SBJ Unpacks: Carol Stiff, the woman who started an earthquake

Tonight in Unpacks: Carol Stiff’s relentless drive to give women’s basketball a bigger platform at ESPN laid the groundwork for the rise of women’s sports -- earning her a spot in SBJ’s 2025 class of Champions: Pioneers and Innovators.

Also tonight:

• U.S. video game stocks weather Monday’s tariff hits, but Japanese firms take beating 
• Sources: FanDuel Sports Network deadline delayed again for five NBA teams
• Robinhood, Kalshi latest to test a betting line that has grown fuzzy
• Op-ed: In PR, singles and doubles set up grand slams

Listen to SBJ’s most popular podcast, Morning Buzzcast, where Austin Karp tips off the week analyzing Final Four viewership numbers for the men’s tourney, UConn’s dominating championship on the women’s side, sports entities uncertain about deal flow under Trump’s tariffs and more.

PUBLICATION NOTICE: Nominations are rolling in. Join the hundreds of companies nominating themselves for SBJ’s Best Places to Work in Sports 2025. This program is a fantastic way to highlight your organization’s dedication to employee engagement, satisfaction and overall workplace excellence. Nominations close April 25.

In a room full of college sports administrators and coaches dressed in khakis and polos, Carol Stiff burst in wearing a hot pink pantsuit.

Stiff, a longtime ESPN executive, stepped to the front of the room at a resort in Amelia Island, Fla., to make the case for women’s college basketball and knew she needed to stand out, especially after colleagues had made presentations on college football and men’s basketball. This was more than a decade ago, and women’s college basketball was growing, but still stuck behind other college sports in popularity and awareness. Stiff knew her attire would complement her message. Women’s basketball, she told the room, is hot, hot, hot.

“I’m wearing it because I want you to understand that women’s basketball is on fire,” she told the room that day.

“It caught their attention,” she said, recalling the incident more than a dozen years later. “That’s all I wanted to do.”

For Stiff, 63, her professional life was spent largely doing the same thing, though usually in more subtle fashion: drawing attention, eyes and viewers to women’s basketball to help push the sport forward. A former collegiate player and coach herself, Stiff started as a temp at ESPN in 1989 and spent 32 years there, building a trailblazing career through the ranks of the programming department and rising to vice president of women’s sports programming.

From creating the Tennessee-Connecticut rivalry in 1995 that elevated the sport to new levels of awareness to increasing coverage of the women’s NCAA Tournament that revolutionized how the network broadcast the sport, Stiff laid the foundation for an explosion of growth, interest and viewership in recent years.

It’s a movement, not a moment, Stiff says, and one that those at the network and in women’s basketball say came in no small part to her work getting more and more of the games on television.

“She was a strong advocate for women’s sports, I think a long time before they were widely accepted at ESPN as valuable content,” said Burke Magnus, ESPN’s president of content, who worked with Stiff throughout her career and was her supervisor in her final years with ESPN.

“There were a lot of skeptics. There were a lot of people who would maybe not overtly say it, but sort of behave like it was an obligation and not an opportunity. … She had her shoulder into this for decades with very modest returns. It was like a ground war. It was get 10 feet further every year, slow and steady. And it really took the effort, the dedication, the commitment that she’s demonstrated to make it possible for when Angel Reese and Caitlin Clark come along and capture the imagination of the American public. That wouldn’t be possible unless we laid that foundation, and she did it all.”

That foundation came from Stiff’s relationships, ones she built within ESPN and in the sport. As she lobbied for more coverage, better time slots, new matchups and more opportunity for women’s basketball, her positive energy helped recruit others to her point of view. In the face of setbacks, her doggedness helped her persist in showing why her ideas were good for the business and good for the sport.

By the time she left ESPN in 2021 — a year after she was elected to the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame — Stiff had moved the network far closer to her vision of a showcase platform for the sport she loves.

“When they write the history of women’s basketball, you say, ‘Well, who was a major driver of why women’s basketball became popular on national television?” said Connecticut coach Geno Auriemma. “There was this woman, Carol Stiff, who just refused to take no for an answer.”

