Women's Soccer Review Podcast - The Business of Women's Soccer

Jonathan Tannenwald is joined by AdWeek's Mollie Cahillane and Business Insider's Meredith Cash to discuss the U.S. Soccer Federation presidential election, U.S. Soccer's new long-term media rights deal with WarnerMedia, and the risks of the many new cryptocurrency sponsorships in the NWSL.

Episode Transcript

(00:07):
The women Fucker Review podcast with DwayneRowlands and Jonathan tan And Wald on the
Sports Podcasting Welcome to another episode ofthe Women's Soccer Review here on the Sports
Podcasting Network. I'm Jonathan Tannon Waldof the Philadelphia Inquire. It has once
again been two months since our lastshow. In fact, it's been more
than two months at this point sinceour last show. I'm sorry about that.

(00:30):
As ever, I've been wildly busyfor us so long now. There
was no such thing as an offseasonan American soccer this winter, as all
of you who followed me on Twitterand read my work, no, so
we missed a bunch of stories thatwe should have discussed on the podcast.
But we've come to a bit ofa moment right now where there's three big
stories going on that center around thetheme of the business of women's soccer.

(00:54):
The US Soccer Federation presidential election,which might be over by the time that
you are listening to this. We'rerecord to get on Thursday night Eastern time
in the US. The election isSaturday, late morning, early afternoon.
I don't know exactly when the showis going to go up, but what
you will here discussed on this showis certainly going to be relevant no matter
who wins, whether it's Carlos Corderoor Cindy Parla Coone. We will then

(01:17):
discuss the US Soccer Federation's big newmedia rights deal with WarnerMedia, which is
known some of you as Turner Sports, which is known through some of you
as t nt N, TBS andHBO Max. And then we will discuss
a business matter in the NWSL thathas been of interest to discuss all of

(01:38):
this. Joined by two good friendsof mine who are journalists, but really
business media journalists who happened to writeabout sports instead of somebody like me who
was a sports journalist who happens towrite about business stuff a lot, and
some people would say too much.One is a debutante here on the show,
Molly Kahlane of Adweek, and oneas a returning guest to the Cash

(02:00):
of Business Insider. I'm sure thatmany of you already follow both of them
on Twitter because they are both biginto women's soccer and it is great to
have you both here. Good tobe here, Jonathan from Life from the
Depths of Twitter. Yeah, really, we haven't. The three of us
have a group chat going where wejust go off about all kinds of things,
very off the record, and nowwe're going to andre come our bad

(02:28):
business opinions. Well, I know, I fear I know of some people
who are not going to want tohear them. But that's not our fault,
right, that's the fault of otherpeople. Let us start with the
election. Cindy Colney, incumbent againstCarlos Cordero, the challenger and her predecessor,
which is a wild dynamic. Forthose of you listening, I would

(02:53):
encourage you all, even if youare listening to this after the election has
taken place, I would encourage youall to really read up on all of
the journalism that has done has beendone during the campaign. Cindy Cohen gave
a lot of interviews. She madethe rounds quite a bit. I'm very
fortunate that her first stop on hercampaign was to me. I asked her

(03:17):
some hard questions which she answered,and I appreciated that Carlos Cordero has not
made the rounds quite as much.I'm sure many of you have noticed.
He has spoken to Soccer America andto ESPN, which are two outlets that
you cannot turn down if you wantto be in the governance of soccer in
this country. Soccer America has beendoing it for longer and better than anybody

(03:37):
else, more than fifty years.And ESPN of course as ESPN Cordero also
spoke briefly to The Guardian. Iasked, since people will might want to
know, I asked a number oftimes, never got an answer. There's
no obligation to talk to me.There's technically no obligation to talk to anybody.
But some of you out there,I'm sure, would say that it

(03:59):
helps a candidates case to be outthere and transparent and saying things. That's
dependent on you not asking a hardquestion. Well, and that's look.
Jeff Carlisle of the ESPN, whodid the interview there, Paul Kennedy and
Mike Waity who've been at Soccer Americaso long, did the interview there with

(04:20):
Cordero, and they asked a lotof the hard questions and he answered a
lot of the hard questions. Didhe answer them to everyone's satisfaction? As
again, as we are recording,this still to be seen, but I
would call your attention to a fewthings. One part of it is in

(04:43):
Soccer America two columns that were written, and there are not a lot of
columnists in the American soccer mainstream mediain the way I'm going to use a
big old adult word that there areat newspapers, for example. A lot
of us who are quarters are notcolumnists, even though we end up offering
opinions on lots of things, manyof them on Twitter, even some of

(05:06):
them snarky, but we're not reallycolumnists in the traditional media way. That
for the most famous example in Americansoccer, Paul Gardner of Soccer America is
as he has been for many,many years. He is the dean of
all of us in this business,going back to the nineteen seventies and even

(05:26):
beyond that. And he wrote ofCarlos Cordero in a column that is paywalled,
you should read it, and youshould subscribe to Soccer America. Yes,
I am hawking somebody else's product ontop of Business Insider's paywall, ad
Weeks, the Inquirers, the sportspodcasting networks, Patreon. Yes, I'm
telling you to subscribe to Soccer Americatoo, even though it's not my money,

(05:47):
because they have as I said,I've been doing it for longer and
better than anybody else, especially whenit comes to US soccer, governance matters.
And so Paul Gardner, who Godbless him, he's a friend of
mine, is in his nineties now, but he still has every ounce of
his fastball. Who wrote and Iwill quote that Cordero quote now sees himself

(06:12):
as one of soccer's most respective figures. He should certainly not be seen in
that light in this country. Itis to be hoped that the US soccer
voters will not be taken in byhis laughable delusion that currying favor with soccer's
world leaders can cancel out is appallingbehavior within American soccer. That is a
reference to Cordero being an adviser tothiefa president Giohnny Infantino. It is also

(06:39):
in response to what Cordero believes asa perception and many of us know as
a fact that he is thief ispreferred candidate in this election. Another column
that was in Soccer America written byBaudu. You should read it. And
I know that's a very controversial thingto say in women's soccer. I do
not agree with everything Bo writes.I've known him for a long time.

