April 10, 2025 • 40 mins
In this episode of The Deal, Alex Rodriguez and Jason Kelly talk about two big records: Alex Ovechkin topping Wayne Gretzky’s legendary scoring record in the NHL, and Geno Auriemma’s 12th NCAA Women’s Basketball Championship win as coach at the University of Connecticut. Then, they speak with Jessica Berman about how she has helped revolutionize the National Women’s Soccer League for the last three years as commissioner. Berman tells the hosts why the NWSL decided to get rid of the draft, how she’s making the most of her media rights deal with Amazon, ESPN, CBS, and Scripps ION, and whether she thinks expansion teams are getting too expensive too fast.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, Radio News.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome back to the Deal. I'm your host Jason Kelly
alongside my partner Alex Rodriguez. Alex, I'm here in New York.
You're down in Miami. There's a ton happening in the
sports world and one of my favorite things records being broken,
and a record in the National Hockey League that folks
thought was going to stand forever eight hundred and ninety
(00:33):
five goals for Alexander Ovechkin. He breaks the great one,
Wayne Gretzky's record. The highlights were inescapable. When you see
something like that, what does it make you think of?
How do you analyze that from a business perspective?
Speaker 3 (00:46):
Well, I think, first of all, is wonderful for sports.
Is great for the sport of hockey. It's amazing for
a good friend Ted Leonsis. And look, as an athlete
who played for twenty three years, this is Alexis twenty year. Yeah,
he's won one title and he's only payed with one team.
And of course this reminds me of right down the
street where he plays, where my childhood hero Cal Ripken
(01:10):
broke the all time record for consecutive games when he
broke Luke Garrick's record, and that was like a national holiday.
Speaker 4 (01:16):
But I loved last night. It wasn't at home.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
He was playing the Islanders, you know, up in your
neck of the woods up there, and you had the commissioner,
you had Wayne Gretzky, you had Wayne's wife, Janet Jones.
And records are meant to be broken and good for
hockey and good for Alex.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Yeah. And I mean records are meant to be broken.
And the thing is people pay attention. It was inescapable
on YouTube, on social media, on ESPN. You know they
were tracking it. You know, you think about the business
of it all. There's merch associated with that. You know.
You made the point that they were playing the Islanders,
and I mean it certainly when he broke that record,
(01:50):
he slides across the ice, you know, head first, you
would have thought they were playing down in DC. I mean,
the crowd went bananas. And you know that Islanders people
for that moment, they were of Vegekin fans. You know,
more than anything. You're there for this unbelievable moment in
sports history. And you know, like you said, it's good
(02:11):
for business. We remember, I mean cal Ripken we both
love him. That was a long time ago, and yet
we still you know, remember him, you know, trotting bases
and then you know, running the whole the circumference of
Camden Yards and slapping hands and it's cool to witness
and as you said, great for ted Leonsis and the
(02:31):
Washington Capitals.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Is not only good for business, it's good for spirits, it's.
Speaker 4 (02:35):
Good for vibes.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
Here's Canada's you know, pastime hockey, which America loves hockey.
But here's a guy who came from Russia and it
came here in two thousand and five, has spent twenty
years with one franchise.
Speaker 4 (02:48):
Again, he won a title.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
But it also is a lesson on perseverance, on grit,
staying with it, on loyalty. It's what sports does in
a world of geopolitical craziness. Here's rushat Canada and US
and the rest of the world celebrating one man's accomplishment
is pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
It is the reason we love sports. Another reminder of
why we love sports and some of the shifting tides,
I think in a very positive way about what is
really capturing our attention. We are recording this on Monday afternoon.
So we don't know what's going to happen with the
men's championship. We do know that Duke University is not
going to be in it, which was upsetting for a
(03:26):
lot of people, especially in the brackets for a cause contest,
which you're a part of that Bloomberg does here. A
lot of Duke fans are a lot of people who
at least picked Duke. I mean, even our chairman Peter Grouer,
who went to the University of North Carolina. He had
picked Duke, and so he was both sad and happy.
I think he was sad for his bracket, but happy
as a tar heel to see Duke lose. That was
(03:46):
a huge upset. So tonight University of Houston and University
of Florida will play. By the time people are listening
to this, they'll know who the champion is. But we
do know who the champion is. On the women's side,
Yukon absolutely dominant, a reminder of that amazing history of
that franchise. Gino Orieama delivers the twelfth national championship, a
(04:09):
record there, a record for him. He is the winningest
college coach in terms of championships ever in basketball It's
just an amazing accompliment. Sue Byrd another callback to one
of our previous guests on the deal she played there,
Azy Fudd was the most outstanding player and fun fact,
asy Fudd was featured in the series Athlete Empire here
(04:30):
at Bloomberg Originals, the pilot episode of which was young
Man from Miami Alex Rodriguez and all of his business activities.
That's how you and I met, that's, you know, where
all this great stuff started. So I don't know how
much you dug into basketball over the weekend, but it
was fun to watch.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
Well, I got to tell you.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
I mean you talked about the coach Gino, I mean
his twelfth title. I mean he's become the modern day
John Wooden. They have now officially become the territory of
the Lakers, the Cowboys, the Yankees, the best of the best.
And it's great for sports and the domination and what
he's done for so many years. There's so many lessons,
whether it's business or sports or just humanity of how
(05:09):
difficult it is to be consistent and great for that long.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
Hats off and they deserve a lot of flowers.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, and it's interesting to think about Gino's tenure there
because it was probably surprising for people to be reminded
they had not won a title since twenty sixteen, so
it had been a bit of a drought for Yukon.
You know, Pagebeckers had made it to four final fours
during her tenure. She of course, is the presumptive number
one pick in the WNBA draft coming up later this month,
(05:39):
so they obviously were on the cusp of doing it again,
but they had not won it all. They faced off
against Don Staley's University of South Carolina. They were looking
to repeat, and really the storyline was, really, you know,
could Don Staley establish a full on dynasty at University
of South Carolina? May have to wait a little bit longer.
So the women's game, there's so much enthusiasm around it.
(06:04):
You saw the crowds there in Tampa through the whole
weekend for the Final four. A really a big reminder
of how big that game has become. Especially in March Madness.
There is something very close to parody when it comes
to who's watching, how many people are tuning in. We'll
see what the final numbers are. But that was the
matchup that everybody wanted, was Yukon South Carolina.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
Yeah, I think you're one hundred percent right, Jason. You
know Yukon said to South Carolina as far as the
dynasty goes, not so fast, right, We're back on top
of the hill.
Speaker 2 (06:37):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
And if you're Yukon and you're part of that ecosystem,
I mean not bad. Three titles in three years, two
from the men's one from the women's basketball, complete domination
when it comes to hoops, and then from the business lesson.
Here is if anyone thought, you know, there's allway skeptics
out there there say, oh, women's sports, I'm not sure
it's not going to happen again. Not so fast. We're
here and we're here to stay, and we're only going
(06:58):
to get bigger and better. And by the way, they
also say, the product's always been good in women's sports.
Now we have the attention, we're putting marketing dollars behind them,
and we have the right partners involved. So Women's Sports
Newsflash is here to stay well.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
And that is a great transition to our guests coming up,
Jessica Berman. She is the commissioner of the National Women's
Soccer League. We're going to talk to her about everything
that's happened. The valuations have gone bananas, I think is
the technical term during her tenure. Over the last few years,
we've talked to several owners of teams here on this program.
So all right, Coming up Jessica Berman. She is the
(07:36):
commissioner of the National Women's Soccer League. Hi, everyone, welcome
back to The Deal. I'm Jason Kelly alongside my partner
Alex Rodriguez. We are so excited to have a good
(07:57):
pal of mine join the podcast. Joined the Deal. It's
Jessica Berman. She is the commissioner of the National Women's
Soccer League.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Hey, Hi, so fun to be with you.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Well, I'm very excited for the two of you to
meet officially because I talk about you all the time.
We've talked a lot about women's soccer on this show.
It's having an incredible more than a moment right now.
But as we get underway of your season here, what's
the vibe, what are you learning? What's sort of the
(08:28):
underlying business feel like to you?
