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RE: Am I the only one who thinks pay for play will be a train wreck?
(10-04-2019 04:54 PM)Frank the Tank Wrote: (10-04-2019 12:58 PM)Captain Bearcat Wrote: (10-02-2019 10:56 AM)Frank the Tank Wrote: (10-02-2019 10:37 AM)quo vadis Wrote: (10-02-2019 10:06 AM)Frank the Tank Wrote: It doesn't compute in my brain that we can have this massive college sports industrial complex financed by billions of dollars of TV revenue, donations, and sponsorships and we can then sit here and claim that the actual athletes that fuel all of that getting compensated would suddenly be a bridge too far.
Here's the thing, though: Would Zion have been able to make some pretty big endorsement bucks while at Duke last year? Yes.
But, would Zion have made those same bucks if he was in the D-League? I very much doubt it.
So yes, the athletes do "fuel" this to an extent. But, a significant part of their value is that they are representing universities that are themselves big brand names with huge fan bases and lots of national TV exposure. Zion playing for Duke is worth something, Zion playing for the Albany Salmoncatchers of the ABL is worth a lot less.
So i can imagine that big schools might try to capture some of this value by insisting on a cut of whatever endorsement deals their players sign.
Kind of like how record companies are getting artists to sign "360 degree" contracts that give the record company a cut of concert ticket sales, merchandising, celebrity endorsements, etc.
Of course in the end, the market will sort that out. But the point for me is let's not pretend the star athlete is the *only* driver of value here. The school uniform matters greatly too.
Sure, but it's all circular and symbiotic because the schools are deriving value from having those elite level athletes. Duke basketball has massive brand value, but it only has such brand value because it has a consistent standard of having among the best teams in Division I college basketball. It can't just start trotting out Division III athletes and retain that brand value. The Duke brand certainly adds to the endorsement potential of Zion - there's no question about that. However, it also takes players like Zion and other top level athletes to sustain that Duke brand.
In fact, that's what makes college football and basketball so uniquely popular compared to, say, college baseball. There's a symbiotic merger of a brand that where there's an intense emotional connection (the school itself) and the top athletes for that particular level. If you take away the school brand, then you have minor league sports teams without the intense emotional connection. If you take away the top athletes for that particular level, then you have something more akin to college baseball (which isn't nearly as popular) or Division II/III sports that draw little interest.
All of it is intertwined for college football and basketball. You need both the school brands AND the elite athletes for the whole economic system to work.
FWIW, you could say the exact same thing about pro sports. LeBron James doesn't make the money that he makes today if the NBA didn't exist. You could argue that his market value is nothing if he's not on an NBA roster. However, the NBA doesn't work as an entity if elite athletes like LeBron James don't join their league. The Lakers can't just trot out random players on the court any more than Duke can and expect the multi-billion dollar valuation that they have as a franchise. You need BOTH the branding AND the elite talent for the economic system to run correctly.
Actually, I disagree with this. If the NBA lost its best athletes to other sports or other leauges, I don't think the NBA's revenues would change much.
The NFL loses great athletes to baseball all the time because MLB pays more and offers a better post-career health. Charlie Ward, the Heisman Trophy winner, went to the NBA. Hasn't affected NFL profits one bit.
Even if the NBA started losing players to, say, the Spanish or French league, it wouldn't change the Lakers' revenue - leagues in the USA will outdraw foreign leagues because the USA is still the biggest sports market in the world.
Look at the the Japanese baseball league - despite regularly losing its best players to the USA, it has higher average attendance than MLB and $1.3 billion in revenue for just 12 teams. And Look at MLS - among soccer leagues it ranks 22 in player salary but 6th in attendance, despite being practically brand new and actively hated by most people over 40 years old.
Losing the best athletes to other sports is something that is largely out of the control of leagues (e.g. Kyler Murray choosing the NFL over MLB, Charlie Ward choosing the NBA over the NFL, etc.).
However, losing the best players in your own sport to other leagues in that sport is definitely something that isn't sustainable, especially in a market like the United States where we expect to watch the best of the best. The brand value of all of the NFL, NBA, MLB and NHL are based on the fact that they are the number one leagues in the world in their respective sports by a wide margin. Period. Sure, there could be an outlier out there of a star still playing baseball in Japan or playing basketball in Spain, but there isn't a question that virtually all of the very best players in the world still come to the US leagues for football, basketball, baseball and hockey and they receive outsized super-premium valuations are based on that fact. It is internalized in our brains that we are watching the best of the best in those sports, so if that is eroded, interest and valuations go down accordingly.
You point to the Japanese league making $1.3 billion in revenue, but the Los Angeles Dodgers by themselves sold for over $2 billion. Major League Baseball dwarfs Japanese baseball in terms of market valuations. The disparity is even greater in basketball and hockey, while American football barely exists anywhere else. We're spoiled Americans where we get all of the best athletes in virtually every sport except for soccer... and you can see how interest and valuations for MLS clubs are a fraction compared to their Premier League and other top European club counterparts (where their club values are in the billions of dollars, too).
Saying that the Lakers could just trot out random players while the Spanish league could grab top basketball players is a false notion because Americans simply don't put up with that crap. If we're not watching the best of the best, then we largely ignore it. Just look at our Olympics coverage as a microcosm: we breathlessly cover the US athletes and teams that are in position to win gold medals while ignoring everyone else (whether they're from our country or a different country).
We can apply this to college sports, too. If all that matters is school pride and branding, why don't we watch Division III sports en masse? Why do more people watch FBS football over FCS football? Why do more people watch Power 5 schools over Group of 5 schools? Why do more people watch Alabama and Ohio State compared to Vanderbilt and Rutgers? It's because we have internalized that the best athletes *at that level* are playing at the top programs in the Power Five... and that's what drives their valuation. Once again, there can be outliers (e.g. an excellent UCF or Boise State team or great players that come out of FCS), but it's the penumbra effect of having that consistent critical mass of talent at that power schools year after year after year that sustains the branding and revenue. When you remove that consistent critical mass of talent, the whole thing falls apart.
As a result, you truly can't just trot out Division III talent at Ohio State and expect 110,000 people to still show up (or trot out G-League talent with the Lakers and expect to sustain their valuations). There's a symbiotic combination of top level talent for that level with the school branding and pride that creates value that is greater than the sum of its parts - essentially, 1 + 1 = 3.
To use an analogy, when I pay to see, say, Hamilton on Broadway or downtown Chicago, I may not know the specific actors playing the parts. However, when I'm paying a few hundred dollars per ticket plus my time and energy to travel to watch the show, I'm still expecting top level quality and talent to be on stage. If they just trot out a community theater cast, I'm going to notice it right away and it's not going to be a satisfactory experience no matter how much I like the songs. I know the difference between a Broadway cast and a community theater cast, just as I know the difference between a Division III team and a Division I team or an MLB team and a minor league baseball team. Americans that are watching sports expect Broadway-level talent (regardless of whether it's pro or college) and they're not going to pay for anything less.
On the other hand, how do you explain the popularity of Kentucky and South Carolina football?
Seriously, UK looked like a MAC team 10 years ago relative to the rest of the SEC. Yet they still drew 60k+ a game.
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