October 15, 2025 • 42 mins
Netflix and Amazon are betting big on live sports to drive subscriber growth, boost sponsorship revenue, and deepen audience engagement — transforming the media landscape in the process. In this episode of StreamTime Sports, co-hosts Nick Meacham and Chris Stone explore why streaming giants are racing to secure live sports content, from the Champions League to Amazon's Skins Game revival. The duo breaks down how sports are reshaping their platforms, the shifting broadcast landscape, and the billion-dollar deals changing the game.
Key Points:
- Why is Amazon choosing to revive the Skins Game, and what does it mean for golf streaming?
- Does the UEFA Champions League fit into Netflix’s broader sports strategy?
- What do streaming giants like Amazon and Netflix gain from investing in live sports?
- Why the ECB believes digital clips and highlights can be as valuable as live coverage.
- Who is responsible for the death of pay-per-view in sports?
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:04):
Hello everyone, welcome back to the next episode of String Prime
Sports. My name is Chris Stone, the
community league joined as always by our CEO Nick Meacham.
Now Nick, as we report this, theCincinnati Bengals are now in a
four-game losing streak, still with the absence of Joe Burrow.
Although I will say I thought Joe Fico looked as good as he
could have looked, but I am under the understanding based on
your outfit that you have something celebratory or more
(00:28):
positive news than I can share about any team I support.
Well, I'll tell you what, I'm not that happy with the Bengals
because I have Joe Burrow and his backup and they brought this
this Joe Flaca guy in now my backup.
So I have no quarterbacks basically to start at the
moment. So I'm in a bit of trouble.
But yes, I am. For those watching those not
watching, I'm wearing I think myonly AFL related clothing.
(00:51):
Oh no, I actually have 1A jersey, they call it and I for
the Brisbane Lions. I'm currently wearing it, which
is not really my team, but kind of is my team.
I'd say it's definitely my second, second, second or third
team, top three, which makes youcan you can make your own
judgments, but I've been out of the country a long time.
So I've I've lost too much lots lost the fandom, but basically
(01:14):
they won the grand final as we were recording this just just
the other day and actually a bitof a history connected with the
club through through friends andso forth.
So it's, it's I've always kept, yeah, they always have a very
strong soft spot. I had a a friend from where I
used to live in the desert in the middle of nowhere who I used
to like do loads of sports with Broken Hill not.
(01:35):
Broken Hill, broken knee. I Maybe I'm thinking about my
head. Broke it easy even better.
Broke it easy even better name Broken Hill and we used to do
sports together and everything else and heard nothing from him.
Then he popped up and he was oneof the leading players for the
Brisbane Lions until he randomlygot knocked out by on during a
game. He just got punched and
completely knocked out. There's a incredible footage of
(01:57):
it like a Brent Staker and he was a standing there next to the
guy and he just king hit him Andhe he became just as much homies
for that alongside his several years in, in, in the, in the
AFL. And actually, but actually now
the captain of the team is, was actually the younger brother of
one of my best mates at high school.
(02:18):
And he used to be this annoying little pest.
It always used to annoy us when we I'd go over to my mate's
place and hang out and he's a pest on the field and he's
bloody good at it. He's played over 300 games which
is equivalent of like probably 15 gig career.
And it's a very physical sport. Yeah.
So anyway, he yeah. So it's kept the soft spot, soft
(02:39):
spot in my heart and thought I'dput put it on when I actually
put on this morning by chance. I'm like, it's a sign I should
be wearing this and I'm going towear it on the pod today.
Got to do it, got to do it, got to support the hometown.
Always remember your roots and, you know, speaking though Nick
of exciting competitions. Anyone that's listened to the
podcast over the summer knows that this year I've tried to
make golf a part of my life, youknow, golf lessons, going out
(03:02):
golfing. And that extends actually
watching golf content. And for the first time ever, I
watched the Ryder Cup. And I don't know this is going
to be considered a bold take or a hot take or not because like,
I don't know enough of the golf community to know this.
After watching the Ryder Cup. I would like to start a petition
that all golf should be a team competition.
(03:24):
That's going to put it out therewell.
What makes the Ryder Cup so great is that it's a novelty
value that the team format isn'tplayed all the time.
But I am with you about team golf, actually.
So there's a format, I don't know if you've played it or I
think it's called Scramble in the UK and in Australia it's
called Ambrose is the name. It's completely different, but
(03:44):
it's the same thing. Basically, you play the best
shot out of the the group and you use a handicap to deduct off
your your net score and that's that.
That format is just so much fun and I would love to see
basically you play the best shotbetween a few of you.
I think they do. One of the games in the Ryder
Cup they do. They might play.
The best ball, one of the rounds, yeah.
One of them, but you can play itas a four ball and it's a load
(04:06):
of fun because there's a lot of pressure off until it's on.
And what I mean by that is you, yeah, 4, you have four shots to
to make it work on any given hold.
But then you might have pressurewhere is like, oh, we need this
to go in, otherwise we are we'rein trouble.
And that extra pressure of having the whole team on your
back can be quite a momentous amount of pressure at that given
(04:29):
time. So I love the team version of
the game and definitely think itshould have a lot more airtime
than it does. I actually tuned into the Ryder
Cup. I had to.
I've not really watched them much.
They're coming from Australia. The Rotter Cup's not as big.
We have the President's Cup, which is the internationals
versus the Americans. It's nowhere near as big,
(04:49):
probably because just the internationals aren't as good as
the collection of the Europeans.But at the time when I was
growing up, they were. We had some of the greatest
players to play the game. We're playing Greg Norman and a
bunch of major winners came fromAustralia and it was Nick Price
and and Ratif Goose and Ernie Els and all these these great
(05:12):
greats of the game that were playing at the time.
So it used to be a really big competition for us to to go and
support. And I got really into it then,
but only just started watching the Ryder Cup really this year,
probably because it was actuallyon pay TV channels.
I never really got the chance toactually watch it, but this
year, again in Sweden, it's withViplay.
(05:33):
Viplay is really expensive to sign up for it and they're
making it really hard not to sign up to them.
It's almost like there's something in this sport, live
sports investment strategy. But again, it's this whole
challenge around OK, I want to watch one event for one weekend
and they're telling me I have topay the equivalent of like
€65.50 odd pounds a month to sign up for this package that I
(05:58):
have no interest in watching after today.
But would you, if you maybe pay 2030 lbs for the weekend to
watch hours and hours, Would I? I probably I would.
I would definitely think about it as a one off thing anyway.
So I couldn't, but I was able toborrow a login that only works
on mobile but not on connected TV's.
(06:21):
So you have to be in the same household as the, I don't know,
the router that's connected withthe TV or something.
I cover the specifics. So I watched it on my phone.
And so I went to bed on Sunday night when I don't know if you
were going down a rabbit hole here, but like the the scores
was the Europeans were just dominating.
Spoiler alert, the Europeans were dominating.
(06:44):
But then obviously a huge comeback towards the I don't
know if you got to watch the very ending, but I did.
I did because. Because I'm not.
Because I'm not currently watching the Bengals so I was
watching the Ryder Cup instead. So anyway, well, I I basically
watched it in my room because I couldn't get on the bigger TVI
watched I went to bed, but then like chained watched thought I
just watched a little bit beforeI went to bed.
(07:04):
And then I stuck was glued to myphone in after darkness because
obviously my wife was sleeping at the same time and I'm.
Just and it's Sweden glued to this.
Yeah, and it's and it's Sweden glued for hours and I end up
going from a very early bedtime to a very late bedtime watching
until the result was finally settled.
And it was absolutely gripping stuff.
(07:24):
I don't think I have watched a sporting event like that in
terms of being so compelled through the last few hours of
that that I have in in quite a long time, particularly for a
tournament, a competition that runs over 70 days.
Yeah, well, you know, we we've talked about our our colleague
Josh Simon, the editorial team does his his sports wrap up, you
(07:44):
know, going through some of the big numbers.
It did set record numbers in theUK viewership.
So we weren't the only people that found it really intriguing.
I think it said, look at this, it was up 45% in terms of
viewership, 8.8 million viewers across the weekend.
That's not insignificant numbers.
It was down in the US They, you know, attributed that to the
fact that it was not, despite how it ended, was not nearly
(08:07):
that competitive throughout the entire weekend.
But nonetheless, yeah, You know,then the the rating drowned up.
It was, you know, very popular over here.
I saw a funny joke was like, do the Europeans have to pick a
European venue? Can they just go play back at
the same venue in 2027 since they enjoyed it so much?
Like, do you have to play in Europe?
(08:28):
But yeah, I I really enjoyed theformat, Nick, having never
watched it before. To your point, the pressure of
the teammates like I just it opened up a more variables than
you get, which is sort of, you know, single player scores.
I was actually thinking about this the other day.
Can you think of another sport that has such patriotism towards
(08:49):
Europe as a collection? I couldn't think of anything
that came to mind that there's this competition where everyone
basically gets right behind a collection of Europe.
I don't know if there's any thatexists.
If anyone listening can think ofany, then then let us know.
But I think it's that's another reason why it's such a
(09:11):
fascinating competition. It's bringing and uniting the
European countries together, which is pretty much, yeah.
I don't think happens in any other sport to that level
anyway. Yeah, well, Speaking of we're
we're not the only people to think this and maybe the 2 are
connected or not connected. And you have to remind me on
this, Nick, because this is before my golf days.
But apparently there's a revivalof the skins game, which to my
(09:33):
understanding is a bit of a Ryder Cup S sort of style in
terms of team play. But this is going to be
revitalised by Amazon, which I find really interesting because
it looks like it's going to playover the Thanksgiving weekend.
