Closing Bell

Michigan State signed a 10-year jersey patch sponsorship with MSU Federal Credit Union “across all sports, including football and men’s basketball.” It is the “first department-wide patch sponsorship in the Big Ten.” Practice jerseys also “will don MSUFCU branding, and so will the bumper of Michigan State football’s helmets.” AD J Batt, who left MSU for the Univ. of Kentucky on Monday, in his one-year tenure was “not shy about finding revenue streams.” The actual sponsorship money will “route through Spartan Ventures,” which was created over the past year to “maximize revenue for the athletic department.” The latest MSU athletics budget expects more than $114.7M in disbursement from Spartan Ventures, where it “also routes fundraising, ticket sales and parking through the non-profit Spartan Athletic Fund” (DETROIT NEWS, 6/15).

Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach is “backing the Big 12,” arguing that the conference can “punish Texas Tech amid a sports betting scandal.” The letter, posted Monday, follows one from Texas AG Ken Paxton threatening legal action against the Big 12 if it sanctions Texas Tech over QB Brendan Sorsby‘s gambling. Kobach said Paxton’s antitrust claims “are incorrect.” Oklahoma AG Gentner Drummond wrote a letter supporting the conference on Friday. Kobach wrote in a post on X, “The Big 12 should not be intimidated by the Texas AG’s Office,” adding the Kansas AG’s office “stands ready to assist the Big 12″ (TOPEKA CAPITAL-JOURNAL, 6/15).

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox and AG Derek Brown also posted a letter backing the conference on Monday, urging it to “take action against Texas Tech” for allowing Sorsby to play this season despite the NCAA ruling him ineligible for gambling on college football. Cox and Brown wrote putting Sorsby on the field “not only bends a rule but places the integrity of every game he plays in question and, by extension, puts the integrity of the conference itself at risk” (DESERET NEWS, 6/15).

Eddie Andelman, the “voluble voice who pioneered sports talk radio in Boston in the early 1970s,” has died at 89. Andelman was behind the microphone at multiple stations for nearly four decades and more than 13,000 shows, where he “advocated for average fans and railed against team owners he felt took advantage of them.” Andelman also “raised millions of dollars for charities,” most notably for cystic fibrosis research. He was best known for his founding role in “The Sports Huddle,” a call-in discussion among Andelman and friends Jim McCarthy and Mark Witkin that began in 1969 and “came to define the genre.” Andelman is survived by his wife Judith and sons David, Daniel and Michael (BOSTON GLOBE, 6/15).

Welsh soccer star Gareth Bale has teamed up with Juggernaut Capital Partners to launch the Juggernaut Sports Fund. The new private equity vehicle is targeting more than $500M in funding. It will target teams and leagues; youth sports; women’s sports and golf/hospitality/experiential. Juggernaut, which had $1.2B in assets under management at the end of March, has previously invested in 3STEP, KemperSports and Thrill One Sports & Entertainment, the parent company of TK (Chris Smith, SBJ).

Bale said that he has “still not ruled out a move to buy” EFL League One club Cardiff City after launching the fund. Bale, talking to Front Office Sports, said with Cardiff, his hometown club, “there’s those heartstrings that pull there” (WALES ONLINE, 6/15).

Premier League club Newcastle United’s partnership with Knox Hydration “will now extend to a front of shirt sponsorship deal.” The arrangement is believed to be worth around $80.6M (all figures U.S.), but the South African company also have an $8M a year “deal with the training ground for the next three years.” Knox “will pay around” $13.4M for the upcoming 2026-27 season, and given Newcastle’s new home kit went on sale last week without a sponsor, supporters who have already bought “the controversial kit will be able to take it to club shops to get the sponsor ‘pressed on’ if they wish.” For the following two seasons, the payment by Knox “will increase to up to” $33.5M annually, depending on “bonuses being met,” while it has been reported that United “will also launch a drinks brand with the company” (Newcastle CHRONICLE, 6/15).

Premier League club Manchester United has “agreed a record-breaking deal” with Amazon to “open their doors for a behind-the-scenes documentary covering the club’s 2026/27 season.” ManU will become the latest club to “feature in Amazon Prime’s All or Nothing series,” and it is understood that the deal “eclipses the fee paid for the shows involving Manchester City, Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur.” Old Trafford sources believe that the deal is a “record fee for any documentary covering a professional football club,” and they will “welcome the Amazon cameras in for the start of pre-season and they will follow the entire 2026/27 campaign.” ManU has been “weighing up the merits of this kind of documentary for a number of years.” Any decision to “throw open the first-team environment and the dressing room to the cameras needed the support of those in charge as well.” The decision to do a deal with Amazon is “part of United’s desire to become more open and transparent,” while they also “felt the platform’s track record in the All or Nothing series made them an attractive partner” (MANCHESTER EVENING NEWS, 6/15).

The athlete-led Champ fund announced that it is making its first investment, “taking a minority stake” in U.S. activewear brand Rhoback. Sources said that the fund -- which is backed by French luxury holding company LVMH -- and a “handful of other investors are putting nearly” $50M in the apparel brand. Champ launched in April with more than 200 professional athletes and said that it aims to raise $500M “to invest in buzzy consumer brands.” It is joining with “some of America’s best known sports figures,” including Pacers G Tyrese Haliburton, Cowboys QB Dak Prescott, Bengals WR Ja’Marr Chase, Sparks F Cameron Brink and Angels OF Mike Trout. Rhoback co-founders Kevin Hubbard, Kristina Loftus and Matthew Loftus said that the brand plans to use the Champ investment “to open new locations” (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 6/15).

FIFA leaders are weighing whether to “propose a youth match between Israel and Palestine to open a new festival for under-15s.” The idea has been discussed “at high levels” but has not yet been “put to the respective football associations.” There is likely to be “significant opposition to the plan from the Palestine federation,” which has previously “called for Israel to be suspended from world football.” Sources said that the idea of a youth match has been discussed “as an attempt to build peace.” FIFA announced in December that there would be a new under-15 “festival-style tournaments for boys and girls that will be open to all 211 FIFA member associations” (London TIMES, 6/15).