05/03/19: Red Bull's 3x3 gameplan

Good morning. It’s Friday May 3, 2019 and this is your first early morning Sports briefing.

USA Basketball cemented a multiyear partnership with Red Bull North America to build “an elite pathway for men’s and women’s players who have a goal of competing at the highest levels of 3×3 basketball.” As part of the partnership, Red Bull will host more than 20 qualifying tournaments across the country under the newly-created Red Bull 3X series to identify the eight athletes who could potentially represent USA Basketball at the 2020 Olympics. The winning teams at these qualifiers will compete to accumulate enough individual FIBA points with the goal of moving on to the Red Bull USA Basketball 3X Regionals in the Fall of 2019, and then to the Red Bull USA Basketball 3X Nationals in March 2020, which will be used to select the USA men’s and women’s 3×3 national teams.

Additionally, Red Bull Media House will create original storytelling with USA Basketball to shine a light on the 3×3 game, qualifiers and players, and celebrate the journey as the sport makes its debut at the Olympics. Red Bull is now the official energy drink of USA Basketball and will support the USA Basketball Men’s and Women’s National Teams as both look to defend their gold medals from the 2016 Summer Olympics.

PROGRAMMING

NBCSN saw its most-watched April of all-time last month, anchored by the NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs, a full slate of Premier League matches, and two INDYCAR races. Tallying its top marks in both primetime and Total Day, according to Nielsen and Adobe Analytics, as the network saw viewership grow 29% in primetime compared to April 2018. The network averaged 663,000 primetime viewers in the month overall, up 29% from April 2018, and 194,000 Total Day viewers, up 15% from last April.

As NBC prepares for the Kentucky Derby this weekend, the network announced that NBC Sports asked a number of celebrities and NBCUniversal personalities for their horse picks, including John Legend, Adam Levine, Charles Barkley, Katie Ledecky, Kelly Clarkson, Blake Shelton, Shaquille O’Neal, Blake Shelton, Lil Jon, Gabrielle Union, and more. Their picks will be revealed during NBC’s Kentucky Derby broadcast on Saturday. Laila Ali narrates the show open, as well as several scene-setting vignettes this Saturday. Jennifer Nettles will perform the national anthem inside the Kentucky Derby Winner’s Circle prior to the race.

Major League Soccer announced that Atlético de Madrid, the Spanish club and 10-time champions of La Liga will face the best in MLS in the 2019 MLS All-Star Game presented by Target, played at Orlando City Stadium on July 31 and televised domestically on FS1 and UniMás in the U.S., on TSN and TVA Sports in Canada, and in more than 170 countries around the world. “The atmosphere in Orlando will be intense and memorable when Atlético de Madrid takes on the MLS All-Stars,” said MLS Commissioner Don Garber. “Atlético de Madrid joins the list of the many prominent clubs in global soccer to play in our midseason showcase, and we know the passionate supporters that make up The Wall and the rest of Orlando City Stadium will provide a distinctive home-field advantage for the MLS All-Stars.”

Golf Channel announced a multi-year partnership with Maridoe Golf Club in Carrollton, Texas, to create and televise the Maridoe Collegiate Invitational, a new men’s college golf championship that will run September 14-16, 2020. The Maridoe Collegiate Invitational, which will be televised in more than 50 countries, will become the fifth annual collegiate golf event to air on GOLF Channel.

Over 200 women’s hockey players, with named that include Team USA stars Hilary Knight and Kendall Coyne Schofield, announced that they will play in a professional league next season, noting in a statement that “We cannot make a sustainable living playing in the current state of the professional game. Having no health insurance and making as low as two thousand dollars a season means players can’t adequately train and prepare to play at the highest level.” Some players noted that they hope the NHL will support a women’s league via financial and infrastructural resources, per ESPN.

The Mountain West Conference unveiled its national television package for the 2019 football season with 44 games being carried nationally between CBS Sports Network and ESPN networks. The MW’s national television slate opens with a nonconference matchup on Saturday, Aug. 24, between Arizona and Hawai‘i on CBS Sports Network with other early-season games on the channel set to include Purdue/Nevada (Aug. 30), Missouri/Wyoming (Aug. 31), and Minnesota/Fresno State (Sept. 7). ESPN’s national coverage begins on Sept. 6, as Boise State hosts Marshall on ESPN2.

Back to ratings. ESPN’s morning studio show lineup – including its flagship news and information show SportsCenter, Get Up! and debate show First Take – generated year-over-year viewership increases across the board in the month of April, according to Nielsen. SportsCenter:AM saw a 17% uptick over the same timeslot last year, averaging 321,000 viewers. Get Up! was up 30% year-over-year in April, averaging 348,000 viewers for its 8-10 a.m. timeslot. First Take averaged 413,000 viewers during its two hour window, up 2%.

FloSports, the NCAA and NCAA Digital – managed by Turner Sports – announced live and on-demand coverage of the 2019 Division I NCAA Track and Field East and West Preliminary Championships for the second consecutive year on FloTrack.com from May 23-25. “FloSports is proud to partner with the NCAA and NCAA Digital for the second consecutive year to provide deep coverage of the NCAA DI Track and Field Prelims,” FloSports Director of Global Rights Acquisition Ryan Fenton said. “These events feature some of the greatest track and field competition in the world and we are excited to showcase both the institutions and student-athletes as they look to qualify for the NCAA Championships.”

ESPN Films’ 30 for 30 series continues on May 28 with “Qualified” at 9p on ESPN. Directed by Jenna Ricker, the program “chronicles the roadblocks and hardships Janet Guthrie overcame in becoming the first woman ever to compete in both the Indianapolis 500 and the Daytona 500 – and eventually, an auto racing legend.”