So alongside what we know, we get, you know, the Thursday NFL
games on Thanksgiving and Amazonnow have the Black Friday games
(09:53):
as well. But now we're going to introduce
the skins game with, you know, anumber of some of the top
golfers in this team set up. So my understanding is this has
not been played since 2008. So, you know, nearly 17 years
since it's it's been gone. But you know, how much of this
is people actually like the teamstyle?
How much of this is Amazon season is a great opportunity to
(10:15):
add more coverage around the Thanksgiving Day.
I don't know, Nick, but it's notgoing to be the last.
We're going to see this year of a little more of this style of
golf. Well, that the whole idea and
concept of skins golf is a little bit akin to the Ryder Cup
model of match play golf. It's it's very similar.
And what's great about it is it really puts you against the
(10:36):
person that you're playing with in that particular group.
And you think about what sports properties and what just what
sports really resonate with audiences and have done for
generations and for centuries. It's that one-on-one style sport
competition. It could be be boxing, it could
be tennis, it could be those sports where you're up against
(10:57):
another individual. It's like almost like that, you
know, going back to the gladiator days, you know, it's
basically it's one person against one person or whatever
comes out the other side is the,you know, comes out the other
end is the victor. And I think this type of format
will do really well. My main thing when I see
something like this launch is, is there a commitment to make
this a longer term project? Because we've seen so many
(11:19):
things come and go. Netflix have done a bunch of
different event based things andI just then for struggle to give
it my commitment of time. If I know, I don't know if it's
a serious play, not just a, a tool to try and get a basically
a bit of a quick hit, a bit of adopamine hit for, for audiences
(11:43):
and so forth, that it's actuallygoing to be something of
substance behind it. So I, I, I, I believe that the,
with the different stakeholders involved with Prime Video
getting in into it, I think theywon't be looking at this as
purely A1 off. They want to build something
sustainable. And I, I love the format.
It just makes everything so compelling because even if
someone's having a bad, a bad hole, that means their round's
(12:04):
not over. But likewise, you can see
someone have an incredible hole and result, and then someone
else has a credible result on the same hole that nullifies all
that great work. It's it's it's it adds such
another dimension to the game and it makes it so, so much more
worth worth watching. And if they do it for money,
even the better. Yeah, Well, what what I find.
(12:25):
Interesting from an Amazon perspective is there's been
conversations around all, you know, slightly sort of like the
NFL, it's so fragmented, but it's like, you know, everyone's
got Netflix. Is anyone actually missing out
on everyone's got Amazon? So they really missing out on
Thursday Night Football. And it's, I guess the question
is, and what we've seen Amazon do or feels like Amazon does is
they're very selective. They don't always just go in
(12:45):
and, you know, get an exclusive broadcast deal with someone.
It's always, you know, really selective.
So they used to have the the theBoxing Day with the Premier
League. Now they've moved over to the
one Tuesday game a week of the Champions League.
It's always kind of pick and choose and there always seems to
be a reason for it. I guess my question just sort of
be, do they even need it? Like I'd be just just be
(13:08):
curious, you know, sort of what,what's the strategy behind it in
the sense of I'm pretty sure most people probably already
have Amazon. Like I just that I think that's
more the question is the why what exactly?
I just, it feels like Amazon's so just common these days.
Are they are they bringing in any new customers or subscribers
with this? I mean, it's a great question.
(13:29):
I think we've got an interview coming out soon where we've
talked to someone who's from, you know, Sky Sky Deutschland,
Charlie Classen and he talks, hehe talked much more
interchangeably about acquisition and retention.
Like they were the same objective almost.
You're creating content that kind of that wants to do both.
I think in this instance you are, we've had the same question
(13:51):
and we're making the same statements about Netflix a few
years ago. Why is Netflix but needing to
buy sports rights that cost a load of money if they already
have maximum a huge maturity of audience?
And I think the same thing applies here for Prime.
They'll be looking to test out what impact it has on audience
behaviour, whether that be retention, whether it be
(14:12):
acquisition or whether we just watch time from its existing
audience base on a on a case by case basis.
Amazon hasn't been afraid to do testing style deals.
I just hope it's a longer term play and they typically have
been doing things on a multi year approach.
I remember when I talked spoke to Marie Donohue, who was
leading the Amazon strategy at the time a few years back, the
(14:37):
big thing was about they wanted to own a moment, right?
And they want to own that periodof time.
And obviously the Black Friday side of things is obviously a
huge thing for them because the commerce, commerce aspect of it,
right, that that is their business.
So being attached to Black Friday is such a, an important
thing. And so they would present one
page just to Bezos and say that here's what we think.
(14:57):
This is great. Here's what we think is going to
move the needle for us. What do you think?
And they, they get the sign off and they go for it.
And I think this, it's just theywant to own these moments in the
calendar, which can drive ultimately engagement.
Some things are just about valuefor Prime Video.
And in this instance, it's a value for the Prime Video
customer, but it's also potentially driving customers
(15:18):
directly to their biggest, one of the biggest days of the year,
driving customers to the platform itself to hopefully
convert into some further revenue.
True, true. That's probably right, Nick.
I'll still ask why, but that's probably, that's probably where
the answer's headed. And you know, we've talked about
Netflix, we've talked about Champions League.
Now the two of them have a bit of a, again, just all these
(15:40):
analogies, all that where there's smoke, there must be
fire sort of things. And there's a story coming out,
you know, that Netflix is interested in bidding in the
UEFA Champions League rights deal.
What's been reported is that this would be similar to the
approach Amazon did. Those that aren't aware, at
least in the UK, Amazon Prime gets their their choice of the
(16:01):
Tuesday round of games. The rest of them are all the TNT
sports. My understanding is this would
not be Netflix coming in for some sort of global exclusive
deal for all the Champions League rights, but they want one
game per round. Those that aren't aware, the
Champions League is massively expanded the amount of games
that it has. So perhaps if Amazon gets their
(16:22):
choice of the Tuesday game and TNT gets the rest, it may be
this is something like Netflix gets their choice of the
Wednesday games and the restaurant TNT.
That that's just sort of what has been proposed.
UEFA is looking for a pretty significant expansion in the
rights. My understanding is they're
currently around $4.4 billion. Is that their global set of
(16:44):
deals? They're looking to push north of
5 billion. So, you know, nice growth, good
in there. And, you know, having more
competitors and splicing up yourpackages is one way to do that.
That's why the NFLI think is so great is that they're always
able to carve out a new package,whether, you know, they have the
initial deal, but then they introduce YouTube TV, then they
(17:04):
introduce the Netflix and they're always finding a way to
carve deals. So it seems like UEFA is
probably trying to take that similar approach to reach north
of 5 billion. But what do you think, Nick?
Does it make sense for Netflix to to take an approach like
this? I understand why UEFA would like
it, but you know, does does thiskind of just we want the one
game. We don't want the full thing.
We just want the one. Yeah, well, they obviously they
(17:26):
have been very focused on eventsbased investments.
The most regular investment theyhave made is in the WWE, right?
It's the, yeah, I think it's theMonday Night Raw, I can't think
it's called. I've forgotten which one it is.
And that's the closest thing they've got to something that is
a regular, a recurring entity. And now they've added so many
more games. Obviously their expectation or
(17:47):
hope is they will extract more value from the meteorites they
now have available. You also have to layer on that
team marketing who have been running those rights for such a
long time have lost those to Relevant sports who are based in
the US. And I'm guessing they've been
very bullish with the commitmentthey've made financially to to
having this deal come to come tothe fore.
(18:10):
Is a relevant sports believe they can get a big deal out of a
streaming partner or or two. And naturally Netflix coming to
the fore will be a huge win justfor visibility.
If they do can make this commitment for UEFA, The
challenge will be for Netflix. They've been very clear and
they're still clear today about they are what was the line pro
(18:30):
profit? I think the the Co CEO used when
referring to the expensive nature of sports rights.
So they aren't going to be looking to pay a premium for
these just so they can say they've got the UEFA rights.
It's not in their, it's not in their interest.
They will pay what they think isfair market value for them and
(18:51):
definitely no more so the notionor the story that they are
bidding for these rights. Yeah, they might be, but they
probably have a bid for everything at the right price
these days. They've got enough of the
breadth of breadth of stuff, butthey're not going to outbid the
bulk of the competition. So I believe the Champions
League in the UEFA and UEFA itself will have to make a
commitment. Do we want to play basically
(19:13):
pull this card, take a haircut on this one game a week with a
view that we can get a streamer on board, potentially get them
interested for something bigger down the line and to create more
competitive tension in the market.
But otherwise, I don't see Netflix making this play unless
it's for a very favourable pricefor them.
Yeah. Well, what's interesting is I
(19:35):
believe his name's Greg Peters is the CEO of Netflix, maybe the
Co CEO. He mentioned they were talking
about the NFL and sort of to your point, you know, these
events basing, you know, they'rehappy with the Christmas thing.
It's a it's a one big day. And they were saying it doesn't
make sense for them in their model, kind of along with lines.
If you were talking about from aprice perspective of doing these
seasonality things. And one of the things they
mentioned is partly because theycan't actually measure what
(19:59):
success would be for that, how many people would actually need
to watch, how much money from advertising, what it actually
cost to to, to balance that all out.
So what I find interesting aboutthe Champions League thing, and
we'll talk about the the comments separately, is if is
that just an American approach? I mean, obviously the Champions
League is more European, but I imagine have a global element,
(20:20):
like are they just saying they don't want to do it at the
American business or because theNFL is just going to be on such
a different cost point that, youknow, those are separate.
But it almost seems like if you don't want to do this
seasonality approach, does that almost conflict with the
purported interest in the Champions League?
Because that would take place basically from September kind of
(20:40):
all the way to like March ish time, Because once you get the
knockout stage, I don't think Amazon's involved anymore.