Speaker 5 (08:29):
Well, first of all, it's fun to be with you,
and I know that you're our number one fan.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Jason, so excited to bring Alex along.
Speaker 5 (08:38):
I love that you use the word vibe in your question,
because we actually just concluded market research with our fans
and the number one word used to describe the nwsl
unprompted across our data set was vibes.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
That was a nut word. Yes, yes, but the vibes
are good.
Speaker 5 (08:58):
We had three weeks of our season already in twenty
twenty five, and everything has been incredible. We launched our
first ever original content docu series, called for the Win,
on Amazon Prime, which really helped with our priority the
season of storytelling. We did a full takeover of Times
(09:19):
Square where we had our players' full body images projected
in the center of Time Square for the full four
weeks of the start of our season. We opened with
the Challenge Cup with basically a rematch of the championship
between the Orlando Pride and the Washington Spirit, and just
been an incredible start to the season.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Of course, there's.
Speaker 5 (09:41):
Stuff on the business side too, but I know that's
the stuff you're going to ask me about.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
So what is the biggest business initiative for twenty five, Well.
Speaker 5 (09:48):
We announced our Team sixteen expansion deal with Denver, and
that is the biggest investment ever made in the history
of women's sports at one time. In one transaction, several
hundred million dollars committed to be invested in Denver with
(10:09):
a purpose built facility both stadium and training facility. And
of course the expansion feeds a league of one hundred
and ten million dollars. And you know, because you've been
covering us since before I came in here, that valuations
before twenty twenty two were in.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
The five million range.
Speaker 5 (10:28):
So franchise valuations have grown exponentially, and our most recent
transaction is a testament to that, and spending a lot
of time with Boston and Denver making sure they're ready
to launch a year from now.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
Basically, Jessica, I have a friend that is part of
the LP group of Denver, and I can tell you
that they're wildly excited about the opportunity, about the investment,
about the early feedback from season tickets, and all the
excitement they've piloted.
Speaker 4 (10:57):
It's been really through the roof.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
My question is you mentioned in twenty two sub five
million dollars and now you're talking about north of one hundred.
Is there any concern as a leader of the league
that values are rising too quickly and is that sustainable?
Speaker 4 (11:12):
How do you feel about that.
Speaker 5 (11:13):
It's definitely an appropriate question to ask. You know, we
look at it through the lens of really twofold number
one to ensure that demand significantly outpaces supply so that
we can see a path to the continued growth in
the future. And ultimately those are the underpinnings of the
economic analysis that will continue to drive value. But also
(11:33):
looking at the core tenants of our business, and a
lot of what we've worked on over my first three
years here is really building the operational rigor and professionalization
of the league office, and we've built out an entire
business operations team that's working hand in hand with our
clubs to help them to drive revenue. And so ultimately
the thing that drives valuations from a metrics perspective is
(11:57):
revenue multiples, and so we got to keep drive up
those repeatable revenue sources. Looking at sponsorship, ticketing, and media rights.
We're in the second year of a four year deal
in our current media rights cycle, and most recently we
had our most watched game ever on ESPN, which was
incredible to have and see, and to just continuing to
(12:20):
see the growth in each season with those big moments
that we're going to continue to drive towards throughout the
twenty twenty five season.
Speaker 4 (12:28):
Yeah, Jessicau.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
So one quick follow up on that, So, second year
of a four year deal, it's obvious the metrics suggest
that you've overperformed, right, which is always good. You know,
a guy like Roger Goodell with the NFL, he has
an opt out clause and he can take advantage of
the metrics that they're doing. Do you feel like, oh,
I left some on the table or do you just
kind of pack your lunch and get ready for the
(12:49):
next negotiation and say, bucket your seat built, we're coming
hard and we're coming strong.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
Good question.
Speaker 5 (12:54):
We went four years very intentionally, which was much shorter
than any of our new partner wanted us to go.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
And we did that because we felt.
Speaker 5 (13:03):
Like we needed enough consistency as an emerging challenger property
to establish the viewership numbers year over year and also
bring our sponsors to the table to support the investment
in advertising, so that our four partners hopefully want to
renew with us and want to have those discussions, and
of course they'll give us an opportunity to go to
(13:23):
the broader marketplace to make sure we're getting the all
evaluating all the options for the league, but we really
wanted to have our deal be long enough that each
of Amazon, ESPN, CBS and Script's Ion had skin in
the game to be able to invest in us, because
no matter how much we spend in marketing, we will
(13:45):
never be able to match what the value of an
investment is when, for example, in March Madness, when ESPN
and CBS were running lower thirds and ads for the NWSL,
they had ten to fifteen million people tuning in for
men's and women's March Madness.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
That is so valuable to us.
Speaker 5 (14:08):
And if we had an opt out, or if we
had a two year deal or even a three year deal,
I'm not sure it would make sense for them to
invest in us the way that we're seeing them invest
in us.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
And we really want.
Speaker 5 (14:19):
Them to view us as partners and we're growing this
business together. We want them to be winners in this
and we want to over deliver for them in every
single year of the deal so that they feel good
about their investment.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
And so as you look across those media partners, just
sticking with this, what have you learned about your viewer?
What have you learned about the product, when it comes
to the watchability of it. You know what different platforms
deliver in terms of demos, like, what are the key
learnings from media From the media side so far, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
So far.
Speaker 5 (14:49):
Our average age is one of the lowest, if not
the lowest, across all live rights holders, which is consistent
with what we would have thought from to sales and
other research we've done. So that's good check. That's what
brands are looking for. Our audience is very multicultural. Our
audience skews heavily female, or more heavily female than other sports,
(15:15):
not exclusively. I believe we're around sixty to sixty five
percent female as of the latest data, and we know
that women control eighty percent of households spend, and so
really triangulating that from a business perspective.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
Is super important.
Speaker 5 (15:31):
We also know that the audience is very balanced, even
for us in terms of people watching on linear and
people watching on their devices or streaming.
Speaker 1 (15:42):
The advent of fast channels and.
Speaker 5 (15:45):
Being able to have our games in places and spaces
where people consume live content. It isn't just on streaming,
but it is an important vehicle for us to reach
particular fans who are not watching traditionally at least not
week over week for particular regular season games.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
So we're learning a lot.
Speaker 5 (16:05):
Having partners like Amazon are incredible for that. They really
know how to learn their customer and they're helping us
get smarter about how we serve our fans, and we're
leveraging all those insights across the full slate of our platforms.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
So I want to go back to expansion for a
second if we can, because you've been pretty aggressive there.
You talked about Boston and Denver coming online next year.
You have made some comments recently about, you know, continuing
to expand. I think I saw something and keep me
honest here, that you think you could get to NFL sized,
you know, at a thirty ish type of number, which
(16:44):
would you know, I'm not that good at math, but
that's close to double what you are. Now, what's the
business case sort of city per city? What is the
process you go through to make those selections and also
to figure out what the right pace is.
Speaker 5 (16:59):
Yeah, well, I think at every stage of growth and
at every decision point where we're thinking about our next
round of expansion, you have to look at the state
of the business in terms of the geographic footprint of
our country and where we believe there are markets that
the NWSL could be successful, which spoiler alert, there are
(17:21):
many markets where we are not currently operating that we
know we will be successful if we had a team.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
There so no.
Speaker 5 (17:29):
Question on the ability for the footprint to be sustainable
in terms of it continuing to scale and ultimately, yes,
getting up to thirty thirty two teams.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
The way we'll make those decisions in.
Speaker 5 (17:40):
Real time is I think mostly evaluated through the lens
of the talent pipeline for players and technical staff, because
ultimately the growth needs to really be rationalized through the
lens of whether the game itself, which is our product,
can support that growth.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
And so we're sending a.
Speaker 5 (17:59):
Lot of time thinking about how we develop the path
pro what are the investments we should be making, how
we should steer the ecosystem working with US Soccer, and
a lot of those conversations are very much underway and
are a specific strategic priority in twenty twenty five for
us to better understand and analyze and ultimately make a
(18:21):
recommendation to our board so that we could be in
a position of strength as we choose to expand in
the future. I will say, just going back to the
conversation around Denver, they announced this week that they have
sold over ten thousand season ticket deposits, and.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
That's in under two months.
