A Thursday night flex? WBC revenue nears $100M; NWSL set to kick off new season amid momentum; and Broncos bring back a familiar face to lead commercial sales
Hard to believe, but just over three weeks until the CAA World Congress of Sports at LA Live, April 18th and 19th. It's going to be one of the biggest and best conferences and networking events of the year. Join me, join your friends, join your colleagues, sign up today at sportsbusinessjournal.com. Or let me know if you have any questions but it'll be great to see you in LA. And as we head into a big weekend of college basketball, I got to ask my colleague Reggie Walker, how's your bracket still doing, my friend?
A really, really good night on Thursday night. Three of the four games, I had teams still involved. All three of those teams, won so I'm in really good shape. My champion and other Final Four team Houston, both still alive as well.
Alabama, Houston, in your final Reggie, you are looking pretty good. We'll check in on Reggie's bracket on Monday. And this is your Morning Buzzcast for Friday, March 24th. Good morning, I'm Abe Madkour. Big story last night, flex scheduling could be coming to Amazon's Thursday night football. SBJ's John Ourand and Ben Fisher had some big news in reporting that NFL owners will be asked at next week's owner's meeting to approve a flex scheduling plan for late season Thursday games. The vote would also relax limits on the number of games each team can play on a short rest schedule each season. So both measures would give the schedule makers more flexibility to avoid meaningless games with poor teams for that Thursday night football window. But this will surely rankle coaches and general managers who feel their teams could be put at a disadvantage with short rest.
But here is the key for the league, they would give teams 15 days notice of any change from a Sunday afternoon game to a Thursday night game during weeks 14 through 17. Ourand and Fisher reported that resolutions like this are rarely sent to the full ownership for a vote without a high degree of confidence they will pass. And that two media committees have already been supportive of the measure. So it's not clear when the changes would become effective. But again, I would expect to hear from coaches, general managers, the NFLPA, as well as ticket holders about this change. So stay tuned for more on possible flex scheduling coming to Thursday Night Football.
Let's shift to Major League Baseball. Now that the World Baseball Classic is over, the league told the Associated Press that it will finish with revenue of $90 to a $100 million for the World Baseball Classic and that is a significant figure as you see the financial growth of this event. Now, this was all boosted by attendance of more than 1.3 million, which is the event's highest 20% over 2017. The question we all have, after seeing how successful this event can be, how much can it grow? Will more players play and support it? The players certainly cared a lot about the outcome and that had to resonate with players that didn't participate.
Yes, team USA had Mike Trout, and Mookie Betts, and Trey Turner, but not the best pitchers, and interestingly, Mike Trout said he's already recruiting players for the next iteration, saying he will be back and will try to get other players to join him. But the buzz continues around the World Baseball Classic. A friend of mine, an avid SBJ reader, an avid listener to the Morning Buzzcast, gave me a little bit of a hard time this week with SBJ naming Las Vegas as the number seventh ranked top sports business city in the US.
They argued to me it was far too low for a city that had such a long history of boxing and UFC as well as recent investments with the arrival of the Golden Knights, the Raiders. You have Formula One, you have college championships, you have the Super Bowl going, you have the NCAA there, and countless other sporting events in the last few years. They also pointed out the financial performance of the teams. The Raiders, the Golden Knights, even the Aviators really at the top of their respective leagues in local revenue. And they also cited the performance of the venues in the market. And so yes, they made a very compelling argument and we have talked about how far Las Vegas has come.
And now the city has another big advocate and the WNBA has more good news as Tom Brady has acquired an ownership interest in the reigning W Champion, the Las Vegas Aces. Brady sat courtside at a game last year said he always had a love for women's sports. Remember, he has two older sisters who were great athletes in their own right.But getting star power investment like Tom Brady is very good news for the WNBA as it's another marker of the league's cultural relevance. The ACEs have had a nice run. They won the W title, they acquired Candace Parker. The team is close to opening a new training facility and headquarters in Henderson, which is right outside Las Vegas. Now they have Tom Brady in their ownership ranks, which is another good look for the Las Vegas ACEs. And another strong mark for the city of Las Vegas.