So, you know, it's a it's a longtime.
So I'm just a there's does it match up with what they're
doing? Because you did say they have
the WWE. But then on the other side, and
probably the more interesting side is, you know, Netflix is
saying they don't know how to measure success.
Now what does that maybe say foreverybody else when it comes to
bidding for sports rights? Yeah, I mean, just them saying
(21:02):
that blew me away, right? To think about Netflix, one of
the most technologically advanced companies in the entire
world, which struggle to identify what's providing value
and what's not based on having them for a seasonal perspective.
But I get the point. I think that I think most people
would understand that. And so that's why I think their
potential interest, that reported interest in one game a
(21:23):
a week makes makes a fair bit ofsense.
It leans into that event style weekly experience that they've
got with the WWE, but I don't think the WWE experience is has
it's, it's OK. It has started from memory,
right. I maybe they've seen that that's
worked for them in some capacity.
And so they're interested in taking that weekly approach with
(21:45):
something without committing to something which is a defined
like needle mover for subscribers like this.
There's no way that this would be a acquisition play for one
game a week. This is a very much a retention
play if you are committing such a minimal, minimal amount of
time, But it can just allow themto build out their catalogue
(22:06):
stuff to make people excited andand also market more heavily
around those events to drive anddrive people to the platform
when those when those key matchups are happening.
Because I believe they had, I'm not sure if you set up a
selection of the first picks in certain rounds, but part of the
the reported framework. But yeah, I, I oddly think
(22:26):
that's they're going to be mentioned in every single global
deal now moving forward. They're the new Apple.
Yeah, they had the new Apple, but they've actually followed up
with delivering and then some, which Apple is still up in the
air until this point until we actually see this move.
I don't know if we weren't goingto cover it, but if you've seen
recently and now the report is like that F1 rumour is still
(22:49):
going with them that they're going to buy buy those rights.
But now they they want to shut down the F1 TV pro product as
part of that or maybe integrating to their own
platform. I mean, how long that rumour
meals going to go is anyone's guess.
But anyway, back back to Netflix.
Ultimately, I think you're goingto hear more of these.
I think I think they're up for pretty much buying anything now
Netflix for the right price. And they've just said yeah.
(23:11):
And they've you look at their library of stuff from an
entertainment perspective, it kind of shows you that they do.
So I think that that they'll be up for it if, if UEFA, Champions
League and indeed relevant sports sees in my view sees them
taking a haircut on the value ofthose rights will be worth it in
the long term. Yeah, Well, it's, it's
(23:33):
interesting you referenced the interview video Charlie Clawson.
And to be honest with listeners here, we did that interview
about two hours ago. So Nick and I, we're we're just
talking ourselves to death here today.
But what he talked about as well, just sort of the idea
that, you know, pay TV, it's notjust about the sport trade.
You're going to have the family members, you're going to have to
have all the other entertainment.
That's where the Netflix side ofthings comes in because it's not
(23:53):
really about the sports. Sports is actually the minority
element of their. I think one of the interesting
things about the WWE is this isn't to get our our colleague
Steve McCaskill fired up, is it?It's obviously stage.
I think WWE has a larger opportunity for playback video
on demand, like catching up on things.
Whereas it feels like with live sports, like I'd be curious and
(24:13):
let's just say they have PSG Barcelona on, would that footage
then stay on Netflix for me to go watch on demand later?
Or would it would it disappear? I've not actually, because I'm
not on the WWE platform. I don't know what the on demand
accessibility is on Netflix, which would be interesting
because I'm I'm not even sure ifI've seen it on Amazon Prime,
though usually you start from the beginning.
I'm trying to remember if I've ever been able to go back and
(24:33):
watch on demands that that wouldalso be interesting to sort of
the the WWE comparison to something live sports.
Now that's an interesting point.I remember seeing for the Canelo
fight that I had recently, the numbers they shared, I think
they were about 20% extra if I remember the number correctly
after the fight they were on demand came afterwards.
So like that's a decent number Ithink of on demand consumption.
(24:57):
And I did notice for some of theother events that they did have
an on demand access to it, a component to to that.
It would just ultimately depend on what Uefa's also rights
framework using whether they allow there to be an on demand
component. I would imagine that Netflix
wouldn't do that deal without having that available just to
some capacity just because that's seems to be their
(25:18):
approach for other other sets ofrights and they've had other
sets of events they've had. So we'll have to wait and see.
I'm I kind of like, like what I normally say is I'm kind of
excited about if they do it and they keep making a play in this
space. I know that relevant, relevant
sports will definitely want to get this done, not just from the
financial perspective, but also for them to be able to go to the
(25:40):
UEFA team in Switzerland and say, hey, look, we've put you on
a global scale now that you we've never been able to do
before by bringing Netflix to the table.
Because remind me, how recently did relevant takeover, we
covered that story. It's like like 12 months ago.
It's not been that, it's not been that long because they've
been with was it team marketing for like the 2030 years previous
(26:00):
to that. Yeah, they they have been.
It was, it was announced. Gosh, I'm not actually sure when
started this year, end of last year that they were going to
lose those rights. And this was the final cycle
that this meant the team basically had to continue with
the delivery before stepping away and relevant taking over
this this cycle. So it's only fairly fairly
(26:24):
recently and you've seen team marketing therefore have to make
a huge pivot. Now team marketing's legacy is
basically they were effectively kind of part of UEFA that their
their whole business was built around that UEFA relationship
for all of these years. And they were the first to
basically create until commercial stand alone entity at
the time that specialises in monetization and
(26:45):
commercialization of the of the sports rights.
So they were being built solely on that.
So for relevant to come in and take that, that has mean has
meant that team have really had to start pivoting their approach
to business and I've seen and they have been I've talked to
their CEO previously and they'llbe making some changes already
in the event that this might happen.
(27:07):
I think more recently they've basically been announced, which
is a bit of a different play forthem, but partnering I think
with the Bowlers League to help them monetize and commercialise
globally as well. It'll be interesting to see if
they're able to lean on those existing Champions League
relationships they've had with all the broadcast partners and
expand the visibility of the Bowlers League globally.
(27:28):
Yeah, well, we will. We will follow that story.
Like again, it, it seems like when we do these news stories,
the more cyclical they get, Nick, we can never quite get rid
of them. So I'm sure, you know, even
we're speaking to Charlie, They,they sky Deutsche is going to
have their own conversations, the Champions League.
So they'll be more stuff to comefrom those conversations.
But moving to the next story, Nick, looking at the ECB, so
(27:50):
talking about cricket now, obviously something that you're
more familiar with, your Australian background, I'm sure
our colleague George Beer, who'll be in Australia.
I think by the time this podcastcomes out, we'll be listening to
it because I believe the Ashes is coming up.
What, in December, Nick? Yeah, that's it.
I think it's probably one of thereasons you'll see George there
and keep an eye out for him in the live, live broadcast.
He'll be wearing some sort of crazy costume, probably.
(28:12):
Absolutely. But they've come out and they
have been talking about their broadcast deal and they've got a
split between sort of free to air coverage and sky coverage.
But I think the thing that you wanted to pull out of this story
was them talking about that theythink digital clips are arguably
as valuable as some of the stuffthey're doing free to air, which
I suppose is interesting for an organisation like the ECB.
(28:33):
And I think the reason you called it out is we've seen
people like the NBA really pivotto this sort of the the value in
digital clips. I think the NBA probably one of
the front runners in terms of embracing some of the content
creators, YouTube and things like that.
But for someone like the ECB to be kind of pivoting and making
these similar comments, it's just a little bit of a change
for them in terms of sort of I guess their their approach
(28:56):
before, but just sort of what you took from that story because
you can put it in a much better terms than me.
Well, no, there's three two things I took away from it. 1 is
that Adam Silva recently got himself in quite a lot of
trouble by saying that. I think he said something about
the fact that in the sport's nowbuilt for highlights and given
they've just done this record meteorites tender for three
(29:17):
times the value for their live rights didn't go down very well
across the industry as almost like a screw you to his partners
that they've just invested something that's not as
valuable. He has now since come out and
said that's not quite what he meant.
I think what he was trying to say, the way I actually took it
before the world ran with it wasbasic classic.
It's a it's a sport built, builtwith loads of highlight moments.
(29:41):
I think the word highlight is the misleading part.
Loads of moments, right? Loads of things to be excited
about through the course of a 2 hour event, not just highlights
as they stand on a social media platform.
But anyway, hearing him say thatand then hearing the ECB chair
come out and say since that they're worth more has been
really compelling to hear from 2senior leaders that they value
(30:05):
the impact social media has so much and highlights and non live
content to the growth of their respective sports.
Because normally their focus hasalways been on the live
experience for for so long. And I reflected on that a little
bit and I was starting to think,why would he even say that?
I'm not sure this is really the reason, but one of the most
(30:26):
interesting things that ECB has done over the last five to 10
years, I think five years or so was the launch of the 100
competition, which is since for those that aren't familiar with
it is another version of the of 20 over or the short version
version game of cricket. And was recently raised huge
amount of money for private investors to take the
(30:48):
competition private in the UK. But their model, which was
originally founded with the support of two circles in the
development of that, was basically built with the mindset
of reaching a new type of audience, being very family
centric, focusing on free to wear reach and highlights and
wider visibility. And then commercialising the
(31:10):
bulk of that through sponsorships and commercial
partnerships and less about the traditional meteorites play.
So I wonder whether that is an influence in his comments here
to say that actually we've seen the 100 framework of Mass Reach
partnering with BBC heavily, giving them a little bit extra
visibility and rights. The same with Sky, who's the
(31:31):
preeminent cricket broadcaster in the UK.