Stiff comes from a basketball family. Her mother, Jeanne, was a sports fanatic and the brother of Don Donoher, who coached the University of Dayton for 25 years, taking the Flyers to the 1967 national championship game.

Stiff, the youngest of six, would tune into the games they could get on the radio with her mother. Title IX, the landmark law that paved the way for rapid growth in opportunities for girls and women to play sports, passed days after her 11th birthday in 1972. Stiff had grown up in Bernardsville, N.J., 40 miles west of New York City, playing basketball and baseball with the boys in her neighborhood.

She played CYO basketball for Sister Mary Cleary, a Mercy nun with whom she still trades Christmas cards.

One March day in 1977, Jeanne took Stiff to Madison Square Garden. The 15-year-old sat enthralled as Carol Blazejowski scored 52 points — without the 3-point line, she notes — for Montclair State in a win over Queens College.

“I don’t know how she afforded tickets and then took me alone,” Stiff said. “It had a huge impact in my life because for the first time, I could relate to what I was seeing on the court.”

By then, Stiff was at Bernards High School, where she had the same access to the new gym as the boys’ team and got one pair of Converse sneakers each season. Recruited by Don Perrelli to play at Southern Connecticut State, by the time she arrived, she had a new coach after Perrelli had left for St. John’s.

After enduring the grind of two years of 3-hour daily practices, Stiff quit basketball, opting to join the field hockey team at Southern, a sport she had played in high school.

“[Basketball was] what I was really good at and liked and found joy from, and now I didn’t care for it anymore,” she said. “I cried a lot.”

In field hockey, she found a bigger team with more personalities. She turned it into her first job.

She had gone to Southern aiming to become a physical education teacher, but struggled to find a position coming out of college in 1983. But someone in the athletic department at Western Connecticut reached out to one of Stiff’s professors at Southern, needing a field hockey coach.

She took the job, working on the side as a cook at Bank Street restaurant and teaching physical education at two different Catholic elementary schools.

“I was just piecemealing money together,” she recalled.

While at Western, Stiff had been the assistant basketball coach for a season, and she left the school after three years to take over as head basketball coach at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1985.

After three years at RPI, Stiff moved to Brown, where she was an assistant coach for one season, 1988-89, before deciding to step away from coaching. She had grown tired of recruiting and wanted to be closer to friends in Connecticut following the death of her cousin, Gary Donoher, who was a day younger than her.

While she considered going back to teaching, Stiff started finding work through a temp agency, Kelly Services. For about a month, she worked for an insurance company in Hartford, answering phones and making copies.

Then the agency asked about another job. Would Stiff want to go work for ESPN?

By the summer of 1989, ESPN had started to find a foothold in American sports. It aired the men’s NCAA Tournament, had just shown its first NFL Draft, and earlier that year, had signed its first deal with Major League Baseball.

That year, it was celebrating its 10th anniversary with a party, which Stiff joined the communications team to help plan.

“Absolutely fell in love with the place,” Stiff recalls. “Each day was different, and I asked a lot of questions and did whatever they asked.”

By the start of 1990, Stiff had found a full-time job in the programming department. Initially, that meant inputting the programming, entering schedules and recording ratings. That led her to ask why events weren’t coded by gender, so the network — still just one channel at the time — could keep track of how many men’s and women’s events it was airing.

“Back in those days, you could just suggest things, and if your boss thought it was a good idea, you ran with it,” she said.

As she moved up to program planner, Stiff took on scheduling water sports, looking for slots for the rights ESPN had acquired for water skiing and surfing. By that point, in 1992, Tom Odjakjian had been programming all of the rights ESPN had for college sports, focusing on football and men’s basketball.

He asked if Stiff would return some calls he’d been getting from conference administrators for women’s basketball.

“He gave me the files and he said, ‘You played it, you coached it, you love it. Here you go,‘” Stiff remembers.

She did more than just return the calls. Each Friday, she’d set aside time to check in with coaches, announcers and others in the sport. Yes, she was looking at programming their games.

But in a pre-internet era, she’d also get their insight on which teams might be good. As she was scouting out matchups, she built relationships, asking about their families as much as their players.

