Weekend Rap

The World Cup has reached the knockout stage, with the expanded tournament now featuring 32 teams in this round, the total size of the most recent tournaments. It is “sudden death, but with so many fixtures that make you feel alive.” Looking at the draw is “exhilarating.” Brazil-Japan is a “match of quarter-final quality” and Netherlands-Morocco “perhaps a semi-final-level clash.” There are “very few mismatches, and instead a lot of games that are very hard to call.” There “arguably hasn’t been a World Cup like this since the 1950s, in how so many of the best players have immediately been at their best” (London INDEPENDENT, 6/28).

Several of international soccer’s “minnows continued to defy expectations at the expanded tournament.” DR Congo qualified on Saturday after a 3-1 win over Uzbekistan, and joined several lower-ranked teams, including Cape Verde and Bosnia and Herzegovina who have “beaten the odds to reach the World Cup knockouts for the first time.” FIFA opted to increase the number of teams at the World Cup to 48, adding 40 additional matches to the five-week competition. While the move “drew criticism from some for making the tournament too big, it has delivered some eye-catching results on the pitch” (FINANCIAL TIMES, 6/27). An “abiding theme of the tournament” has been “how unheralded nations have defied expectations.” The World Cup has “illustrated that football’s global depth is greater than ever before” (London TELEGRAPH, 6/28).

It is “time to declare: The North American World Cup has been a success.” Overall, the “stadiums have been full, even for matchups that seemed lackluster on paper.” And for headliner events, the “environment has been top-tier.” Visitors and hosts alike have been “dazzled by the scenes.” K.C. was “swarmed with tens of thousands of Dutch fans for a pre-game march.” Boston was “besieged by the Tartan Army” (NPR, 6/28).

The World Cup group stage wrapped up on Saturday, and listed attendance from matches surpassed 4.6 million as FIFA continues to blow past its record for the most attended World Cup. According to data tracked by SBJ, the World Cup group stages drew 4,644,996 fans and racked up 44 sellouts in 72 matches.

N.Y. N.J. Stadium, which was tied for the most matches with five and has the second-largest capacity of all World Cup venues at 80,663, had the most fans at 403,197 with four sellouts. B.C. Place, which has a capacity of 52,497 and is the fourth-smallest World Cup venue, drew the most sellouts as all five matches were listed as filled. Mexico City Stadium, the largest World Cup stadium by capacity at 80,824 and host site to three matches, maxed out all three matches to sit with the highest average attendance of 80,824. Guadalajara Stadium, the second-smallest venue at 45,664, was the only stadium not to list a sellout, though it still averaged 99.06% capacity with an average of 45,233 fans during its four games.

Among World Cup teams, Ecuador, which played in Philadelphia, K.C. and N.J., finished the group stages with the most fans at 217,982, picking up a pair of sellouts. Uzbekistan (217,840), England (215,035), Brazil (213,465) and Morocco (213,048) rounded out the top five. The USMNT ranked 11th at 207,909, and was one of 11 teams that sold out all three matches. It joined Uzbekistan, Brazil, Morocco, Argentina, Paraguay, Portugal, Haiti, Scotland, Turkiye and Australia.

Colombia’s match against Portugal on Saturday was “practically a home game,” with Miami Stadium “awash in yellow as more than three quarters of the sellout crowd” of 64,478 was rooting for Colombia. Fans showed up as early as 8am ET on Saturday, more than 11 hours before kickoff. More than 40,000 Colombian fans were expected at the match and this time, “nobody was crashing through the gates without tickets, as thousands did for the 2024 Copa America final against Argentina.” Security was “extra tight, with three checkpoints, and the mood was festive” (MIAMI HERALD, 6/27). There was “only a smattering of red in a crowd full of Colombia fans,” and Cristiano Ronaldo’s Portugal jersey “made up most of the red around the stadium” (MIAMI HERALD, 6/27).

Among the familiar faces in attendance for Colombia-Portugal were U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who arrived with Inter Miami owners Jorge and Jose Mas. FBI Director Kash Patel was also there, seated with FIFA President Gianni Infantino. Also on the VIP list was Warriors F Jimmy Butler, musician J Balvin, actor Matt Damon and singers Carin Leon and Camila Cabello (MIAMI HERALD, 6/27).

