What is Endeavor's next move? How Mission Foods is using sports to drive sales; New study shows slight growth in women's sports coverage and Saudi's new sports leader
I am back from New York. What a fantastic Game Changers Conference on Tuesday. Such energy, such great networking. It's a can't miss event. You have to be there next year. What else is fun? How about the NBA tipping off last night on Wednesday night, great storylines from Wembanyama's debut to Porzingis making a difference for the Celtics, to the Hornets winning here in my hometown of Charlotte under new ownership. Finally, hope to see many of you at Media Innovators next week in New York City. And this is your Morning Buzzcast for Thursday, October 26th.
Good morning, I'm Abe Madkour. Fascinating news broke late Wednesday that Endeavor, owner of WME-IMG and a majority stake in the TKO Group is going to test the market. What does that mean? They put out a statement saying they're going to consider strategic alternatives and now is even considering going private. So here's the key. The company said it will be initiating a formal review to evaluate strategic alternatives for Endeavor, but Endeavor said it is not considering selling its stake in TKO, which owns and operates the UFC and WWE.
Endeavor CEO, Ari Emmanuel, has said this plenty of times. He firmly believes that Wall Street is not valuing the totality of Endeavor properly and that has led to this review. And then private equity firm, Silver Lake, which is a major shareholder in Endeavor, came out to say that it's working toward making a proposal to take Endeavor private. Silver Lake remains bullish on the overall Endeavor business and doesn't want to see assets sold. But overall, Endeavor feels it hasn't seen the positive reaction in the marketplace that it wanted when it went public. In fact, Endeavor stock price has dropped more than 35% since it went public and is down more than 16% so far this year.
What could be at play here? Well, think of the assets that Endeavor could sell or spin off. There's the talent agency, WME, that's the largest part of their business. There is IMG, IMG Media. They're in the betting space with OpenBet. We've talked a lot on the Buzzcast about the on-location event and hospitality business. There is 160over90. There's the Professional Bull Riders, there's the Miami Open Tennis Tournament. So a lot of assets and there's plenty more that I haven't even talked about, but there are plenty of assets that could be in play here, and perhaps Endeavor believes that dropping some of these assets would boost the stock price and market reaction. So this is a big story and it has a lot of downstream impact. So I'm anxious to see how the marketplace responds to Endeavor's statement and we'll have to see where the Silver Lake proposal goes, but this is a big story. Have to keep your eye on this one.
Let's move on. Some brief news about the A's possible relocation to Las Vegas as a new timeline came out that stated construction on an A's ballpark is scheduled to begin an April of 2025 and be completed in January of 2028. So that gives us a little glimpse of an early possible timeline for the A's Ballpark. MLB team owners still need to approve this relocation to Las Vegas. That vote is expected to take place next month at the MLB owners meetings in Texas. And then we have to think about where the A'S would play temporarily before any new ballpark is opened.
Let's talk about the NHRA that we don't talk a lot about on the Buzzcast, but the NHRA has a new title sponsor to replace Camping World. Its tortilla brand, Mission Foods. So that will entitle the Drag Racing Series starting next year with the 2024 season. This is part of a multi-year deal. SBJ's Adam Stern had reported that the NHRA had previously sold title sponsorship for around $5 million per year, and they are very happy they said with this new deal. So it's probably in that ballpark. Additionally, the NHRA has signed Camping World to a new deal that will see that company stay in the sport but reduce its spending overall.
Now, Mission Foods, which manufactures a variety of Mexican food products, has been getting increasingly involved in racing in recent years. It had been a sponsor of motorcycle racing and IndyCar and they were a lower level sponsor of the NHRA. Now, Mission Food said one of the reasons to title sponsor the NHRA was because data had shown that its sports sponsorships were positively driving sales and brand awareness. Mission Food says it's eager to activate this deal heavily at retail, grocery stores and the like. So that is exactly what the NHRA loves to hear as that can drive major awareness around any sports property. Bottom line, this is a big, big deal for the NHRA.
Let's talk about some topics that we discussed at Game Changers. One of the big topics at Game Changers of course was the growth of women's sports. And with that came calls for more and more media coverage of women's sports. Well, here is one encouraging report from The Collective, that's the women focused practice within Wasserman. That report showed that women's sports comprised on average, 15% of total sports media coverage, 15, 15%. And that's increased content notably, driven by streaming and social media.
So when you look at this report, there's some good news and some bad news in these numbers. Here's the good. It's clearly increasing. For years, coverage of women's sports was anywhere between 8% to 10% of the overall sports media coverage. The bad is that in the US, women's sports comprised roughly half of the total competitions played across college, pro and national sports events, and yet they only receive about 15% of the coverage. And when you remove collegiate competition from this mix and the study, it shows that professional women's sports make up only 8% of the sports media coverage. So while there has been some gains, there is still a lot, a lot of ground to make up and a lot of work to do, but an interesting study by The Collective.
In addition, there was more and more discussion at Game Changers about athlete empowerment and National Basketball Players Association Executive Director, Tamika Tremaglio, talked about working with players to ensure generational wealth, which includes allowing players opportunities to obtain equity in sports teams. And here's an example in the NFL, and it was announced yesterday as Browns Defensive End, Myles Garrett has purchased a minority stake in the Cleveland Cavaliers. Now, Garrett is represented by Clutch Sports Group, which negotiated the deal. Financial terms were not available. It was also unclear how much of the team he acquired or has equity in. But bottom line, he will serve as an official ambassador for the Cavaliers, and this is another way that players are becoming more and more engaged in sports team ownership. Myles Garrett purchasing a minority stake in the Cleveland Cavaliers.
And finally, a name that many of you have not heard of, but you should be paying attention to it, SRJ Sports Investments. Now what is that? That is the sports unit of Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, and that has named Danny Townsend as CEO. Now, who is Danny Townsend? Well, he comes to SRJ Sports Investments from the Australian Professional Leagues where he was CEO. He was based in Australia, but many people in the States know Danny Townsend. He's had experience at Repucom. He helped found that company with Paul Smith. He was then part of Nielsen Sports. He was over at Sydney FC and became CEO of the Australian Professional Leagues. He was also an SBJ 40 under 40 Honoree in 2015.
So why is this important? Well, this new role will help oversee all investments, sports investments by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund. This is a search that has been going on for some time. Many heavy hitters in the sports business talk to me about this search. Many were interested in this position. This will have a wide purview. Obviously deep pockets, a big checkbook to invest in sports. And now Danny Townsend is CEO of SRJ Sports Investments, the sports unit of Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund.
And so that is your Morning Buzzcast for Thursday, October 26th. I'm Abe Madkour. Thanks for listening to the Buzzcast. Stay healthy, be good to each other. Let's all pray for peace in this world. I'll talk to you tomorrow.