As Odjakjian recalls it, Stiff enthusiastically jumped into the role. He’d leave in 1994 to become an associate commissioner at the Big East, but not before he signed off on what would become a milestone for Stiff and ESPN.

For years, women’s basketball had gone up against the NFL on Sunday afternoons, and Stiff was looking for a slot to get more attention. She keyed in on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, looking for a matchup of top teams.

“There was only so much room,” Odjakjian said. “And at the time, the advertising department didn’t have a lot of interest in women’s basketball.”

But, Odjakjian told her, “If you can get these teams to play, we’ll clear the time slot.”

Contractually, the game was supposed to be between a Big East and an ACC school, with the former serving as host. Stiff first tried North Carolina, which was coming off a national title in 1994, but coach Sylvia Hatchell turned it down. She wanted the game, just on her court.

With Auriemma already on board to host the game, Stiff took a different tack and called Pat Summitt. It’d be a trip to the Northeast in the middle of conference play — Summitt already knew they’d be coming off a game at Auburn — but they’d have a spot on ESPN on a holiday.

Summitt said she’d take it, Stiff recalls, “for the good of the game.”

“That was totally Carol’s idea,” recalled Mimi Griffin, who announced the game alongside Robin Roberts. “That was not an easy task to talk those coaches into that, especially in the middle of the season, in the middle of conference play.”

By the time it rolled around in January 1995, the matchup was perfect. No. 2 UConn knocked off undefeated No. 1 Tennessee on its way to a 35-0 season and its first national championship — capped with another win over the Volunteers.

“You could feel the energy, like the electricity in Gampel Pavilion,” Stiff said. “It was sold out at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, did like a 9-point rating. It was a massive rating. All I could think of was getting a 1-vs-2 to air is your priority, and you did it, and getting a rating, that’s your job.”

The game was the start of a rivalry that lasted years. By the next season, CBS, which had the rights for SEC games, had set up the matchup and Stiff got Summitt and Auriemma to agree to a home-and-home series.

It was one of many matchups Stiff helped create. Another she landed in line at Subway in her hometown of Farmington, Conn.

Auriemma was in town to watch his son’s game when he ran into Stiff at the sandwich shop. By the time they had their orders, she’d convinced him to play then-No. 3 LSU in the MLK game in 2006.

“It was more about, if you want women’s basketball to grow, you’re going to have to play in these games,” said Auriemma. “I don’t know that I’ve ever said no the whole time Carol was there.”

Neither did Summitt, opting always for the national television exposure that Stiff was offering. “For the good of the game” was a reason Stiff used throughout women’s college basketball to advance the sport.

“She was probably the first and only person in the sport of women’s hoops to go out there and really get people to try to play each other, the top teams, and really try to deliver some compelling matchups that would get some traction,” said Dave Brown, who spent more than 20 years in programming at ESPN and is now the founder of Gridiron, a scheduling software company.

“That’s what will always separate her from everybody else. She had the contacts. She worked hard at developing them.”

That didn’t happen overnight. But Stiff carried on the lessons from her mother, taking an interest in people’s lives away from basketball, sending handwritten thank-you notes and letters.

Val Ackerman, who is now the Big East commissioner, said Stiff’s travel — from conference meetings to the Final Four — made her “present in people’s lives.”

That meant Stiff, who she’s known for 30 years, sending her an occasional bouquet of flowers or a bottle of wine. (Something she recently did for Diana Taurasi, sending the legendary player two bottles of red in recognition of her retirement.)

Magnus shares a birthday with Stiff, and after years of getting a note from her first, set a calendar reminder for himself to beat her to it.

Coaches celebrating milestone wins found themselves with a supply of Hershey’s Kisses — one for each win, receiving hundreds at a time. Over the years, Stiff has done it for everyone from former Texas coach Jody Conradt to South Carolina’s Dawn Staley. She was so known for celebrating their milestones with that candy that when Stiff went into the Hall of Fame, the display included a crystal dish full of them.

“She understood the value of developing strong personal relationships with the coaches, the players, the administrators and the talent, and that trust and that loyalty that she fostered added to her credibility,” Ackerman said. “And that made her even more effective, because people at ESPN knew that she was the connective tissue with all of these key stakeholders, and that they trusted her in turn to make judgments about how best to promote the sport.”