Speaker 5 (18:39):
So we know the demand is there and the success
of our expansion teams will dictate and continue to build
the confidence that we need to see in order to
continue to expand.
Speaker 3 (18:52):
Jessica, you have this exceptional background. You went to Michigan,
then you went You had a lot of grift ford them.
You worked thirteen years in the NHL. We also worked
for a smaller league in the NLL, which is lacrosse.
I guess from your landscape when you zoom out and
you look at some of the great things the big
three are doing in the leagues wise NFL and will
be an NBA, what are some of the things that
(19:14):
you can copy and paste from both the big Blue
Chippers and some of the younger leagues that you think
about applying to your league.
Speaker 5 (19:20):
Now, that's exactly why I wanted to take this job,
because I feel like it is the cross section of
my two tranches of experience in having worked for yes,
the National Hockey League, but also I was outside council
for those other leagues as well, working closely with the
NFL and the NBA in Major League Baseball, and then
(19:43):
coming to what was really more of like an emerging
challenger league in the National Lacrosse League. This league is
sort of the intersection of those two worlds. So we've
been able to sort of take from the bigger leagues
the things that we think are replicable and make sense
for us, and leave behind the things that we don't
(20:04):
think makes sense for us. And it's been very liberating
actually to approach each decision through an innovative lens and
to make affirmative decisions about what we think makes the
most sense for us. One example that recently we decided
in our new collective bargaining agreement to eliminate the draft,
(20:28):
which is crazy to imagine if you come from.
Speaker 1 (20:31):
Those big leagues.
Speaker 5 (20:32):
I was actually the labor lawyer representing those leagues who
negotiated to protect and build the infrastructure to support things
like reserve systems, salary arbitration, and the draft, and so
I understand the value of those things, and when I
came to this league and really analyze it through the
(20:54):
lens of what makes sense for our business, it didn't
satisfy our analysis, and so we made the very audacious
and bold decision to actually negotiate with our player association
to get rid of it. So imagine a world alex
where every player is who's not under contract is a
full free agent from the day they come into the league.
(21:15):
And that's the situation in our league really built around
this idea that we're building a player first league where
players have the I call it lowercase a agency where
they want to play, and I think for women in particular,
that's important. But it's also just important given the global
(21:39):
competition we face for player talent, where in soccer outside
of the US, there is no such thing as a draft,
and there is no such thing as a reserve team,
and there definitely is no such thing as salary arbitration.
And so if we want to put ourselves in a
position to compete for the best players in the world,
and we believe we are the best league in the world,
(22:00):
to face some really important existential questions like that one.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
And so just before we leave this draft, no draft conversation,
like what's the risk you had to analyze in making
that bold of a decision, Because I'm guessing that didn't
just like sail through the board. I'm guessing with some
pretty vibrant discussion, shall we say how did that go?
Speaker 1 (22:22):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (22:23):
Absolutely, And I would say vibrant discussion not just with
the board but even internally at the league office to
really challenge ourselves to ask.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
The question, is this the right decision? I'd say there's two.
Speaker 5 (22:35):
There are two potential risk factors which we obviously got over,
but that we considered very heavily. The first is that
in a world where we're all looking for three hundred
and sixty five days a year, programming, the draft for
professional sports leagues is a really helpful touch point with
fans in the off season. So it creates stories, it
(22:59):
gives people are recent to pay attention, It shortens the
off season from a content and promotion perspective, and those
things actually matter. So you know, we are still thinking
about how we're going to fill that gap because we
did not fill that gap this past year, and we felt.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
It in the off season candidly.
Speaker 5 (23:16):
So you know, whether we do a combine or something
else that is a relevant touch point in the off
season that is a very useful output of the draft.
The second thing that would be a risk around it
that we considered is a world where we are not
in a position to preserve the competitive balance or parity
(23:39):
that we have in our league, and the draft is
a very useful mechanism for forcing the redistribution of talent.
That's one of the main purposes that it serves in
our league. Because we have a salary cap, and because
there are minimum spends, and because we are the best
league in the world in terms of visibility, in terms
(24:00):
of investment, in terms of infrastructure, we believe that there's
incentive alignment to create a forcing function because of the markets,
because of essentially the free markets for our owners to
continue to invest and lure players to their market with
all of the reasons why a player should choose to
come there, and if that's not happening, then the league
(24:21):
has to think about what other levers we can pull
to ensure that there's distribution of talent across the league,
which we will and are continuing to measure. But those
are really the two pieces of it, and we really
feel like ultimately this salary cap is the most important
safety net to avoiding a situation where there's haves and
(24:42):
have nots, and we don't have a compelling product on
the field.
Speaker 3 (24:58):
So, Jessica, you sit there as the lead during the
commission of this league and we talked about all the
metrics so far on what's going up into the right
in your league. Maybe what are one or two things
that are challenges that keep you up at night.
Speaker 5 (25:12):
One challenge is really just a virtue of the country
we live in, which is that there's just such competition
for people's attention and for people's disposable income.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
That is across all entertainment and sports.
Speaker 5 (25:34):
And I'll go like even closer to our world, I
would say soccer. Soccer in particular, it is both amazing
and a challenge that there's just about to be a
tidal wave of soccer coming in to our country. I
think the good will outweigh the challenges. But it is
something that we are watching because it used to be
(25:57):
that access to the best soccer in the world was
hard to find. And the men's World Cup is going
to be here next year. Now those are the men,
so I think distinguishable in that way. We are the
best women's league in the world. So if you want
to watch the best women's soccer in the world other
(26:17):
than at the World Cup, which happens once every four years.
You would look to the National Women's Soccer League and
we think because of that there is incredible tailwinds for
us in our future. And back to your question, the
challenges around all of the touch points that are going
to be flowing into the market over the next few years.
(26:39):
Around the sport of soccer and sports in general, there's
just a lot of clutter. Like the fall, you have
the NFL, you have college football. In the spring, you
have March Madness, and then you go into the early
part of the summer and you have NBA playoffs and
NHL playoffs like almost every single summer. In the middle
of the summer you have Olympics, you have the World.
Speaker 4 (26:59):
Cup, and don't forget about baseball.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
Don't forget about baseball. Don't forget about baseball.
Speaker 5 (27:07):
You know, there's just a lot of competition, and so
that's sort of first piece of it, I think, just
like the second piece of it is just, you know,
I think a product of having achieved some really quick success,
like we really have transformed the business in such a
short period of time. And I think back to my
(27:28):
first few months in this job, where the expectations.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Were so low they were so low.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
And in just three years, literally it's my three year
anniversary on this job next week. In just three years,
the expectations have gone from literally nonexistent to you should
be competing with the best properties in the world, and
when are we going to have, you know, multi billion
dollar media rights deal. The expectation are very high, and
(28:02):
I think that creates some challenges because in order to
have sustainable growth, it has to be measured, It has
to be consistent, it has to be strategic, it has
to be sustainable.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
And Jess, not to add to your worry pile and
keeping up at night pile, but like this whole notion
of the world catching up and you see what's going
on with the WSL specifically in the United Kingdom, you
see other investments in Europe and South America and elsewhere.
What are the specific things you're doing to ensure that
(28:35):
the best players continue to play in your league.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
Well, I think it's leaning into our strengths.
Speaker 5 (28:41):
So number one, this is a country that is capitalistic
and brands like to spend money in advertising. And if
you play in this league, you will be a star.
You will be a star. If you are a top player,
you will be a star, and I don't think that's
true in most other countries in the world.
Speaker 2 (29:00):
And by being a starry, you mean you'll get paid.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
You'll get paid, You'll get paid. I mean again, we
have a salary cap in place.
Speaker 5 (29:06):
And that's to ensure the long term sustainability of this league,
which I think is critically important, and our country should
be able to support making sure that as it does
with nil, as it does in so many other places.