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SPONSORSHIP & PROMOTION

The Professional Fighters League locked in a marketing, content and promotion partnership with iHeartMedia to promote fight events and enhance the fan experience through the “fusion of music and MMA.” iHeartMedia on-air hosts and talent will make appearances at select events and includes creating music experiences in connection with each fight night and providing fans with access to PFL “in the life” fighter interviews.

Visa unveiled its global marketing campaign for the FIFA Women’s World Cup France 2019, titled “One Moment Can Change the Game” and designed to amplify “the meaningful moments women are creating on and off the pitch, whether it be inspiring athletic greatness on the field, influencing business outcomes in the boardroom or driving economic impact at home and across industries.” The global campaign showcases a series of authentic vignettes, including Team Visa female football players, Lucy Bronze (Great Britain), Eugenie Le Sommer (France), Kim Little (Scotland), Dzsenifer Maroszan(Germany) and Nadia Nadim (Denmark).

May 11 will see HBO Sports open an interactive experience in NYC to promote the upcoming two-part documentary What’s My Name | Muhammad Ali via a two-day pop-up event in Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood. The experience will showcase different aspects of Muhammad Ali’s life covered in the film using eye-catching imagery, artwork, quotes, and directional speakers to target audio in the space.

DIGITAL, DATA & TECH

StubHub opened the doors to the StubHub Fan Optimism Index, described as a tool that uncovers which sports fans are the most optimistic by looking at ticket trends and Vegas projections. “There are seemingly endless amounts of stats analyzing team and player projections, but StubHub wanted to create a formula to tap into fan optimism – something that has been difficult to put numbers against until now,” said Akshay Khanna, General Manager of NFL at StubHub. “What we found proves fans’ hopes for their team’s season are not impacted by hard stats of any sort. After all, none of the teams with the ‘most optimistic’ fan bases made the playoffs last year.” According to the list, the top five optimistic NFL fans are:

Cleveland Browns
Washington Redskins
Miami Dolphins
New York Jets
Arizona Cardinals

ESPORTS

In an investor call to announce first quarter 2019 results, Bobby Kotick, Chief Executive Officer of Activision Blizzard, announced that the company had sold the first five city-based franchise slots for the Call of Duty World League, locking in Atlanta, Dallas, New York, Paris and Toronto “to owners who recognize the scale of the opportunity from their partnerships with us on the Overwatch League.”

Valve locked in dates for the 2020 and 2021 Counter-Strike Majors, announcing that the first Major event in 2020 will span May 11-24, with the second event running Nov. 1-14. Meanwhile, the first major of 2021 will be from May 10-23, with the fall event from Nov. 1-14, per Dot Esports.

The NHL announced the lineup for the 2019 NHL Gaming World Championship Regional Finals. The top four players from the US for each of the Xbox and PS4 consoles – including three past regional finalists – earned a trip to the Live U.S. Regional on Thursday, May 30. These players will finish the bracket this Saturday, May 4, to determine seeding and then meet in-person on May 30 at NBC Sports studio to compete for the chance to travel to Las Vegas for the 2019 NHL Gaming World Championship. The 2019 NHL Gaming World Champion will walk away with his/her share of the $100,000 cash prize pool. For the first time, all Regional Final rounds and the 2019 NHL Gaming World Championship Final will be streamed live on the NHL’s Twitch channel.

INDUSTRY/ROSTER MOVES

The City and County of Denver and Kroenke Sports & Entertainment announced a tentative agreement to keep the Nuggets and Avalanche in Denver through 2040. The tentative agreement will still need approval from the NBA and NHL. The existing arena agreement with the city was set to expire in 2023.

DICK’S Sporting Goods appointed Ed Plummer as the company’s Chief Marketing Officer and Steve Miller as the Senior Vice President of Strategy and Analytics. Plummer joined the Company in 2010 as the VP of Customer Relationship Management in marketing while Miller joins DICK’S from Joann Stores where he served as the Senior Vice President of Marketing and eCommerce.

The Sixers Innovation Lab, Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment’s early-stage incubator housed at the Philadelphia 76ers Training Complex, locked in Hydrant, an electrolyte hydration solution to its roster of start-up companies. Hydrant has been incubating at the Sixers Innovation Lab since November 2018 under the supervision of Lab Managing Director, entrepreneur and the Founder of AND1, Seth Berger.

THE MAIN EVENT

Kentucky Derby coverage starts on NBC at 2:30p.

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ON THIS DAY in 1910: The Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States is renamed the National Collegiate Athletic Association.

In the Know: Which beverage is considered to be the traditional drink of the Kentucky Derby? (Email [email protected] with your answer and be sure to include your name, company and city.)

Answer to Our Last Sports Trivia Question: Who was the last jockey to win the Kentucky Derby in back-to-back years? Answer: Victor Espinoza. Kudos: Michael Ritz-Northwestern Mutual/NY; Rick Rosenfelt-New York Red Bulls/Harrison; Tim Overmyer-20th TV/Atlanta; Synda Kollman-Charter Marketing Group/Boca Raton; Juan Pablo Garcia McCausland-NBCUniversal Internaitonal Distribution/Miami; Joe Lyons-ESPN/Dallas; Andy Pittman-TAMU/College Station; Rich Wolfe-Lone Wolfe Press/Scottsdale; Tom Moore-Kalt Productions/LA; David Westberg-SAG-AFTRA Federal Credit Union/Burbank; Brian Robin-Pechanga Resort Casino/Temecula

Later — Chris

Chris Pursell @VegasandVine
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