That credibility helped bolster Stiff, as 1996 proved a pivotal year for ESPN and women’s basketball.

The company acquired the rights for the women’s NCAA Tournament, edging out CBS by offering a rest day between the national semifinals and championship. Under that first deal, which was $19 million for seven years, ESPN aired 23 games during the tournament.

That same year, the U.S. women’s national team won a gold medal in the Atlanta Olympics, using that and an eight-game series leading into the Games as a springboard for launching the WNBA.

With Stiff helping to lead the way, ESPN sought to separate the women’s tournament from the men’s while staying close enough to leverage the excitement of March.

Once ESPN had the rights, it worked with the NCAA to move dates around, getting the women’s tournament to start on Friday instead of Thursday, the same day as the men’s. For more than a decade, they got the NCAA to run the women’s games Sunday through Tuesday, giving those games unopposed windows, before the NCAA reverted to the current schedule in 2015.

“She spent 30 years laying the groundwork for the overnight success to then happen,” said ESPN historian Mike Soltys, who spent more than four decades in communications for the company. “And not a lot of it was resistance from her bosses. It was resistance from other departments to say, ‘No, I’m not going to do on-air promotions for it. No, ‘SportsCenter’ is not going to cover it.‘”

Even as ESPN was doing more on women’s basketball and women’s sports than other networks, Stiff still faced indifference to giving them a greater platform and competition from other rights the network had.

Stiff worked to leverage ESPN’s inventory, not content to just air the games. She pushed for “SportsCenter” to cover the sport, from getting scores in the bottom line to getting highlights in the broadcast. If a particularly good or significant game wasn’t on ESPN, she’d call other networks to get permission to use highlights.

That holistic approach went beyond her role as a program planner, but Stiff knew it would push the game forward. She worked to build relationships internally that would help others see the merits of what she was pushing for, even as they had other, sometimes competing, priorities.

“I don’t know if anyone else in our department was going over and being in the control room until 1 or 2 in the morning for the first and second rounds of the tournament,” Stiff said. “Those producers in the studio, they felt I had their back. I was right in there with them.”

She did the same with the WNBA, which launched in 1997, working closely with Pat Lowry on the production side. If Lowry wanted to put a camera on the court when teams were shooting free throws, or use live microphones, Stiff looked for a way to facilitate it.

“Any crazy thing I wanted to try, Carol was right there helping me fight the fight because we were trying to be innovative and different to try to get the league noticed,” Lowry said. “I’m talking basketball because that’s what I worked with her on, but she did it for all of women’s sports.”

Still, she faced resistance within the network, something she and others characterized as closer to indifference than opposition. Stiff would be told that a game wouldn’t rate, only to argue that it hadn’t rated because it hadn’t been given a shot in a prime slot.

Making progress for Stiff, ever the former coach, came by taking those losses as positively as she could and knowing when to revisit an argument.

“Carol was a fierce advocate for women’s sports, both collegiate and professional,” said longtime ESPN President George Bodenheimer. “And she has a kind of personal demeanor and professional demeanor that allowed her to persevere in spite of the obstacles that were placed in front of her.”

Stiff found allies internally and externally to help advance her ideas of how to get the women’s game in better windows. It wasn’t just her lobbying executives — her pitches gained extra weight with a call from an athletic director or conference commissioner. Always, she came prepared with her research — ratings, rankings and storylines backing up why she thought a game or an approach could do better if given the chance.

“Her whole career has been defined by her advocacy,” said Odjakjian. “She wasn’t always successful. None of us are. She ran into roadblocks at times where I’m sure she wanted to do more, and for some reason, either finances or other programming priorities, she wasn’t successful. But her energy and her passion just always continued, and she kept pushing and pushing and pushing.”

In 2001, five years after ESPN first got the rights to the women’s tournament, it committed to air all 63 games starting in 2003.

Faced with that proposition, Stiff tried to resign.

In what she characterized as a midlife crisis, she had applied for and accepted a teaching job as a middle school health teacher in Bristol. By that point — with son, Alec, born in 1999 and daughter, Gillian, who would be born in 2002 — summers off sounded appealing.

