Hear more about the BIG3 and what the league can do to uniquely bring brands to life at the Cynopsis Power Plays webinar on June 3. Among the industry experts will be entertainment powerhouse Ice Cube, co-founder of the BIG3 basketball league, and his partner, Jeff Kwatinetz, COO of Cube Vision, who not only changed the rules of basketball – they changed the business model. Want to know more? Go here.

“It’s been a lot of hard work creating our vision of Western sports in the world,” Sean Gleason, CEO/Commissioner of PBR, told Cynopsis Sports. “Not only doing that and traversing the waters that we had to traverse from the traditionalists in the rodeo space, but as we set forth on introducing Western sports to a new fan, it’s been an uphill battle. We’ve had to push the rock up the hill a lot along the way … We’re starting to see a lot of momentum behind the sport, and it’s a great feeling.”

Those 20 bull riders had invested $1,000 each at the time. Since then, PBR has been acquired by Endeavor and is now part of sports entertainment powerhouse TKO Group, boasting 800+ riders from around the world competing in more than 200 events each year. PBR’s media deal includes CBS Sports, which airs 25 hours of PBR content per year, as well as PBR’s FAST channel RidePass. In 1Q24, PBR on CBS posted an average of over 1 million viewers, serving as a 15% YOY increase at the time. As a whole, PBR broadcasts reach nearly 300 million households in 91+ territories.

Gleason, who joined PBR 26 years ago, has been on quite a wild ride with PBR. We spoke with him to discuss the league’s growth amid a competitive sports landscape. Below is an edited excerpt of the conversation.

As PBR itself has grown, how has the sports landscape changed during that time?
There were a few articles back in the day that were motivation for me, because when PBR had been on the scene … for seven, eight years at that point in time, and had established itself as a going concern and had made it through a lot of rough waters, we were constantly referred to as a niche sport. There were a couple of articles that suggested that of all these niche sports, none were going to survive, or very few would. PBR was always listed among the novelty or niche sports that weren’t going to make it, and that served as a lot of motivation for me, personally, to prove everybody wrong. I knew what we had, which was one of the most exciting, raw and real sports events that you can possibly watch. It’s filled with danger, excitement and adrenaline, so at its core, the sport’s very appealing to a broad audience, not just traditional rodeo enthusiasts. Our commitment to constantly putting the best bulls and both bull riders on the dirt in front of new fans, from Madison Square Garden to Crypto.com [Arena] in L.A. and all the places we’ve taken it over the years. It’s just It’s been a long, hard road to crack through … and here we are, 30 some odd years later, as arguably one of the top seven or eight sports in the U.S.

How important is the approach to marketing and presenting to fans or those not familiar with PBR in saying, ‘This is what we have to offer’?
I think marketing is everything, especially if you take it back to the fundamental principles of marketing, which is design your product to appeal to the audience. It started with that. We took bull riding out of these historically very rural rodeo environments. We promised our fans we put the best bulls and the best bull riders in the world, week in and week out on the dirt, and then we wrapped it in a rock concert and defined the product to meet the audience’s demands, as opposed to, ‘This is what has been going on for years and years. Please come watch us.’ It was really a redefinition of the product, and then positioning that in your marketing materials, your social posts, everything that we’ve done over the years, whether it’s building bulls and bull riders into the to the stars that they’ve become within the scope of what we’ve been able to establish. It’s all marketing. It’s all marketing-driven, and so every decision we make from this start of the conceptualization of what the product is and how it’ll appeal to the fans, to how you get them to choose to spend their money to come out and enjoy it or tune in on television. It’s all marketing, and we’ve been very aggressive over the years in marketing and shifting our marketing initiatives to meet the consumer trends and demands, but at its core, bull riding is a really exciting sport, and it’s also been perfect for social media, where you can wrap up the greatest rides and the greatest wrecks in 30 seconds for an audience that has a very low attention span these days, largely because of social media.