That extra amount of visibility,this can lead to a lot more
commercial revenue with the right commercial strategy behind
it. And therefore that's why it is
more important, or at least as important, to have the the
highlights in the right places, reaching the right audiences and
(31:52):
not just the live game itself. Yeah.
And I think to bring us back to the golf, we mentioned earlier
when we're talking about cricket, like we are talking
about Test matches. So we're talking five days long.
You know, it's even a day longerthan you know, the PGA
tournaments, it's starting on Thursday and end on a Sunday.
You'll have some fans that'll watch every shot.
You'll have some fans that'll watch every bowl.
(32:12):
But the average person does not have 5 days.
And I think that's really to saywhere that value comes in.
Because your point that Adam Silver comment is there's
there's moments within there andthe average person is just not
going to watch five days. I mean, they just simply can't
get the time off work, don't have other interests.
Like those moments are really valuable because those are the
moments of people are going to engage with repost, stuff like
(32:36):
that, where, yeah, the live rights are great because it
takes up a large chunk of programming time, but how many
people actually engage with the the full length of that for
something that is so long? Like, it does seem like that
would place an emphasis on thosehighlights because that's really
what everyone's going to replay and rewatch.
Well, I would say in particular with things like Test cricket,
(32:56):
which goes over 5 days, again, abit like the Ryder Cup, which
goes over a number of days as well.
People basically keeping an eye out because they, they want to
follow it. They're passionate about the
sport. So they, they might be consuming
a dozen different highlights, you know, could be wickets,
could be shots that are played in cricket.
But ultimately they're also keeping half an eye out to see
if it's worth watching the end of the event to see what the
(33:18):
conclusion is. A bit like what the NBA tried as
well. They tried fourth quarter
pay-per-view. Basically, you could buy access
for the final quarter and I haven't heard much mentioned
about that since. But that type of idea of people
will keep an eye out for saying it's highly visible.
And then if it's getting to a point where there's enough
tension there to make a really compelling viewing, I'm going to
(33:39):
tune in and watch. And I think Test cricket is
beautifully built for that. I'm sure people are watching,
keeping an eye on it, whether it's through work and life and
and social and then on the finalcouple of days when they see
it's getting towards crunch timebecause it can.
That's the thing with cricket, it's really ridiculous.
It could take 3 days and come toa crunch moment.
It could take five days even though it's a five day event.
(33:59):
But I'm not going to bore peoplewith explaining why and how that
works, but keeping an eye on things because if it does get to
a crunch moment then I can just tune on and actually watch it
and focus my attention. Because the reality is no one's
going to sit there and watch five days.
I did when I was a kid. That's because I probably didn't
have a babysitter and that was my babysitter for five days.
So a little bit different, but on on school holiday breaks, so
(34:21):
a little bit different times back then.
Fair. I mean I was the same way.
It reminds me of the old days, classic sports centre when it's
just highlights. You put that on TV during the
summer holidays. Basically from like 8 till 11
I'm just going to watch sports centre for three straight hours
It we had a babysitter but like wasn't doing much.
Just me watching the same highlights for three hours over
(34:42):
and over again. But look, ultimately I think the
ECB and any cricketing nation will struggle so much to get
meteorites return out of Test cricket these days.
We've just seen it's basically the the the sport is nearly
dead. The Ashes Cricket is probably
The only exception from from thefrom the rest of them.
(35:02):
Otherwise there is some small other other tournaments or other
Test series that do OK, but ultimately they're just too long
to drive enough needle moving attention.
So instead, the highlights are probably are more valuable to
the minimal multitude of ways and doesn't surprise you they
made those comments, but it is just another reminder of the
power of non live, particularly in a in a sport that's ageing as
(35:26):
much as. Cricket is, yeah, well, Speaking
of maybe ageing sport isn't the right way to do it, but a sport
that certainly coming under a lot of shift.
And the last thing we'll we'll kind of talk about today, we've
touched on a little bit. It's just sort of the end of
pay-per-view. Are.
A Dixon from editorial team recently wrote a piece.
(35:48):
It is definitely worth going in depth as he kind of talks
through sort of the individual pieces that has led to the end
of pay-per-view. Part of it being, you know, the
UFC taking a step, part of it being the the Saudi Arabia
funding and what they're trying to do with Riad seasons.
Part of it is actually longer than that.
You know, Ed actually goes back to say that, you know, the Zone
declared boxing dead in 2018 when, you know, the zone wanted
(36:11):
to make, you know, subscriptionsa thing.
You know, so some of this, it feels like Knick boxing has
changed really quickly in the last six months.
But, you know, maybe someone like the zone always kind of
envisioned it. And then there's the ties
between Saudi Arabia and the zone and all those sorts of
things. But it it's it's a nice, really
sort of in depth article. Kind of what are the different
factors at play? How long is some of this been
going? Why did we get to this point?
(36:33):
And is pay-per-view actually dead?
And Lisa, we, we covered it withthe UFC story with the Paramount
Plus acquisition, not acquisition partnership, we
should say. But just, you know, going back
on that, Nick, a little bit and just sort of looking through it,
you know, do you think 1 plays abigger factor than the others
(36:53):
for the rights holders going to the new model or the new upstart
competitions or whether it's theintroduction, new broadcasting
partners where, you know, they want in on the action?
Just, you know, what's your take, Nick?
Well, I definitely recommend people taking some time to read
the article that that it put together it's it's really
comprehensive. Ultimately, I think that boxing
(37:16):
is being and in many ways this happens right across sports, but
boxing has been struggling its way through.
I don't know if they're struggling is the right word,
but like find finding its way through troubled waters for some
time, they haven't been unified in the way they approach the
(37:37):
emotions and stuff is so antiquated and there's no way
that it is built for the good ofthe game or the good of the
sport. And it has the right structure
in place to be able to focus on all stakeholders up and down
that spectrum. So whether it be fans to the pro
athletes to the amateurs, etcetera, it's not built the
(37:58):
right way. I think the shift away from pay,
pay-per-view will definitely help its visibility, the
interest in the sport and will mean they have to take a very
different approach to sponsorship and revenue
generation. It'll be a lot more work for the
athletes themselves to also generate more income because
these days they are just basically quite given just a cut
(38:21):
of pay-per-view revenue. It's a pretty fundamental shift.
Now some people are saying this is not it.
It was all a inevitable but B, cyclical.
So it'll come back and see pay-per-view make a return.
I need to see that really happening is if you have a truly
marquee matchup popping up out of out of somewhere after it
(38:41):
goes through a state of revolution and people start to
and some consolidation in the way basically the boxing is
delivered. But until then, I think
pay-per-view in this world is pretty difficult to see working
for boxing at the premiums that we're charging at a much lower
price point in pennies to the dollar, so to speak of what
(39:03):
they've been charging. Maybe.
But I think they they can open up a whole new set of fans by
take moving away from pay-per-view.
And that's going to be quite exciting for all the
stakeholders across UFC and boxing.
It will be interesting. I almost view and I think Ed
touches a little bit this sort of angle.
It almost feels like a Spotify moment where the fans love
Spotify, the labels love Spotify, but there's been a lot
(39:26):
of report that the artists don'tactually like Spotify.
You know, it doesn't necessarilyreward you financially the same
way, just the way the algorithm pays out and things like that,
where it's the same way for the athletes, right?
Before it was a, it was a share of pay-per-view, right?
So if you're Floyd Bayweather, you know, you're going to drive
those numbers if you remove the pay-per-view.
And again, that's not really something that's going to be the
(39:46):
media side a little bit probablynot for us.
We're not going to figure it out.
But like, does that eventually become a thing where it's like,
hey, let's just say the next Floyd Mayweather, because I
don't know who the next big namein boxing is going to be, but
becomes that guy and he says, I don't want to do this.
I'll be curious, you know, because I think they're.
We see those struggles even and like the NFL or we're seeing it
right now in the WNBA where players want a larger cut of the
(40:10):
TV revenue. You know, we're going to go and
have our collective bargaining agreement.
I'm as far as I'm aware, I'm not, not aware of there being a,
a, a players union, a fighters union or something like that.
But I'm sure that is going to have to be a part of this
conversation as things go on to figure that out.
Particularly, like I said, you know, if I'm Joe Burrow or I'm,
(40:31):
you know, old school Aaron Rodgers, top of my game, I don't
want to lose my potential earnings so that I can look out
for some six round rookie draft pick.
So it will be interesting how some of that plays out and
whether if it's good for him, bad for him and maybe it's more
unionised. But I think that's an
interesting part of this all. Super interesting.
(40:54):
I have no idea how it's going togo, but it need it will need to
change and I think it'll take some time to get there because
at the moment all the powers with the promoters and that
isn't really a healthy, a healthy approach to it.
And the World Boxing Federation is under huge scrutiny.
I mean, we could talk about another hour about boxing's
state of play, but it is a absolute mess.
(41:17):
So I I mean, hopefully this might help democratise it.
I'm just intrigued to see whether the typical, what do
they call it when they the the standoff where they have it
they. The way off, the way off, the
way in, the way in, that's what is the way.
In and the standoff they had normally they stand nose to
nose, whether that changes because I don't need to worry
(41:37):
about like selling selling pay-per-view anymore because it
was all about basically I'm going to kill that guy
basically, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And that's because they wanted to get people excited about
enough to buy a pay-per-view, whether that might just calm
down those things or when they'll still buy into, you
know, making a big deal on stageor not.
So yeah, a lot, a lot of revolution needed in boxing as a
(41:59):
business, that's for sure. Absolutely.
Well, everyone, we appreciate you taking the time to join us.