Facing the thought of having to figure out how to air the whole tournament, with no clue where to begin, she wrote a letter of resignation and gave it to John Wildhack, then ESPN’s senior vice president for programming and now the athletic director at Syracuse.

“She slid it across the desk, and I remember I read it, I looked at it and I slid it right back across the desk at her,” Wildhack said. “Thank God, I didn’t accept that resignation. … I have so much respect for Carol, so much respect for her intellect, her passion, her commitment.”

Wildhack told her to take the night, and Stiff wrestled with the paralyzing fear of how to actually program that many games in a short window on what was then two channels. Then it struck her — she didn’t have to do it all.

Stiff decided to stay — thus avoiding teaching sex ed to seventh and eighth graders — and, relying on the technical skills of her ESPN colleagues, found a way to do it all.

With four games going on at any one time in the early rounds, ESPN regionalized games for local audiences and programmed what it thought would be the best for areas of the country without a team.

“That was a battle within. We did it regionally first,” said Laura Sandillo, who worked under Stiff as associate manager for programming and acquisitions. “It was painstakingly pinpointing the regions that would produce ratings.”

ESPN also relied on whiparound coverage, taking viewers through games around the tournament, something Stiff heard her fair share of complaints about.

“We used to affectionately laugh at the whiparound,” said Chris Plonsky, executive senior associate athletics director at Texas and a close friend of Stiff’s. “I used to call her and say, ‘I want to whip your you-know-what because of this.’ But it actually was smart. It was educating all of us as to what streaming was gonna be like.”

Outside of the tournament, ESPN’s coverage of regular-season women’s basketball began to expand, something those in and around the network attributed to Stiff’s efforts. She received no small assist from Taurasi, whose run of three titles in a row at UConn helped sway the minds of executives who could go see her play in person.

Led by Stiff, ESPN launched Big Monday for women’s basketball in 2006, giving the Big East conference a prime-time slot to showcase its games. From 2011-13, it hosted the WNBA Draft on its campus, a herculean feat for Stiff that meant seating friends and family in the cafeteria.

Stiff moved over to espnW from 2013-16, working as vice president of content program and integration, and serving as executive producer on its “Nine for IX” series, but returned to programming, where she resumed responsibility over women’s basketball. In 2017, ESPN added Thursday prime-time games.

In 2021, the network moved the women’s semifinals to ESPN, relegating regular-season NBA games to ESPN2, something Stiff had long been pushing for.

“I’m sure she rubbed some of the executives the wrong way. I’m sure they rolled their eyes when they would see her extension number come up, going, ‘Oh boy, here we go.’ She didn’t care, and I give her credit for that,” said Roberts. “She was relentless in seeing it through. … She stuck it out, and she always came back. And she didn’t win all the battles, but she won the war.”

The best evidence of the premise Stiff pushed for decades — that there was an audience for women’s sports and women’s basketball — has come in the years since she left the network.

Stiff retired amid layoffs in 2021. She now has more time for biking, a hobby she picked up during the pandemic (she regularly played pickup basketball games after starting at ESPN, but no longer). She also joined FAST Studios’ Women’s Sports Network as its president and chair of its advisory board. The free streaming network airs games from LOVB and the PWHL and features a daily studio show, “Game On,” as well as athlete interviews and original productions.

“I firmly believe in the product,” Stiff said. “I know that we are never going to compete with ESPN rights fees, NBC and CBS, but what we are is storytellers.”

Led by the appeal of the likes of Clark and Reese, and by better windows, the women’s NCAA Tournament has delivered viewership Stiff once dreamed of — and positioned the sport to one day achieve.

ESPN moved the championship to ABC in 2023, and in 2024 drew 18.9 million viewers for the title game between Clark’s Iowa Hawkeyes and Staley’s South Carolina Gamecocks, a record for any college basketball game ever on ESPN and the most ever for a women’s college basketball game.

Stiff was in Cleveland for last year’s Final Four, just as she has been for all but one edition in the past 43 years. As she prepared to head to this year’s Final Four in Tampa, Stiff was glad to see sustained interest in the women’s tournament, with first- and second-round viewership lagging behind only last year’s historic tournament.

