What Koepka's PGA Championship win could mean for golf, key decisions that could come from NFL owners' meetings, NASCAR closing in on new media rights agreement.
Three informative podcasts that I listened to over the weekend that are worth your time. First, University of Georgia Athletics Director Josh Brooks speaks with Navigate's Jeff Nelson. The second one was Endeavor's Karen Brodkin and Hillary Mandel talking about the sports media business with Matt Belloni on The Town. The third one was Endeavor's Mark Shapiro talking all things sports business with Richard Deitsch. They are all really good listen, so you may want to check them out.
This is your Morning Buzzcast for Monday, May 22nd. Good morning, I'm Abe Madkour. Thanks for joining on the Buzzcast.
Brooks Koepka's PGA championship win at Oak Hill will certainly revive the debate about LIV Golf as Koepka's victory is the first major championship win by a LIV Golf League player. Other members of the circuit said it proved they belong in the major championships and comments by some of the LIV golfers showed they set out was something to prove at Oak Hill and they feel their performance for players in the top 20 further validates LIV Golf and could, could lead to discussions about the two sides finding some common ground, but certainly Koepka's win revives the LIV Golf debate for now.
There was a shocking move in the college ranks Friday afternoon as University of Southern California Athletic Director Mike Bohn resigned. While his initial statement said it was health-related, it later came to be known that the resignation came a day after Bohn and USC were asked about internal criticism of his management of the athletic department. Sources shared that Bohn had made inappropriate comments about female colleagues that made some staffers feel uncomfortable. They also alleged he was a poor manager who missed meetings and was often absent from key events. Two former USC coaches said that Bohn's leadership of the department was a primary reason they left. Meanwhile, several sources said people confronted Bohn about his comments that they felt were inappropriate, but he never did anything about them and they continued.
Now, USC did not immediately announce who would serve as interim athletic director. Bohn was hired in November of 2019 and there has been so much going on with USC and so much more to do as it enters the Big 10 and USC president Carol Folt, who hired Bohn, now must move quickly to hire an experienced athletic director because, yes, as they go into the Big 10, you can imagine all the logistical and operational challenges facing that new athletic director with some major changes at a pretty interesting time coming at the University of Southern California.
There is an NFL owners meeting this week, started yesterday in Minneapolis and here's what you can expect. First, owners, they will not vote on approving the purchase by Josh Harris of the Washington Commanders. A number of reports over the weekend stated that owners will get an update on the bid, but that Harris's bid may not be approved until this summer. Owners are expected to discuss and possibly vote on a proposal for flexing late season Thursday night football games. Remember, this was the issue that was table at March's meetings, the plan that Giants owner John Mara really didn't like, he strongly criticized it, but they will bring this back for discussion that late season possible Thursday night flex.
In addition, the NFL will hold its second annual coach accelerator program where 40 minority and female coaches will meet with owners and team executives. They'll hear from industry leaders including a search expert from Russell Reynolds. They'll hear from an agent Trace Armstrong. They'll even hear from former McDonald's CEO Don Thompson so a lot of that. Here is an accelerator program to try to get these minority and female coaches, I would say, more known to the decision-makers in the NFL and we will certainly touch on the owner's meetings much more this week on the Buzzcast.
Let's shift to NASCAR. Kyle Larson dominated the All-Star race on Sunday as the Cup Series returned to North Wilkesboro Speedway. That's about 90 miles outside of Charlotte. It returned for the first time in 27 years. We talked about this on the Buzzcast on Friday. It was a sellout of roughly 30,000 fans. It looked good on TV. I know some were concerned by the track conditions, but the Speedway's asphalt held up fairly well following a week of racing, despite not having been paved in more than three decades. Now Speedway Motorsport CEO Marcus Smith said there is a future for other races at North Wilkesboro. He said they want to make it an entertainment venue for the region and he could easily see more NASCAR races at the venue. The bottom line is we will have to see when NASCAR rolls out next year's schedule, but the fans certainly responded and showed up at the All-Star race in North Wilkesboro.
Staying with NASCAR, it seems that NASCAR's next media deal is coming close to being announced, as SBJ's John Ourand reported that NASCAR appears close to renewing with both Fox and NBC. Fox would keep the first half of the season with the Daytona 500, NBC keeping the second half of the season with the NASCAR playoffs.
Now NASCAR also is shopping a mid-season package of NASCAR Cup Races to streaming companies that's familiar to the six-race package that TNT carried up until 2014. That was early in the summer July races that TNT carried. It looks like NASCAR's taking a similar package to the market. Amazon is considered a strong candidate to land that package. Nothing is close to being finalized, but sources do believe that NASCAR will have handshake deals before the July 4th holiday on its new broadcast and streaming deals. NASCAR is also likely to move its Xfinity Racing Series exclusively to a streaming company.
John Ourand adds that by creating these new packages that'll help NASCAR see a significant increase over the average annual value of its current deal. Currently, NASCAR gets $820 million per year, and if they get a significant increase, that would be a very good story for NASCAR, but that media deal looks like it's coming to fruition fairly soon.
What a great strong opening weekend for the WNBA and especially Mercury center Brittney Griner. She made her return to the W for the team season-opener at the LA Sparks on Friday at Crypto.com Arena. The place gave her incredibly warm welcome. She also had her home opener on Sunday in Phoenix. On Friday, Griner received a standing ovation and that game drew such star-studded bold-faced names as Billie Jean King and Magic Johnson and Dawn Staley. Vice President Kamala Harris was there. Nike and the WNBA took out billboards in downtown Los Angeles on Friday to welcome Griner back with the message, quote, "Basketball is home."
Meanwhile, Sunday in Phoenix was even more powerful as the entire lower bowl of the Footprint Center in Phoenix sold out. The team had to sell seats in the upper deck. The 14,000 fans in attendance on Sunday are believed to be the largest Mercury crowd since 1998, so a very strong opening weekend for the WNBA.
You know, I had a couple of questions about the new MLS team in San Diego on Friday, and so here are a few more details. The working name for the team is San Diego Football Club and there was some speculation that even though that's a working name, it could end up being the team's final name and continue with some of the traditional names we have seen recently around football clubs. Also, there was the interesting return of Tom Penn as the team CEO. Tom Penn, of course, has been a longtime sports executive. He was a key executive in the success of LAFC as he was part of that startup team from 2015 to 2020. Meanwhile, close to a thousand fans came out to Snapdragon Stadium on Saturday to celebrate the arrival of the new team so the early vibe on soccer in San Diego is very positive.
Finally, we'll end with this. We talked about this on the Buzzcast last week. Sounds like the Golden State Warriors are trying to play a bit more offense regarding the future of President of Basketball Operations Bob Myers. Remember last week there was the report that talks had not progressed and it was very possible Myers could leave. Well, over the weekend the San Francisco Chronicle reported that the contract offer that the Warriors extended to Bob Myers would make him the highest-paid GM in the NBA. His contract expires June 30th and there will be a lot of interest in Bob Myer's future and especially if he doesn't remain with the Golden State Warriors.
So that is your Morning Buzzcast for Monday, May 22nd. I'm Abe Madkour. Thanks for listening to the Buzzcast. Stay healthy, be good to each other. I'll speak to you tomorrow.