Stuff Worth reading and Sharing...'08

MMA Takes The Big Stage To Try And Grow Audience and Interest…
The World Series is now over, the NBA and NHL seasons have begun their long stretches, college football is missing a compelling weekend matchup, the luster of the NYC Marathon is gone and the NFL is passing its midpoint. So into the mix when there is a lack of marquis events this weekend falls the sport of Mixed Martial Arts, which returns to CBS in primetime still looking for a challenger to provide any mainstream competition to the UFC. Can either capture the casual fan on a slow weekend? The CBS/Strikeforce show will feature perhaps MMA’

End of the Day, Live Events Make Sports, Brands, King…
The debate has gone on for several years as to what the value of the live event is with regard to sports. In this age of instantaneous, multimedia applications with hundreds of applications, why do we need to watch anything live or be there in person for it? After all we can google, youtube or TiVo any event and watch it when we want to watch it, right? Yes that is true, and the options do present those challenges to event marketers, teams and brands. However Mark Cuban, in a recent BlogMaverick post, had some great points to the contrary, and at the

Finding The Happy Medium For Twitter…Howard yes, Johnson no…
The twitter debate with regard to athletes and celebrities rages on as to what is acceptable and helpful and what is detrimental and contrived, and what at the end of the day is actually the best mix for use in the social networking space. Much like other media that have launched…sports radio, blogs, websites…the initial pushback is due more to the unknown as opposed to the medium itself. Sports remains a very traditional, very routine business, especially for those who are amongst its veterans in communications on the team side. The season has its patterns, and many times there is a reticence to differ from that pattern or try new things or embrace new technolog

CRONS, Big South Makes Good Sense For Brands…
Many times we all get caught up in the hype…the necessity to make sure our athletes. schools and teams are associated with the big names to gives us “street cred.” However in these challenged times, the mainstream names and providers…from the drink category to media companies to apparel…are struggling to make ends meet even with the most mainstream of partners, so expecting the dollars and promotional pop for second tier partners is even more of a struggle than it has been before. More importantly, add-ons to gain marketshare that major brands interested in athletics needed in the past, second tier or mid-major conferences, niche sports, rising ath

From the Mayors to the Players…MLB incorporates giving back and service into every message…
Its the time old tradition…the Mayors of a city betting the obligatory food items and jersey exchanges for the big game. You see it everywhere every year and its cute, it gets coverage and its part of tradition. However not in baseball this year. The Mayors of Philadelphia and New York…Michael Nutter and Mike Bloomberg…changed a the wager from the traditional to the productive, and instead of exchanging cheese steaks and cheesecake only they will exchange working on a community service project in the other city. The idea fits perfectly in line with MLB’