Welcome back to MoneyCall, The Athletic’s weekly sports business cheat sheet. (Want to conveniently receive it in your email? Subscribe here.)
Name-dropped today: Candace Buckner, Pat McAfee, Kylian Mbappe, Kalshi, Fleetwood Town, Cody Campbell, Natalie Nakase, J.J. Watt, Jay-Z, Strands (Sports Edition!) and more. Let’s go:
Driving the Conversation
The WNBA Finals matineehhh …
How did we reach the point where the WNBA is playing what could be a thrilling, championship-clinching Game 6 on a Thursday at 12:30 p.m. ET?
Overnight, my colleague Annie Costabile was out with new reporting on this scheduling snafu, including an open letter from the Dream team owners essentially saying, “Not our fault!”
As Costabile reports, that’s … not necessarily entirely accurate? The reality is that blame for how we ended up here falls on a wide range of folks purportedly in charge, from the league to the team to the NBA.
Brian Hamilton put it bluntly:
“Inexcusably obtuse planning, astoundingly bad optics, and most of all a wildly crappy thing to do to the people who consume your product, all during the biggest showcase of the sport.”
National interest in the WNBA Finals, using TV ratings as a proxy, is stronger than ever. Versant will do its best with a limited hand, expanding its main coverage on USA to simulcasts on E! and SyFy, which feels slightly weird, but extra access is extra access.
In a strong column this morning, Candace Buckner makes a very compelling business argument about all of this:
“When the NBA has a stake in the league, which has gone from tax write-off to golden goose status, then it should do more to promote its product. Now’s not the time to make the WNBA fight for an audience’s attention on a lazy afternoon. It’s the time to fight harder for the WNBA.”
Look, who doesn’t love a good piece of weekday scheduling novelty? Those mid-afternoon group-stage World Cup games! March Madness was built on that first Thursday and Friday afternoon of the NCAA Tournament.
But in this breakthrough season for the WNBA — more money, more star power, more visibility than ever — this is the kind of thing that just shouldn’t happen, anymore or at all.
Are you watching? Take the MoneyPoll a couple scrolls below!
Get Caught Up
Big talkers from the sports business industry:
World Series: As my colleague Chris Kirschner put it, “There will be at least one more night of baseball (after the Tampa Bay Rays avoided a sweep last night). We’re all winners.” My favorite subplot is the way Brewers fans are out in force, including taking over Tampa, not just out of enthusiasm but because it’s easier/cheaper to get tickets than back home in Milwaukee.
Pat McAfee vs. the Utes: I’m personally comfortable with my level of being “corny,” but it feels a little thin-skinned for someone with as much money, clout and license to say basically whatever he wants as McAfee to worry about a college kid playfully tweaking him on an official school IG video no one watched, let alone to compare himself to *checks notes* Charlie Kirk. (Speaking of thin-skinned, the University of Utah contorted itself in contrition, which I get, but …)
NBA partners with Kalshi, Polymarket:This was inevitable. Too much potential revenue sloshing around for the league to dismiss it. Just wait until the individual teams now get in on it.
“There is no excuse or reason to lose a game like this.” That’s Texas Tech’s billionaire booster Cody Campbell, taking to Twitter to lament the Red Raiders’ embarrassing loss last weekend. Kinda relatable!
Related: Great edition of our Until Saturday college football newsletter yesterday, in which Jason Kirk laid out a strong hypothesis about All The Money: “In this era, there’s only so good most rosters can get.” (Subscribe here — as always, free!)
Kylian Mbappe, Madrid, La Liga and China: The star’s joke was quickly followed by profuse apologies from the player, team, league and anyone else in his orbit. This is a helpful explainer.
Ballon d’Or … awards show: Did we really need this?
(Way more interesting: The way winning “doubles or triples” a female player’s commercial value.)
Man City vs. the Premier League, cont’d: Really interesting analysis of how the case threatens the league, from my colleague Philip Buckingham. A+ quote from a source in the piece: “Asterisks are not good for the brand.”
