volleyball, basketball and lacrosse.

“Athletes Unlimited turned the ownership model on its head,” Brown said. Unlike NBA and WNBA teams, Athletes Unlimited teams have a player-centric ownership structure – each league has a Player Executive Committee (PEC), which is made up of players who provide input on league rules, regulations, and even players. Brown says that the freedom and opportunity afforded to her by Athletes Unlimited has been “life changing.”

The women’s basketball arm of Athletes Unlimited thinks of itself as complementary to the WNBA, giving players the opportunity to remain in the United States during the off-season as opposed to feeling forced to go abroad, an issue which was raised to a new level of awareness amid Brittney Griner’s detention in Russia. The WNBA has recently allowed Athletes Unlimited to stream their games on the WNBA app, as the app gets limited use during the off season.

Clara Wu Tsai’s husband Joseph, of Alibaba fame, bought the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets, but was their deal together to buy the WNBA’s NY Liberty the better sports franchise opportunity?

The Game Plan event has had a lot of talk about the scarcity value of pro sports teams in a world where many sectors have been commoditized, especially in media. David Blitzer, co-owner of two pro teams, said the $6 billion recently paid for the NFL’s Washington Commanders wasn’t anywhere near a bubble.

But emerging leagues are a big opportunity, according to Wu Tsai.

“The NBA is a prime asset, but with emerging leagues there is potential for exponential growth,” Wu Tsai said.

She compared the investment opportunity to venture capital, so not without big risks, but she said when the Tsais were evaluating the NY Liberty one thing that stood out was a big advantage it had over the Nets scarcity value wise: no competing team in the same league in the same city.

There a few basic criteria: the league has to have the world’s best players, there has to be the possibility to attract a passionate and loyal fan base, and owners have to be able to see how the team becomes commercially successfully. “But in the case of the WNBA, we saw an advantage we did not have with Nets, two NBA teams in New York City, but only one professional women’s team,” she said.

“So we saw this great business opportunity to showcase the best women’s basketball players in the largest media market in the world.”

Wu Tsai described the WNBA, even 26 years into its history, as a startup compared to the NBA. “Look at almost all the economics, from revenue to player salaries. It is one-one-hundredth of the NBA. So if the WNBA just grows to 10 percent, it’s a 10x investment.” 

—Eric Rosenbaum

The start of the 2023 Women’s World Cup last week is helping once again put a global spotlight on female soccer stars, something that NWSL Commissioner Jessica Berman sees helping build momentum not only for the league, but also as it negotiates a new media rights agreement.

The NWSL’s current deal with Paramount Global‘s CBS, which was a three-year deal signed in 2020 reportedly worth $4.5 million over the length of the deal, expires after this season, and Berman said the league is currently in the market talking to potential partners.

“As we think about next year, and where we need to be, we think about it being in all places at all times,” Berman said. “We really need high discoverability, and we need to make sure that we’re serving our content in ways that our fans know how to find us.”

That points to the NWSL considering both a traditional linear broadcast element as well as a direct-to-consumer strategy as well – the league currently also has a deal with Amazon‘s Twitch to broadcast games on the streaming platform, and some are on CBS’s Paramount+ platform.

Berman did not comment on which media or tech companies the league is talking to but noted that the NWSL is a “perfect property to be able to demonstrate the value of direct-to-consumer, and we want to think about ways to expand our audience.”

DTC is a big focus at the sports business event, with ESPN chairman James Pitaro saying that it is not an if, but a when, for Disney flagship TV channels to go direct-to-consumer via streaming.

Finding where NWSL games are being broadcast has been a challenge in the past for fans, and Berman said the league needs a way to “make sure that we’re serving our content in ways that our fans know how to find us.”

Women’s sports are surging in popularity, especially amongst millennials and Gen Z, but the Women’s Sports Network, the first network to ever focus solely on women’s sports, launched less than a year ago.

