Stephen A. Smith Is the Face of ESPN. How Much Is That Worth ...

Thus, as the cable-tv-dominated status quo crumbles, pro sports will develop a new playbook, centered around better telling player stories. Players will also have more opportunity to tell and sell these stories themselves, direct-to-consumer:

The league entered talks at a time when the sports rights market was tightening, economic headwinds were rising, and TV ratings were flattening. Before negotiations started, some thought the NBA would struggle to achieve a significant increase over its current nine-year, $24 billion deal. Instead, as Front Office Sports has learned, the league coul... See more

When we spoke to Josh, he mentioned how shockingly under-monetized esports is: “The average NFL viewer is valued at, like, $45 per fan or something; esports is at around $3. Especially in esports, the viewer has been trained to get too much value for free.”

After establishing its FANography insight community, sports broadcasting leader ESPN has been able to bring market research in-house, saving approximately $650,000 in one year.