Like you said, the next coming weeks, we we reference, we have
the interview of Charlie Clawson, who's the EVP of Sports
at Sky Deutschland. We also have David Sam and I
believe his title is official like he's the the international
Vice President, international Director of sports for Tubi.
(42:20):
So we do have some interviews coming up that align with the
upcoming sports Pro Media Summit, which we don't know
about, you need to know about. We've been saying lots of
marketing emails with discounts,maybe drop Nick or IA message if
you missed one of those newsletter emails with a
discount code. We'll see what we can hook up
for you. Thanks everyone.
Hello everyone, welcome back to the next episode of String Prime
Sports. My name is Chris Stone, the
community league joined as always by our CEO Nick Meacham.
Now Nick, as we report this, theCincinnati Bengals are now in a
four-game losing streak, still with the absence of Joe Burrow.
Although I will say I thought Joe Fico looked as good as he
could have looked, but I am under the understanding based on
your outfit that you have something celebratory or more
(00:28):
positive news than I can share about any team I support.
Well, I'll tell you what, I'm not that happy with the Bengals
because I have Joe Burrow and his backup and they brought this
this Joe Flaca guy in now my backup.
So I have no quarterbacks basically to start at the
moment. So I'm in a bit of trouble.
But yes, I am. For those watching those not
watching, I'm wearing I think myonly AFL related clothing.
(00:51):
Oh no, I actually have 1A jersey, they call it and I for
the Brisbane Lions. I'm currently wearing it, which
is not really my team, but kind of is my team.
I'd say it's definitely my second, second, second or third
team, top three, which makes youcan you can make your own
judgments, but I've been out of the country a long time.
So I've I've lost too much lots lost the fandom, but basically
(01:14):
they won the grand final as we were recording this just just
the other day and actually a bitof a history connected with the
club through through friends andso forth.
So it's, it's I've always kept, yeah, they always have a very
strong soft spot. I had a a friend from where I
used to live in the desert in the middle of nowhere who I used
to like do loads of sports with Broken Hill not.
(01:35):
Broken Hill, broken knee. I Maybe I'm thinking about my
head. Broke it easy even better.
Broke it easy even better name Broken Hill and we used to do
sports together and everything else and heard nothing from him.
Then he popped up and he was oneof the leading players for the
Brisbane Lions until he randomlygot knocked out by on during a
game. He just got punched and
completely knocked out. There's a incredible footage of
(01:57):
it like a Brent Staker and he was a standing there next to the
guy and he just king hit him Andhe he became just as much homies
for that alongside his several years in, in, in the, in the
AFL. And actually, but actually now
the captain of the team is, was actually the younger brother of
one of my best mates at high school.
(02:18):
And he used to be this annoying little pest.
It always used to annoy us when we I'd go over to my mate's
place and hang out and he's a pest on the field and he's
bloody good at it. He's played over 300 games which
is equivalent of like probably 15 gig career.
And it's a very physical sport. Yeah.
So anyway, he yeah. So it's kept the soft spot, soft
(02:39):
spot in my heart and thought I'dput put it on when I actually
put on this morning by chance. I'm like, it's a sign I should
be wearing this and I'm going towear it on the pod today.
Got to do it, got to do it, got to support the hometown.
Always remember your roots and, you know, speaking though Nick
of exciting competitions. Anyone that's listened to the
podcast over the summer knows that this year I've tried to
make golf a part of my life, youknow, golf lessons, going out
(03:02):
golfing. And that extends actually
watching golf content. And for the first time ever, I
watched the Ryder Cup. And I don't know this is going
to be considered a bold take or a hot take or not because like,
I don't know enough of the golf community to know this.
After watching the Ryder Cup. I would like to start a petition
that all golf should be a team competition.
(03:24):
That's going to put it out therewell.
What makes the Ryder Cup so great is that it's a novelty
value that the team format isn'tplayed all the time.
But I am with you about team golf, actually.
So there's a format, I don't know if you've played it or I
think it's called Scramble in the UK and in Australia it's
called Ambrose is the name. It's completely different, but
(03:44):
it's the same thing. Basically, you play the best
shot out of the the group and you use a handicap to deduct off
your your net score and that's that.
That format is just so much fun and I would love to see
basically you play the best shotbetween a few of you.
I think they do. One of the games in the Ryder
Cup they do. They might play.
The best ball, one of the rounds, yeah.
One of them, but you can play itas a four ball and it's a load
(04:06):
of fun because there's a lot of pressure off until it's on.
And what I mean by that is you, yeah, 4, you have four shots to
to make it work on any given hold.
But then you might have pressurewhere is like, oh, we need this
to go in, otherwise we are we'rein trouble.
And that extra pressure of having the whole team on your
back can be quite a momentous amount of pressure at that given
(04:29):
time. So I love the team version of
the game and definitely think itshould have a lot more airtime
than it does. I actually tuned into the Ryder
Cup. I had to.
I've not really watched them much.
They're coming from Australia. The Rotter Cup's not as big.
We have the President's Cup, which is the internationals
versus the Americans. It's nowhere near as big,
(04:49):
probably because just the internationals aren't as good as
the collection of the Europeans.But at the time when I was
growing up, they were. We had some of the greatest
players to play the game. We're playing Greg Norman and a
bunch of major winners came fromAustralia and it was Nick Price
and and Ratif Goose and Ernie Els and all these these great
(05:12):
greats of the game that were playing at the time.
So it used to be a really big competition for us to to go and
support. And I got really into it then,
but only just started watching the Ryder Cup really this year,
probably because it was actuallyon pay TV channels.
I never really got the chance toactually watch it, but this
year, again in Sweden, it's withViplay.
(05:33):
Viplay is really expensive to sign up for it and they're
making it really hard not to sign up to them.
It's almost like there's something in this sport, live
sports investment strategy. But again, it's this whole
challenge around OK, I want to watch one event for one weekend
and they're telling me I have topay the equivalent of like
€65.50 odd pounds a month to sign up for this package that I
(05:58):
have no interest in watching after today.
But would you, if you maybe pay 2030 lbs for the weekend to
watch hours and hours, Would I? I probably I would.
I would definitely think about it as a one off thing anyway.
So I couldn't, but I was able toborrow a login that only works
on mobile but not on connected TV's.
(06:21):
So you have to be in the same household as the, I don't know,
the router that's connected withthe TV or something.
I cover the specifics. So I watched it on my phone.
And so I went to bed on Sunday night when I don't know if you
were going down a rabbit hole here, but like the the scores
was the Europeans were just dominating.
Spoiler alert, the Europeans were dominating.
(06:44):
But then obviously a huge comeback towards the I don't
know if you got to watch the very ending, but I did.
I did because. Because I'm not.
Because I'm not currently watching the Bengals so I was
watching the Ryder Cup instead. So anyway, well, I I basically
watched it in my room because I couldn't get on the bigger TVI
watched I went to bed, but then like chained watched thought I
just watched a little bit beforeI went to bed.
(07:04):
And then I stuck was glued to myphone in after darkness because
obviously my wife was sleeping at the same time and I'm.
Just and it's Sweden glued to this.
Yeah, and it's and it's Sweden glued for hours and I end up
going from a very early bedtime to a very late bedtime watching
until the result was finally settled.
And it was absolutely gripping stuff.
(07:24):
I don't think I have watched a sporting event like that in
terms of being so compelled through the last few hours of
that that I have in in quite a long time, particularly for a
tournament, a competition that runs over 70 days.
Yeah, well, you know, we we've talked about our our colleague
Josh Simon, the editorial team does his his sports wrap up, you
(07:44):
know, going through some of the big numbers.
It did set record numbers in theUK viewership.
So we weren't the only people that found it really intriguing.
I think it said, look at this, it was up 45% in terms of
viewership, 8.8 million viewers across the weekend.
That's not insignificant numbers.
It was down in the US They, you know, attributed that to the
fact that it was not, despite how it ended, was not nearly
(08:07):
that competitive throughout the entire weekend.
But nonetheless, yeah, You know,then the the rating drowned up.
It was, you know, very popular over here.
I saw a funny joke was like, do the Europeans have to pick a
European venue? Can they just go play back at
the same venue in 2027 since they enjoyed it so much?
Like, do you have to play in Europe?
(08:28):
But yeah, I I really enjoyed theformat, Nick, having never
watched it before. To your point, the pressure of
the teammates like I just it opened up a more variables than
you get, which is sort of, you know, single player scores.
I was actually thinking about this the other day.
Can you think of another sport that has such patriotism towards
(08:49):
Europe as a collection? I couldn't think of anything
that came to mind that there's this competition where everyone
basically gets right behind a collection of Europe.
I don't know if there's any thatexists.
If anyone listening can think ofany, then then let us know.
But I think it's that's another reason why it's such a
(09:11):
fascinating competition. It's bringing and uniting the
European countries together, which is pretty much, yeah.
I don't think happens in any other sport to that level
anyway. Yeah, well, Speaking of we're
we're not the only people to think this and maybe the 2 are
connected or not connected. And you have to remind me on
this, Nick, because this is before my golf days.
But apparently there's a revivalof the skins game, which to my
(09:33):
understanding is a bit of a Ryder Cup S sort of style in
terms of team play. But this is going to be
revitalised by Amazon, which I find really interesting because
it looks like it's going to playover the Thanksgiving weekend.
So alongside what we know, we get, you know, the Thursday NFL
games on Thanksgiving and Amazonnow have the Black Friday games
(09:53):
as well. But now we're going to introduce
the skins game with, you know, anumber of some of the top
golfers in this team set up. So my understanding is this has
not been played since 2008. So, you know, nearly 17 years
since it's it's been gone. But you know, how much of this
is people actually like the teamstyle?
How much of this is Amazon season is a great opportunity to
(10:15):
add more coverage around the Thanksgiving Day.