In 2022, PBR introduced the team series. How much has it helped PBR having those teams and regionally specific entities?
The team product was designed really to create and build fandom that transcends the individual athletes that survives for a team as the athletes come and go and succeed and fail and retire and whatever else happens. Part of the Team Series strategy really was to focus on a number of core markets where we could start building fandom that survived the rise and fall of their favorite rider or their favorite bull. Another marketing-driven initiative behind teams was that the vast majority of sports fans are fans of team sports. They understand it, they get it and they understand that this is the score, and in order for the other team to win, their score needs to be higher than the other team, and so it’s a very familiar paradigm. We didn’t change bull riding at all. It’s still eight seconds man against beast, but we changed the competition, and the competition in [a] teams format is a much more palatable and familiar competition platform to a general sports fan than individual bull riding is, which can be complicated and historical, and in some cases, hard to understand. The combination of those things really allows us to build fandom for the sport, for the brand among a consumer group that that may have never come to us if it were not for the team aspect and the fact that they can now root for a team where their colors and be a fan of that team for the next 20 years as bull riders come and go.

What is the approach to gaining more of an audience when there’s so much competition from other sports leagues, social media and different forms of content?
I think we stand out because of at the core, it’s the product. It’s a visceral, engaging, highly difficult, dangerous sport that puts you on the edge of your seat, and you’re not going to get that with pickleball. There’s a lot of fans of a lot of different sports, but we’ve done some research, and one of the things I looked at years ago was how many fans are truly a fan of one sport versus multiple sports? And what is the crossover between those sports? What we found through that research was that baseball had the most fans that were fans of only baseball and nothing else. They were not sports fans, they were baseball fans. PBR was the second sport at that time, and this is probably 12 plus years ago that we did this research. Then you look at the number of people that are fans of multiple sports, and it’s not a zero-sum game, really, when it comes to finding your niche in the sports world. It’s finding your consumer that is engaged and entertained by your product. So as you can imagine, there’s a lot of crossover between PBR and NASCAR. There’s a lot of crossover between PBR and outdoor sports. There’s a lot of crossover between PBR and UFC. So it’s a certain type of fan that’s looking for that visceral, thrilling moment of danger and excitement, and again, as you hook them into the sports competition, or the competition that’s following your favorite rider through a season or you follow your team through a season. When you start to care at that level, that’s when you have succeeded. That you’ve had to put all these pieces together with your product and your marketing and gain trial and educate them and do all of these things to get them to be fans of the sport.

LIV Golf is taking a sip of DAOU Vineyards’ finest after signing a three-year partnership to be the league’s Exclusive Wine Partner. DAOU Vineyards will have a prominent presence at all 2025 LIV Golf tournaments. The collaboration got underway at LIV Golf Miami earlier in April, where an immersive activation space “DAOU on the Green” was debuted to offer an elevated area for attendees to enjoy a glass and learn more about DAOU’s Bordeaux-style wines.

PUMA was in Miami recently as well, launching a PUMA x F1 Miami Race Pack capsule collection. It features an F1 Miami Inverse shoe as well as three graphic T-shirts that resemble the neon mystique of retro Miami. PUMA launched a 2025 Replica Collection earlier this year to commemorate the 20th anniversary of its partnership with Scuderia Ferrari HP, coming with vintage racing jackets, polos, driver-specific tees and more.

Yahoo Sports and Motorsport Network are looking to tap into a growing fan base throughout the 2025 racing calendar. The Yahoo Sports website now shows a dedicated hub of racing coverage from both Yahoo Sports and Motorsport Network, featuring content from Formula 1, NASCAR, MotoGP, IndyCar and more. Co-produced shows from the two platforms will be released over time, and the free “Daily Draw” game in the Yahoo Sports app will have Motorsport in contests connected to major events. Additionally, brands will be able to have cross-platform media placements and sponsored franchises across Yahoo Sports and Motorsport Network.

FloSports is working with Accedo, a global video streaming software and services provider, to grow the FloSports Connected TV service to more Smart TV platforms. FloSports will use Accedo’s portfolio of products that have helped deploy over 30 sports streaming services in recent years.

The Flo doesn’t stop there. FloTrack and the independent running brand Tracksmith are collabing to amplify activations and create content at high-profile marathon events in North America throughout 2025. FloTrack will be on hand at Tracksmith events to develop athlete-focused feature stories, with a special focus on supporting the launch of Eliot Racer—Tracksmith’s first dedicated performance running shoe—and FloTrack’s inaugural Wanda Diamond League season. FloTrack and Tracksmith launched at the recent Boston Marathon and will appear at the Chicago Marathon in October and the New York City Marathon in November.