(07:03):
I get along with him professionally andsometimes that's what you do. You need
to read this because some of thecomplaints against Cindy Cone that are held by
the state and regional level youth andadult amateur soccer associations that will vote for
the presidency, some of those complaintshave some real merit, and I took

(07:26):
some of them to Cindy Cone,and she acknowledged that she had not done
a good enough job with them inher first term in office, and that
she wants to do better if shegets reelected. Read Bo's column, and
read in particular the kicker at theend. In any case, he writes,
the state associations have plenty of validconcerns, but they've made one crucial

(07:47):
error. Instead of reaching out tosomeone, anyone who could have lent their
concerns a fresh ear without disrupting thefederation's goodwill with the public and sponsors,
they chose Corday. Let that sinkin for a minute. The sponsorship side
of this is what we're going toget into here on the show. I'm

(08:09):
sure that many of you have readthe Sportico piece that ran on February twenty
fourth, which included remarks from RicardoFort, who used to be the former
head of global sponsorships for Coca Colaand Visa, both of whom have been
quite involved with American soccer and globalsoccer for a long time. Visa presently
with the She Believes Cup women's soccerreference. Carlos Cordero's history with women's soccer

(08:33):
is well known. Ricardo Fort toldSportico quote A feeling is shared, and
the concern is that Carlos Cordero maycome back to the presidency. This is
not a future that they want tobe a part of. Now, some
of you will note that Ricardo Fortis already working within US Soccer on Cindy

(08:54):
Cone's behalf as part of the Federation'sDiversity, EQUI and Inclusion initiative. That's
correct. If that influences your view, I will read you what for a
lot of us is the kicker ofall of them so far when it comes
to commercial sponsors, it comes fromDeloitte, the global consultancy that I think

(09:15):
it's safe to say all three ofus know people who work for even if
we don't know the people who wrotethe statement. I went to the University
of Pennsylvania, Meredith went to DukeMolly went to Northwestern these are people who,
for better or worse. I thinkwe know it's a miracle that we
are not consultants. Actually, wellit might be a miracle. We're also
getting paid a lot less, Isee, but we escape a lifetime of

(09:39):
misery, so well, sort of, a Deloitte spokesperson said in a statement
to Sportaco. As we made clearin twenty twenty, while our support for
the team is unwavering, we weredeeply offended by the views expressed at that
time by the USSF. That's areference to the sexist legal filings in the

(10:01):
equal pay lawsuit. We have appreciatedthe improved tone and trajectory of this matter
under new leadership, and our futuresponsorship decisions will be contingent on continuity of
that progress. I'm gonna go toMeredith first and say, that's some pretty
strong language when you first read it, what did you make Well, I'm

(10:26):
not sure if continuity means continuity interms of Cindy Kane, or if it
means continuity in the more affable relationshipthat she has forged with the US women's
national team, which obviously was ahuge public I think it's safe to say
disaster under Carlos in his first orin his term when he literally had to

(10:52):
stept out from the presidency. I'mnot sure that there's a past, a
possible path forward for it continued positivetrajectory with the US women's national team if
Carlos is at the help, Ireally don't see a world where that happens.

(11:15):
There's just too much history there.But I guess by the time you're
listening to this podcast, we'll seewhether or not that's something that the both
sides are going to have to navigate. What if I'm a voter and I'm
hearing that I'm concerned. I thinkDeloitte is a hard enough hitter to understand

(11:39):
that this is not simply to Deloitteharboring these feelings of like reluctance to move
forward with the federation. And forall of the talk over the past what
decade about the finances of the Federation, I'm very concerned if if the money

(12:01):
is getting pulled, that's just myperspective. How do you how do you
take you know, money talks.I feel like every other issue with the
Federation will revolve around that. Ifthe Federation is struggling more with money than

(12:22):
it was prior, so that wasmy initial thought there, and maybe that
was more than you bargained for whenyou when you pitched to me there.
But oh it's I think it's Ithink it's way more impactful than then maybe
it reads on first glance. Imean everything revolves around this. And Ricardo
Ford also wrote a personal essay onLinkedIn where he said, my work was

(12:46):
impacted in many ways by some ofCordero's decisions during his turbulent years as president
US Soccer. Historically one of thebest partners any brand could have, suddenly
became unrecognizable as a sponsor. Ifelt less motivated to invest, and the
message I heard from across my industrynetwork was that US Soccer had turned into

(13:07):
a liability for most companies associated withthem. Thankfully, the Grete later writes,
Thankfully leadership changes at US Soccer occurredmister Cordero's resignation to be precise,
and sponsors were able to re engagewith the federation in a more constructive way.
Again the words of Ricardo Fort,he was doing some work for US
Soccer in addition to all of hiswork in the global world of soccer money,