Meanwhile, Dallas Stadium hosted Argentina-Jordan on Saturday, and Argentina fans “owned this stadium in a way Cowboys owner Jerry Jones only wishes his team could in a major game.” Any visit from a Cowboys “rival of consequence brings out 15,000-20,000 visiting jerseys.” However, Saturday’s match saw the stadium “basically filled with something just shy of 70,000” Lionel Messi jerseys (DALLAS MORNING NEWS, 6/28).

With the World Cup group stage coming to a close on Saturday, the Toronto FIFA Fan Festival “stopped letting people in” after its 20,000-people capacity was reached. Saturday was the “first time the venue was at capacity.” A person in line to enter the Fan Festival said that “ticketholders who were barred from entering were angry.” They described the scene as “pure chaos.” Saturday’s live match broadcasts featured the final World Cup group contests: Panama-England, Croatia-Ghana and Colombia-Portugal (CP24.com, 6/27).

Thousands of soccer fans “packed Houston’s FIFA Fan Festival” on Saturday, “filling the venue to capacity well before kickoff” of Colombia-Portugal. The festival grounds reached its capacity at 7,500 people, about an “hour and a half before the match began, with fans of both countries creating one of the largest crowds the venue has seen since opening.” With both teams still alive in the tournament, organizers said that they are “expecting more large crowds at Houston’s FIFA Fan Festival as the knockout rounds begin” (KHOU.com, 6/27).

Philadelphia’s FIFA Fan Festival hosted “PA Day” on Saturday, and “despite cloudy and rainy conditions, crowds of fans entered the festival grounds again on Saturday for Croatia-Ghana.” The Fan Festival has hosted 250,000 fans since opening on June 1 (PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER, 6/28).

With the World Cup Round of 23 matchups all set, South Africa and Canada open up the knockout stage on Sunday at L.A. Stadium and ticket prices are down for the game. The get-in price sits at $557 with over 400 tickets available. That price is down 34% from the start of the tournament and 29% from three days ago. But the biggest drop is from seven days ago, with the price falling 70%. SBJ has partnered with TicketData.com to track get-in prices and trends for upcoming games. For additional information on games, visit the World Cup page at TicketData.com.

Kalshi and ADI Predictstreet have partnered on co-branded placements during the World Cup knockout stage. The deal connects Kalshi with ADI Predictstreet, the tournament’s official FIFA prediction market partner. The two jointly launched a co-branded hub featuring soccer prediction markets, live updates and fan content (Kalshi).

The move is Kalshi’s “latest effort to use the world’s most popular sport to propel growth as it races to scale.” Kalshi’s brand will be “plastered on ads surrounding the field at World Cup matches and on TV and online.” The partnership will “also benefit ADI Predictstreet,” which operates in far fewer markets. Kalshi will “funnel betting volume to ADI Predictstreet’s platform across international markets.” Any further gains from the partnership “could be helpful for what may be Kalshi’s biggest ambition yet: an initial public offering” (N.Y. TIMES, 6/26).

The Maple Leafs selected F Gavin McKenna with the first overall pick in the 2026 NHL Draft on Friday, and singer Justin Bieber, a “longtime Leafs fan,” was on hand to make the announcement. On the draft stage at Keybank Center, Bieber said, “Mr. McKenna, we would like to draft you to the Toronto Maple Leafs.” McKenna, a native of Whitehorse, Yukon, walked up to Bieber’s song “Yukon” (ROLLING STONE, 6/26). Mckenna still “wasn’t absolutely sure the Maple Leafs were going to take him with the first pick in Friday night’s NHL draft” until he “locked eyes” with Bieber on the stage. McKenna: “He was looking at me and I started thinking, yeah” (TORONTO STAR, 6/26).

Whatever it is the NHL paid Bieber to show up at the draft Friday, the league should “demand a refund of some kind.” Bieber had “one line to say -- and he messed it up.” It was Bieber’s job to stand beside NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and “say something along the lines of: ‘With the first pick in the 2026 NHL draft, the Toronto Maple Leafs are proud to select from Penn State University, Gavin McKenna.’” It “couldn’t have been easy getting Bieber, and it certainly wasn’t cheap.” And in the end, it “sure wasn’t worth it” (TORONTO SUN, 6/28).