Like if you are a star and you are top talent,
you will get paid. That's not a problem that keeps
(29:26):
me up at night. So that's point one. Point two
is I think our single most important superpower is that
we are an independent league. We are independent from the
men's league, and we are independent from the federation, and
there is no other professional women's soccer league, and candidly,
most women's leagues in general sit nestled within the men's
(29:50):
league or the national governing body. What that means is
that there are times when you can't make the decision
that it's in your own best interest only, and we
get to make decisions that are only in our own
best interests. When I go to my owner's meeting next week,
we are going to sit in a room and talk
about the things that we need to do to drive
the growth of the NWSL to be the best league
(30:12):
in the world from a player, from a fan, and
from an organizational perspective, and anything else outside of that
matters only to the extent it matters to us, and
that's not always the case in terms of how decisions
are made in other places. And if I'm a player,
I want to be in a place that's investing for
me and for the growth of me and my sport
and not calibrating it based on other factors.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
So, Jessica, so do you find it an asset or
a liability as some of your owners own, both the
male and the women sports and soccer.
Speaker 5 (30:43):
Yeah, it's a great question, and I appreciate the question,
particularly in the context of my last answer, because what
I was talking about was from a league perspective, in
terms of our holistic enterprise level strategy. I think from
a team perspective, there's incredible economies of scale and efficiencies
that can be achieved with shared ownership structure. So long
as I'll say through the lens of let's say the
(31:06):
NWSL and NWSL teams, So long as the investment is
being made independently for the women's team. I think what
oftentimes happens with the property of the two that is
a challenger property or the one that is in high
growth but maybe not quite there yet in terms of
the number of zeros it's generating in revenue, is that
(31:27):
it's secondary or off the side of someone's desk, and
it actually should be the primary driver of investment for
growth because it is the thing that has the most
upside and unless there's somebody who's looking at it through
that strategic filter. In terms of okay, taking a step
back holistically across both of these properties, where are we
going to see growth in the next five years? It
(31:49):
really should be in a shared resources model from the
women's team, because there's so much opportunity that has not
been tapped into. And you know, it's not only through
the lens of a women's and a men's team. For
my NHL days, there were teams that were shared resources
with NBA NHL and similarly back in the day now
(32:12):
I'm taking you back like twenty years ago or more,
when the NHL was more of a niche property, we
used to say the same thing to our NBA owners,
which is like, we love that you're sharing resources and
you have economies of scale and efficiencies to be able
to pull different levers and achieve some savings and or
(32:34):
increased profitability. And if you don't separately resource the NHL
team in that context, you're not going to see it grow.
It's not going to reach its maximum potential.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
And it's the.
Speaker 5 (32:45):
Same thing here and so I definitely do not consider
it a liability.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
I consider it a benefit.
Speaker 5 (32:51):
And we want to always remind our owners who have
those shared resources to separately resource the NWSL team so
that it can maximize its upside.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
All right, before we get to our lightning round, I
did have one one last question on the ownership side,
because we've had a number of owners on the show.
Carolyn Tish Blodgett obviously owner of Gotham and her family
deeply involved to say the least, they owned the New
York Football Giants. There has been and Jessica, you and
I have talked about this as well over the years.
You know there has been this. You don't have to
(33:28):
say it. I'll say a different caliber of owner that
has come into this league under your stewardship. I turned
on the TV a couple weekends ago, and like, there
you are at Bemo Stadium, you know, sitting with Willow
Bay and Bob Iger, and you know they are obviously new,
relatively new owners in the league. What do you say
to a new owner in terms of the expectation of commitment,
(33:52):
whether that is time, whether it's financial resource. Now that
might be different than what you said two or three
years ago.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
Yeah, great question.
Speaker 5 (34:01):
And I would also say different from what I used
to say at the NLL or even at the NHL. Well,
the things that are the same are that our expectations
or that you have a long range view on capital
and that you're here for the long haul. This is
not a place for investments where you're looking for a
(34:23):
quick turn or an immediate ROI. And we like owners
who think of this as an intergenerational asset that is
not that much different from other sports leagues.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
So that's where we're similar.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
The place where we're different, which candidly I love, particularly
through the lens of the kinds of people who are
sitting around my board table, is that the unique element
of our ownership group is that they many of them,
almost all of them at this point have the financial
wherewithal to really build a league and are excited to
(34:59):
roll up their se yes and really be part of
building something. Many of our owners have told me that
it feels almost like a startup where we're asking them
for a lot of time, We're asking them for their ideas.
We're giving them an opportunity to debate and discuss different
strategies and tactics for growth. This isn't a league that
(35:21):
is at its one hundredth year birthday and you sort
of like have all the basic tenants built, and yes,
there are decisions you have to make along the way,
but the league is already sort of established and you're
you're sort of steering it through its different cycles of growth.
We just signed our first real media deal in twenty
(35:42):
twenty four, literally last year, and so the path as
we move forward has a lot of opportunity for input.
And what I tell new owners coming in is our
expectation is that you're going to serve on committees, You're
going to show up at board, You're going to spend
(36:02):
time talking to me and other executive leaders here who
need and want your input, and we're probably going to
ask you to pick up the phone and make phone
calls for us because we're trying to close sponsorship deals,
we're trying to bring on new partnerships, we're trying to
understand the broader ecosystem. And so that's not for everybody,
(36:23):
but for our ownership group, they've really enjoyed it, people
like Alan Waxman and Mark Wilf and Carolyn Tish. You know,
they might jokingly say, like, I spend more time on
that than I spend on some of my bigger properties,
but they also will tell you that they're enjoying it
and having a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
They secretly love it, you know that that's.
Speaker 1 (36:44):
I know they do. They do, and they like to
complain about it too, exactly.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
Yeah, we all, we all, we all love to complain
about the things that we love. All right, So let's
do the lightning round. It's five questions. We're going to
bounce it back and forth. All we ask is you
keep it tight, all right. What's the best piece of
(37:11):
advice you've ever received on deal making or business?
Speaker 5 (37:15):
Listen to what the other side actually needs to have
a win.
Speaker 4 (37:22):
Who's your dream deal making partner?
Speaker 5 (37:27):
I don't know if I have a person, but I
would say I'll describe them someone who is smart, prepared,
and both respected and respectful.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
What's the most nervous you've ever been?
Speaker 5 (37:41):
Oh, actually, most nervous I've ever been after I gave
birth to my first child and imagining how I was
going to parent this little blob that was crying and
I didn't know what to do.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
It was a lot easier to run a sports league
than to do that.
Speaker 3 (37:56):
Hey man, what's your hype song before big meeting or negotiation?
Speaker 5 (38:00):
Ooh, the song that keeps coming to my mind is
going to make you laugh, But I'll just say it
because it just happens to be on my running mix.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
It's bring them out nice.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
There's a good one, all right. So you have had
an incredible career so far. I believe your son Noah
characterized you as a pioneer when you became the first
woman to be a deputy commissioner, when you've joined the NLL.
So what's your advice for someone listening who wants a career.
Speaker 1 (38:28):
Like yours to focus on the actual work.
Speaker 5 (38:31):
I think there's a lot of ways you can be
distracted by things that are out of your control or
how you feel like you might be treated. What opportunities
you're being given, how fair it is. All those things
I think are distraction. Ultimately my advice to people. I
(38:51):
have a lot of quotes in my house and around
my office. One of my many quotes is the Surroundery prayer,
which is essentially to focus on the things you can control.
That's what I've done for most of my career, and
I think people who do that save a lot of
energy and don't waste time with things that drain your
emotions and are counterproductive to getting to your goals.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
All right, well, Jessica Berman, she is the commissioner of
the National Women's Soccer League. I'm very excited we made
this happen. You and I were texting a couple of
weeks ago. It's like we got to get together. I
didn't do that just to get you on the show,
but I'm glad we really made this happen. I'm excited
that you and Alex got to meet. Look forward to
you guys spending some time together as well. This has
been a really fun story to watch, and you know,
(39:36):
your career is a fascinating one to track, so I've
been very fortunate to be a witness to it and
glad that we could have you on the show.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
Thank you so much.
Speaker 4 (39:45):
Congrats on everything.
Speaker 2 (39:55):
The Deal is hosted by Alex Rodriguez and me Jason Kelly.
This episode was made by animaz Racus, Stacey Wong and
Lizzie Phillip. Amy Keen is our editor and Will Connolly
is our video editor. Our theme music is made by
Blake Maples. Our executive producers are Kelly Leferrier, Ashley Hoenig,
and Brenda Newham. Sage Bauman is the head of Bloomberg Podcasts.