(13:31):
sponsorships, investing in teams and thingsas he is also looking to do
in addition to this and Molly.It interests me because these sorts of people
don't normally throw former Goldman Sachs executivesunder the bus publicly. In this higher
realm of finance and influence. Theydon't tend to go after each other publicly

(14:00):
because there is some mutual benefit inthat circle, as it were. From
your side of things, dealing withmedia sponsors as you do, dealing with
people who are investing money in women'ssports as you do, what do you
see? Well, certainly looking atit from my perspective, I mean I
work for Adweek. I cover thebrands and the marketing, and we look

(14:22):
at everything from the branding and thesponsorship, and how can you look at
it like this? The fact thatDeloitte is speaking out, I think is
a huge deal, and I thinkthe fact that Ford is just saying these
things it's almost unprecedented. I don'twant to say it's unprecedented because I'm not
positive, but I think it's somethingthat US Soccer needs to take very seriously

(14:43):
and something that voters should look atvery seriously as well, because I mean,
the echo Merida's point the idea ofcontinuity. Does that mean a strong
relationship with the US women's national teamand Cindy doesn't mean a continuation of the
strong relationship with the US when thisnational team? Unclear? But I think

(15:05):
going forward, and again, asMeredith said, money talks and the fact
that brands are willingly speaking out likethis is something that I haven't really frequently
seen and something that I think uscerneeds to take into consideration when it comes
to looking into a new precedent.Look. Obviously, I don't think it's

(15:26):
any secret to you two or anybodylistening to this show that I've been doing
this longer, longer than both ofyou. I've never seen it. I
don't know anybody who has ever seenanything quite like this, and I haven't
and I just and I haven't seenanything like this, not only in soccer,
but in almost any other aspect ofmarketing and media. This is very,
very unique, and it's very rare, and it's something that people should

(15:48):
be paying attention to. And thefact that a company as big as Deloitte,
and if Deloitte is speaking out,other brands are feeling this way,
and US Soccer cannot afford to losethese kinds of sponsorships, especially if there
is invested, as they claim theyare in growing the women's game. If
they are that invested, they can'tlose these people. And the message is
going It is not going to theathletes. The athletes already know this,

(16:12):
and the Athletes Council, which holdsthirty three percent of the electoral votes,
already knows this. The message isreally going to two places. It's going
to the professional leagues, who I'msure have heard it. There's no doubt
in my mind that they have heardit, because some of these same companies
sponsor the NWSL, sponsor MLS,the USL, etc. Where the message

(16:33):
where I am most interested to seewhere if the message resounds, is with
the youth groups, with the statelevel and regional level youth associations in the
country, whether they hear this.Because the sport has grown so much in
this country and the governing body hasgrown so much in this country now,
the US Soccer makes more money fromcommercial sponsorships now than from registration fees,

(17:03):
and that's probably how it ought tobe for a modern soccer governing body.
That doesn't mean that it should onlyfocus on the senior national teams. Cindy
kona Is admitted she has focused toomuch on the senior national teams and not
listened enough to the youth and adultamateur groups, and that she wants to
do that if she gets another term. She wants to fix that. But

(17:25):
it that to me and for peoplewho are who knows. I've heard some
things about the election. I'm sureyou've read some of the explainers that are
out there. The athletes have thirtythree point three percent of the vote that
is mandated by the by federal law, a new federal law since the last
election. The adult amateur is,the youths and the professional leagues each have

(17:45):
twenty percent. The professional leagues asone block, mind you, it's not
one league as twenty percent. Theprofessional leagues as a block have twenty percent.
That is then subdivided into the variouspro leagues, the youth groups and
aggregate at twenty percent. The yadultamateurs have twenty percent, Various other people
have small percentages. The math isif the athletes go in mass for cone,

(18:11):
If they all go for cone,which wouldn't surprise anybody. Nobody knows.
If they all go for cone andthe pro council goes for Cone,
it's over, which is one ofthe reasons why the adult amateurs don't like
her. They've lost some of theirpower. They can't call the shots if
the youth vote splinters over Carlos Cordero'shandling of abuse of the Christian Press complaint

(18:36):
and wondering if you know I'm notout here endorsed, I'm really not.
But I've talked to a lot ofpeople around the American soccer in the last
few weeks and said, if itwas your kid or my kid who'd been
playing for Wary Dames within the greatsphere of Illinois youth soccer, where he

(18:57):
has so much power, what wouldwe have done. I can't answer that
for anybody else, but that's oneof the questions that the youth groups are
facing. And if they splinter,I don't think Cordero has a chance.
I don't know if they will becausethe number one priority for the youth and
adult amateur groups is how much moneythey can make off the hosting of the

(19:18):
twenty twenty six Men's World Cup inthe United States. They want a piece
of that pie, and they believethat Cordero gives them a better shot of
getting it than Cone does. Whatelse happens in terms of other dynamics,
we will see. And as Isaid, if the athletes all go for
Cone, the pro Council puts herover the top. In particular Major League

(19:40):
Soccer Commissioner Don Garber. If theathletes splinter, if they don't all go
for Cone, all bets are off. And the Athletes Council has not endorsed
yet. We've seen some individual membersindorsed we when this is being recorded,
we have not yet seen the AthletesCouncil as a whole endorse And until that