That is not an uncommon feeling historically for fans of women’s sports, Berman said. “There hasn’t been a role for a complacent women’s sports fan, and for anyone in this audience who follows women’s sports you know you had to work really hard to identify where to look and when to watch because it’s been everywhere and nowhere all at the same time.”

— Ian Thomas and Natalie Rose Goldberg

Follow CNBC on Twitter for more real-time coverage of Game Plan.

The value of major professional sports franchises keeps setting new records, which could lead one to conclude it’s a bubble, but according to David Blitzer, co-owner of the NJ Devils and Philadelphia 76ers, and Global Head of Tactical Opportunities at Blackstone, owners aren’t overpaying.

Less than a year ago the Denver Broncos sold for $4.6 billion. The Washington Commanders just sold for $6 billion with Blitzer’s peer private equity titan Josh Harris as managing partner, but Blitzer among others also in on the deal as a co-owner.

“I get asked all the time, I still remember not long ago, 2014, when Steve Ballmer paid $2 billion for the [Los Angeles] Clippers and people said the last team that traded was $650 million … “what’s going on here?’ Now I hear a similar dynamic with the Broncos and Commanders.”

Blitzer says the scarcity value of pro sports teams is a huge factor and isn’t that hard to explain.

“At the end of the day, I come back to they are not making any more of them,” Blitzer said of pro sports franchises. “And they are growing,” he said. Teams are growing off existing fan bases, while also creating a new fan base and international growth.

Of the NFL specifically, Blitzer said, “The NFL is one of best business models I have ever seen in my life.”

He said every team generates significant free cash flow and that is one reason the numbers are getting bigger.

As an investor, he noted it is also a non-correlated asset with respect to other investment asset classes. “Franchise values have been growing since inception, and the rate of growth has increased over the past decade, and we can all debate over the next 10 to 20 years, but they are going to grow. … the live content is most valuable in the world. … revenue is growing.”

—Eric Rosenbaum

The 2022 season was the first year of Amazon‘s 11-year deal with the NFL, one that Jay Marine, Global Head of Sports at Prime Video, said left the e-commerce giant “extremely excited” but was also just the start of an investment for the “long term.”

Amazon is paying the NFL roughly $1 billion per season for the rights to “Thursday Night Football.” In the first year of its broadcast, which was available to most viewers only through streaming, it averaged roughly 11 million viewers, according to Amazon. In the previous year, when “Thursday Night Football” was not only available on Prime Video but also the league’s NFL Network, broadcasts averaged about 15 million viewers, according to Nielsen data.

Marine said Amazon felt it was a “great first year” for its broadcast, noting that those 11 million average viewers were younger and had higher income levels compared to other NFL broadcasts.

Amazon expects to grow that audience in year two, as not only more NFL fans recognize that Amazon is the exclusive “Thursday Night Football” broadcaster, but also as more consumers in general move towards streaming. “You can debate that rate of change, but you can’t debate the macro trajectory,” Marine said.

On top of that, the opportunity around the new Black Friday game that Amazon will exclusively stream – the first time the NFL will play a game on the day after Thanksgiving, historically a big day for NFL ratings – is “perfect” for the ecommerce giant, Marine said.

“I think it’s a testament to the NFL’s trust in us to help launch a new NFL holiday and tradition,” he said.

— Ian Thomas

Disney leadership has said publicly in recent years it’s only a matter of time before ESPN and its TV channels shift to direct-to-consumer streaming.

Chairman Jimmy Pitaro reiterated Tuesday “it’s not if, it’s when,” that happens. But, he noted, that when that day comes it wouldn’t leave pay-TV distributors behind and nix the traditional TV model that has supported the business for so long.

Media companies have been shifting toward streaming as more consumers cut their traditional TV packages. Still, while these companies bleed pay-TV customers, the business remains a cash cow while streaming is still looking for a route to profitability.

“The [traditional TV] model has been very good to Disney,” Pitaro said. 