“Her impact cannot be overstated,” Griffin said. “It is a magnitude that probably won’t be really recognized until far after she’s gone, because now we’re breaking through with all this notoriety in this incredible wave of popularity of women’s basketball, and women’s sports in general. But that just didn’t happen. There had to have been an earthquake to start the tsunami, and the earthquake started with Carol really pushing the edge of the envelope internally.”

No one needs a pink suit anymore. What Stiff has been advocating for over decades is abundantly clear — women’s basketball is hot, hot, hot.

Video game stocks with connections to sports and esports took a beating Monday in Japan as foreign markets continue to react to President Trump’s tariff slate, but key U.S. firms Electronic Arts, Take-Two Interactive and Microsoft either saw tiny gains or losses on Wall Street.

EA (EA Sports) was down .53%, while Take-Two (2K Sports) was up 1.5%. It’s a sign the market sees these software companies as better insulated from tariffs, as players are buying digital copies of games over physical discs and cartridges more than ever before. The worry these companies face is if consumers feel the pinch of raising prices in other sectors, forcing them to cut or eliminate spending on games and in-game transactions (which make the likes of EA Sports FC and 2K Sports’ NBA 2K franchise so lucrative to their companies).

Microsoft, the one U.S.-based manufacturer of a major gaming console, saw its stock dip .5%. The Xbox is already the third-place console in a three-system race, but it makes a good chunk of its gaming revenue from Game Pass subscriptions (again, which could be threatened by pressures from other sectors).

On the Nikkei 225 index (which was down 8% overall for Monday), Nintendo closed down 7.85%. Both markets and consumers are watching how Japan’s leading video game console maker and publisher reacts to Trump’s proposed tariffs following Nintendo’s announcement of the June 5 launch of the Switch 2 at $450. It’s already delayed preorders for the new console in the wake of those retaliatory tariffs scheduled to kick in Wednesday.

Sony took the biggest hit, down 10.04%, as tariffs could likely force a price increase in its hardware business, highlighted by the PlayStation 5 ($499) and the PS5 Pro ($699). Sony also makes MLB: The Show. The worries here go beyond hardware sales (which, to be fair, include a large number of electronic goods outside gaming). If rising prices hurt consumer’s capability to buy software and in-game transactions, it could also affect Sony’s cut from such transactions.

Capcom, one of the largest third-party game publishers in Japan and the makers of Street Fighter (the biggest fighting game in esports), was down 6.61%.

The soft deadline of April 1 for five NBA teams to extend their expiring deals with FanDuel Sports Network has been delayed for an undisclosed period, sources told SBJ, a postponement that could ultimately induce the Hawks, Cavaliers, Heat, T’Wolves and Bucks to opt back in to their RSNs for at least next season.

The artificial deadline has been pushed several times -- from December 2024 to April 1 and now perhaps into this summer or beyond -- as the league office negotiates a potential national streaming RSN with Amazon, YouTube, Apple and perhaps ESPN+, Roku or others. The five teams in question had expected to be briefed on the infrastructure and financial upside of the national streaming RSN by April 1 before making decisions on their local TV futures but instead remain in limbo as the regular season winds down this month.

Their options, in the interim, are two-fold. The five teams can return to FanDuel Sports Network, where rights fees have dwindled since 2022 but are still significant. Or they can go to a less lucrative linear over-the-air model -- similar to the Jazz, Suns, Trail Blazers, Mavericks and Pelicans -- that could possibly be supplemented with formidable revenue once the league finalizes a deal for a national streaming platform. But sources said the NBA has informed team executives that the streaming RSN is not immediately imminent, to stay patient and to trust that the league will eventually negotiate an enormously profitable streaming deal for local broadcasts.

Based on that timeline, the five teams could likely end up in a time crunch by the end of this summer, waiting for the national streaming RSN while trying to make a local TV decision for the 2025-26 season. Going the over-the-air route means securing advertising and launching a direct-to-consumer app -- preferably not something to be rushed considering teams like the Jazz have only generated about $16M annually under the over-the-air/DTC app template.