(40:16):
Additional support from Rachel Carnivale and Elena Los Angeles. Thanks
so much for listening to the Deal. If you have
a minute, subscribe, rate and review our show. It'll help
other listeners find us. I'm Jason Kelly. See you next week.
Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, Radio News.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome back to the Deal. I'm your host Jason Kelly
alongside my partner Alex Rodriguez. Alex, I'm here in New York.
You're down in Miami. There's a ton happening in the
sports world and one of my favorite things records being broken,
and a record in the National Hockey League that folks
thought was going to stand forever eight hundred and ninety
(00:33):
five goals for Alexander Ovechkin. He breaks the great one,
Wayne Gretzky's record. The highlights were inescapable. When you see
something like that, what does it make you think of?
How do you analyze that from a business perspective?
Speaker 3 (00:46):
Well, I think, first of all, is wonderful for sports.
Is great for the sport of hockey. It's amazing for
a good friend Ted Leonsis. And look, as an athlete
who played for twenty three years, this is Alexis twenty year. Yeah,
he's won one title and he's only payed with one team.
And of course this reminds me of right down the
street where he plays, where my childhood hero Cal Ripken
(01:10):
broke the all time record for consecutive games when he
broke Luke Garrick's record, and that was like a national holiday.
Speaker 4 (01:16):
But I loved last night. It wasn't at home.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
He was playing the Islanders, you know, up in your
neck of the woods up there, and you had the commissioner,
you had Wayne Gretzky, you had Wayne's wife, Janet Jones.
And records are meant to be broken and good for
hockey and good for Alex.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Yeah. And I mean records are meant to be broken.
And the thing is people pay attention. It was inescapable
on YouTube, on social media, on ESPN. You know they
were tracking it. You know, you think about the business
of it all. There's merch associated with that. You know.
You made the point that they were playing the Islanders,
and I mean it certainly when he broke that record,
(01:50):
he slides across the ice, you know, head first, you
would have thought they were playing down in DC. I mean,
the crowd went bananas. And you know that Islanders people
for that moment, they were of Vegekin fans. You know,
more than anything. You're there for this unbelievable moment in
sports history. And you know, like you said, it's good
(02:11):
for business. We remember, I mean cal Ripken we both
love him. That was a long time ago, and yet
we still you know, remember him, you know, trotting bases
and then you know, running the whole the circumference of
Camden Yards and slapping hands and it's cool to witness
and as you said, great for ted Leonsis and the
(02:31):
Washington Capitals.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Is not only good for business, it's good for spirits, it's.
Speaker 4 (02:35):
Good for vibes.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
Here's Canada's you know, pastime hockey, which America loves hockey.
But here's a guy who came from Russia and it
came here in two thousand and five, has spent twenty
years with one franchise.
Speaker 4 (02:48):
Again, he won a title.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
But it also is a lesson on perseverance, on grit,
staying with it, on loyalty. It's what sports does in
a world of geopolitical craziness. Here's rushat Canada and US
and the rest of the world celebrating one man's accomplishment
is pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
It is the reason we love sports. Another reminder of
why we love sports and some of the shifting tides,
I think in a very positive way about what is
really capturing our attention. We are recording this on Monday afternoon.
So we don't know what's going to happen with the
men's championship. We do know that Duke University is not
going to be in it, which was upsetting for a
(03:26):
lot of people, especially in the brackets for a cause contest,
which you're a part of that Bloomberg does here. A
lot of Duke fans are a lot of people who
at least picked Duke. I mean, even our chairman Peter Grouer,
who went to the University of North Carolina. He had
picked Duke, and so he was both sad and happy.
I think he was sad for his bracket, but happy
as a tar heel to see Duke lose. That was
(03:46):
a huge upset. So tonight University of Houston and University
of Florida will play. By the time people are listening
to this, they'll know who the champion is. But we
do know who the champion is. On the women's side,
Yukon absolutely dominant, a reminder of that amazing history of
that franchise. Gino Orieama delivers the twelfth national championship, a
(04:09):
record there, a record for him. He is the winningest
college coach in terms of championships ever in basketball It's
just an amazing accompliment. Sue Byrd another callback to one
of our previous guests on the deal she played there,
Azy Fudd was the most outstanding player and fun fact,
asy Fudd was featured in the series Athlete Empire here
(04:30):
at Bloomberg Originals, the pilot episode of which was young
Man from Miami Alex Rodriguez and all of his business activities.
That's how you and I met, that's, you know, where
all this great stuff started. So I don't know how
much you dug into basketball over the weekend, but it
was fun to watch.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
Well, I got to tell you.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
I mean you talked about the coach Gino, I mean
his twelfth title. I mean he's become the modern day
John Wooden. They have now officially become the territory of
the Lakers, the Cowboys, the Yankees, the best of the best.
And it's great for sports and the domination and what
he's done for so many years. There's so many lessons,
whether it's business or sports or just humanity of how
(05:09):
difficult it is to be consistent and great for that long.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
Hats off and they deserve a lot of flowers.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, and it's interesting to think about Gino's tenure there
because it was probably surprising for people to be reminded
they had not won a title since twenty sixteen, so
it had been a bit of a drought for Yukon.
You know, Pagebeckers had made it to four final fours
during her tenure. She of course, is the presumptive number
one pick in the WNBA draft coming up later this month,
(05:39):
so they obviously were on the cusp of doing it again,
but they had not won it all. They faced off
against Don Staley's University of South Carolina. They were looking
to repeat, and really the storyline was, really, you know,
could Don Staley establish a full on dynasty at University
of South Carolina? May have to wait a little bit longer.
So the women's game, there's so much enthusiasm around it.
(06:04):
You saw the crowds there in Tampa through the whole
weekend for the Final four. A really a big reminder
of how big that game has become. Especially in March Madness.
There is something very close to parody when it comes
to who's watching, how many people are tuning in. We'll
see what the final numbers are. But that was the
matchup that everybody wanted, was Yukon South Carolina.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
Yeah, I think you're one hundred percent right, Jason. You
know Yukon said to South Carolina as far as the
dynasty goes, not so fast, right, We're back on top
of the hill.
Speaker 2 (06:37):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
And if you're Yukon and you're part of that ecosystem,
I mean not bad. Three titles in three years, two
from the men's one from the women's basketball, complete domination
when it comes to hoops, and then from the business lesson.
Here is if anyone thought, you know, there's allway skeptics
out there there say, oh, women's sports, I'm not sure
it's not going to happen again. Not so fast. We're
here and we're here to stay, and we're only going
(06:58):
to get bigger and better. And by the way, they
also say, the product's always been good in women's sports.
Now we have the attention, we're putting marketing dollars behind them,
and we have the right partners involved. So Women's Sports
Newsflash is here to stay well.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
And that is a great transition to our guests coming up,
Jessica Berman. She is the commissioner of the National Women's
Soccer League. We're going to talk to her about everything
that's happened. The valuations have gone bananas, I think is
the technical term during her tenure. Over the last few years,
we've talked to several owners of teams here on this program.
So all right, Coming up Jessica Berman. She is the
(07:36):
commissioner of the National Women's Soccer League. Hi, everyone, welcome
back to The Deal. I'm Jason Kelly alongside my partner
Alex Rodriguez. We are so excited to have a good
(07:57):
pal of mine join the podcast. Joined the Deal. It's
Jessica Berman. She is the commissioner of the National Women's
Soccer League.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Hey, Hi, so fun to be with you.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Well, I'm very excited for the two of you to
meet officially because I talk about you all the time.
We've talked a lot about women's soccer on this show.
It's having an incredible more than a moment right now.
But as we get underway of your season here, what's
the vibe, what are you learning? What's sort of the
(08:28):
underlying business feel like to you?
Speaker 5 (08:29):
Well, first of all, it's fun to be with you,
and I know that you're our number one fan.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Jason, so excited to bring Alex along.
Speaker 5 (08:38):
I love that you use the word vibe in your question,
because we actually just concluded market research with our fans
and the number one word used to describe the nwsl
unprompted across our data set was vibes.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
That was a nut word. Yes, yes, but the vibes
are good.