BUFFALO, N.Y. – The second edition of the NHL’s decentralized draft added star power and largely avoided the pitfalls of the inaugural run, earning high marks from the executive behind the event.

“We’ll give it the A-minus,” Steve Mayer, NHL President of Content and Events, said when asked for his assessment, “because I always want to get to the A. But I’m a tough critic.”

Family members of top prospects scrambled to pull out their phones as Justin Bieber walked down the aisle at KeyBank Center to announce Gavin McKenna as the first pick for the Maple Leafs, giving the league a viral moment that helped reach wider audiences than when Commissioner Gary Bettman announced the top selection of Matthew Schaefer a year ago. Nashville’s first-round pick got a similar bump from country star Luke Bryan, who made the announcement in person before performing at a country music festival down the street.

If ESPN’s John Buccigross had his way, broadcasters would still be able to show the look on a GM’s face as he worked a trade or learned of a rival team’s pick, rather than having them work from their own facilities. But like all good hockey minds, Buccigross knows to only worry about what he can control. Diehard hockey fans like him are already hooked; the league needs to continue making new fans to grow.

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L.A. officials have reached a “tentative agreement with organizers of the 2028 Olympic Games laying out the process for reimbursing the city for potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in public services.” The agreement, which still needs approval from L.A. Mayor Karen Bass and the City Council, would “require the privately run Olympic organizing committee LA28 to provide the city with funding in advance to cover services that are ineligible for reimbursement from the federal government, such as traffic control and trash pickup.” City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo said that under the proposed arrangement, the city would “seek reimbursement from the federal government for security costs.” He added that if the federal government does “not provide full reimbursement for those security costs, the city would seek to tap LA28’s contingency funds to cover the difference.” The deal goes before the council’s ad hoc committee on the Olympic Games on Tuesday, then to the full council (L.A. TIMES, 6/27).

The Angels on Friday fired GM Perry Minasian and hired John Mozeliak as interim GM and baseball operations consultant with the goal to “help the Angels find their next GM, not to keep the job himself.” Mozeliak said that there had “been a few weeks of discussions” with Angels President Molly Jolly, and it “intensified in the last week,” leading up to Friday’s firing of Minasian (ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER, 6/27). Mozeliak intends to “audit” the Angels in this new role alongside Jolly, with “plans to hire a general manager by the time Mozeliak’s contract is up ‘sometime in December.’” Mozeliak understands that the Angels have “lacked direction in recent seasons.” He asked for “patience in rebuilding the team alongside Jolly” (L.A. TIMES, 6/27).

The Angels were 392-500 under Minasian, failing to win more than 77 games in any season. Minasian was “saddled with one of the worst farm systems in baseball, and the Angels missed chances to upgrade it by failing to trade from their major league roster -- most notably, holding on to Shohei Ohtani," who left for the Dodgers. However, owner Arte Moreno was “responsible for many of the choices that hampered the development of the baseball operation under Minasian.” The Angels also cut payroll in recent years, which Moreno “acknowledged was because of revenue limitations from the changing television landscape” (ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER, 6/27).

Mets President of Baseball Operations David Stearns said that he “hasn’t considered stepping aside from his role” and he “still has the support of owner Steve Cohen to do the job." This follows the team opening the season with a 34-47 record, leading to manager Carlos Mendoza’s firing on Friday. SVP/Baseball Development Andy Green was named interim manager for the remainder of the season, but Stearns said that Green “will return to the office following the campaign -- and that the Mets will conduct a full managerial search” (N.Y. POST, 6/26). Stearns “suddenly finds himself in the crosshairs.” With Mendoza gone, that means “only one thing for Stearns: There is nobody left to blame for this mess but himself” (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 6/26).

It was “only a matter of time” before Mendoza was fired, but “this mess is on” Stearns. But Stearns was “not going to be the one to go now.” That is “just not how it works” (N.Y. POST, 6/26). With Mendoza out, there is “no one left to ax, except for the architect of baseball’s Titanic” (NEWSDAY, 6/26).

Stearns has “done very little right since taking over the front office of the Mets.” At two-and-a-half years into his tenure, maybe Stearns can “still turn things around and the Mets can be something other than an afterthought across the second half of the season” (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 6/27). The Mets are in “need of a near-total overhaul now.” Keeping Stearns is “only going to be an extension of a status quo that clearly isn’t working” (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 6/27).