I don't know, Nick, but it's notgoing to be the last.
We're going to see this year of a little more of this style of
golf. Well, that the whole idea and
concept of skins golf is a little bit akin to the Ryder Cup
model of match play golf. It's it's very similar.
And what's great about it is it really puts you against the
(10:36):
person that you're playing with in that particular group.
And you think about what sports properties and what just what
sports really resonate with audiences and have done for
generations and for centuries. It's that one-on-one style sport
competition. It could be be boxing, it could
be tennis, it could be those sports where you're up against
(10:57):
another individual. It's like almost like that, you
know, going back to the gladiator days, you know, it's
basically it's one person against one person or whatever
comes out the other side is the,you know, comes out the other
end is the victor. And I think this type of format
will do really well. My main thing when I see
something like this launch is, is there a commitment to make
this a longer term project? Because we've seen so many
(11:19):
things come and go. Netflix have done a bunch of
different event based things andI just then for struggle to give
it my commitment of time. If I know, I don't know if it's
a serious play, not just a, a tool to try and get a basically
a bit of a quick hit, a bit of adopamine hit for, for audiences
(11:43):
and so forth, that it's actuallygoing to be something of
substance behind it. So I, I, I, I believe that the,
with the different stakeholders involved with Prime Video
getting in into it, I think theywon't be looking at this as
purely A1 off. They want to build something
sustainable. And I, I love the format.
It just makes everything so compelling because even if
someone's having a bad, a bad hole, that means their round's
(12:04):
not over. But likewise, you can see
someone have an incredible hole and result, and then someone
else has a credible result on the same hole that nullifies all
that great work. It's it's it's it adds such
another dimension to the game and it makes it so, so much more
worth worth watching. And if they do it for money,
even the better. Yeah, Well, what what I find.
(12:25):
Interesting from an Amazon perspective is there's been
conversations around all, you know, slightly sort of like the
NFL, it's so fragmented, but it's like, you know, everyone's
got Netflix. Is anyone actually missing out
on everyone's got Amazon? So they really missing out on
Thursday Night Football. And it's, I guess the question
is, and what we've seen Amazon do or feels like Amazon does is
they're very selective. They don't always just go in
(12:45):
and, you know, get an exclusive broadcast deal with someone.
It's always, you know, really selective.
So they used to have the the theBoxing Day with the Premier
League. Now they've moved over to the
one Tuesday game a week of the Champions League.
It's always kind of pick and choose and there always seems to
be a reason for it. I guess my question just sort of
be, do they even need it? Like I'd be just just be
(13:08):
curious, you know, sort of what,what's the strategy behind it in
the sense of I'm pretty sure most people probably already
have Amazon. Like I just that I think that's
more the question is the why what exactly?
I just, it feels like Amazon's so just common these days.
Are they are they bringing in any new customers or subscribers
with this? I mean, it's a great question.
(13:29):
I think we've got an interview coming out soon where we've
talked to someone who's from, you know, Sky Sky Deutschland,
Charlie Classen and he talks, hehe talked much more
interchangeably about acquisition and retention.
Like they were the same objective almost.
You're creating content that kind of that wants to do both.
I think in this instance you are, we've had the same question
(13:51):
and we're making the same statements about Netflix a few
years ago. Why is Netflix but needing to
buy sports rights that cost a load of money if they already
have maximum a huge maturity of audience?
And I think the same thing applies here for Prime.
They'll be looking to test out what impact it has on audience
behaviour, whether that be retention, whether it be
(14:12):
acquisition or whether we just watch time from its existing
audience base on a on a case by case basis.
Amazon hasn't been afraid to do testing style deals.
I just hope it's a longer term play and they typically have
been doing things on a multi year approach.
I remember when I talked spoke to Marie Donohue, who was
leading the Amazon strategy at the time a few years back, the
(14:37):
big thing was about they wanted to own a moment, right?
And they want to own that periodof time.
And obviously the Black Friday side of things is obviously a
huge thing for them because the commerce, commerce aspect of it,
right, that that is their business.
So being attached to Black Friday is such a, an important
thing. And so they would present one
page just to Bezos and say that here's what we think.
(14:57):
This is great. Here's what we think is going to
move the needle for us. What do you think?
And they, they get the sign off and they go for it.
And I think this, it's just theywant to own these moments in the
calendar, which can drive ultimately engagement.
Some things are just about valuefor Prime Video.
And in this instance, it's a value for the Prime Video
customer, but it's also potentially driving customers
(15:18):
directly to their biggest, one of the biggest days of the year,
driving customers to the platform itself to hopefully
convert into some further revenue.
True, true. That's probably right, Nick.
I'll still ask why, but that's probably, that's probably where
the answer's headed. And you know, we've talked about
Netflix, we've talked about Champions League.
Now the two of them have a bit of a, again, just all these
(15:40):
analogies, all that where there's smoke, there must be
fire sort of things. And there's a story coming out,
you know, that Netflix is interested in bidding in the
UEFA Champions League rights deal.
What's been reported is that this would be similar to the
approach Amazon did. Those that aren't aware, at
least in the UK, Amazon Prime gets their their choice of the
(16:01):
Tuesday round of games. The rest of them are all the TNT
sports. My understanding is this would
not be Netflix coming in for some sort of global exclusive
deal for all the Champions League rights, but they want one
game per round. Those that aren't aware, the
Champions League is massively expanded the amount of games
that it has. So perhaps if Amazon gets their
(16:22):
choice of the Tuesday game and TNT gets the rest, it may be
this is something like Netflix gets their choice of the
Wednesday games and the restaurant TNT.
That that's just sort of what has been proposed.
UEFA is looking for a pretty significant expansion in the
rights. My understanding is they're
currently around $4.4 billion. Is that their global set of
(16:44):
deals? They're looking to push north of
5 billion. So, you know, nice growth, good
in there. And, you know, having more
competitors and splicing up yourpackages is one way to do that.
That's why the NFLI think is so great is that they're always
able to carve out a new package,whether, you know, they have the
initial deal, but then they introduce YouTube TV, then they
(17:04):
introduce the Netflix and they're always finding a way to
carve deals. So it seems like UEFA is
probably trying to take that similar approach to reach north
of 5 billion. But what do you think, Nick?
Does it make sense for Netflix to to take an approach like
this? I understand why UEFA would like
it, but you know, does does thiskind of just we want the one
game. We don't want the full thing.
We just want the one. Yeah, well, they obviously they
(17:26):
have been very focused on eventsbased investments.
The most regular investment theyhave made is in the WWE, right?
It's the, yeah, I think it's theMonday Night Raw, I can't think
it's called. I've forgotten which one it is.
And that's the closest thing they've got to something that is
a regular, a recurring entity. And now they've added so many
more games. Obviously their expectation or
(17:47):
hope is they will extract more value from the meteorites they
now have available. You also have to layer on that
team marketing who have been running those rights for such a
long time have lost those to Relevant sports who are based in
the US. And I'm guessing they've been
very bullish with the commitmentthey've made financially to to
having this deal come to come tothe fore.
(18:10):
Is a relevant sports believe they can get a big deal out of a
streaming partner or or two. And naturally Netflix coming to
the fore will be a huge win justfor visibility.
If they do can make this commitment for UEFA, The
challenge will be for Netflix. They've been very clear and
they're still clear today about they are what was the line pro
(18:30):
profit? I think the the Co CEO used when
referring to the expensive nature of sports rights.
So they aren't going to be looking to pay a premium for
these just so they can say they've got the UEFA rights.
It's not in their, it's not in their interest.
They will pay what they think isfair market value for them and
(18:51):
definitely no more so the notionor the story that they are
bidding for these rights. Yeah, they might be, but they
probably have a bid for everything at the right price
these days. They've got enough of the
breadth of breadth of stuff, butthey're not going to outbid the
bulk of the competition. So I believe the Champions
League in the UEFA and UEFA itself will have to make a
commitment. Do we want to play basically
(19:13):
pull this card, take a haircut on this one game a week with a
view that we can get a streamer on board, potentially get them
interested for something bigger down the line and to create more
competitive tension in the market.
But otherwise, I don't see Netflix making this play unless
it's for a very favourable pricefor them.
Yeah. Well, what's interesting is I
(19:35):
believe his name's Greg Peters is the CEO of Netflix, maybe the
Co CEO. He mentioned they were talking
about the NFL and sort of to your point, you know, these
events basing, you know, they'rehappy with the Christmas thing.
It's a it's a one big day. And they were saying it doesn't
make sense for them in their model, kind of along with lines.
If you were talking about from aprice perspective of doing these
seasonality things. And one of the things they
mentioned is partly because theycan't actually measure what
(19:59):
success would be for that, how many people would actually need
to watch, how much money from advertising, what it actually
cost to to, to balance that all out.
So what I find interesting aboutthe Champions League thing, and
we'll talk about the the comments separately, is if is
that just an American approach? I mean, obviously the Champions
League is more European, but I imagine have a global element,
(20:20):
like are they just saying they don't want to do it at the
American business or because theNFL is just going to be on such
a different cost point that, youknow, those are separate.
But it almost seems like if you don't want to do this
seasonality approach, does that almost conflict with the
purported interest in the Champions League?
Because that would take place basically from September kind of
(20:40):
all the way to like March ish time, Because once you get the
knockout stage, I don't think Amazon's involved anymore.
So, you know, it's a it's a longtime.
So I'm just a there's does it match up with what they're
doing? Because you did say they have
the WWE. But then on the other side, and
probably the more interesting side is, you know, Netflix is
saying they don't know how to measure success.
Now what does that maybe say foreverybody else when it comes to
bidding for sports rights? Yeah, I mean, just them saying
(21:02):
that blew me away, right? To think about Netflix, one of
the most technologically advanced companies in the entire
world, which struggle to identify what's providing value
and what's not based on having them for a seasonal perspective.