(20:03):
happens, or we until we findout how the vote goes, nobody knows.
This is not going to be amulti round election like the last one
was. Because there are only twocandidates. It's going to be one vote.
One of them has to get amajority in the first round because nobody's
going to abstain, and that's goingto be it. So, speaking of
the amounts of money coming into theUS Soccer Federation, that takes us to

(20:23):
our second point, which is thebig new media rights deal with Warner Media.
Molly and I have written about extensively. Meredith, I believe you have
some two up to now. Notyet. No, I'm mostly here to
listen to the experts. I'm justI'm with you, listen, right,
I have no doubt. I haveno doubt that you will. Once it

(20:44):
kicks in next year, in twentytwenty three, it will be an eight
year deal will bring US Soccer abouttwenty five million dollars a year. That
was as much, that is asmuch as it as getting from the current
English and Spanish combined deal, whichmeans that it is going to be putting
more money in the bank from itsteam, from its I'm using the phrase
media rights very intentionally here, asyou'll those of sure many of you already

(21:07):
know why. But we'll get intothat in a minute. Twenty five million
dollars a year. The expectation isthat there will be they take a quick
drink of water, around twenty gamesa year in the deal. It is
not every game that the US nationalteams play on home soil. Anything that's
in a Cockcalfe tournament or in aFIFA tournament is separate, right steals.

(21:32):
These are the games that US Soccercontrols, which are the men's senior men's
teams, World Cup qualifiers, friendlies, for the women, including big ones
like the She Believes Cup and friendliesplayed on home soil by the youth national
teams. And this, now,Molly, is where the fund starts.
Oh you're speaking my language. Nowhere we are. All of the games

(21:52):
in this deal will be on HBOMax, which is WarnerMedia's most prominent subscription
streaming platform the moment. If youget HBO as a linear TV channel,
you have it. If you don'tand you pay for HBO Max, you
have it. There are around seventythree point eight million subscribers combined. HBO
has said that's a very big numberby subscription streaming platforms in terms of media

(22:15):
outlets in the United States that theannouncement said that about half the games will
be on linear TV, split betweent n T and TBS, which remain
two of the biggest cable channels thatare out there. They of course have
the NBA, the NHL Major LeagueBaseball if they ever play again, and

(22:36):
a portion of the NCAA men's basketballtournaments, which is something that I watch
religiously, as I think a lotof people on here knows. And it's
almost time to bring back, tobring back the best theme music in all
sports. Twenty five million dollars Mollyis a lot of money. I've heard

(22:56):
it's the most money anybody put onthe table. Ends Is that enough for
you to take it? I thinkit definitely is. I mean, from
what I've heard, they a Turner, beat out, beat out ESPN and
Fox for these rights twenty five milliondollars combined for just the English language rights,
keep in mind, not the Spanishlanguage rights, which it's also a

(23:17):
huge audience in itself. They're makingmore off of this one deal in eight
years. Eight years is a longterm deal. When it comes to sports,
we're usually looking at two to threeyear deals unless you're doing a massive
long term renewal. This is hugeand I cannot emphasize enough how important it
is that it's going to streaming becausethat makes it so much more accessible to

(23:37):
a lot of younger people. BecauseI mean, I'm twenty seven, I
don't have cable. I freely admitthat whenever I need to watch a live
sport that isn't on a streaming service, I log into my parents cable and
I think a lot of the sameis for my generation. So that influx
of cash and the exposure into USSoccer I think is I don't think you

(24:00):
can overstate how important it is.I will give you one minor correction.
I have heard and I'm not theonly one who did that. ESPN and
Fox didn't bid, So yes,yes, Turner beat them. And if
you're listening to if you're listening tothe show, this is in the show
because it actually deserves to be discussed. To my knowledge, CBS bid,

(24:22):
ESPN and Fox didn't. And thisgets into what's in the deal because the
US men are not going to playWorld Cup qualifiers in we think everybody's almost
certainly they're gonna qualify automatically. Allthree hosts are gonna qualify automatically for twenty
six If they have to play qualifiers, frankly, it's gonna be crazy.

(24:47):
They did the deal through twenty thirtyso that Turner would get some men's qualifiers,
even though the expanded Men's World Cupthat's coming to forty eight teams means
that the qualifiers are going to beway less important than they have been in
all the years we've ever known them. But what it does, and Meredith,
I'll go to you first on thisand then come back to Molly.

(25:11):
What it does is put the USwomen's team front and center in this package
and show their value. And Iwonder what you make of that. I
think we should run it back withCarlos Cordero. No say it, Meredith,
No, I mean, I thinkit shows the value of that brand.