This week in AI: Why it makes sense to use in F1 … and a big “no, thank you” to AI-assisted Olympics gymnastics judging at LA28.
Other current obsessions: The Jayson Tatum-Jaylen Brown viral beef (now with even more food metaphors) … the state of the tennis doubles economy … Valkyries leader Natalie Nakase, future NBA head coach? … Fleetwood Town (!), upset of the year … J.J. Watt: CBS’ long-term solution as No. 1 NFL game analyst … the deadline to apply for The Athletic’s Sports Business student internship is Friday (info here) …
What I’m Wondering
MLB: What next?
Despite having at least one more World Series game to go, by the time we reconvene next Wednesday, the World Series will have concluded and we will have started what sizes up as the grimmest offseason for baseball fans in decades.
I’m keeping it simple: What’s the best way to keep up with MLB’s impending laborpocalypse?
If you haven’t yet, click this author name to automatically follow my colleague Evan Drellich, whose reporting has been (and will become even more) essential as we enter this ominous offseason.
Much more on this next week.
Grab Bag
Data Point: $4 million
That’s the approximation of what it will cost for the Knicks to give championship rings to all of their employees, rather than cruelly tease the idea of a ring, only to have it be an IT phishing test that many (reasonably!) failed. The team tried to explain itself (twice!) and ultimately, everyone in the org will probably get rings (but there is still plenty of time for more snafu-ing).
Related: Want to “own” the Knicks or Rangers? $MSGK (Knicks) and $MSGR (Rangers) closed yesterday trading at $306.69 (up 6 percent on the day) and $181.96 (down 4 percent), respectively. (No ring included.)
Name to Know: Jay-Z
Paid to curate the Super Bowl halftime show, Mr. Carter picked … himself. (I don’t hate it!) The biggest challenge? Figuring out what from his endlessly packed catalog will make the cut. (I’ll predict a “Crazy in Love” duet with Beyoncé.)
Power Rankings
Is this business? Not specifically. But, as longtime readers know, I’m a sucker for rankings, and I’m even more a fan of tools that let fans do their own rankings. That’s what our product team released this week. I love this tool so much (try it here, with NFL Power Rankings), and I have already Slacked our data team about how I can use it for our sports business coverage to let you rank things. Updates to come!
Marketing Moves: Maryland
In an effort to get students to stay for the entire game this weekend versus Illinois, one lucky Terp student sticking around into the fourth quarter will win a free semester of tuition. Look, it’s not a million dollars to kick a field goal, but for any parent who can relate to paying for college right now, it’s not nothing. Shoutout to Team FAFSA!
MoneyPoll
Are you going to tune in for the WNBA tomorrow at 12:30 p.m. ET? That was the question for email subscribers (get in on future MoneyPolls with a three-second sign-up here!).
Last week’s Poll: A bit of disagreement with my thesis that “PTI” is the defining sports TV show of the 21st century, though nearly 70 percent voted “yes.” (Some of you emailed with the compelling argument that “Inside the NBA” is the best sports TV show of the 21st c., and it’s a good choice.)
Beat Dan in Connections: Sports Edition
Puzzle No. 765
Dan’s time: 02:37 (!!!)
(Not a typo — more than two and a half minutes! By *far* the longest it has ever taken me. Mark Cooper had me genuinely baffled this morning!)
Play here! Today is amazing opportunity to just crush me!
NEW GAME ALERT!
Strands: Sports Edition is here! Delightfully challenging! Try today’s!
Worth Your Time
Great business-adjacent reads for your downtime or commute:
Sexism has plagued surfing for generations.A rape allegation has led to a reckoning (Melody Gutierrez, Rebecca Tauber and Katie Strang)
Two more:
• Does MLB have a competitive balance problem?We ran the numbers to find out (Evan Drellich and Eno Sarris)
• Inside the “organized chaos”behind baseball WAGs’ custom World Series fits (Charlotte Varnes)
📫 Back next Wednesday! Text your colleagues this link so they can get MoneyCall every week for free. And check out The Athletic‘s other newsletters, too.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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