The most expensive 1,000 seats in No Name Yet Stadium will cost $375 per game - plus $80,000 for a life-of-the-stadium license to buy that one seat. Those 1,000 seats are nearly sold out. “It’s going extremely well,” said Al Guido, vice president of sales and marketing for Legends, the 49ers’ stadium marketing firm, when asked about the overall sales picture. He added, “We’re really, really pleased with the reaction of season-ticket holders.
49ers season ticket prices force out some faithful
Kudos to Legends. A $80k seat license is staggering.
The Dawn of the Xfinity Live! Era: Cordish vs. Aramark?
Xfinity Live! unofficially opens today with a soft opening event for the Bruce Springsteen concert occurring at Wells Fargo Center. (The official opening occurs Friday featuring a free concert by Third Eye Blind.)
I’ll hold off on analysis of the venue’s impact on the Philly sports experience, but I’ve been struck by an interesting set of emails in the past few days.
Concert goers received two separate emails this week advertising pre-concert events:
and
To most non-sportsbiz dorks, it would appear that Comcast-Spectacor is advertising two parties at its venues. However, this appears to me to be the beginning of something of a rivalry between Xfinity Live!, a joint venture between Comcast-Spectacor and Cordish Group, and the Wells Fargo Center’s Cure Insurance Club, run by Aramark under its arena concessions deal.
As I’m not informed on the contractual details between Comcast-Spectacor, Aramark, and Cordish, it’s difficult to form any conclusions. However, it’s clear that both venues will be trying to attract fans before and after games/performances. Also interesting is what (if any) financial relationship the now independent 76ers have with the venues and how that impacts in-game promotion.
More to come on Xfinity Live! in coming weeks as the venue becomes part of the Philadelphia sports landscape.
Two Billion CASH
Pretty incredible update on the Dodgers ownership situation from the LA Times’ Bill Shaikin:
Source: #Dodgers deal is all cash, no financing. MLB review will be formality because of no debt added to team liabilities.
— Bill Shaikin (@BillShaikin) March 28, 2012
That removes any concerns about the financial situation for the new owners. Incredible win for Frank McCourt and hopefully MLB, as the Dodgers franchise and its fans have new hope.
Nike’s deal with NFL Licensing begins April 1, and that’s the date all their promotions have been centered around. Two days later Nike will hold an event unveiling the league’s new jerseys, and online pre-orders will begin April 15. The new Nike uniforms won’t physically be available until April 26, the day of the draft. But manufacturers must make separate deals with the league and the union, and while Reebok’s NFL deal expires March 31, their contract with the NFLPA expired on Feb. 29. So March is a no-brand’s land, when Reebok’s no longer allowed to put players’ names on jerseys, but Nike’s not yet allowed to put team names and colors on them. With Peyton Manning in Denver and Tim Tebow in New York, two of the hottest moneymakers aren’t available for the moneymaking.
According to Nike,
As of March 1, 2012, Reebok’s rights under its NFL Players group licence were limited to, at most, the right to sell out existing inventory of products identified to individual players existing prior to March 1, 2012. For Tebow, that would mean existing Denver Broncos inventory—not new New York Jets products. […] In short, Reebok may create new products featuring NFL Marks, but not new products featuring an individual player, without such player’s authorization or consent.
Nike Sues Reebok Over Controversial Tim Tebow Jets Jerseys
Real interesting stuff here. It seems inconceivable that there would be a one month period in which no one owns the NFLPA license.
It seems that Reebok can still sell the blank Jets jerseys they clearly had in stock and wanted to move when Tebow was traded, but the act of screening Tebow 15 made then unlawful. Will be interesting to watch in the coming weeks.
Basketball legend Magic Johnson led a group that won an auction for the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team Tuesday night, marking the final chapter of in a soap-opera style saga for the legendary franchise, according to people with knowledge of the process. With a bid of $2.15 billion, including the surrounding land, Mr. Johnson, controlling partner Mark Walter and partners Peter Guber, Stan Kasten, Bobby Patton and Todd Boehly beat out a group of some of the wealthiest businessmen in the country to land a team that is one of Major League Baseball’s flagship franchises. The sales figure shatters the previous record sales price for a U.S. sports franchise, Steve Ross’s purchase of the Miami Dolphins for $1.1 billion three years ago.
Magic Johnson Wins Auction for Los Angeles Dodgers - WSJ.com
Surprising news from L.A. as the Magic Johnson group wins the Dodgers auction, defeating presumed favorite Steve Cohen. In a stunner, Frank McCourt stays on as a partner in the JV that will own the parking lots.
One of the investors is Steven A. Cohen, a hedge fund wizard. The others - in a rather striking development given the latest stated plan of the Mets’ owners - would be the team’s partners in the SNY cable network.
Time Warner Cable and Comcast are nearing a plan to finance SNY’s purchase of four shares in the Mets, worth $80 million, said one person with knowledge of the plan who was not authorized to speak publicly.
If the deal is completed, the Mets would appear to have buyers for the 10 shares they are selling.
That means they will have much-needed cash to pay off their substantial debts. But it would be a slightly quirky way of doing it. The deal would mean 16 percent of the Mets would be owned by SNY. The Mets’ parent company, Sterling Equities, owns 70 percent of the network.
NYT: Financial Relief for Mets May
One way to view this (which would erroneously value the team at 0) is that Comcast and Time Warner are each buying back 5.6% of SNY from Sterling for $40M each. Clearly, the team, despite its financial struggles, has a monetary value, but its interesting to see Comcast & Time Warner buying back equity in SNY.
…[A] successful effort by Kroenke to buy the Dodgers could be regarded as the first tangible step toward moving the Rams to Los Angeles.
And here’s where things get even more interesting. If Kroenke owns the Dodgers and another team moves to Los Angeles, how would the NFL’s cross-ownership rules apply? Currently, an owner of an NFL team can own a non-football team in another market as long as there’s no NFL team in that market. If Kroenke buys a baseball team in Los Angeles, which would be permissible, and then an NFL team other than the one owned by Kroenke moves there, the situation could get dicey, to say the least.
Kroenke could be making a bid for the Dodgers | ProFootballTalk
Interesting question raised by Florio regarding cross-ownership rule application to Stan Kronke’s Dodgers bid.
8. PHILADELPHIA
Seattle’s expansion effort has gone so well that anything else isn’t the same by comparison, but the Union’s efforts have been sensational too. PPL Park is a great place to watch a soccer game, and the buzz around this team is real. Owner Jay Sugarman may not be very vocal, but CEO Nick Sakiewicz — long one of MLS’ top execs — makes up for it in a way that’s similar to AEG’s Tim Leiweke. On the soccer side, Philly has one of most promising youth development operations in the league. This is a team that’s going places.
MLS team ambition Rankings - Grant Wahl - SI.com
Interesting article by Grant Wahl to read as MLS training camps start in upcoming weeks. Not many know more about the league and its business ambitions than Wahl.
Li Ning Sells Convertible Bonds to 2 Investors - WSJ.com
More bad news for Li Ning. Makes me wonder what would’ve happened if they had taken a more conservative approach to expansion and athlete endorsements (NBA players).