For those reasons, the Hawks, Cavaliers, Heat, T’Wolves and Bucks may be left with little recourse but to remain with Fan Duel Sports Network’s parent company Main Street Sports Group. On the plus side, Main Street has emphasized leaguewide that they remain a growing, viable business, having reduced their debt from $9B to roughly $300,000, while boosting their linear subscriptions to about 25 million and DTC subscribers to about 400,000 now that they are an add-on channel at Amazon. Main Street also has strategic deals in place with Yahoo and SB Nation to “drive subscriber growth and awareness,‘’ and their streams are also expected to land soon on ESPN’s upcoming DTC service.

According to sources, Main Street also intends to renew MVPD agreements and purportedly could create distribution deals with YouTube TV, Hulu or more. They have retooled their advertising business and also understand their long-term future is likely tied to their DTC gains.

The question for the five teams then -- if they extend their FanDuel contracts -- is how long they will be required to opt in for. Originally, Main Street was mandating that the Hawks, Cavaliers, Heat, T’Wolves and Bucks re-up for two more seasons, not one. But sources indicated those teams prefer just one-year extensions in the event the national streaming RSN was ready to go by the 2026-27 season. It is unclear if Main Street executives -- who have repeatedly declined comment -- will allow only one-year extensions, although Main Street and NBA teams continue to maintain an open working relationship. Executives from Hawks, Cavaliers, T’Wolves and Bucks did not respond to requests for comment, while the Heat declined comment.

Still, sources believe the Hawks, Heat and T’Wolves are almost certainly going to extend their FanDuel contracts. The Hawks, for instance, are just completing a 10-year deal that had a current rights fee payment of $32M this season, double if not more than most over-the-air teams are earning. Even though about 60% of Hawks’ viewership are tiered Comcast customers -- hindering the team’s reach and leading to lower ratings -- sources said the $32M is too much to pass up, unless Main Street asks the team to take a much lower rights fee.

Indications are the Heat will similarly opt in, considering their rights fee payment this past season was the highest of any Main Street team at $55M. Sources all but confirmed that the T’Wolves, with a current $24M rights fee, have already decided to opt in, while the Bucks -- albeit not as definitively -- are also likely to extend their current $24M deal.

That leaves Cleveland as perhaps the only real question mark. Cavaliers leadership had previously been proactive, last year launching owner Dan Gilbert’s over-the-air Rock Entertainment Sports Network even while local Cavs games were being broadcast exclusively on their FanDuel RSN. The team had seemed poised to go over-the-air next season on RESN presuming the league unveiled its national streaming RSN. But with that project still pending, the Cavs (whose rights fee payment this season is $35M) may simply return to FanDuel Sport Network.

Regardless, the national streaming RSN remains a league priority, crystalized by the fact that NBA President of Global Content & Media Distribution Bill Koenig delivered a lengthy presentation at the Board of Governors meetings in late March. At a press conference afterward, Commissioner Adam Silver also intimated that league expansion to cities such as Seattle or Las Vegas could be paused until the national RSN is formalized so those fledgling teams can enter the league with healthy local TV economics.

While the teams all wait -- impatiently or not -- sources said the league has again reminded team executives that even if their Main Street rights fees plummet next season, the incoming national media rights money ($142M going to each franchise starting in 2026, with 7% annual increases the ensuing 10 years) will cushion any immediate financial blows.

“We’re getting more money nationally, so we’re willing to take the hit locally,” one team executive said a month ago.

At 9am ET Wednesday, prediction market contracts that had Duke beating Houston in this Saturday’s NCAA men’s basketball semifinal were trading at 71 cents through online brokerage Robinhood, a pricing structure that would allow those who purchased $71 in contracts to collect $100 if the Blue Devils win.

At the same time, FanDuel bettors in states in which sports wagering is legal could have bet Duke to beat Houston at moneyline odds of -245, giving them a payout of $100 on a wager of $71 if the Blue Devils win.

Robinhood calls this derivative trading, regulated by the federal government and available to anyone over age 18 in all 50 U.S. states -- at least until earlier this week, when gaming commissions in four of them ordered it and other similar sites to stop.