Comcast’s impasse with Chicago Sports Network took a new step when Bulls President Michael Reinsdorf aired his frustrations at a Crain’s Chicago Business real estate event. CHSN has yet to find carriage on Comcast since debuting as an RSN in October. Reinsdorf claimed CHSN thought a deal was in place back in December, but it fell through for an undisclosed reason. He added that it’s a corporate issue rather than a local problem, calling Comcast’s approach to the negotiating table “bad faith.” The center of the two’s disagreement is the tier in which Comcast wants CHSN on. Comcast, the largest cable provider in the Chicagoland region, has been putting RSNs on higher-priced tiers recently, including some of the NBC Sports networks.

Another issue involving Comcast came with YES Network. The looming expiration of their carriage agreement was made public as both sides traded press releases and statements. Even FCC Chairman Brendan Carr was intrigued by the saga. “I would encourage a quick and favorable resolution for the benefit of everyone,” he posted on X. “The FCC does have authority to step in and address claims of discriminatory conduct.” Whether that moved the needle or not, Comcast and YES Network made a deal shortly before the deadline, but the brief statement with a lack of details sparked curiosity among industry watchers: “Comcast and YES have reached an agreement for continued distribution of YES Network.”

The United States Tennis Association and IMG penned a multi-year partnership renewal. IMG will represent and advise the USTA on the international and domestic media rights of the U.S. Open Tennis Championships. USTA and IMG have partnered since 2011.

The WNBA’s newest franchise, the Golden State Valkyries, signed a local broadcast deal with CBS Bay Area ahead of the team’s inaugural season. Games will air on the local stations KPIX and KPYX, with certain locally televised games also broadcasting on CBS Sacramento (KOVR or KMAX). CBS Bay Area will have pregame and postgame shows for the Valkyries in addition to team content, studio analysis and a weekly lifestyle show giving fans a behind-the-scenes look at players, coaches and team storylines throughout the season. Golden State begins its journey May 16 against the Sparks (10pm on ION).

Another WNBA team is staying with a local distribution deal. The Indiana Fever and the TEGNA-owned NBC affiliate in Indianapolis signed a multi-year extension of their agreement. The two originally made a deal last year upon the arrival of Caitlin Clark, but for the 2025 season, WTHR and WALV—TEGNA’s MeTV affiliate—will air 18 games locally across Central Indiana. Fever games on WTHR were viewed in almost 2/3 more households than nationally televised games, also posting a 63% household ratings increase compared to national network games. The first game of this year’s broadcast schedule is set for May 20 at 7pm.

Warm weather means it’s time for pickleball. Major League Pickleball and Gray Media revealed local media partnerships to grow distribution in MLP team markets throughout the 2025 season. The 2025 MLP campaign will include 10 regular-season events, a Mid-Season Tournament and MLP Playoffs. Full information on event coverage will be unveiled roughly 30 days before each event.

One of Brazil’s top Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu organizations BJJ Stars extended its rights deal with FloSports. FloGrappling will have exclusive access to premier events through 2027. More on this one in Executive Moves.

Adobe and the National Football League are growing their partnership to include more focus on AI and content creation. The league will leverage the Adobe Experience Platform to create fan content and engagement at a larger scale. That means more personalized content to connect fans with their favorite teams and players, preferred stadium experiences and promotions relevant to the user and NFL-themed Adobe Express templates that can be altered and shared on social media.

IBM had a slew of digital fan features for the Masters. Its watsonx AI-powered technology fueled the popular Masters app and Masters.com which featured IBM Hole Insights as part of the Track Shots experience. The insights helped with recaps of how each hole was played daily throughout the tournament, such as the percentage of bogies made on a hole, as well as projections of how each hole might play and historical insights based on nine years of tournament data—including over 180,000 shots. IBM and the Masters also allowed fans to use an Apple Vision Pro to get an immersive view of the action. This year’s enhancements came with clearer 3D visuals of Augusta National and video on demand.

Social gamification technology provider Lucra is working with chess platform Chess Kings to bring real-money competitions to the online chess community. Lucra will use its proprietary tech to power Chess Kings’ competitive platform.

