European countries crying foul.
The voting in favor of its European national teams to boycott all the competitions, including the World Cup, and that is because the president Gianni Infantino revealed a proposal to spin off the commercial and moneymaking operations into a new $20 billion commercial subsidiary called Ford Enterprise.
Now under the proposal, which co-written with banking advisors from JP Morgan FA would sell a 20% stake of the subsidiary to the investors and the arguing that bringing internal in the competitions would fundamentally alter soccer governance.
Now major soccer clubs including Real Madrid and Juventus are challenging FIFA's attempt to sell a stake in its commercial business outside investors will joining us this morning.
To weigh in as Rick TV sports business analyst Rick happy Friday.
Thank you so much for joining us.
So let's kick things off with FIFA.
Spain has just won the World Cup, but it does feel like it's been a while since the World Cup ended.
So first and foremost, the UEFA member nations say they may not even show up to the next tournament.
So tell us what's going on and what is your perspective on this.
The tournament is not tomorrow.
The next World Cup is 4 years away.
When you think about it, this is a $4.5 billion attempt to raise significant dollars for grassroots women's programs under FIFA Forward.
So the concept isn't bad.
The spinoff of 21% of this new entity is interesting, and the real issue is how do you do it?
Who gets the dollars, the team.
Teams and leagues have until mid-September to say they want to opt in and opt out.
It sounds like a very quick rush to judgment by Infantino and staff, but the concept is interesting and again more controversy.
After an incredible, as you would agree, Remy, World Cup, I went to 8 venues in the US and all were fantastic, one in Canada, and now we're back to controversy around the sports business, which everybody knows in every league.
Yeah and speaking of controversy, there's plenty of it.
So I do want to shift our focus here to the US, especially since back to school season is right around the corner.
There's ongoing drama surrounding college sports senators working on the bipartisan Protect College Sports Act, which does aim to grant.
The NCAA and power conferences and antitrust exemption as well as federal preemption over state laws.
So this sounds like a lot like the drama we're seeing in crypto with the clarity act ahead of the summer recess.
So will college sports officials run the clock out on this bill.
Last minute strokes.
This bill has a lot of issues in it that are probably really good if they're resolved.
A standardized NIL compensation pack, a portal restructuring, 5-year eligibility limit.
There's also an allocation piece for women's sports and a piece to keep kids retained in their own colleges.
The Big 10 and SEC pushing back.
They say they need more.
Strong federal regulation on it and the NIL cap predictably needed to be higher for the big schools.
They want more haves and have-nots.
Congress gave a final, final, final, final, final, final proposal and a 10:00 a.m. deadline to respond.
Everybody says pencils down.
When I was but a student thousands of years ago.
When I heard pencils down, it meant time to put pencils up again, so we're not done. and you mentioned a women's sports, so I want to shift our focus on over to the WNBA so they backpedal yesterday deleting a social media video that showed Angel Reese as well as page Beckers discussing betting on Wednesday's game.
Between the Dallas Wings and the lot of dreams.
So with the betting schemes we've seen unfold in the NBA this year is there anything to pay attention to here or was this just an air ball from the WNBA social media team.
The airball analogy, the dynamic was a release comment saying even when intended as a joke, these kinds of things have significant consequences.
So you're taking it seriously, but there obviously will be no.
Penalty.
Look, the WNBA has a lot to gain, a lot to lose. $3.1 billion TV deal.
The average franchise value, $460 million.
The stars know their roles, and gaming among all of the stars can't be one of them.
And Rick, we have about 60 seconds here.
Major League Baseball's trade deadline is this coming Monday, and we need you to be our insider Rick.
So what moves are you expecting?
Yeah, 47 seconds to resolve Major League Baseball's history now and forever.
Thanks.
But look, the bottom line is, it's a complicated time.
You've got team control issues, you got minor leaguers, you got about 8 teams on the bubble that want their closer and their next guy.
And at the end of the day, the average franchise value is a little less than 3 billion.
All of those trade ideas are interesting as possibilities.
I don't want to be wrong, so I'll just refer to that page and say, hey, That looks good.
And by the way, Bob Dupe, the former president of Major League Baseball from 002 to 0010, is my second guest on the Icons show.
The first one was Jack Nicklaus.
We're doing this every other week.
We're dropping it on all social media and ultimately on your fast channels.
Really excited, by the way, about this expansion of my role at the network and because these people know more than I do, and it's very important to get them on.
Well Rick, it's always great having you on and getting your perspective, so thank you so much as always for joining us here and have a great weekend.
The rest.
