CYNOPSISSPORTS
08.11.14 Good morning. It’s Monday, August 11, 2014, and this is your first early morning Sports briefing.
With the NFL’s preseason in full swing, McDonald’s, Verizon, Gillette and Nationwide are game planning around the league’s new platform as presenting sponsors of NFL Now. The platform launched last week as the league’s personalized next-gen video service, available via Android, iOS and Windows on mobile, as well as on Amazon Kindle Fire tablets, Fire TV, Xbox and Roku, among other outlets. The basic version of NFL Now is free, with fans able to pay $1.99 a month for the NFL Now Plus premium service that offers more and fresher game highlights as well as access to that archival vault of NFL Films.
Cynopsis Sports spoke with Brian Matthews, Senior VP of Sales at the NFL about pitching the brands on the platform, how CBS is affecting sales and what to expect in the months ahead.
Matthews on NFL Now: We informed sponsors that we would be launching a next-generation video service that would provide our fans with access to not only our library of content across NFL Films and across NFL Video, but also looking at highlights of in-progress games, which was something that we really hadn’t done to date. So NFL Now will give users extensive highlights and original NFL content. All 32 teams will be providing content so there’s about 4800 minutes per week of club content. There’s NFL Films and the video that’s available and then we are also working in live content, with things like press conferences and other types of shows will also be put into this platform. Some content, of course, will be exclusive to subscribers. But the idea is that you can get any type of NFL content at your fingertips on multiple devices.
On the pitch: The advertiser reaction was extremely positive right out of the gate. We have four launch partners with Gillette, McDonald’s, Verizon and Nationwide. Some of those guys came on board right from the beginning. There were some like Verizon who wanted to be distribution partners as well. Our goal was to have four presenting sponsors and we met that goal. We’ve seen demand outside of that and what we are working on now is to find ways to work in those advertisers. In addition, one of the things we are working on is that NFL will have its own studio out in LA. So we can also build content, producing stories and breaking news. Down the road, that is something we want to be working on advertisers with as well.
On NFL Network’s upfronts: We’ve seen a lot of interest for Thursday Night Football. We have a new partnership with CBS that gives CBS the ability to run the first eight games of the season and we run the back half of the schedule. We’ve worked very closely with CBS on presenting sponsorships where clients can take advantage of those positions throughout the entire Thursday Night Football season. So, we’re in the final stages of closing out our upfront and saw tremendous success. The NFL Network is going to benefit greatly this year from CBS producing our games, Jim Nantz and Phil Simms announcing our games, etc. with a whole new dynamic. In our upfront discussions, that was a big positive. We are also seeing success on the network in Inside the NFL, which is coming to the NFL Network for the first time this year, following its run on Showtime. That’s an asset that has never been commercialized before. We’ve some success there as well along with our other programming. Overall, the demands this year was very strong.
On the digital market: We’ve seen a lot of interest on the digital side outside of NFL Now as well. One area would be Fantasy Football where we have five presenting sponsors. The interest from the user side was up by double digits last year and from an advertiser standpoint, we have double digital growth as well this year. We have a lot of returning clients and the idea with our Fantasy product is to create a lot of custom experiences for our advertisers, so as opposed to running banners and pre-roll throughout Fantasy, we have tried to customize the experience. Another big area of interest has been TNF Live. We’re going to streaming our Thursday Night Football games, just the ones on NFL Network, running ad executions that are unique to the experience on those digital platforms. That is something that we have not offered in the past and we are seeing a lot of growth there.
Mark Emmert said he isn’t done after the NCAA faced a historic decision to eliminate its rules blocking payments to college players for commercial use of their names, images and likenesses last week. Emmert told ABC’s This Week With George Stephanopoulos on Sunday that the NCAA will appeal the judgment. Emmert stated that while the organization admired portions of the decision, other parts would be challenged. "No one on our legal team or the college conferences’ legal teams think this is a violation of antitrust laws and we need to get that settled in the courts," Emmert said.
In other legal news, a judge ruled that Major League Baseball cannot use its antitrust exemption to stem a lawsuit claiming that the league unfairly controls television markets and outlets for its teams. The judge wrote, according to the AP, that exceptions to antitrust laws had to be construed narrowly, noting that the U.S. Supreme Court has "expressly questioned the validity and logic of the baseball exemption and declined to extend it to other sports," and ruled that the lawsuits could proceed to trial.
Police told media that the investigation for the on-track accident that saw that death of a driver on Saturday after he was hit by three-time NASCAR champion Tony Stewart offered no evidence of "criminal intent" from the tragedy. Stewart did not race on Sunday and released a statement conveying his sorrow. “There aren’t words to describe the sadness I feel about the accident that took the life of Kevin Ward Jr. It’s a very emotional time for all involved, and it is the reason I’ve decided not to participate in today’s race at Watkins Glen. My thoughts and prayers are with his family, friends and everyone affected by this tragedy.”
CBS Sports will reportedly launch the first all-female sports talk show in national TV history. CBS Sports President David Berson told The Big Lead that CBS Sports Network is prepping a series that will be produced and directed by women in addition to its all-female cast. Although few other details were discussed, the series is slated to launch this fall.