Cohen waited two years to land Stearns before hiring him in September 2023. Stearns built small-market successes with the Brewers, and as a native New Yorker who grew up a Mets fan, he “figured to make a smooth transition to big-market honcho.” But now Cohen “surely must wonder if Stearns is ill-suited for the job, more ill-suited than Mendoza was as manager” (THE ATHLETIC, 6/26).

Venezuelan players and staff across MLB have “mobilized to send relief to the South American country that has been overwhelmed” since back-to-back earthquakes struck late Wednesday. Reds trainer Tomas Vera, a Venezuela native who served as the athletic trainer for Team Venezuela during its World Baseball Classic championship run in March, said that players and staff associated with that team have “come together on a WhatsApp chain to coordinate relief efforts, with Team Venezuela bench coach Robinson Chirinos leading the effort through his Venezuelan-based charitable foundation” (CINCINNATI ENQUIRER, 6/27).

Red Sox players have donned hats with the letters “VZ” sewn into the side during games. Red Sox RF Wilyer Abreu recently wrote “SOS” and “All Together For Venezuela” on his hat. Red Sox 1B Willson Contreras also wrote “Pray for Venezuela” on his. Baseball HOFer David Ortiz was “raising money to put toward the relief effort at a Fenway gate before Saturday’s game.” He also “encouraged Red Sox fans at home and people in Boston to donate to the cause through the Red Sox Foundation” (BOSTON.com, 6/27).

The Dodgers included “VZ” on the side of their caps, while Petco Park has the Venezuelan flag on one of its video boards (X, 6/26).

WTA No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka on Saturday at Wimbledon “defended a prize-money protest by leading players” despite the tournament “increasing its pot by a record 20% this year.” Players are “demanding a bigger slice of the Grand Slam pie and improved player welfare.” Wimbledon’s $84M pot this year equates to about 15% of the tournament’s revenue, short of the 16% -- about $92M -- the players sought. Sabalenka said, “It’s a ​great start they raise the prize money. It’s an amazing start. If you look ⁠over the last 10 years, if you compare the prize money to 2016, it’s kind of like ​the same (as a percentage) because it went down.” She added, “I really hope we can finally get to ​the table and really get it done, come to a conclusion that everyone’s going to be happy with. Hopefully we’ll never have to do it again” (REUTERS, 6/27).

WTA No. 4 Jessica Pegula, looking ahead to the U.S. Open, said, “We’ll see how it progresses. ... We’ll kind of get a good grasp about where we’re really standing with the Slams and see what we can get out of that with talking to them” (AP, 6/27).

Linda Cohn said her goodbye to “SportsCenter” on Saturday after 34 years at ESPN, with the longtime anchor set to retire from the network. Cohn started the show acknowledging the key to being on “SportsCenter” was that she belonged in the chair behind the desk. When asked about her influence on women in the industry, Cohn said it meant so much to her. She said, “It’s very important to empower other women.” Cohn added while she was “enjoying every single minute of being in the moment and doing what I do, loving sports and sharing that passion through the screen,” there were women “checking me out, watching the re-airs back in the day and saying to themselves, ‘You know what, maybe I can do this.’” Former co-hosts Neil Everett, Kevin Connors, Jay Harris, Kenny Mayne and Chris Berman gave a tribute to Cohn during the show. Cohn concluded, “Thanks to everyone. Thanks to ESPN and all. And to everyone who I’ve come in contact with” (“SportsCenter,” ESPN, 6/27).

Late Pro Football HOFer O.J. Simpson “won’t be included” by the Bills in the legends portion of Family Circle in front of the new Highmark Stadium. It is “likely he’ll be the only current Bills Wall of Famer from the old stadium that won’t be among those honored in the new version of the shrine for team legends.” The Family Circle is “expected to be a major attraction outside the Bills’ new stadium.” The plaza, which is “to be open year-round, is expected to be the main entryway on game days.” For years, “some fans had clamored about taking” Simpson off the Wall of Fame, but the Bills were “not ready to make that move, choosing to focus on his on-the-field accomplishments.” But “times are changing” (BUFFALO NEWS, 6/27).