(25:33):
I mean, I think when you'retalking about soccer in the United States
for the past decade, the women'steam has ruled the roost. We know
that there are it's difficult to lookinto the finances of the federation, but
we have strong indications that the realbreadwinner for US soccer was on the women's

(25:59):
side, especially in the latter halfof that decade. Yeah, yeah,
I think. I think to seeHBO now investing in getting those women's games
shows that value, and I thinkunderscores the importance of not alienating that entity

(26:23):
and all of the fans surrounding themand all of the casual people who have
only heard of US soccer in thecontext of the massive scandal that had to
do with that. So I thinkthat is not surprising within the context of
knowing how valuable US women's national teamis to the federation and has been as

(26:48):
a brand entity. But you know, still in a world in which women's
sports are constantly overlooked. It isprobably a surprise to some people. I
was just going to say, andMeredith to build on that. If you
looked at the comments that US Soccerand WarnerMedia put out when this deal was

(27:12):
announced, Cindy said that the partof the reason they took this deal with
WarnerMedia was because they were committed tobuilding and emphasizing on women's soccer. And
men's soccer was mentioned, obviously,but mostly in the context of the highlight
matches between the US and Mexico andWorld Cup qualifiers, but it was mostly

(27:33):
about women's soccer and putting that fromcenter I think is a huge reason why
this deal is so important. Soit begs two questions, first of which
is do you think US Soccer madea mistake by making this deal eight years
That was one of the big questionsthat I had for Cindy Khane, because
they can't now go back to themarket right after they host twenty six and

(27:56):
potentially either twenty seven or thirty one. If it's twenty seven, it's during
this deal as of the twenty eightOlympics. If they're going to host thirty
one, then they're on the marketgoing into that Women's World Cup. Do
you think they made a mistake makingthis deal eight years so that they can't
go back to market to capitalize onthe spike from twenty six You know,

(28:21):
I actually hadn't thought about that beforeyou ask me right now, So please
bear with if I'm ramble personally.I don't think so. I think this.
I mean, I do think thatthe US women's national team is going
to continue growing the popularity. Ithink soccer in the US is only a
right opportunity for investment. But Ithink locking in a very solid deal that

(28:41):
is currently worth more than the combineddeal they have right now. I think
locking that in for eight years isa constant source of revenue. It is
a solid chance for growth, andI think it's going to continue building.
And I think after these eight years, the after twenty thirty, I think
they're going to be able to cometo the table and be like, look
what we did in these past eightyears, and we are worth double the

(29:04):
twenty five million we are right now. I could be wrong, and you
can, Jonathan, you can callme in twenty thirty and if we're all
if we haven't all been nuked bythen then you know, um, one
of the thing, and then we'lltake a break after that. Um.
The reaction to this deal was split. I don't know whether it was split
fifty fifty, but it was definitelysplit. Soccer fans saying, oh god,

(29:29):
I have to pay for another subscriptionstreaming service on top of all of
the ones I already pay for.And you, Molly were among the people
on the side saying it is greatthat they are going to HBO Max specifically,
which doesn't have any live sports yet. It will they'll have the NHL.
Then they're not it's not there yet, but they will. It will

(29:52):
be it right right. The gamesaren't there yet. They will get there,
probably some time in twenty three,is my guess. But it's a
it's a platform that hasn't had livesports yet, but it's a very popular
platform. And they some people know, they had the LFG movie too.

(30:12):
They do. They do sports,just not live sports, which is a
different audience. What what do youmake of that? Listen? I wrote
an entire story about this for Adweek. So sports and streaming are synonymous now,
you cannot separate them. You boutESPN, plus you've gout, Paramount
Plus, you've got Peacock. Asall heavily invested in soccer. I mean,

(30:33):
they all have massive rights and theywill all tell you, like Paramount
Plus wants you to turn on it, turn it on and just see a
soccer match live at anytime. HBOMax was the last one to do it,
and it was the piece they weremissing. Because we look at WarnerMedia
sports rights deals. They have theNFL, they have the NHL, they
have MLB, they have NBA,they have March Madness, they have everything.

(30:53):
They were missing soccer. It wastheir last growth piece. So from
a business propective, it was incrediblysmart investment of them to get US soccer.
From a consumer perspective, seventy fourmillion people seventy three point eight have
HBO Max, even if they don'tknow they have it. You probably have
it. If you're listening to this, you probably have it and just don't

(31:14):
know it. If not planned startat nine ninety nine. This is not
an ad I promise, but thefact that think about how difficult it is
to access the US women's soccer gameright now too. If it isn't a
massive match like it's on FS two, it's on ESPN two. If you
don't have cable, you're kind ofscrewed. This is an easy access service
where you know twenty plus games peryear are going to be on this streaming

(31:37):
service and only half of those aregoing to be on cable, which you
might not have. I think thisis a fantastic deal for both the consumer
and for the business, and forUS Soccer. You're widening your audience.
It's seventy four million people. Theycan just turn on your streaming service and
watch the US women's national team.And it remains to be seen what they
do in Spanish if they stay withthe comment Univision, which puts a lot

(32:01):
of games on free to air TV, obviously much more on the men's side
in the women's side. But ifthey stay with Univision, that's going to
be plenty accessible. And I've saidto people many times, you might not
speak Spanish, although well I certainlydon't, but give it a shot because
you might just enjoy it. Icertainly have for a long time, and
I don't think you's gonna want tolose that deal. We will see,

(32:23):
we will see. That is abig question that I have going forward.
Now we are going to take aquick break so that my producer, Kevin
Larry May up in Montreal can sellsome ads. I'm Jonathan Tannenwald, and
this is the women's soccer review hereon the Sports Podcasting Network. Welcome back
to the women's soccer review here onthe Sports Podcasting Network. Jonathan Tannenwald of

(32:44):
the Philadelphia Inquirer shooting the breeze withtwo good friends of mine, Meredith Cash,
a business insider, and Molly Kaylaineof Adweek. We've been discussing the
US Soccer Federation's new media rights dealwith Warner Media, and we're going to
continue doing that because there is apiece of it that we haven't addressed yet,
and that WarnerMedia hasn't really addressed yeteither, but it will soon.

