Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
He It's Dennis Blaska for My Heart Sports DC, and
I am very proud to introduce to our entire iHeartMedia
listenership that we are partnering with Jeff Azelouni, who is
the president and CEO of Fusion Sports and Entertainment. And
on Wednesday, December seventeenth, in partnership with iHeartMedia, at the
Willard Hotel in Washington, DC, Fusion is hosting Powerbrokers mid
(00:20):
Atlantic Sports Summit, which will bring the region's most significant
and consequential sports business leaders together. Jeff and I will
talk about what this event is, what it offers, and
how you can purchase tickets to be a part of
this incredible one day event. Well, everybody heard my intro
to the excitement coming up in less than a month
this recording date for a Powerbrokers mid Atlantic Sports Summit,
(00:42):
And Jeff, I know that last time we talked that
things were coming together quite well, but now they're even
bigger and better. I know you've added a post event
that I want to talk with you about. But for
the people that miss the interview last time, I'd love
to give context about not only your background and why
you're doing this, but putting this together because it really
is unique events. So before we do anything, can you
kind of give people context about your background and all
(01:05):
the things that you've done in sports, because your resume
is really incredible.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Well, thank you, Dennis, and again thank you for inviting
me to come back on.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
I've been in these professional sports business for a little
over thirty years.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
I'm a Detroit native.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
I started my career with the Detroit Red Wings and
Detroit Tigers. Then I moved on and worked for the
Tampa Bay Buccaneers for twelve years. Also ran corporate partnerships
for Manchester United and a few other teams.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Along the way.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
I won't bore you with every stage, but I left
the team side of sports a little over a year
ago and I started my own sports consulting business, essentially
using my institutional knowledge to help corporate brands guide them
through the landscape of their sponsorship portfolios and how to
engage with the teams i'm in.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
Part of that business that I.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Started also involves curating sports business conferences, and so I
decided to kind of launch a series of regional based conferences,
and the first one being here in Washington, DC, which
is coming up on December the seventeenth at the Willard Hotel.
What's unique about these sports conferences, Dennis, is that the
(02:18):
audience is the corporate community, And although I have great
participation from all the major teams in the market, they're
really speaking to corporate decision makers about sponsorship opportunities, premium hospitality, sports, media,
real estate development. So it's really kind of a unique approach.
The other thing is that they're regional in focus. So
(02:40):
my first one is here in Washington, but I'll be
expanding it with other cities in the near future. Well, first,
let me touch on the market, Dennis, and what's so
unique about the Mid Atlantic region Washington, d C. And Baltimore.
It's unlike anywhere else in the country. What is going
to transpire here in the next three to five years
is bigger than any market in the nation. And the
(03:02):
reason why that is is because the scale of things
that are happening in a condensed period of time. Obviously,
there are things happening all over the country. There are
new stadiums being built, major renovations happening with arenas and stadiums,
but here in one place, you have the biggest stadium
development project in the nation. About to take place with
(03:24):
the new Commanders Stadium. Then on top of that you
have monumental sports and entertainment, which is essentially building a
new arena around an old one. This isn't just a
referb over in Baltimore, no less. You have the Ravens
and the Orioles, both in partnership with the States, infusing
hundreds of millions of dollars into their facilities, and not
(03:46):
far down the road you're going to hear news about
the Nationals doing similar things. So all of this is
happening at one time in a market that's one of
the biggest in the country.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
It's that pretty massive news that's happening in.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
The business, and you ask me about what the focus
is of those developments. You know, the sophistication of facilities
and the way we interact with them has changed so
much over the past few decades. You know, gone are
the days where it's just a bowl with seats in
them and people get a hot dog. The experience is
so sophisticated and it's so targeted different segments of an
(04:19):
audience that buildings are built with a lot of thought
and attention to detail around market segmentation. So what you
see is a lot of the renovations and developments in
the arenas and stadiums are built around premium hospitality experiences
that are divided up in multiple ways to suit every
(04:40):
market need outstanding.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
So I don't want to bury the lead anymore. You've
got a great guest speaker list. And also there's going
to be lunch and there's going to be a lot
of things that people are going to experience that day
at the Willard Hotel. So when somebody does purchase a
ticket and folks, we're going to tell you how to
do that. And if you're on the website listening to this,
there are links to that so you can check that out,
see what it's all about, register, get your tickets. But
(05:02):
let's talk about what the day includes, and then let's
go to the guest speakers, because it really is an
amazing list that you compiled.
Speaker 3 (05:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Absolutely, it's a really simple layout with the conference because
if you attend, there are no breakout sessions, any choices
to be made like that.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
If you have a ticket to.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
This event, you'll experience the whole thing, you know, soup
to nuts right from the beginning. The lineup of speakers
is something I'm proud of because you know, when I
approached all the teams, they all were very excited to participate.
So you have the presidents of all the major clubs
in the market. Mark Klaus, the president of the Washington Commanders.
You have Jim Vanstone, the president of Monumental Sports and Entertainment,
(05:41):
which is the Capitals, the Wizards, and the Mystics. Then
you have Sashi Brown, the president of the Ravens, Katie Griggs,
the president of the Baltimore Orioles, and we just recently
announced Kim Stone, who's the president of the Washington spirit
So an incredible lineup of keynote speakers. And that's on
the team side. The other fifty percent, really of the
(06:02):
programming are discussion panels led by panelists from the corporate community,
people that are deeply involved in the sports business, people
that make decisions in sponsorships, in sports media, premium hospitality.
