Making Championship Content

In today's fragmented media world, sports coverage remains one thing that cuts through the clutter. Live sports in the US consume billions of entertainment dollars. The Super Bowl is usually the highest rated television show every year. Local sports networks receive ratings for games routinely higher than entertainment programs in their markets. Major League Baseball, Football, Basketball, and hockey all have their own channels; the number of collegiate sports leagues with their own channels continues to grow. The Pac-12 channel will launch this year. There are reports that even the Ivy League plans a post-season tournament for their major sports. Sport teams remain a great investment. According to news reports, Frank McCourt stands to make a $1 billion profit on his sale of the LA Dodgers franchise. He bought it for $430 million of mostly borrowed money and recently sold it for $2.15 billion to a group led by Laker great Magic Johnson and former mlb executive Stan Kasten. He got this price despite the fact that the Dodgers were in bankruptcy at the time. By the way, this enormous price should, but probably won't, silence any future complaints from team owners that they're not making money on their baseball teams. If you can invest $430 million in a franchise, run it into bankruptcy, and still make $1 billion on the sale, baseball teams must be a pretty good investment. It's not only sports teams but also sports media outlets that continue to rise in value. When I moved to Orlando to launch the Golf Channel as its first director of programming many friends in the business told me I was crazy. A channel based on one sport would never make it, they said. That's another example of why you shouldn't listen to the nay-sayers when you have a conviction. Not only did Golf Channel thrive, eventually being valued by Comcast at over $1 billion, but sports niche channels are becoming profitable -- the Tennis Channel, Soccer Channel, and Speedvision are just a few of the channels turning an excellent profit these days. The number of online media sources has exploded. In addition to official sites like mlb.com and nba.com, fan sites like Deadspin, and recruiting sites like Rivals, are worth big money. Reporters from sports blogs routinely receive media pases from pro teams. Do you remember when that was controverial? I do. Fans complain about the money players make, but how can you complain about paying $20 million to a player who helps generate billions of dollars in revenue across all platforms? I became a sports programmer and producer because I love working with live sports. Sports have drawn big audiences since the Ancient Greeks got together to hold competitions to honor the gods of Olympus. There's something tremendously compelling about watching people strive to do their best in an arena where there is a clear winner and loser. You're probably saying by now, "Okay, I know sports are popular, but what does that have to do with my content?" I'm glad you asked. Frankly, I'm in the sports media business because I love it, but even I was surprised about the size of the business and amount of money at stake. It's motivating to realize that if you create or own content that commands this large an audience, the financial rewards are large, too. Even if you're not a sports fan, you can bring some of the lessons to your content -- create clear winners and losers. Keep the stakes high, and have the characters strive hard to do their best. Make sure the audience knows the rules. Give them someone or something to root for. Include these elements in your content, and you'll be on the road to popular success.