Speaker 5 (08:58):
We had three weeks of our season already in twenty
twenty five, and everything has been incredible. We launched our
first ever original content docu series, called for the Win,
on Amazon Prime, which really helped with our priority the
season of storytelling. We did a full takeover of Times
(09:19):
Square where we had our players' full body images projected
in the center of Time Square for the full four
weeks of the start of our season. We opened with
the Challenge Cup with basically a rematch of the championship
between the Orlando Pride and the Washington Spirit, and just
been an incredible start to the season.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Of course, there's.
Speaker 5 (09:41):
Stuff on the business side too, but I know that's
the stuff you're going to ask me about.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
So what is the biggest business initiative for twenty five, Well.
Speaker 5 (09:48):
We announced our Team sixteen expansion deal with Denver, and
that is the biggest investment ever made in the history
of women's sports at one time. In one transaction, several
hundred million dollars committed to be invested in Denver with
(10:09):
a purpose built facility both stadium and training facility. And
of course the expansion feeds a league of one hundred
and ten million dollars. And you know, because you've been
covering us since before I came in here, that valuations
before twenty twenty two were in.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
The five million range.
Speaker 5 (10:28):
So franchise valuations have grown exponentially, and our most recent
transaction is a testament to that, and spending a lot
of time with Boston and Denver making sure they're ready
to launch a year from now.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
Basically, Jessica, I have a friend that is part of
the LP group of Denver, and I can tell you
that they're wildly excited about the opportunity, about the investment,
about the early feedback from season tickets, and all the
excitement they've piloted.
Speaker 4 (10:57):
It's been really through the roof.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
My question is you mentioned in twenty two sub five
million dollars and now you're talking about north of one hundred.
Is there any concern as a leader of the league
that values are rising too quickly and is that sustainable?
Speaker 4 (11:12):
How do you feel about that.
Speaker 5 (11:13):
It's definitely an appropriate question to ask. You know, we
look at it through the lens of really twofold number
one to ensure that demand significantly outpaces supply so that
we can see a path to the continued growth in
the future. And ultimately those are the underpinnings of the
economic analysis that will continue to drive value. But also
(11:33):
looking at the core tenants of our business, and a
lot of what we've worked on over my first three
years here is really building the operational rigor and professionalization
of the league office, and we've built out an entire
business operations team that's working hand in hand with our
clubs to help them to drive revenue. And so ultimately
the thing that drives valuations from a metrics perspective is
(11:57):
revenue multiples, and so we got to keep drive up
those repeatable revenue sources. Looking at sponsorship, ticketing, and media rights.
We're in the second year of a four year deal
in our current media rights cycle, and most recently we
had our most watched game ever on ESPN, which was
incredible to have and see, and to just continuing to
(12:20):
see the growth in each season with those big moments
that we're going to continue to drive towards throughout the
twenty twenty five season.
Speaker 4 (12:28):
Yeah, Jessicau.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
So one quick follow up on that, So, second year
of a four year deal, it's obvious the metrics suggest
that you've overperformed, right, which is always good. You know,
a guy like Roger Goodell with the NFL, he has
an opt out clause and he can take advantage of
the metrics that they're doing. Do you feel like, oh,
I left some on the table or do you just
kind of pack your lunch and get ready for the
(12:49):
next negotiation and say, bucket your seat built, we're coming
hard and we're coming strong.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
Good question.
Speaker 5 (12:54):
We went four years very intentionally, which was much shorter
than any of our new partner wanted us to go.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
And we did that because we felt.
Speaker 5 (13:03):
Like we needed enough consistency as an emerging challenger property
to establish the viewership numbers year over year and also
bring our sponsors to the table to support the investment
in advertising, so that our four partners hopefully want to
renew with us and want to have those discussions, and
of course they'll give us an opportunity to go to
(13:23):
the broader marketplace to make sure we're getting the all
evaluating all the options for the league, but we really
wanted to have our deal be long enough that each
of Amazon, ESPN, CBS and Script's Ion had skin in
the game to be able to invest in us, because
no matter how much we spend in marketing, we will
(13:45):
never be able to match what the value of an
investment is when, for example, in March Madness, when ESPN
and CBS were running lower thirds and ads for the NWSL,
they had ten to fifteen million people tuning in for
men's and women's March Madness.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
That is so valuable to us.
Speaker 5 (14:08):
And if we had an opt out, or if we
had a two year deal or even a three year deal,
I'm not sure it would make sense for them to
invest in us the way that we're seeing them invest
in us.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
And we really want.
Speaker 5 (14:19):
Them to view us as partners and we're growing this
business together. We want them to be winners in this
and we want to over deliver for them in every
single year of the deal so that they feel good
about their investment.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
And so as you look across those media partners, just
sticking with this, what have you learned about your viewer?
What have you learned about the product, when it comes
to the watchability of it. You know what different platforms
deliver in terms of demos, like, what are the key
learnings from media From the media side so far, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
So far.
Speaker 5 (14:49):
Our average age is one of the lowest, if not
the lowest, across all live rights holders, which is consistent
with what we would have thought from to sales and
other research we've done. So that's good check. That's what
brands are looking for. Our audience is very multicultural. Our
audience skews heavily female, or more heavily female than other sports,
(15:15):
not exclusively. I believe we're around sixty to sixty five
percent female as of the latest data, and we know
that women control eighty percent of households spend, and so
really triangulating that from a business perspective.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
Is super important.
Speaker 5 (15:31):
We also know that the audience is very balanced, even
for us in terms of people watching on linear and
people watching on their devices or streaming.
Speaker 1 (15:42):
The advent of fast channels and.
Speaker 5 (15:45):
Being able to have our games in places and spaces
where people consume live content. It isn't just on streaming,
but it is an important vehicle for us to reach
particular fans who are not watching traditionally at least not
week over week for particular regular season games.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
So we're learning a lot.
Speaker 5 (16:05):
Having partners like Amazon are incredible for that. They really
know how to learn their customer and they're helping us
get smarter about how we serve our fans, and we're
leveraging all those insights across the full slate of our platforms.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
So I want to go back to expansion for a
second if we can, because you've been pretty aggressive there.
You talked about Boston and Denver coming online next year.
You have made some comments recently about, you know, continuing
to expand. I think I saw something and keep me
honest here, that you think you could get to NFL sized,
you know, at a thirty ish type of number, which
(16:44):
would you know, I'm not that good at math, but
that's close to double what you are. Now, what's the
business case sort of city per city? What is the
process you go through to make those selections and also
to figure out what the right pace is.
Speaker 5 (16:59):
Yeah, well, I think at every stage of growth and
at every decision point where we're thinking about our next
round of expansion, you have to look at the state
of the business in terms of the geographic footprint of
our country and where we believe there are markets that
the NWSL could be successful, which spoiler alert, there are
(17:21):
many markets where we are not currently operating that we
know we will be successful if we had a team.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
There so no.
Speaker 5 (17:29):
Question on the ability for the footprint to be sustainable
in terms of it continuing to scale and ultimately, yes,
getting up to thirty thirty two teams.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
The way we'll make those decisions in.
Speaker 5 (17:40):
Real time is I think mostly evaluated through the lens
of the talent pipeline for players and technical staff, because
ultimately the growth needs to really be rationalized through the
lens of whether the game itself, which is our product,
can support that growth.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
And so we're sending a.
Speaker 5 (17:59):
Lot of time thinking about how we develop the path
pro what are the investments we should be making, how
we should steer the ecosystem working with US Soccer, and
a lot of those conversations are very much underway and
are a specific strategic priority in twenty twenty five for
us to better understand and analyze and ultimately make a
(18:21):
recommendation to our board so that we could be in
a position of strength as we choose to expand in
the future. I will say, just going back to the
conversation around Denver, they announced this week that they have
sold over ten thousand season ticket deposits, and.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
That's in under two months.
Speaker 5 (18:39):
So we know the demand is there and the success
of our expansion teams will dictate and continue to build
the confidence that we need to see in order to
continue to expand.
Speaker 3 (18:52):
Jessica, you have this exceptional background. You went to Michigan,
then you went You had a lot of grift ford them.