Get ‘em before they’re gone! Networking, keynotes, Commissioners and the top brands in the business will all be at the Cynopsis Sports Business Summit and Women of Action on Aug. 19-20 in NY. Our annual sold out conferences continue to deliver with organizations this year that will include the NFL, College Football Playoff, CBS Sports, NBA, ESPN, Mars, NHL, EA Sports, MLS, Big East, FOX Sports, Chobani, NBC Sports, WWE, HBO Sports, Twitter, Turner Sports, SiriusXM, Soccer United Marketing, AEG, Univision, LPGA, Telemundo, IMG, Learfield Sports, US Ski and Snowboard Association, CSE, CBS Radio, Nielsen, AVP, Troika, Daytona International Speedway, WNBA, Campus Insiders, GroupM, USA Gymnastics, Bloomberg, Neulion, Sporting News, Omnigon, USA Today Sports Group and more! Make a move before the fall and don’t miss out. For more info and to register, click here.
ESPN suspended Max Kellerman, who appears on SportsNation and ESPNLA Radio, after his appearance on Mason & Ireland, where he admitted that he once struck his girlfriend (now wife) after she slapped him. His suspension reportedly runs through Thursday.
FOX Sports 1 will offer a “newly unearthed interview” with former Hendrick Motorsports NASCAR star Tim Richmond on Wednesday at 5p on NASCAR RACE HUB. The interview will commemorate the 25th anniversary of his death. At a Crossroads: The Lost Tim Richmond Interview will offer lost footage from January 1987, when broadcaster Ken Squier traveled to Richmond’s hometown of Ashland, Ohio, for an interview regarding Richmond’s medical condition and to inquire as to what the future might hold for his racing career.
A CYNOPSIS MESSAGE
Cynopsis Sports Women of Action
AUG. 19 | New York Athletic Club | 1-6:30 PM
A sampling of the featured panels:
FOX Sports Women’s FIFA World Cup Q&A
Making the Pitch: Successfully Marketing to Women
State of Play: Driving Women’s Sports to New Highs
On Air, and On the Line
View the complete list of speakers & register:
Thank you to our sponsors – FOX SPORTS 1 & WICT
NBC Sports Group continues to add new outlets to its promotion for the upcoming 2014-15 Premier League season, which kicks off on Saturday at 7a on NBCSN with Premier League Live. The company announced over the weekend that NBC Sports Group teamed up with The Topps Company to create custom trading cards for NBC Sports Group’s Premier League commentators and personalities. Bars in select markets across the country will receive Season Starter Kits that feature Topps trading cards spotlighting announcer Arlo White, Premier League Live host Rebecca Lowe, analystsRobbie Earle, Kyle Martino, and Robbie Mustoe, as well as “football” coach Ted Lasso, aka Jason Sudeikis, who is reprising his role for the campaign.
CBSSports.com unveiled its Fantasy Draft Kit by CBS Sports for iOS, featuring a “completely new mobile app designed to make drafting… an easier, more successful experience.” The kit will offer the ability to manage drafts for multiple leagues on different sites with fully customizable settings, player pools, and scoring rules; a Draft Board check-off tool and a Cheat Sheet to recommend the best players still available; and offline functionality, among other tools.
Dodgers/Braves on ESPN at 7p.
A CYNOPSIS MESSAGE
Cynopsis Sports Business Summit August 20th | New York Athletic Club
[REGISTER NOW]
Thank you to our sponsor – FOX SPORTS 1 Hear speakers from: Bloomberg Sports, CBS Sports, CSE, Electronic Arts, Fanatics, FOX Sports, Group M, HBO Sports, IMG College, MLS Business Ventures, NBA, NBC Sports Group, Neulion, NFL Media, NHL, Omnigon, SiriusXM, Sporting News Media, Troika and more.
ON THIS DAY in 1984: Cincinnati Reds retire Johnny Bench’s #5.
In The Know: Which NFL player holds the record for most career fumbles? (Email [email protected] with your answer and be sure to include your name, company, city and time zone. Unofficial rules: Only the second four correct answers from each time zone will be mentioned; and once you’ve been mentioned in any of the Cynopsis editions, you can’t be mentioned again that calendar week.)
Answer to Our Last Sports Trivia Question: The movie Major League saw this sports personality famously proclaim a wild pitch as “Juuuuuust a bit outside." Who was he? Answer: Bob Uecker. Kudos: Greg Schoen-NCC Media/NY; Lou Monaco-Daily Racing Form/NY; Chris Long-USA Today Sports Media Group/NY; Tim DeLaney-Showtime Networks Inc./NY; Mark McDonald-ESPN/NY; Jerry A. Kapner-Kapner Group/Montclair; Barbara Linebarger-TBS/Atlanta; Chris Brown-TV One/Silver Spring; Chris Faulds-Bell Media Digital/Toronto; Jeremy Bowman-ESPN/Chicago; Greg Finch-Time Warner Cable/Dallas; Austin York-Turner/Chicago; Dory Petsrillo-HRP/Dallas; Barbara Spafford-Spafford Creative/Mobile; Michael Jaquet-US Ski and Snowboard Assoc./Park City; Justin Elliott-Facebook/Menlo Park; John Sutton-Charter Digital Marketing/LA; Carl E. Ossipoff-ESPN/LA; Dennis Treleven-Fox Networks Group/LA.
Later — Chris
Chris Pursell for Cynopsis | Sports @VegasandVine
08.11.14
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