Sleeper, a fantasy sports platform, and IC360 are teaming up to integrate the latter’s prohibited bettor monitoring solution ProhiBet in an effort to improve platform integrity and responsible gaming measures. ProhiBet will supply Sleeper with real-time alerts to make sure it stays compliant with regulations that block certain individuals, like athletes and league officials, from participating in fantasy sports contests involving the sports they’re associated with.

Want to see how your swing compares to Mets players? Samsung Electronics America put on an interactive pop-up shop, “Mets House N.Y.C.” It includes a “Mets Match Your Swing” experience that uses advanced sensors from Diamond Kinetics to analyze stances and swings. It then identifies which Mets player that swing most resembles, coming to life on a 98-inch Samsung display that shows results. Mets House also lets fans play the video game MLB: The Show. Additionally, two 85-inch displays showcase Mets history through a mix of modern highlights and archival replays.

“For me, baseball is more than a game—it’s a legacy. A legacy built by trailblazers who not only played against the odds but overcame them to pave the way for players like me,” Howard, a 2008 World Series winner, said. “The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum is more than a collection of artifacts; it’s a living, breathing tribute to those who shaped the game and changed history.”

The facility and campus will include the Buck O’Neil Education and Research Center along with a 30,000-square-foot state-of-the-art museum. It would be the only Negro Leagues campus in the U.S. Howard and Shildt will also be part of storytelling initiatives, fundraising efforts, program support and advocacy of the museum’s mission and expansion plans.

Rory McIlroy finally got his Green Jacket, and CBS Sports’ coverage of the last day of the Masters was the most-watched golf telecast on any network in seven years with an average of 12.71 million viewers. Ratings peaked from 7-7:15pm ET with 19.54 million viewers, right around the time McIlroy and Justin Rose faced off in a playoff. Paramount+’s final-round coverage was its largest non-NFL sports day and its most-streamed golf event ever. The third round had 7.6 million viewers. ESPN handled the first two rounds of the Masters. Round 1 averaged 2.3 million viewers and Round 2 garnered 3.1 million.

The Florida Gators and Connecticut Huskies are the respective champions of men’s and women’s college basketball. Florida’s dramatic win over Houston had 18.1 million viewers on CBS, the most-watched since 2019 and up 22% from last year’s title bout between UConn and Purdue. Men’s Final Four weekend averaged 16.4 million viewers—an eight-year high—and tournament viewership finished at 10.2 million viewers across TBS, CBS, TNT and truTV, up 3% versus last year.

The Huskies’ defeat over South Carolina was the third-most-watched women’s National Championship on ESPN platforms, reeling in 8.6 million viewers across ABC, ESPN and ESPN+. UConn’s Final Four game against UCLA had 4.2 million viewers while SC-Texas had 3.7 million, both being on ESPN and ESPN+.

The 2025 WNBA Draft checked in with 1.25 million average viewers, making it the second-most-viewed WNBA Draft of all time. It only trails last year’s WNBA Draft, which saw Caitlin Clark go first overall to the tune of 2.45 million viewers. Compared to 2023, however, this year’s draft is up 119%. “WNBA Countdown” averaged 647,000 viewers.

Some are still scratching their head after Luka Dončić was traded from the Mavericks to the Lakers. Nonetheless, Dončić’s return to Dallas was the most-watched NBA regular-season game on ESPN this season (excluding Christmas). The game had 2.26 million viewers tune in and peaked with 2.79 million. That helped it be the most-watched program of the day across all TV among People and Males 18-34, 18-49, Under 50 and Males 25-54.

The 2025 NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Championship had its second-most-watched event ever on ESPN platforms. The semifinals and championship rounds combined to average 446,000 viewers across ABC, ESPN+ and Disney+. The final was up 18% YOY, and the semis were led by Session II (LSU, Utah, UCLA and Michigan State) and its 212,000 viewers. Session I (Oklahoma, Florida, Missouri and Alabama) recorded 154,000 viewers, with both airing on ESPN2 and ESPN+.

The final round of RBC Heritage had its best viewership in 23 years after averaging 4.36 million viewers, peaking with 6.07 million.

Fellow college football pundit and CBS Sports’ Gary Danielson is retiring upon the conclusion of the 2025 season, his 20th with the network. Danielson will be alongside Brad Nessler and Jenny Dell for his 36th and final season on TV. CBS Sports tapped football analyst Charles Davis to succeed Danielson as lead college football analyst. Davis will stay on NFL coverage this upcoming season.