But I get the point. I think that I think most people
would understand that. And so that's why I think their
potential interest, that reported interest in one game a
(21:23):
a week makes makes a fair bit ofsense.
It leans into that event style weekly experience that they've
got with the WWE, but I don't think the WWE experience is has
it's, it's OK. It has started from memory,
right. I maybe they've seen that that's
worked for them in some capacity.
And so they're interested in taking that weekly approach with
(21:45):
something without committing to something which is a defined
like needle mover for subscribers like this.
There's no way that this would be a acquisition play for one
game a week. This is a very much a retention
play if you are committing such a minimal, minimal amount of
time, But it can just allow themto build out their catalogue
(22:06):
stuff to make people excited andand also market more heavily
around those events to drive anddrive people to the platform
when those when those key matchups are happening.
Because I believe they had, I'm not sure if you set up a
selection of the first picks in certain rounds, but part of the
the reported framework. But yeah, I, I oddly think
(22:26):
that's they're going to be mentioned in every single global
deal now moving forward. They're the new Apple.
Yeah, they had the new Apple, but they've actually followed up
with delivering and then some, which Apple is still up in the
air until this point until we actually see this move.
I don't know if we weren't goingto cover it, but if you've seen
recently and now the report is like that F1 rumour is still
(22:49):
going with them that they're going to buy buy those rights.
But now they they want to shut down the F1 TV pro product as
part of that or maybe integrating to their own
platform. I mean, how long that rumour
meals going to go is anyone's guess.
But anyway, back back to Netflix.
Ultimately, I think you're goingto hear more of these.
I think I think they're up for pretty much buying anything now
Netflix for the right price. And they've just said yeah.
(23:11):
And they've you look at their library of stuff from an
entertainment perspective, it kind of shows you that they do.
So I think that that they'll be up for it if, if UEFA, Champions
League and indeed relevant sports sees in my view sees them
taking a haircut on the value ofthose rights will be worth it in
the long term. Yeah, Well, it's, it's
(23:33):
interesting you referenced the interview video Charlie Clawson.
And to be honest with listeners here, we did that interview
about two hours ago. So Nick and I, we're we're just
talking ourselves to death here today.
But what he talked about as well, just sort of the idea
that, you know, pay TV, it's notjust about the sport trade.
You're going to have the family members, you're going to have to
have all the other entertainment.
That's where the Netflix side ofthings comes in because it's not
(23:53):
really about the sports. Sports is actually the minority
element of their. I think one of the interesting
things about the WWE is this isn't to get our our colleague
Steve McCaskill fired up, is it?It's obviously stage.
I think WWE has a larger opportunity for playback video
on demand, like catching up on things.
Whereas it feels like with live sports, like I'd be curious and
(24:13):
let's just say they have PSG Barcelona on, would that footage
then stay on Netflix for me to go watch on demand later?
Or would it would it disappear? I've not actually, because I'm
not on the WWE platform. I don't know what the on demand
accessibility is on Netflix, which would be interesting
because I'm I'm not even sure ifI've seen it on Amazon Prime,
though usually you start from the beginning.
I'm trying to remember if I've ever been able to go back and
(24:33):
watch on demands that that wouldalso be interesting to sort of
the the WWE comparison to something live sports.
Now that's an interesting point.I remember seeing for the Canelo
fight that I had recently, the numbers they shared, I think
they were about 20% extra if I remember the number correctly
after the fight they were on demand came afterwards.
So like that's a decent number Ithink of on demand consumption.
(24:57):
And I did notice for some of theother events that they did have
an on demand access to it, a component to to that.
It would just ultimately depend on what Uefa's also rights
framework using whether they allow there to be an on demand
component. I would imagine that Netflix
wouldn't do that deal without having that available just to
some capacity just because that's seems to be their
(25:18):
approach for other other sets ofrights and they've had other
sets of events they've had. So we'll have to wait and see.
I'm I kind of like, like what I normally say is I'm kind of
excited about if they do it and they keep making a play in this
space. I know that relevant, relevant
sports will definitely want to get this done, not just from the
financial perspective, but also for them to be able to go to the
(25:40):
UEFA team in Switzerland and say, hey, look, we've put you on
a global scale now that you we've never been able to do
before by bringing Netflix to the table.
Because remind me, how recently did relevant takeover, we
covered that story. It's like like 12 months ago.
It's not been that, it's not been that long because they've
been with was it team marketing for like the 2030 years previous
(26:00):
to that. Yeah, they they have been.
It was, it was announced. Gosh, I'm not actually sure when
started this year, end of last year that they were going to
lose those rights. And this was the final cycle
that this meant the team basically had to continue with
the delivery before stepping away and relevant taking over
this this cycle. So it's only fairly fairly
(26:24):
recently and you've seen team marketing therefore have to make
a huge pivot. Now team marketing's legacy is
basically they were effectively kind of part of UEFA that their
their whole business was built around that UEFA relationship
for all of these years. And they were the first to
basically create until commercial stand alone entity at
the time that specialises in monetization and
(26:45):
commercialization of the of the sports rights.
So they were being built solely on that.
So for relevant to come in and take that, that has mean has
meant that team have really had to start pivoting their approach
to business and I've seen and they have been I've talked to
their CEO previously and they'llbe making some changes already
in the event that this might happen.
(27:07):
I think more recently they've basically been announced, which
is a bit of a different play forthem, but partnering I think
with the Bowlers League to help them monetize and commercialise
globally as well. It'll be interesting to see if
they're able to lean on those existing Champions League
relationships they've had with all the broadcast partners and
expand the visibility of the Bowlers League globally.
(27:28):
Yeah, well, we will. We will follow that story.
Like again, it, it seems like when we do these news stories,
the more cyclical they get, Nick, we can never quite get rid
of them. So I'm sure, you know, even
we're speaking to Charlie, They,they sky Deutsche is going to
have their own conversations, the Champions League.
So they'll be more stuff to comefrom those conversations.
But moving to the next story, Nick, looking at the ECB, so
(27:50):
talking about cricket now, obviously something that you're
more familiar with, your Australian background, I'm sure
our colleague George Beer, who'll be in Australia.
I think by the time this podcastcomes out, we'll be listening to
it because I believe the Ashes is coming up.
What, in December, Nick? Yeah, that's it.
I think it's probably one of thereasons you'll see George there
and keep an eye out for him in the live, live broadcast.
He'll be wearing some sort of crazy costume, probably.
(28:12):
Absolutely. But they've come out and they
have been talking about their broadcast deal and they've got a
split between sort of free to air coverage and sky coverage.
But I think the thing that you wanted to pull out of this story
was them talking about that theythink digital clips are arguably
as valuable as some of the stuffthey're doing free to air, which
I suppose is interesting for an organisation like the ECB.
(28:33):
And I think the reason you called it out is we've seen
people like the NBA really pivotto this sort of the the value in
digital clips. I think the NBA probably one of
the front runners in terms of embracing some of the content
creators, YouTube and things like that.
But for someone like the ECB to be kind of pivoting and making
these similar comments, it's just a little bit of a change
for them in terms of sort of I guess their their approach
(28:56):
before, but just sort of what you took from that story because
you can put it in a much better terms than me.
Well, no, there's three two things I took away from it. 1 is
that Adam Silva recently got himself in quite a lot of
trouble by saying that. I think he said something about
the fact that in the sport's nowbuilt for highlights and given
they've just done this record meteorites tender for three
(29:17):
times the value for their live rights didn't go down very well
across the industry as almost like a screw you to his partners
that they've just invested something that's not as
valuable. He has now since come out and
said that's not quite what he meant.
I think what he was trying to say, the way I actually took it
before the world ran with it wasbasic classic.
It's a it's a sport built, builtwith loads of highlight moments.
(29:41):
I think the word highlight is the misleading part.
Loads of moments, right? Loads of things to be excited
about through the course of a 2 hour event, not just highlights
as they stand on a social media platform.
But anyway, hearing him say thatand then hearing the ECB chair
come out and say since that they're worth more has been
really compelling to hear from 2senior leaders that they value
(30:05):
the impact social media has so much and highlights and non live
content to the growth of their respective sports.
Because normally their focus hasalways been on the live
experience for for so long. And I reflected on that a little
bit and I was starting to think,why would he even say that?
I'm not sure this is really the reason, but one of the most
(30:26):
interesting things that ECB has done over the last five to 10
years, I think five years or so was the launch of the 100
competition, which is since for those that aren't familiar with
it is another version of the of 20 over or the short version
version game of cricket. And was recently raised huge
amount of money for private investors to take the
(30:48):
competition private in the UK. But their model, which was
originally founded with the support of two circles in the
development of that, was basically built with the mindset
of reaching a new type of audience, being very family
centric, focusing on free to wear reach and highlights and
wider visibility. And then commercialising the
(31:10):
bulk of that through sponsorships and commercial
partnerships and less about the traditional meteorites play.
So I wonder whether that is an influence in his comments here
to say that actually we've seen the 100 framework of Mass Reach
partnering with BBC heavily, giving them a little bit extra
visibility and rights. The same with Sky, who's the
(31:31):
preeminent cricket broadcaster in the UK.
That extra amount of visibility,this can lead to a lot more
commercial revenue with the right commercial strategy behind
it. And therefore that's why it is
more important, or at least as important, to have the the
highlights in the right places, reaching the right audiences and
(31:52):
not just the live game itself. Yeah.
And I think to bring us back to the golf, we mentioned earlier
when we're talking about cricket, like we are talking
about Test matches. So we're talking five days long.
