Will sponsors step up for Mikaela Shiffrin? Sapphire Sport eyes next-gen behavior while investing with new fund and breaking down NFL Divisional round viewership
I'll be at the NACDA mid-winter meetings this weekend in Marco Island, Florida. If you're going to be there, let me know. Love to say hi. Also, Super Bowl schedule is filling up, but if you're out and about in Phoenix, drop me a line. And this is your Morning Buzzcast. It is Wednesday, January 25th. Good morning, I'm Abe Madkour. Thanks for listening to the Buzzcast. Well, it's easily one of the more or most overlooked stories in sports right now, and that is the accomplishments of Mikaela Shiffrin. She won another giant slalom race on Tuesday, and that win in Italy was the 83rd World Cup triumph of her career, giving her the most wins by a female skier in history that topped the accomplishments of another American skier, Lindsey Vonn, who had 82 World Cup wins. Shiffrin now needs just four more wins to break. Ingemar Stenmark's record of 86 World Cup wins. The most by a male or female skier.
So why do I bring this up? I bring this up because the profile of American skiers remains muted in the US and we won't see a lot of hype or promotion. Unfortunately, Shiffrin is remembered more by her performance at the Beijing Winter Games where she didn't meet expectations. Yes, she has sponsorship deals with brands like Barilla pasta, Visa, Adidas, good brands, but it would be great if some other high profile blue chip brands signed her or that her current partners continue to promote her and her accomplishments. They are that special. Mikaela Shiffrin is a great brand ambassador, but it shows that there is limited endorsement dollars and even limited attention span for a niche sport like skiing, as outdoor winter sports certainly aren't a popular follow for American sports fans. Regardless, what she is doing is special. So keep your eye on the media and marketing attention that she receives.
One element we've talked a lot on the bus cast is sports and leagues trying new things. Some things more bold, some things more cosmetic, but at least they are trying to see what sticks and what the fans want. You are seeing it with the Pro Bowl this year with the NFL, and the NBA continues to try to revamp its product line. One example is the NBA All-Star game, and now the league is changing the way rosters are announced for the game. The game will be February 19th in Salt Lake City and rosters will be secret until the night of the game. The players themselves won't even know who they're playing with. So yes, the NBA is going old school playground ball. Two team captains will make their picks in a live televised pre-game segment shortly before the game begins in Salt Lake City.
So this format has been done before players have been chosen, the teams have been chosen by captains, but in each of the first five instances, the rosters were selected several days before the game. Here, it's right before game time. So this is a new element. It should add a little surprise and delight for fans, add a little bit of intrigue right up until game time. It's not entirely clear how this will be deemed a success or not, but I anticipate it being a fun watch to see who the captains select right before the game. But again, we're seeing a little bit more ideation and experimentation by sports leagues.
Let's move to some finance news. Many sources I speak to expect deal flow in 2023 to slow in light of an economic slowdown and some economic headwinds, and some people I'm speaking to are really having trouble raising new capital and investment. But Sapphire Sport, the sports investment arm of the VC firm, Sapphire Ventures has raised a second fund valued at $180 million with investments from some of the sports industry's biggest names. The new funds limited partners include returning investors from Sapphire Sports First Fund. That includes City Football Group, Adidas, AEG, the Wilf family's WISE Ventures, and there are new partners including Madison Square Garden Sports, Arctos Sports partners, Steve Pagliuca from the Boston Celtics, and of course investor David Blitzer, who has invested in multiple sports teams and funds. These are all serious investors and heavy hitters.
So as it looks to deploy capital with their investment fund, Sapphire Sports said they are looking at the next generation of consumer behavior. Co-founding partner, Michael Spirito said the firm is looking at opportunities to invest in NextGen media, in gaming, in digital commerce, in health and human performance and the companies that drive those verticals. So this is an interesting fund, very, very well funded, obviously big names behind it. Spirito is well regarded in the investment community. Sapphire Sports' First deal with its second fund was its investment in the online lottery ticket company Jackpot, the first Sapphire Sport Fund that had a fund of $117 million. That made investments in 15 companies. You know some of them. They invested in Buzzer, they invested in Overtime Elite and they invested in Tonal. So Sapphire Sport, continuing to be active in the marketplace.
We'll end around the NFL. I know you have heard this before, but the NFL keeps rolling along. So the divisional round is done and the numbers are in. And the league averaged more than 37 million viewers for the four games during the divisional round. Yes, that's down around 2% from last season, but it is still good enough according to our Austin Carp for the third best divisional round on record behind 2022 and 2015. So yes, still an amazingly strong number. And yes, 49ers cowboys on Sunday night, on Fox, led the way drawing a staggering 45 million viewers. That is the second best divisional game on record NFC or AFC, behind only the 48 million viewers for packers and yes, cowboys in 2017. So let's put it in some greater context. The average viewership of the past five divisional rounds are 2019. For all the games, they averaged 32.4 million. 2020, 33.2 million, 2021, 31 million, 2022, 37.7 million, 2023, 37.3 million. So yes, do you see a trend? I do. The numbers are clearly going up.
And finally we touched on this, so let's close the loop. Good news about the Buffalo Bills and a new stadium as a new deal was approved by a key county group and it includes a separate non relocation agreement. The agreement would require the Buffalo Bills to pay back all project costs incurred by the state and the county over the first 15 years of the lease, if the team breaches the agreement and tries to leave Buffalo. The cost would be estimated at a billion dollars. And of course we don't know the future, but I just don't see the Bills looking to leave Buffalo. And the bottom line is that all the major issues have been resolved around a 30-year lease for the Bills to stay at Orchard Park in a new $1.4 billion open-air stadium.
The Bills will pay roughly $550 million toward construction of this new stadium. They'll raise that through PSLs. They'll get some help from the NFL's G-4 loan program. The team will also pay $900,000 a year in rent, and the rest of the construction costs will be paid for by the county and the state. Most think this is a pretty fair deal, a certainly strong deal for the Buffalo Bills, and now there are just mere formalities to announcing this and then begin construction. So good news for the Buffalo Bills and its long-term future in Buffalo.
So that is your Morning Buzzcast for Wednesday, January 25th. I'm Abe Madkour, thanks for listening to the Buzzcast. Thanks for spreading the word on the Buzzcast. Stay healthy, be good to each other. I'll speak to you tomorrow.