You worked thirteen years in the NHL. We also worked
for a smaller league in the NLL, which is lacrosse.
I guess from your landscape when you zoom out and
you look at some of the great things the big
three are doing in the leagues wise NFL and will
be an NBA, what are some of the things that
(19:14):
you can copy and paste from both the big Blue
Chippers and some of the younger leagues that you think
about applying to your league.
Speaker 5 (19:20):
Now, that's exactly why I wanted to take this job,
because I feel like it is the cross section of
my two tranches of experience in having worked for yes,
the National Hockey League, but also I was outside council
for those other leagues as well, working closely with the
NFL and the NBA in Major League Baseball, and then
(19:43):
coming to what was really more of like an emerging
challenger league in the National Lacrosse League. This league is
sort of the intersection of those two worlds. So we've
been able to sort of take from the bigger leagues
the things that we think are replicable and make sense
for us, and leave behind the things that we don't
(20:04):
think makes sense for us. And it's been very liberating
actually to approach each decision through an innovative lens and
to make affirmative decisions about what we think makes the
most sense for us. One example that recently we decided
in our new collective bargaining agreement to eliminate the draft,
(20:28):
which is crazy to imagine if you come from.
Speaker 1 (20:31):
Those big leagues.
Speaker 5 (20:32):
I was actually the labor lawyer representing those leagues who
negotiated to protect and build the infrastructure to support things
like reserve systems, salary arbitration, and the draft, and so
I understand the value of those things, and when I
came to this league and really analyze it through the
(20:54):
lens of what makes sense for our business, it didn't
satisfy our analysis, and so we made the very audacious
and bold decision to actually negotiate with our player association
to get rid of it. So imagine a world alex
where every player is who's not under contract is a
full free agent from the day they come into the league.
(21:15):
And that's the situation in our league really built around
this idea that we're building a player first league where
players have the I call it lowercase a agency where
they want to play, and I think for women in particular,
that's important. But it's also just important given the global
(21:39):
competition we face for player talent, where in soccer outside
of the US, there is no such thing as a draft,
and there is no such thing as a reserve team,
and there definitely is no such thing as salary arbitration.
And so if we want to put ourselves in a
position to compete for the best players in the world,
and we believe we are the best league in the world,
(22:00):
to face some really important existential questions like that one.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
And so just before we leave this draft, no draft conversation,
like what's the risk you had to analyze in making
that bold of a decision, Because I'm guessing that didn't
just like sail through the board. I'm guessing with some
pretty vibrant discussion, shall we say how did that go?
Speaker 1 (22:22):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (22:23):
Absolutely, And I would say vibrant discussion not just with
the board but even internally at the league office to
really challenge ourselves to ask.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
The question, is this the right decision? I'd say there's two.
Speaker 5 (22:35):
There are two potential risk factors which we obviously got over,
but that we considered very heavily. The first is that
in a world where we're all looking for three hundred
and sixty five days a year, programming, the draft for
professional sports leagues is a really helpful touch point with
fans in the off season. So it creates stories, it
(22:59):
gives people are recent to pay attention, It shortens the
off season from a content and promotion perspective, and those
things actually matter. So you know, we are still thinking
about how we're going to fill that gap because we
did not fill that gap this past year, and we felt.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
It in the off season candidly.
Speaker 5 (23:16):
So you know, whether we do a combine or something
else that is a relevant touch point in the off
season that is a very useful output of the draft.
The second thing that would be a risk around it
that we considered is a world where we are not
in a position to preserve the competitive balance or parity
(23:39):
that we have in our league, and the draft is
a very useful mechanism for forcing the redistribution of talent.
That's one of the main purposes that it serves in
our league. Because we have a salary cap, and because
there are minimum spends, and because we are the best
league in the world in terms of visibility, in terms
(24:00):
of investment, in terms of infrastructure, we believe that there's
incentive alignment to create a forcing function because of the markets,
because of essentially the free markets for our owners to
continue to invest and lure players to their market with
all of the reasons why a player should choose to
come there, and if that's not happening, then the league
(24:21):
has to think about what other levers we can pull
to ensure that there's distribution of talent across the league,
which we will and are continuing to measure. But those
are really the two pieces of it, and we really
feel like ultimately this salary cap is the most important
safety net to avoiding a situation where there's haves and
(24:42):
have nots, and we don't have a compelling product on
the field.
Speaker 3 (24:58):
So, Jessica, you sit there as the lead during the
commission of this league and we talked about all the
metrics so far on what's going up into the right
in your league. Maybe what are one or two things
that are challenges that keep you up at night.
Speaker 5 (25:12):
One challenge is really just a virtue of the country
we live in, which is that there's just such competition
for people's attention and for people's disposable income.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
That is across all entertainment and sports.
Speaker 5 (25:34):
And I'll go like even closer to our world, I
would say soccer. Soccer in particular, it is both amazing
and a challenge that there's just about to be a
tidal wave of soccer coming in to our country. I
think the good will outweigh the challenges. But it is
something that we are watching because it used to be
(25:57):
that access to the best soccer in the world was
hard to find. And the men's World Cup is going
to be here next year. Now those are the men,
so I think distinguishable in that way. We are the
best women's league in the world. So if you want
to watch the best women's soccer in the world other
(26:17):
than at the World Cup, which happens once every four years.
You would look to the National Women's Soccer League and
we think because of that there is incredible tailwinds for
us in our future. And back to your question, the
challenges around all of the touch points that are going
to be flowing into the market over the next few years.
(26:39):
Around the sport of soccer and sports in general, there's
just a lot of clutter. Like the fall, you have
the NFL, you have college football. In the spring, you
have March Madness, and then you go into the early
part of the summer and you have NBA playoffs and
NHL playoffs like almost every single summer. In the middle
of the summer you have Olympics, you have the World.
Speaker 4 (26:59):
Cup, and don't forget about baseball.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
Don't forget about baseball. Don't forget about baseball.
Speaker 5 (27:07):
You know, there's just a lot of competition, and so
that's sort of first piece of it, I think, just
like the second piece of it is just, you know,
I think a product of having achieved some really quick success,
like we really have transformed the business in such a
short period of time. And I think back to my
(27:28):
first few months in this job, where the expectations.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Were so low they were so low.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
And in just three years, literally it's my three year
anniversary on this job next week. In just three years,
the expectations have gone from literally nonexistent to you should
be competing with the best properties in the world, and
when are we going to have, you know, multi billion
dollar media rights deal. The expectation are very high, and
(28:02):
I think that creates some challenges because in order to
have sustainable growth, it has to be measured, It has
to be consistent, it has to be strategic, it has
to be sustainable.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
And Jess, not to add to your worry pile and
keeping up at night pile, but like this whole notion
of the world catching up and you see what's going
on with the WSL specifically in the United Kingdom, you
see other investments in Europe and South America and elsewhere.
What are the specific things you're doing to ensure that
(28:35):
the best players continue to play in your league.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
Well, I think it's leaning into our strengths.
Speaker 5 (28:41):
So number one, this is a country that is capitalistic
and brands like to spend money in advertising. And if
you play in this league, you will be a star.
You will be a star. If you are a top player,
you will be a star, and I don't think that's
true in most other countries in the world.
Speaker 2 (29:00):
And by being a starry, you mean you'll get paid.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
You'll get paid, You'll get paid. I mean again, we
have a salary cap in place.
Speaker 5 (29:06):
And that's to ensure the long term sustainability of this league,
which I think is critically important, and our country should
be able to support making sure that as it does
with nil, as it does in so many other places.
Like if you are a star and you are top talent,
you will get paid. That's not a problem that keeps
(29:26):
me up at night. So that's point one. Point two
is I think our single most important superpower is that
we are an independent league. We are independent from the
men's league, and we are independent from the federation, and
there is no other professional women's soccer league, and candidly,
most women's leagues in general sit nestled within the men's
(29:50):
league or the national governing body. What that means is
that there are times when you can't make the decision
that it's in your own best interest only, and we
get to make decisions that are only in our own
best interests. When I go to my owner's meeting next week,
we are going to sit in a room and talk
about the things that we need to do to drive
the growth of the NWSL to be the best league
(30:12):
in the world from a player, from a fan, and
from an organizational perspective, and anything else outside of that
matters only to the extent it matters to us, and
that's not always the case in terms of how decisions
are made in other places. And if I'm a player,
I want to be in a place that's investing for
me and for the growth of me and my sport
and not calibrating it based on other factors.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
So, Jessica, so do you find it an asset or
a liability as some of your owners own, both the
male and the women sports and soccer.