You know, it's even a day longerthan you know, the PGA
tournaments, it's starting on Thursday and end on a Sunday.
You'll have some fans that'll watch every shot.
You'll have some fans that'll watch every bowl.
(32:12):
But the average person does not have 5 days.
And I think that's really to saywhere that value comes in.
Because your point that Adam Silver comment is there's
there's moments within there andthe average person is just not
going to watch five days. I mean, they just simply can't
get the time off work, don't have other interests.
Like those moments are really valuable because those are the
moments of people are going to engage with repost, stuff like
(32:36):
that, where, yeah, the live rights are great because it
takes up a large chunk of programming time, but how many
people actually engage with the the full length of that for
something that is so long? Like, it does seem like that
would place an emphasis on thosehighlights because that's really
what everyone's going to replay and rewatch.
Well, I would say in particular with things like Test cricket,
(32:56):
which goes over 5 days, again, abit like the Ryder Cup, which
goes over a number of days as well.
People basically keeping an eye out because they, they want to
follow it. They're passionate about the
sport. So they, they might be consuming
a dozen different highlights, you know, could be wickets,
could be shots that are played in cricket.
But ultimately they're also keeping half an eye out to see
if it's worth watching the end of the event to see what the
(33:18):
conclusion is. A bit like what the NBA tried as
well. They tried fourth quarter
pay-per-view. Basically, you could buy access
for the final quarter and I haven't heard much mentioned
about that since. But that type of idea of people
will keep an eye out for saying it's highly visible.
And then if it's getting to a point where there's enough
tension there to make a really compelling viewing, I'm going to
(33:39):
tune in and watch. And I think Test cricket is
beautifully built for that. I'm sure people are watching,
keeping an eye on it, whether it's through work and life and
and social and then on the finalcouple of days when they see
it's getting towards crunch timebecause it can.
That's the thing with cricket, it's really ridiculous.
It could take 3 days and come toa crunch moment.
It could take five days even though it's a five day event.
(33:59):
But I'm not going to bore peoplewith explaining why and how that
works, but keeping an eye on things because if it does get to
a crunch moment then I can just tune on and actually watch it
and focus my attention. Because the reality is no one's
going to sit there and watch five days.
I did when I was a kid. That's because I probably didn't
have a babysitter and that was my babysitter for five days.
So a little bit different, but on on school holiday breaks, so
(34:21):
a little bit different times back then.
Fair. I mean I was the same way.
It reminds me of the old days, classic sports centre when it's
just highlights. You put that on TV during the
summer holidays. Basically from like 8 till 11
I'm just going to watch sports centre for three straight hours
It we had a babysitter but like wasn't doing much.
Just me watching the same highlights for three hours over
(34:42):
and over again. But look, ultimately I think the
ECB and any cricketing nation will struggle so much to get
meteorites return out of Test cricket these days.
We've just seen it's basically the the the sport is nearly
dead. The Ashes Cricket is probably
The only exception from from thefrom the rest of them.
(35:02):
Otherwise there is some small other other tournaments or other
Test series that do OK, but ultimately they're just too long
to drive enough needle moving attention.
So instead, the highlights are probably are more valuable to
the minimal multitude of ways and doesn't surprise you they
made those comments, but it is just another reminder of the
power of non live, particularly in a in a sport that's ageing as
(35:26):
much as. Cricket is, yeah, well, Speaking
of maybe ageing sport isn't the right way to do it, but a sport
that certainly coming under a lot of shift.
And the last thing we'll we'll kind of talk about today, we've
touched on a little bit. It's just sort of the end of
pay-per-view. Are.
A Dixon from editorial team recently wrote a piece.
(35:48):
It is definitely worth going in depth as he kind of talks
through sort of the individual pieces that has led to the end
of pay-per-view. Part of it being, you know, the
UFC taking a step, part of it being the the Saudi Arabia
funding and what they're trying to do with Riad seasons.
Part of it is actually longer than that.
You know, Ed actually goes back to say that, you know, the Zone
declared boxing dead in 2018 when, you know, the zone wanted
(36:11):
to make, you know, subscriptionsa thing.
You know, so some of this, it feels like Knick boxing has
changed really quickly in the last six months.
But, you know, maybe someone like the zone always kind of
envisioned it. And then there's the ties
between Saudi Arabia and the zone and all those sorts of
things. But it it's it's a nice, really
sort of in depth article. Kind of what are the different
factors at play? How long is some of this been
going? Why did we get to this point?
(36:33):
And is pay-per-view actually dead?
And Lisa, we, we covered it withthe UFC story with the Paramount
Plus acquisition, not acquisition partnership, we
should say. But just, you know, going back
on that, Nick, a little bit and just sort of looking through it,
you know, do you think 1 plays abigger factor than the others
(36:53):
for the rights holders going to the new model or the new upstart
competitions or whether it's theintroduction, new broadcasting
partners where, you know, they want in on the action?
Just, you know, what's your take, Nick?
Well, I definitely recommend people taking some time to read
the article that that it put together it's it's really
comprehensive. Ultimately, I think that boxing
(37:16):
is being and in many ways this happens right across sports, but
boxing has been struggling its way through.
I don't know if they're struggling is the right word,
but like find finding its way through troubled waters for some
time, they haven't been unified in the way they approach the
(37:37):
emotions and stuff is so antiquated and there's no way
that it is built for the good ofthe game or the good of the
sport. And it has the right structure
in place to be able to focus on all stakeholders up and down
that spectrum. So whether it be fans to the pro
athletes to the amateurs, etcetera, it's not built the
(37:58):
right way. I think the shift away from pay,
pay-per-view will definitely help its visibility, the
interest in the sport and will mean they have to take a very
different approach to sponsorship and revenue
generation. It'll be a lot more work for the
athletes themselves to also generate more income because
these days they are just basically quite given just a cut
(38:21):
of pay-per-view revenue. It's a pretty fundamental shift.
Now some people are saying this is not it.
It was all a inevitable but B, cyclical.
So it'll come back and see pay-per-view make a return.
I need to see that really happening is if you have a truly
marquee matchup popping up out of out of somewhere after it
(38:41):
goes through a state of revolution and people start to
and some consolidation in the way basically the boxing is
delivered. But until then, I think
pay-per-view in this world is pretty difficult to see working
for boxing at the premiums that we're charging at a much lower
price point in pennies to the dollar, so to speak of what
(39:03):
they've been charging. Maybe.
But I think they they can open up a whole new set of fans by
take moving away from pay-per-view.
And that's going to be quite exciting for all the
stakeholders across UFC and boxing.
It will be interesting. I almost view and I think Ed
touches a little bit this sort of angle.
It almost feels like a Spotify moment where the fans love
Spotify, the labels love Spotify, but there's been a lot
(39:26):
of report that the artists don'tactually like Spotify.
You know, it doesn't necessarilyreward you financially the same
way, just the way the algorithm pays out and things like that,
where it's the same way for the athletes, right?
Before it was a, it was a share of pay-per-view, right?
So if you're Floyd Bayweather, you know, you're going to drive
those numbers if you remove the pay-per-view.
And again, that's not really something that's going to be the
(39:46):
media side a little bit probablynot for us.
We're not going to figure it out.
But like, does that eventually become a thing where it's like,
hey, let's just say the next Floyd Mayweather, because I
don't know who the next big namein boxing is going to be, but
becomes that guy and he says, I don't want to do this.
I'll be curious, you know, because I think they're.
We see those struggles even and like the NFL or we're seeing it
right now in the WNBA where players want a larger cut of the
(40:10):
TV revenue. You know, we're going to go and
have our collective bargaining agreement.
I'm as far as I'm aware, I'm not, not aware of there being a,
a, a players union, a fighters union or something like that.
But I'm sure that is going to have to be a part of this
conversation as things go on to figure that out.
Particularly, like I said, you know, if I'm Joe Burrow or I'm,
(40:31):
you know, old school Aaron Rodgers, top of my game, I don't
want to lose my potential earnings so that I can look out
for some six round rookie draft pick.
So it will be interesting how some of that plays out and
whether if it's good for him, bad for him and maybe it's more
unionised. But I think that's an
interesting part of this all. Super interesting.
(40:54):
I have no idea how it's going togo, but it need it will need to
change and I think it'll take some time to get there because
at the moment all the powers with the promoters and that
isn't really a healthy, a healthy approach to it.
And the World Boxing Federation is under huge scrutiny.
I mean, we could talk about another hour about boxing's
state of play, but it is a absolute mess.
(41:17):
So I I mean, hopefully this might help democratise it.
I'm just intrigued to see whether the typical, what do
they call it when they the the standoff where they have it
they. The way off, the way off, the
way in, the way in, that's what is the way.
In and the standoff they had normally they stand nose to
nose, whether that changes because I don't need to worry
(41:37):
about like selling selling pay-per-view anymore because it
was all about basically I'm going to kill that guy
basically, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And that's because they wanted to get people excited about
enough to buy a pay-per-view, whether that might just calm
down those things or when they'll still buy into, you
know, making a big deal on stageor not.
So yeah, a lot, a lot of revolution needed in boxing as a
(41:59):
business, that's for sure. Absolutely.
Well, everyone, we appreciate you taking the time to join us.
Like you said, the next coming weeks, we we reference, we have
the interview of Charlie Clawson, who's the EVP of Sports
at Sky Deutschland. We also have David Sam and I
believe his title is official like he's the the international
Vice President, international Director of sports for Tubi.
(42:20):
So we do have some interviews coming up that align with the
upcoming sports Pro Media Summit, which we don't know
about, you need to know about. We've been saying lots of
marketing emails with discounts,maybe drop Nick or IA message if
you missed one of those newsletter emails with a
discount code. We'll see what we can hook up
for you. Thanks everyone.
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