Leaders UPload; Umbers’ Numbers; Bach overtures; That Seb Coe rumour; Man Utd’s $10billion dollar question; UP tat; Squeezed Middle; An Idiot’s Guide to Sportel; C-Sweet
Overthinking the sports business, for money
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Umbers’ Numbers
This week’s Squeezed Middle podcast was with regular co-host Ben Wells of PTI Digital and our guest Andrew Umbers, co-founder of Oakwell Sports Advisory, and former chair of Leeds United.
Andrew came armed with data.
The first one got a lot of traction across sportsbiz Linkedin and football Twitter.
$10billion
What Umbers/Oakwell think is the right price for Man Utd - see further analysis below.
1%
The percentage of revenue spent on marketing by UK sports properties. The one above got the headlines, but I thought this one helps explain a lot.
12%
The same number for US sports properties.
95%
The proportion of the 71 EFL clubs currently trading insolvent.
A bit of afters:
Gary Neville on the United board.
Interesting idea.
See also: How to value a football club. Good piece by Matt Slater on The Athletic.
Anatomy of a Rumour
If you believe only one Thomas Bach Seb Coe rumour, make it this one.
First bounce - The IOC members are revolting
Ok, exaggeration.
But at this week’s IOC session in Mumbai a few of them have called for IOC President Thomas Bach to go another term in the job.
The optics aren’t great.
It’s all a bit North Korea.
Jens Sejer Andersen, Play the Game: Eight-to-12-year term limits for Presidents to prevent accumulation of power are the single most important principle of governance reforms across Olympic sports. If Thomas Bach’s term is extended, hundreds of sports Presidents at the national and international sports leaders will be inspired to follow suit."
So, ripple effects.
But so far, so OlympicWorld.
Second bounce - Kremlinology
Did the calls for four more years arise organically or is it an idea planted by Thomas Bach’s people?
Bach’s response was to blush prettily and wave away the calls for more Bach.
But the idea is now out there, in the air. A conversation has begun.
Third bounce - The Coe conundrum
Successors to Bach are positioning themselves for election, scheduled for 2025.
These include Son of Samaranch, another tricky optic for the IOC’s comms dept to handle.
And Seb Coe.
The problem for Coe has been conflict of interest.
His involvement with CSM is often whispered as a barrier to his elevation to the top job.
A few weeks ago, that problem went away, when CSM was bought by Casey Wasserman’s company, the Casey Wasserman who’s in charge of LA2028.
So Seb Coe no longer chairs a major sports agency.
Fast forward to this week, and the idea of Thomas Bach going again is mooted by fawning IOC members who owe their place in the room to, erm, Bach.
If Bach goes four more years to 2029, Coe will be aged out.
The Bach-Coe relationship is described as ‘frosty’.
The President would prefer his legacy candidate to be Kirsty Coventry.
Nice rumour, no?
Hear also - we’ve got a podcast coming up discussing this story.
See also -
Life’s sweet in the C-Suite, pt245
While Bach wrestles with succession, Roger Goodell just got another four years in the NFL Commissioner job he’s had since 2006.
Goodell reportedly earned $63.9m for the 2019-20 and 2020-21 seasons.
Front Office Sports estimated his total pay will total around $700million, if and when he finally calls it a day in four years time.
We could construct a scorecard for Goodell’s tenure.
The minus column might include his handling of player related domestic violence, the existential threat of concussion and the initial response to Colin Kaepernick’s call for social justice by kneeling during the national anthem.
The plus column is media rights.
A massive pile of money that continues to flow from US television.
It’s that money that enabled Dan Snyder to walk away with $6.05billion for selling the Washington Commanders franchise.
Despite everything Dan Snyder did in charge.
Goodell is the definitive case study in the role of attribution error.
His generation of sports leaders (2000-2020) have enjoyed a massive advantage - that their tenure in charge coincided with the boom in media rights income, itself a function of structural change in the media industry.
As mentioned in the podcast, Thomas Bach’s greatest legacy might be the NBC media deal that goes to 2032.
The next generation will likely be judged differently.
This is an example of how the judgement of leadership can be tricky.
See also: Richard Scudamore got lucky.
Leaders UPload
Writing this newsletter with a Leaders Hangover™️ in the media room at Leaders, deep in the bowels of Twickenham Stadium.
Wednesday night is always fun.
IMG went with a beer mat strategy. We went with stickers.
This was found on the floor at 10.30pm.
Next week it’s Sportel Monaco.
If you’re there, come say hello.
Here’s something for the plane journey: