Ashley Mastronardi: We're with Dan Roberts, Editor-in-Chief at Front Office Sports, here to tell us about an exciting event happening in New York City on Tuesday. How are you doing?
Dan Roberts: I'm doing great. We're looking forward to Tuned In, our big sports media summit.
Ashley Mastronardi: Yes. What can we expect at Tuned In?
Dan Roberts: Well, first, I guess I'd say that to set the stage, sports media, as you would probably guess, is our top-clicking category at Front Office Sports. I mean, readers are really fascinated by the media side of things. It's the ESPN personalities, it's streaming rights, it's the big leagues and their packages with all the different networks.
So we've got a banger speaker lineup this year. The commissioners of Major League Soccer, the NWSL, the women's soccer league, the head of NASCAR, the commissioner of the LPGA, the Ladies Professional Golf Association.
We've also got major on-camera talent that everyone knows: Mike Tirico, Chris "Mad Dog" Russo, Pablo Torre, who broke the whole Clippers NBA scandal.
And we get these power brokers in sports media on stage, and we ask them big questions and hope to break a little news.
Ashley Mastronardi: What are those big questions? What conversations will you be having at Tuned In?
Dan Roberts: Well, I will be doing three of these. I'll be talking to Pablo. We'll certainly talk about what happened with the NBA scandal.
I'm also interviewing the head of media for the NFL, Hans Schroeder. And obviously, the NFL is the elephant in the room when it comes to live sports rights, the biggest league in America.
What are they going to do when they opt out of their current media deals a little bit early in 2029? We know they have games already on a ton of streamers, Netflix, Amazon. Are they going to pass a lot more games to those streamers? What are they going to do for their biggest packages?
Fox already said they don't want to do any negotiating until 2029 or 2030. So a lot to talk about with him.
And then I'm also opening the day with Don Garber, who is the outgoing commissioner of Major League Soccer. What kind of a bump has U.S. soccer viewership seen post-World Cups? That's just a few things I'm looking forward to.
Then, of course, we have legends like Chris Berman, Boomer, who has been at ESPN for 50 years. What's he going to be doing for ESPN's first-ever Super Bowl coming up?
Ashley Mastronardi: And I know there will be a lot of day-of news that might have to stay under wraps, but can you give us a little tease?
Dan Roberts: Yes. Nielsen is one of our sponsors for the day, which is great. Obviously, it's a day that involves TV, but also streaming and fragmentation.
We've got some exclusive data from Nielsen that we'll reveal on stage that might surprise some people about a certain sport. So that's one thing I'll tease.
And then in general, we also like to ask people's takes on the news of the day. So last year at this event, we had NBA Commissioner Adam Silver. The allegations from Pablo had just come out a week earlier about the Clippers and Steve Ballmer.
So I kind of grilled him on stage about that, and he was very open about the investigation.
Now it kind of comes full circle that a year later we've got Pablo, and those big punishments came down. Steve Ballmer banned from the NBA for a year. So we get a lot out of having league commissioners.
Ashley Mastronardi: Great. We have Netflix, Amazon and a newly formed Skydance. They just rang the bell at the New York Stock Exchange after transferring this morning. What does this mean for sports streaming?
Dan Roberts: Well, yesterday we led our PPM newsletter, which has about 800,000 subscribers, with the subject line "Sports Media's New Colossus." And that was about the new Skydance, right?
I mean, all the different properties that are in that portfolio, what does that mean for leagues like the NFL, NBA, Major League Baseball in the next few years as they renegotiate their rights?
Skydance is going to be a major player, a major bidder for rights of all different kinds. There are so many different sports properties and leagues that are within that portfolio now.
If you expand it out, Paramount and Skydance and CBS and all the different news programs that are in that house of brands, they are going to be a major, major bidder.
Ashley Mastronardi: All right. Dan Roberts, Editor-in-Chief at Front Office Sports, thanks so much for joining us on Taking Stock. And we wish you nothing but success on Tuesday.
Dan Roberts: Great.