Speaking of players investing, ram's quarterback, Matthew Stafford and his wife Kelly have invested into the NWSL Club, Angel City FC. They've become the latest members of a huge ownership group that right now includes more than 100 investors. Can you imagine those ownership meetings? They must be very interesting. Meanwhile, the NWSL kicks off its season on Saturday. The league tied up a key sponsorship renewal as Anheuser-Busch remains in the fold. You also have HBO set to release a documentary on the successful inaugural season of Angel City FC. And the NWSL as a whole will look to continue its growth from 2022. That year saw big jumps in attendance, ticketing revenue, and sponsorship. The NWSL said early ticket sales are strong as season ticket sales are up 20% already compared to all of last year.
Let's stay with women's sports because the buzz is all about the popularity of women's volleyball on campus. We've talked about it on the Buzzcast and here's a good example. The University of Wisconsin's volleyball team averaged nearly 7,700 fans per home game in 2022. Again, that was last year, and that is by far the highest number for the program. That number is up 30% from 2021 and up nearly 350% from 2012. So again, we've talked about the growth of volleyball on campus. ESPN loves it as a programming vehicle. Athletic directors see real energy and interest around volleyball. And these numbers around women's volleyball at the University of Wisconsin certainly is evident of the growth of volleyball and the interest in the game.
And we'll end the Buzzcast around people like we do frequently. First, get ready to hear more and more of John Skipper on the radio. The former ESPN N President and current CEO of Meadowlark Media is going to get more airtime as he will co-host a new biweekly show called The Sporting Class. And he will be joined alongside former Miami Marlin's President David Sampson. This comes as David Sampson signed a deal with Meadowlark Media to host two audio shows as well as to continue to appear frequently on the Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz.
David Sampson will co-host the Sporting Class with Skipper. He'll also continue his existing show, Nothing Personal with David Sampson that debuted in 2019. Each show will post every other week, lasts for about 45 minutes. Sampson and Skipper do work together. They currently host an hour on the Dan Le Batard Show every other week, and they're expanding their current show to a standalone show, The Sporting Class Meadowlark Media will produce the shows and then sell them to a distributor. Both Sampson and Skipper are colorful figures. I'm sure you're all aware of them. They will make for very good listening. But John Skipper, David Sampson doubling down on some audio shows.
And two big hires related to the NFL. First, The league has named former Red Bull and WWE Executive Garrett Mayer as its new Senior Vice President Managing Director of its International Business. This is an important role as the NFL continues to grow globally. He will oversee the league offices in six countries. He will work out of the NFL's headquarters in New York, but will oversee the league's offices in six countries and report to Executive Vice President Peter O'Reilly. Again, he was at Red Bull, Red Bull Media, he was also at the WWE. He is a dual US/German citizen. And he replaces Damani Leech, the former COO of NFL International, who became the President of the Denver Broncos in August. Nolan Partners advised the NFL on the search for its new Managing Director of its International Business.
Speaking of Damani Leech and the Denver Broncos, they made a big hire as they brought back longtime sales executive Dennis Moore as the team's new Chief Commercial Officer. He replaces Mac Freeman, the Chief Commercial Officer who left the team in August after the ownership group led by Rob Walton and Greg Penner acquired the team from the Pat Bowlen Trust. Now, Dennis Moore worked for the Broncos under the Bowlen family from 2003 to 2019. He then went to become Chief Revenue Officer at St. Louis City SC. And we know how successful that team has become. But now Dennis Moore returns to Denver and the Broncos as the team's new Chief Commercial Officer. Damani Leach and other members of the management team led the search for this role. And so that is your Morning Buzzcast for Friday, March 24th. I'm Abe Madkour, hope you have a great weekend. Stay healthy and be good to each other. I'll speak to you on Monday.