The Diminishing Line between Sport & Business
My 7-year old son has been playing soccer for the past several years like many other kids in USA. A few days back I got him a pro club soccer jersey. He stared at it for a while, turned it front and back, and then gave me a perplexed look. He asked which club the jersey represented. Knowing my son could read, I was a bit puzzled by the question. But then it quickly dawned upon me why he’d feel that way. See the image in the title above and try to figure out which teams these official soccer jerseys represent.
The first two from the left represent FC Barcelona one of the top soccer teams in the world, and the third one is Bayern Munchen arguably the best team in soccer. Looking at the size of the logos slapped on these jerseys, you’d have thought the teams’ names were Qatar Airways, Unicef, and T-Mobile. Frankly I did not have a good answer for my son without going into the whole topic of capitalism, advertising and in-your-face branding.
Obviously, we are living in a new world of Sports where everything is up for sale and has a corporate sponsor arguably at the cost of the team’s own brand recognition. It is interesting to watch yet another venue replacing its rich sporting history and brand with an umbrella corporate name-tag such as Citi Field and Barclays Center in New York or Whataburger Field in TX and KFC Yum! Center in Kentucky.
For sports such as Baseball, Football (American), Soccer and Basketball, I can see the argument made both ways since the players at the top of these sports teams are almost always paid handsomely, so maybe it is just a big business camouflaged as a sport that charges the average family an arm and leg to take their kids to a game, something people have no choice in but to dish out hundreds of dollars for a night out to the stadium. However, for many other sporting categories such as Track & Field and a rather large number of Olympic Sports, this is just not the case since the athletes tend to struggle with unreasonable restrictions placed on them by sponsors and governing bodies while they scuffle to make half decent incomes. In light of this, it was somewhat inspiring to see Olympian Nick Symmonds, an 800-meter runner, take a stand. Whatever your thoughts are on the subject, it has certainly got people talking about the ethics of corporate sponsor and governing sports organizations' demands on athletes.
Despite a win at the US Championships in June, middle distance runner Nick Symmonds will not be traveling to represent USA in Beijing because he took a stand against sponsor Nike and USA Track & Field.
The problems began when the Olympian refused to sign a contract that USA Track and Field requires of all athletes before they’re placed on their team. The strongly worded contract convinced Symmonds that it was time to say something. The letter said:
A significant portion of track and field athletes' earnings come from their individually negotiated personal endorsement deals, and Symmonds had secured such an arrangement with his sponsor Brooks Running. The cost of training and world travel is especially expensive for athletes who want to compete globally, follow their dream of achieving the impossible and make their country proud.
It is important to remember that a personal endorsement deal, such as the one Symmonds struck with Brooks Running can allow athletes like him to concentrate on the sport rather than wonder how they’d go about paying for their next flight, hotel or meal.
On his personal website, Nick also strives to assist fellow struggling athletes obtain sponsorship and stand up to their sports’ governing bodies with their marketing restrictions that only allow minimal advertising dollars to reach the athletes themselves. If his claims hold true that only 8% of sponsorship revenue ends up being shared amongst the large pool of athletes within a particular sport, that then prevents them from earning cash via other direct endorsement deals, it’s a surprise more athletes are not making a stand!
Some will sure say that if you enter a particular sport professionally, you need to play the game by its governing organization’s rules. It is however refreshing to see someone brave enough to take a stand when the rules seem unfair or one sided, and also help other struggling athletes obtain alternative sponsorship to support their sporting career. It is a matter of bread and butter and does not have to be complicated.
The unfortunate part of the story is that there has been more publicity for everybody including Nike, other than the actual championship itself.
If you take a step back and think about the whole idea of Nike worried about losing money because an athlete called Nick Symmonds is wearing a Brooks t-shirt for breakfast in a hotel, you quickly realize the absurdity of the situation. It would be equally unfair to put all the blame on Nike when it is actually USATF that is calling the shots and distributing money from these sponsorship deals.
In fact it is interesting to see the current website of USATF that seems to have the largest portion of its home page dedicated to a sponsor's ad. See the image below. It is great to have sponsorship and advertising and those play a vital part of such organizations and their representative athletes. However making the website's home page look like it is a primary placeholder for advertisers rather than one that represents the sport itself, seems a bit disingenuous.
In some ways it is sad that the only gold all parties are fighting over is not the medal itself and it does highlight how completely commercial all aspects of the sport have become. Maybe we are a little unrealistic to think that it does more harm than good when looking through our idealistic lenses.
Whether you think this level of commercial control over a sport and its athletes potentially cheapens it and represents a sell out of the sport itself, or instead appreciate the benefits this investment brings regardless of the controls it puts on its recipients, the truth remains that it is here to stay. Sponsorship is naturally a huge part of the sporting world, and perhaps all anyone wants is for a greater distribution of these profits so that the athletes do not have to worry about their next flight or meal and can enjoy the fruits of their labor too.
What are your thoughts on the Olympian’s stance against the restrictions his sport’s corporate sponsor and governing body put on his individual ability to secure independent sponsorship whilst limiting the amount of money the athletes can receive from the corporate investment to potentially less than what the athletes can independently secure on their own?
Anurag Harsh [other articles] is a founding exec of Ziff Davis (NASDAQ: JCOM), the world's largest tech & gaming digital corp. He graduated (MBA/MS) from Wharton & MIT, has performed two sold out solo concerts at Carnegie Hall and co-authored the McGraw-Hill bestseller “M-Commerce Security”. Follow him on LinkedIn or Twitter @anuragharsh