(33:07):
We think Media is merging with DiscoveryCommunications. And if all you know as
a listener of Discovery Communications is theDiscovery Channel, you are about to learn
that Discovery Communications is a lot morethan that. It's not yet in the

(33:28):
United States, but if you followsoccer in the rest of the world and
you've heard of the Pan European sportschannel, Eurosports, Discovery owns that,
and that's a big vehicle. Ifthey want to use it for the American
sports rights that they will now have. I'm fairly certain that Major League Soccer

(33:52):
is more than a little interested intalking to them. And I asked Lenny
Daniels, the president of Turner Sports, there were any international distribution rights in
this deal. He said, thereare not. We will see if that
changes over time, because they've gota platform right then and there, especially
in Europe if they want one.And I asked if these games that are

(34:14):
now on HBO Max might also endup on Discovery Plus or HBO Discovery Plus
Max whatever it becomes after the merger, which could Molly. This is where
we start. Have a whole lotof subscribers really fast, and a lot
of content. What do you seecoming down the road for that Listen,
it's hard to predict what they're goingto do. The merger, first of

(34:37):
all, is predicted to close verysoon, early second quarter, and Discovery
itself has twenty million global paying subscribers. And also you talked about soccer sports
rights. Discovery has the rights ofthe Olympics in Europe, a huge sports
player, so if they wanted to, they could make a major global soccer

(34:59):
player. And it depends on whatthey want to do, and we're not
sure what they want to do yet. David's eislap, who runs Discovery right
now and who will run the combinedcompany, hinted at the idea of a
combined offering streaming offering during their earningscall a few weeks ago. We don't
quite know what they're going to do, but I think David's not a dumb

(35:20):
guy. He sees the potential.He sees a pencil in sports, and
I think he sees a pencil instreaming. I think either we're going to
see a bundled offering where it's Discoveryplus an HBO Max for fourteen ninety nine,
fifteen ninety nine, whatever price pointthey want to do. But I
think eventually we're going to see amerger. Don't quote me on that in
case I'm wrong, but I thinkthere's a massive, massive, sports of

(35:40):
potential, and that's part of thereason, one of many reasons why we're
starting to see a major push intolive sports, into HBLAX. American soccer
fans hate to admit this, theyare sheep. They spend enormous amounts of
money because they have it, andevery major media network in this country knows

(36:05):
it, and they'll be doing itfor whatever Warner Media is offering is called
by twenty twenty three. I ampretty sure Warner Browth, Discovery, HBO,
Max Plus, etc. Yeah.Right, really, and again you
step back for a minute and yourealize, wait a minute, this is

(36:29):
the same company. That's Warner Brothers, that's CNN. Yes, this is
that company. They're big. Theyhave not gone and Meredith, I'll go
to you on this. They havenot gone big into streaming yet in the
way that NBC has with Peacock,in the way that Disney has with Disney

(36:49):
Plus and It's Bundle, which theymean they were first, but they obviously
could do it better than anybody else, and they could set the price point
wherever they wanted to, and theydid, and it's why they have so
many subscribers. If you're a women'ssports league, you've written about AU Pro
Sports, You've written about the wNBA. Turners got the men's NBA.

(37:13):
Obviously the w NBA has its dealswith ESPN and CBS. But I've got
to imagine, Meredith, that ifyou're a women's sports league out there,
you are looking at this and seeingsome big potential I would think so.
I mean, just based on thesheer numbers that you guys are citing,
I think seventy four or what seventythree point eight if for being specific million

(37:37):
households, that is a lot ofeyes when you're talking about growing interest in
your sport. And I think whenit comes to women's sports leagues, that's
their major concern. I think gettingin front of the most guys as possible
without barriers to entry eventually you wantto. I think relative to other streaming

(38:07):
platforms, HBO Max and any ofturners entities are widely acceptable to the point
where they feel like a separate thing, like to me as someone who's admittedly
listener, not super engrossed in thestreaming space or television. And I don't

(38:29):
know much as much as these twoat all on this area, but I
will say as a casual consumer,HBO Max doesn't feel like a traditional streaming
platform to me, and it's somethingthat I think most people anyone who watches
TV really has HBO Max. Andif I'm a sports right and I want

(38:53):
to diversify the typical viewer, andI just want to grow the audience and
have people discover our game and ourofferings. You have to be able to
find it and stumble upon it.And this is what everyone involved in women's
sports has basically been hammering home foras long as I've been in this space.

(39:19):
HBO Max is a really good opportunityin I'm not sure if that answers
your question. That's my thought onthat. And every time anybody says the
name David Zaslow, I immediately assomeone who's a close friend of John Rand
of the Sports Business Journal and listensto his podcast religiously. And yes,

(39:40):
I recently got a shout out onthere that was fairly very kind of him.
Molly, you and I and everybodyelse who is very deep in the
sports media space knows that not onlydoes David Zaslow want Discovery Plus to be
a big thing, as you've said, he wants it to be a big

(40:02):
thing with sports specifically, and thatputs another player in the market. And
look, I'm somebody who doesn't subscribeto Netflix because I don't care about popular
culture. I don't subscribe. Ibriefly subscribed it to Apple TV plus.
I don't right now if they getmajor League Baseball and going to have to

(40:24):
think about it, I subscribe toHulu because I'm a Star Wars fan,
so I have the Disney Bundle.That's why I have Hulu. I'm a
Randall. I watched lots of sports, and I think the people who are
critiquing going to HBO Max are thesorts of people who just watch lots of
sports. Is that or they're justalso more culture than I am and they

(40:49):
also have HBO Max. I don'tknow, but trying to figure out how
I want to phrase this as aquestion, which is what I should do
as a good host, But whatdoes it do from your perspective in terms
of increasing the amount of competition forrights beyond the big four sports leagues.