He debunked what he called “a perception in the industry” that when ESPN offers its channels a la carte via streaming to consumers it would flip a switch and leave behind the traditional TV bundle. 

Pitaro said ESPN would still live through the traditional model, even when the shift to direct-to-consumer streaming happens.

-Lillian Rizzo

ESPN and its parent company Disney have been in discussions with potential strategic partners, ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro said Tuesday.

Pitaro said Tuesday he and Disney CEO Bob Iger had started the discussions with potential partners in light of accelerated cord cutting from the traditional cable TV bundle. 

Last week, CNBC reported ESPN had talks with professional sports leagues including MLB, NFL and NBA. Pitaro wouldn’t comment on potential partners and discussions. 

“I will emphasize the fact we believe there are parties out there that can help us on the content side,” Pitaro said. He noted potential partners could come from the tech, marketing, content and distribution sides of the business. 

Earlier in July, Iger said on CNBC that the company is interested in selling an equity stake in ESPN, and is looking for a strategic partner. The admission came after Iger noted the company was rethinking its traditional cable-TV channel portfolio and would be open to selling the networks or exploring other options.

-Lillian Rizzo

There have been plenty of headlines about Disney CEO Bob Iger’s search for strategic partners for ESPN, but Aryeh Bourkoff, Chairman & CEO of investment banking firm LionTree, says one aspect of the story many have not focused on enough is just how rare this kind of business pivot is in the recent history of the markets.

After ESPN chairman James Pitaro said conversations were ongoing with potential partners, and early, when it comes to migrating its flagship channels to direct-to-consumer (DTC) platforms, Bourkoff said we are now in a world were companies like Amazon and Disney and other parts of ecosystem have to come together in the shift to a DTC model, and media players and tech players are both competitors and partners, and the leagues which ESPN has been rumored to be in talks with, are potential partners that have been part of the cost structure of ESPN.

“There is a way to bring it all together that preserves the cash flow model during these transitions, and to do it as pubic company in front of shareholders is virtually unheard of,” Bourkoff said. Whether Reed Hastings with DVD to streaming or Amazon from books to Prime, and now ESPN from linear to DTC, there have been few parallels, Bourkoff said.

And in the current regulatory environment, what used to work — M&A — is no longer an option. “You need to do it with partnerships,” he said. “Partnerships are the new M&A with leagues or private equity or rights holders. Otherwise, there will be too much pressure.”

—Eric Rosenbaum

Athletes, sports executives, owners, investors and other sports and entertainment leaders are arriving now in Los Angeles for the start of the Game Plan sports business conference.

There should be plenty of discussion around the future of sports and the challenges that lie ahead, whether that’s the integration of technology, reaching fans or creating new revenue streams – and where all three intersect.

— Ian Thomas

A little more context ahead of Game Plan’s first session:

The migration from linear TV to streaming has placed enormous pressure on the financial strength of legacy media companies, Disney as much as any media giant. Its marquee cable asset, ESPN, has suffered for years as Americans cut the cord. In a recent interview with CNBC’s David Faber, Disney CEO Bob Iger said the linear TV business has degraded over the past year more than he expected. “If anything, the disruption of that business has happened to a greater extent than even I was aware,” he said.

Iger told Faber of potential ESPN deal-making, “We’re going to be open minded about looking for strategic partners that could either help us with distribution or content. I’m not going to get too detailed about it, but we’re bullish about sports as a media property.”

Shortly after that, CNBC media reporter Alex Sherman reported that the MLB, NFL and NBA were in discussions with ESPN and Disney to take minority stakes. The NBA said it is always interested in discussions about “the future of its partnership” with ESPN. (Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery have exclusive negotiating rights with the NBA until next year.) The NFL has been interested in extending its ownership of NFL-related media in a variety of ways.

One of the key executives in those discussions, ESPN chairman James Pitaro, is up first at Game Plan and all eyes and ears will be on his comments about the future of the sports network.

—Eric Rosenbaum