And so Madden did, drawing fellow analysts like Mina Kimes and Marcus Spears in addition to many other graphics. The Orlovskys even had the chance to sing a duet of the iconic song “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” from Toy Story.

Peter Schrager made the switch from NFL Network to ESPN. Schrager was on “Good Morning Football” as well as “FOX NFL Kickoff,” but his new multi-year contract will see him appear on ESPN studio shows including “Get Up,” “First Take,” “The Pat McAfee Show” “NFL Live” and “SportsCenter” while contributing to coverage of tentpole events like the Super Bowl, NFL Draft and free agency.

TNT Sports and Grant Hill signed a long-term extension for the Hall of Famer to continue serving as a lead game analyst on TNT Sports and CBS Sports’ men’s March Madness coverage. He’ll add on coverage of Big East and Big 12 basketball to his portfolio starting with the 2025-26 season.

In a summer of Banana Ball, ESPN will handle the broadcast duties of 10 Savannah Bananas events. The Bananas’ tour got underway April 26 at Clemson’s Memorial Stadium, but ESPN2 will handle each event outside of their stops in Boston (July 5 at 7pm) and Baltimore (Aug. 1 at 7pm). ESPN will take over for those two. All games will be simulcast on Disney+ and ESPN+ beginning at 7pm, sans the final two events: Aug. 9 in Denver at 9pm and Aug. 15 in Chicago at 8pm.

Nike tapped 14-year company veteran Jennifer Hartley to be its new Chief Strategy Officer. Hartley will work to develop and deliver the company’s strategic vision. She was most recently VP, Strategic Enterprise Capabilities, after holding a handful of other VP- and Senior Director-level titles. Hartley began her Nike journey in February 2011 as a Director, Corporate Strategy & Development.

Monumental Sports & Entertainment appointed AJ Jones II to EVP, Chief Strategic and Corporate Communications Officer. He’ll join the company’s leadership team and oversee the development, execution and growth of MSE’s brand and corporate narrative, also heading up ownership, financial, investor and community-based communications. Additionally, he’ll manage MSE’s broader investor relations and stakeholder engagement strategies. Jones II joins from Starbucks Coffee Company.

Fanatics added its EVP/CFO Glenn Schiffman to the company’s board of directors. Schiffman joined the sports apparel company in 2021 and has a wide array of financial and corporate functions under his purview, including corporate finance, M&A, treasury, financial planning and analysis, investor relations and more. Prior to Fanatics he was EVP/CFO for IAC/Interactive Corp., and before that Schiffman spent 25 years as an investment banker.

After FloSports’ multi-year rights renewal with BJJ Stars, it named Ben Kovacs to the newly created role of GM, FloGrappling. He’ll be tasked with overseeing the strategic direction, programming and go-to-market strategy for the FloGrappling brand. Kovacs previously held senior roles at X (formerly Twitter) and is a co-founder of the BJJ nonprofit Guardian Gym.

1981: Phillies pitcher Steve Carlton became the first left-handed pitcher in MLB history to record 3,000 strikeouts. Carlton, who currently stands as the last pitcher to eclipse 300 IP in a single season (1980), remains having the fourth-most career strikeouts ever while also standing 11th in wins.

1986: Red Sox pitcher Roger Clemens became the first to toss 20 strikeouts in a nine-inning game. Only three other pitchers have accomplished the same feat: Kerry Wood (1998), Randy Johnson (2001) and Max Scherzer (2016). Clemens, however, is the only player to do it twice (1996).

2007: The Oakland Raiders traded wide receiver Randy Moss to the New England Patriots for a fourth-round draft pick. Moss responded by breaking the NFL’s single-season touchdown catch record (23) while putting up 1,493 receiving yards—a franchise record at the time. That helped New England to a perfect 16-0 regular season, ultimately falling short of perfection after the Giants stunned the Pats in Super Bowl XLII.

2015: The White Sox and Orioles played the first-ever MLB game with zero fans in attendance. Gates were kept closed due to lack of security resources for the game. At the time, protests were taking place in Baltimore amid the aftermath of Freddie Gray’s death. Press, team staff and scouts were among the few allowed into the Camden Yards that day, but fans found a way to watch through stadium gates or nearby hotel balconies and roofs. O’s won the game 8-2.