Speaker 5 (30:43):
Yeah, it's a great question, and I appreciate the question,
particularly in the context of my last answer, because what
I was talking about was from a league perspective, in
terms of our holistic enterprise level strategy. I think from
a team perspective, there's incredible economies of scale and efficiencies
that can be achieved with shared ownership structure. So long
as I'll say through the lens of let's say the
(31:06):
NWSL and NWSL teams, So long as the investment is
being made independently for the women's team. I think what
oftentimes happens with the property of the two that is
a challenger property or the one that is in high
growth but maybe not quite there yet in terms of
the number of zeros it's generating in revenue, is that
(31:27):
it's secondary or off the side of someone's desk, and
it actually should be the primary driver of investment for
growth because it is the thing that has the most
upside and unless there's somebody who's looking at it through
that strategic filter. In terms of okay, taking a step
back holistically across both of these properties, where are we
going to see growth in the next five years? It
(31:49):
really should be in a shared resources model from the
women's team, because there's so much opportunity that has not
been tapped into. And you know, it's not only through
the lens of a women's and a men's team. For
my NHL days, there were teams that were shared resources
with NBA NHL and similarly back in the day now
(32:12):
I'm taking you back like twenty years ago or more,
when the NHL was more of a niche property, we
used to say the same thing to our NBA owners,
which is like, we love that you're sharing resources and
you have economies of scale and efficiencies to be able
to pull different levers and achieve some savings and or
(32:34):
increased profitability. And if you don't separately resource the NHL
team in that context, you're not going to see it grow.
It's not going to reach its maximum potential.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
And it's the.
Speaker 5 (32:45):
Same thing here and so I definitely do not consider
it a liability.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
I consider it a benefit.
Speaker 5 (32:51):
And we want to always remind our owners who have
those shared resources to separately resource the NWSL team so
that it can maximize its upside.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
All right, before we get to our lightning round, I
did have one one last question on the ownership side,
because we've had a number of owners on the show.
Carolyn Tish Blodgett obviously owner of Gotham and her family
deeply involved to say the least, they owned the New
York Football Giants. There has been and Jessica, you and
I have talked about this as well over the years.
You know there has been this. You don't have to
(33:28):
say it. I'll say a different caliber of owner that
has come into this league under your stewardship. I turned
on the TV a couple weekends ago, and like, there
you are at Bemo Stadium, you know, sitting with Willow
Bay and Bob Iger, and you know they are obviously new,
relatively new owners in the league. What do you say
to a new owner in terms of the expectation of commitment,
(33:52):
whether that is time, whether it's financial resource. Now that
might be different than what you said two or three
years ago.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
Yeah, great question.
Speaker 5 (34:01):
And I would also say different from what I used
to say at the NLL or even at the NHL. Well,
the things that are the same are that our expectations
or that you have a long range view on capital
and that you're here for the long haul. This is
not a place for investments where you're looking for a
(34:23):
quick turn or an immediate ROI. And we like owners
who think of this as an intergenerational asset that is
not that much different from other sports leagues.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
So that's where we're similar.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
The place where we're different, which candidly I love, particularly
through the lens of the kinds of people who are
sitting around my board table, is that the unique element
of our ownership group is that they many of them,
almost all of them at this point have the financial
wherewithal to really build a league and are excited to
(34:59):
roll up their se yes and really be part of
building something. Many of our owners have told me that
it feels almost like a startup where we're asking them
for a lot of time, We're asking them for their ideas.
We're giving them an opportunity to debate and discuss different
strategies and tactics for growth. This isn't a league that
(35:21):
is at its one hundredth year birthday and you sort
of like have all the basic tenants built, and yes,
there are decisions you have to make along the way,
but the league is already sort of established and you're
you're sort of steering it through its different cycles of growth.
We just signed our first real media deal in twenty
(35:42):
twenty four, literally last year, and so the path as
we move forward has a lot of opportunity for input.
And what I tell new owners coming in is our
expectation is that you're going to serve on committees, You're
going to show up at board, You're going to spend
(36:02):
time talking to me and other executive leaders here who
need and want your input, and we're probably going to
ask you to pick up the phone and make phone
calls for us because we're trying to close sponsorship deals,
we're trying to bring on new partnerships, we're trying to
understand the broader ecosystem. And so that's not for everybody,
(36:23):
but for our ownership group, they've really enjoyed it, people
like Alan Waxman and Mark Wilf and Carolyn Tish. You know,
they might jokingly say, like, I spend more time on
that than I spend on some of my bigger properties,
but they also will tell you that they're enjoying it
and having a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
They secretly love it, you know that that's.
Speaker 1 (36:44):
I know they do. They do, and they like to
complain about it too, exactly.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
Yeah, we all, we all, we all love to complain
about the things that we love. All right, So let's
do the lightning round. It's five questions. We're going to
bounce it back and forth. All we ask is you
keep it tight, all right. What's the best piece of
(37:11):
advice you've ever received on deal making or business?
Speaker 5 (37:15):
Listen to what the other side actually needs to have
a win.
Speaker 4 (37:22):
Who's your dream deal making partner?
Speaker 5 (37:27):
I don't know if I have a person, but I
would say I'll describe them someone who is smart, prepared,
and both respected and respectful.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
What's the most nervous you've ever been?
Speaker 5 (37:41):
Oh, actually, most nervous I've ever been after I gave
birth to my first child and imagining how I was
going to parent this little blob that was crying and
I didn't know what to do.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
It was a lot easier to run a sports league
than to do that.
Speaker 3 (37:56):
Hey man, what's your hype song before big meeting or negotiation?
Speaker 5 (38:00):
Ooh, the song that keeps coming to my mind is
going to make you laugh, But I'll just say it
because it just happens to be on my running mix.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
It's bring them out nice.
Speaker 2 (38:10):
There's a good one, all right. So you have had
an incredible career so far. I believe your son Noah
characterized you as a pioneer when you became the first
woman to be a deputy commissioner, when you've joined the NLL.
So what's your advice for someone listening who wants a career.
Speaker 1 (38:28):
Like yours to focus on the actual work.
Speaker 5 (38:31):
I think there's a lot of ways you can be
distracted by things that are out of your control or
how you feel like you might be treated. What opportunities
you're being given, how fair it is. All those things
I think are distraction. Ultimately my advice to people. I
(38:51):
have a lot of quotes in my house and around
my office. One of my many quotes is the Surroundery prayer,
which is essentially to focus on the things you can control.
That's what I've done for most of my career, and
I think people who do that save a lot of
energy and don't waste time with things that drain your
emotions and are counterproductive to getting to your goals.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
All right, well, Jessica Berman, she is the commissioner of
the National Women's Soccer League. I'm very excited we made
this happen. You and I were texting a couple of
weeks ago. It's like we got to get together. I
didn't do that just to get you on the show,
but I'm glad we really made this happen. I'm excited
that you and Alex got to meet. Look forward to
you guys spending some time together as well. This has
been a really fun story to watch, and you know,
(39:36):
your career is a fascinating one to track, so I've
been very fortunate to be a witness to it and
glad that we could have you on the show.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
Thank you so much.
Speaker 4 (39:45):
Congrats on everything.
Speaker 2 (39:55):
The Deal is hosted by Alex Rodriguez and me Jason Kelly.
This episode was made by animaz Racus, Stacey Wong and
Lizzie Phillip. Amy Keen is our editor and Will Connolly
is our video editor. Our theme music is made by
Blake Maples. Our executive producers are Kelly Leferrier, Ashley Hoenig,
and Brenda Newham. Sage Bauman is the head of Bloomberg Podcasts.
(40:16):
Additional support from Rachel Carnivale and Elena Los Angeles. Thanks
so much for listening to the Deal. If you have
a minute, subscribe, rate and review our show. It'll help
other listeners find us. I'm Jason Kelly. See you next week.
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