(41:17):
I think that's a great question.And I also think to your point,
Netflix is never never say it ever. In my guess, Netflix is not
going to pursue s courts, right, So that's not their deal, It's
not what they want. But HBOMax is part of WarnerMedia who soon to
be Warner Bros. Discovery. It'sa bigger entity. It's not focused solely

(41:38):
on streaming, and this space isalready invested in sports. Like WarnerMedia has
sports. They I mean they havethey have March madness. It's a huge
investment, so it makes if you'renot familiar deeply entrenched in the cable and
streaming industry, it's completely understandable whyHBO Max wouldn't make sense because hey,

(41:58):
is an HBO Max. What hasyou Foia? What the heck? I'm
going to watch soccer and Euphoria onthe same channel. But it's a really
smart business play for them, andI think that once, especially post Discovery
merger, I mean, Davids,I've been pushing this and I think if
they want to, they're going tobe a massive S fourts player. And

(42:22):
I'm losing the point of your originalNo, it's you answered, you answered,
I'll I'll just conclude by saying that'sThere are two reasons why Cindy Cone
is in Atlanta to night on thisThursday night as we're recording this one because
of the annual General Meeting that startsFriday, about twelve hours from when we're
recording this, and I need togo to sleep as soon as we're done

(42:42):
so I can be awake for it. The other issue went over to the
inside the NBA set tonight and tookpictures with Charles Barkley, who must be
calling Molly right now because he's sucha soccer fan and such a fan of
Molly's working good. Yeah, yeah, And and Cindy Cone's there on the
inside the NBA set taking pictures withCharles Barkley. That's what US Soccer is
getting into. Um. I thinkwe have made the point well enough.

(43:07):
I said we were going to bringup one thing in WSL related, So
why don't we do that to capoff the show? Wait? Yes,
go ahead? Can I make onemore comment on the on the HBO Max
topic to your point about sports fanssaying, oh I don't have HBO Max,
Why the heck would they ever putit there where there isn't a history

(43:30):
of sports content or live sports content. You're the fan who's going to buy
it, because now there is that'sright, live sports content, and the
fan and the fan who already hasit and wouldn't buy it or buy another
thing is the fan that US Socceris looking to pick up. So to

(43:54):
your point, Molly, brilliant businessdecision there. Literally, Meredith, have
you met women's soccer fans? They'regoing to go where the soccer is.
Yeah, and they spend money,which is why all of these people are
after them, except for FIFA,which is who st Never mind. Okay,

(44:16):
speaking of going after women's soccer fansmoney, we are going to now
give it to the NWSL. Meredithand Molly are laughing uncontrollably, and I
am trying to stop myself from laughinguncontrollably because this is very directly about going
after people's money. How ah,that's the punchline, isn't it. All

(44:37):
three of us on this year programare regular attendees in some form or another,
whether as credentialed media or celebrity fansof Gotham FC, which recently became
the latest of many teams in theNational Women's Soccer League to sign sponsorship deals

(45:00):
relating to what one could charitably callblockchain technology or non fungible tokens, or
what one could far less charitably callcrypto, which some of us think is
a scam. So Meredith, I'mgoing to start with you, because you

(45:21):
have for better or worse, andGod knows, on Twitter, it's always
for the worst because whenever you tweetanything about this on Twitter, you have
to aster usk out half of itso you don't get railroaded by robots.
What's going on here. I don'tknow. To me, I don't know.

(45:43):
I think I think that this isthe trendy move within the sports space,
right. It's just another way tobuild your brand and mutually help one
another out, you know. Ithink the most recent example as Gotham took
on a Crypto partner, Gotham FC, that is and in New York,

(46:07):
Jersey, New York. I don'tsee this as any different than any other
unrelated brand putting their money into asports entity in order to get a spot
on their shirt or a spot intheir bleachers or something along those lines.

(46:31):
The fact that Crypto is a farless established entity and one that is not
understood by the masses. And maybeI'm just projecting because I don't. I
don't get it. I don't andI don't. My girlfriend across the room
is like probably laughing, but Hannah, she she kind of gets it.

(46:52):
But I sure as hell don't.I would venture I guess that a good
portion of NWSLL fan bases don't umAnd I'm not really sure whether or not

(47:14):
these partnerships are trying to be paintedas authentic. I don't know how that
would work. But you know,as I think the theme of the pod
today as money talks, right,I think I think that's the long and
the short of it here. Andmoney's on the blockchain now, So Molly,

(47:37):
the checks are clearing somewhere because thereare ads for this stuff all over
television. I try and block asmany of them, but no that they
are legit like and and you know, are all of the checks going to
clear for the NBA arena in LosAngeles? I don't know, but they're
clear and somewhere because there's t longarena, right, there's ads all over

(48:02):
linear television, so the checks mustbe clearing somewhere. I mean, we've
all seen that Matt Damon ad buttoo often come on and it started airing
forever ago, but it got popularright before the Super Bowl and everyone started
talking about it, and it's like, guys, that was in the fall.
But anyways, I don't fully understandcrypto, and I'm not going to

(48:23):
pretend I do, so just fulldisclosure there, the checks are clearing.
But to me, this feels almostlike if you have to keep constantly telling
me, no, my money's legit. It's legit, it's legit. Why
are you telling me that I don'tknow? And I mean the Gotham deal.
It's been reported to the seven figuredeal, which is fantastic for Gotham.