We're going to have a really unique panel about real
estate development around sports anchored districts, which is going to
(06:23):
be a very relevant topic here in Washington and in
Baltimore in the near future.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
So the lineup is really exceptional.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
Jeff, there are so many touch points with all the
guests that you mentioned about the different avenues and buckets
that come with pro and amateur sports, and whether it's
a building and whether it's hospitality, which I love to
talk to you about because that seems to be in
the news with not only the new stateiuments being built,
but the experience that they want to have fans go
and get at a game or an event. With that said,
(06:53):
when you put this together the idea of the Sports Summit,
what kind of person were you gearing this ad like,
who would you like to attend, get excited about this
and who will get the most out of it.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Yeah, the people in the room are primarily going to
be those in the corporate community that make major decisions
for their companies through marketing perspective, sales engagement with clients.
So when I look at the lineup of people that
have registered so far, as primarily chief executive officers, chief
(07:22):
revenue officers, chief marketing officers, heads of marketing, heads of operations,
people that engage directly with their client base.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
One other thing I wanted to talk to you about
that'll be addressed at the conference is the sports media
when it comes to sports business, And I know that's
a real large, giant thing we're talking about, because there's television,
there's radio, there's digital, there's social media, and then of
course the in game experience. But with that said, the
business of sports, I mean there's so many websites, there's
(07:53):
so many companies covering it now. I mean, it really
is a big business because we're seeing the sports contracts
with the stream services that are in the billions of dollars,
and I know ownerships are getting involved in this. It
really is an incredible over the last decade, and I
know you've been a part of it. How it's growing
on Mentally, can you talk a little bit about the
business of sports.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
There are multiple factors that influence the value of teams
and how the industry is rising. The biggest by far
are the value of media, which you have seen happen
in the past I would say decade or so, is
a major shift in how we consume our sports. It's
fascinating because you know, back in the day, let's say
(08:32):
thirty years or so ago, your options were network television
essentially the Big Three, and regionalized sports that were on
linear channels or through cable networks. But today that evolution
has been taking shape and growing in different directions. So
obviously direct to consumer offerings through streaming platforms, entities like
(08:55):
Disney and Netflix, Prime through Amazon, all of these avenues
are growing and they're creating greater value to the leagues
because of the kind of contracts the leagues are negotiating
with these entities. All of that causes the rise and
value of clubs. There are other factors, but the media
landscape is the thing that has the biggest influence on that.
(09:16):
On a regional basis, however, that has caused a major
rift in the business because regional sports networks that always
existed on cable channels or cable networks have been affected
significantly by cord cutting. So people are consuming sports on
a regional basis in a very different way. The interesting
thing is here in this market in Washington, DC, you
(09:39):
have an entity like Monumental Sports Network, which is owned
by Monumental Sports and Entertainment Ted Leonsis and his investors
are very contrariant because they're going all in on their network.
They're having tremendous success because they have the scale through
multiple teams to accomplish that. So it's fascinating evolution to watch.
(10:00):
It's going to continue to happen because the one value
in media today more than anything is live sports.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
It's the one thing that people love and consume.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
Yeah, and it's one of the few things I think
people like me watch actually live and nothing else. Everything's
now DVR in this world because we're moving so quickly
and there are so many choices out there. Before I
get some final thoughts from you on the series, kind
of recap what we talked about with the guest and
what everybody will get at the Willard Hotel in Washington,
d C. On December seventeenth. I just want to make
(10:30):
sure that everybody knows about the website, how to register,
how to get tickets, and also we should mention at
the time of this taping you also added a post event,
which is really exciting. Can you talk about that first.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
Absolutely, Dennis.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
We just announced a partnership with Monumental Sports and Entertainment,
so everybody that attends the events will also after the
event attend a post a reception at Capital One Arena.
This will be a private reception and that will include
great food and beverage and kind of an exclusive tour
of the arena and all the incredible changes that are
(11:06):
going on over there, some of which that are publicly
facing today, a lot of which are still in developments
because some people may not realize that Capital One Arena
is going through a three year phased redevelopment. So that's
going to be exciting experience for people who are really
keen on learning about what's happening in the sports space.
To get an inside look of what it looks like
(11:28):
back of house over at Capitol One Arena, right.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
And it's hard and it's already underway, and if anybody's
seen the renderings, please look it up because it is
going to look gorgeous down there.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Now. It's pretty amazing.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
I mean, already the things that are live and accessible
to the public are incredible.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
But that's just the preview of what's the.
Speaker 1 (11:46):
All right, So let's tell people how they can register.
Let's remind them about the dates, the times, your guest speakers,
and how to get tickets, and of course the website.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
Jeff, Yes, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
The event is Wednesday, December seventeenth at the Willard Intercontinental
Hotel downtown DC, right next to the White House. It's
the nicest hotel in the city, so it's a fabulous setting.
To get tickets, you can go on powerbrokersevents dot com.
That's powerbrokersevents dot com. If you buy a ticket and register,
(12:18):
you'll attend the whole events. There are no choices to
make on breakout sessions or anything like that. We'll have keynotes,
conversations with the presidents of the Washington Commanders, the Baltimore Orioles,
Monumental Sports and Entertainment, the Baltimore Ravens, and the Washington
Spirit So heck of a lineup of keynotes. In addition
(12:39):
to that, we'll have a number of discussion panels from
leaders in the corporate community about sponsorship, about media, sports,
anchored real estate development, and a variety of other topics,
as well as fantastic food and great networking.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
And not too embarrassed Jeff, but I know how hard
he's worked on this inaugural event, and it is herculean
that he's put this together because the names are epic,
the topics are going to be great, and it really
is going to be a great inaugural event. So I
couldn't be more stoked for you, Jeff and your team,
So thank you again for your time. We're looking forward
to once again participating and being partners with you in this,
but thank you so much. Continued success, really looking forward
(13:17):
to this.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
Thanks for inviting me back. Dennis