(48:46):
It's fantastic that the money is gettinginjected into the franchise. It's fantastic.
I am skeptical, skeptical about thelong term pantibility of this. I
don't know if crypto going to foldin two years or five years, or
if it's going to be what we'reall using in twenty years. I think
also what worries me a little bitabout the Gotham partnership is that, I

(49:09):
mean, the press release was talkingabout how you can use blockchain and crypto
to pay for entrance and pay forvenues. I don't understand what that means.
And I don't think the general nwslS fan is going to understand what
that means. I think that attractsa very specific type of person. It
will be in Meredith's replies whenever shetweets about crypto, and I just I'm

(49:30):
very hesitant. And maybe that makesme old school or not with it.
I just it makes me very verynervous a seed amount of crypto investment in
an NWSL because those are two verydifferent marketplaces. I was just chuckling to

(49:51):
myself thinking about you. But evenbefore you mentioned maybe I'm a old school
but like, there's some gen Zkids somewhere who still upon this podcast,
who's like, Okay, Boomer,I'm twenty seven. Okay, I'm a
millennial. I'm trying. I'm aboutto I'm about to pay for HBO Max
with my bitcoin and put it there. I'm thirty eight, my hair is

(50:16):
gray, and y'all want to hitme with the Okay, Boomer, go
ahead, I mean whatever, Butum it, I'm gonna give a shout
out to Clara Watkins, who's beenon this show many times, who tweeted
recently is this Gotham crypto partnership inwhich it mentioned that you could get postgame
field access if you participated in allof this thing? Is this is this

(50:37):
Gotham crypto partnership a false flag opto get n FT into the enthusiasts to
touch some grass. Claire really tweetseight plus, Claire, if you're listening,
that was that was wonderful. UmI think we've made our points by

(51:00):
now. You know, again,as I said earlier, we all went
to college with a bunch of futureDeloitte employees. I went did my major
across the streets from a place thatsome of you might have heard of,

(51:22):
called the Warden School of Business.You might I know that, Meredith,
Molly know plenty of people who gottheir educations from there and how they turned
in. Some of them are goodpeople, There's no question about that.
We all make our choices in life. Isn't that the way it is?

(51:42):
This has been great, both ofyou. Thank you so much for coming
on and blabbering for an hour andchange about some things that are legitimate and
some things that are less so.But the election stuff is very legitimate.
And in fact, if you ifyou would like something tangible like the thing

(52:05):
that you can actually watch with yourown eyes in person, you can't hope,
I mean you could. You couldeven acquire things that you could hold
in your hand while there. Iam hopeful to see both of you in
town next month when the US Womenplay here. I see what you do
there, Jonathan. I was gonnasay, I think we need a live

(52:28):
pod. Um. Look, Idon't know. I'll be in the press
box. We'll see what happens.In terms of everybody else. For those
who don't I'll now finally say thisat the end. Molly is the celebrity
fan of the three ears, greatcredential for a lot of sports business stuff

(52:50):
through AD week. But I thinkyou would you have said to me,
and you would say here, you'renot You're not credential for games per se
in the way that I am,for example, not at all. I
would never get a sports credential.I could hear the business side of it.
Meredith. I know you do alittle more, but it depends on
the circumstances. You're on a lotof US soccer calls and stuff like that.

(53:15):
Um, but I do, Ido, sincerely. Meredith and Molly
are both based in New York.Um, I do hope that they make
the painfully long hour and a quartertrain ride down here brutal for the game
in April. Um. Yeah,right, which will be the US one

(53:36):
episode of something. Meredith, yougotta wait till twenty twenty three when the
deal kicks in. I don't evenI don't know if you could get through
all of LFG in that train,right. I was talking about you for
you guys. The US women areplaying Uzbekistan. I've written about why at
some length, go read it.I'm not the only one who's written about

(53:58):
it. It's I'm well, thankyou, Thank you both enjoy going back
to watching college basketball. And waskicking Illinois butt right now. So Molly
is always a fan of Illinois losing. If my math is right, you

(54:20):
are correct as I said you might. You might hear this after the presidential
election. A few hours after thepresidential election. None of us will be
allowed to bother Meredith, who isgoing to be very deeply ensconced in her
person cave watching Duke basketball, gettingready for the remainder of the best month

(54:44):
of the year in both men's andwomen's basketball. And I will be taking
some time away from soccer for that, which I'm actually really looking forward to
because I have not covered a basketballgame since before the pandemic. I've waited
long enough. All I have rambledenough, we all have on the show.
That's that for Meredith Cash of BusinessInsider, for Molly Kahlen of adwik.

(55:05):
This is Jonathan Tannenwald of the PhiladelphiaInquirer. Thanks to my colleagues Dwayne
Rawlins and Toronto Kevin Larramay in Montrealfor putting it all together at the Sports
Podcasting Network and we will talk toyou again next time.