FanDuel calls it sports betting, regulated by gambling commissions in 31 states and D.C., and available only to those over 21 in all but four states, where the legal age is 18.

In a similarly perplexing parallel, a Wednesday night NBA parlay that had the Cavaliers’ Donovan Mitchell and Hawks’ Trae Young scoring more than 25.5 points and Knicks’ Karl-Anthony Towns getting more than 23.5 offered winners a $100 payout on an entry fee of $20 at PrizePicks, while FanDuel bettors in legal, regulated states could place a wager on that same combination at odds of +482, paying $97 on a wager of $20.

PrizePicks calls this a daily fantasy “pick ‘em” game, available to those old enough to legally play DFS -- a bar typically set at 18 -- in 35 states, including California, Texas, Georgia and 10 others that haven’t legalized online sports betting.

FanDuel calls it a “same-game parlay,” which it offers through its sportsbook in legalized states. It does not offer what PrizePicks, Underdog and other similar sites call a “pick ‘em” game through its daily fantasy app.

Finding a loophole

Nearly seven years after a Supreme Court ruling cleared the way for states to legalize sports betting, it seems we’ve moved on from the question of whether a state will legalize it to whether it entirely matters.

Neither Robinhood, Kalshi, PrizePicks or the other sites that have gotten into the game offer anything close to the menu of a full-scale sportsbook. But in states that don’t allow sportsbooks, and among those in the 18-20 age demo in states that do, they’re happily filling the void.

We are at this point largely because the often-overlooked corollary to 60% of over-21 U.S. adults being able to bet legally from the couch is that 40% cannot, with the lion’s share of them clustered in California, Texas and Georgia -- three states that don’t appear close to legalizing sports betting this year or next.

“We’ve seen an explosion right now of unregulated and unlicensed operators in both sports betting and online casino,” said Jeremy Kudon, an Orrick law firm partner who directs legislative strategy for a coalition of sportsbooks FanDuel, DraftKings, BetMGM and Fanatics. “If you’re out there thinking about trying to become an online player in this market, isn’t it just so much better to argue that you’re a sweepstakes, or its daily fantasy, and just enter the market? And you just hope that no one goes after you or challenges you? Or, ‘hey, let’s try to play the prediction markets.’ Those states that haven’t legalized are a vast, untapped market. And people are finding their way in.”

Rolling the dice

Robinhood and the regulated exchange that it’s selling into, N.Y-based Kalshi, have been making headlines since late October, when they began offering event contracts around the presidential election. Since then, Kalshi has expanded its menu to include prediction markets across a wide range of sports. Robinhood briefly offered contracts on the Super Bowl before pulling them, but it has returned with Kalshi for a full-throated run at March Madness.

Not surprisingly, opposition has come from gaming commissions in four states in which sports betting is legal and regulated: New Jersey, Nevada, Ohio and Illinois.

The longer term fate of contracts based on sports outcomes likely will be determined by the end of May, when the Commodity Futures Trading Commission completes a review of the practice. The CFTC opposed Kalshi’s election derivatives before losing in court, but that was under the Biden administration. In January, Kalshi added Donald Trump Jr. as a strategic adviser.

Though a ruling that blesses sports prediction markets as a financial vehicle initially could be disruptive, Kudon thinks it might accelerate legalization in states that thus far have resisted. He expects a clear ruling that prediction markets are legal would lead the top U.S. sportsbooks to offer them, allowing them to enter states that haven’t legalized traditional sports betting.

With both prediction markets and pick ‘em games readily available and heavily advertised in their states, legislators may find the more established version of sports betting, and the tax revenue that would come along with it, far more palatable.

“This will bring front and center the reality that there are going to be other markets competing with the states,” Kudon said. “My argument to the states is going to be that the legal market will still be superior to [prediction instruments], and therefore you should legalize sports betting, regulate it and collect a fair tax.”

What’s the future of pick ‘em games?

The path to resolution for the pick ‘em games isn’t so clear. Their similarity to same-game parlays led to a flurry of shutdowns by regulators in legal states. PrizePicks responded by launching a peer-to-peer game that presents almost identically to consumers, but with a complicated mechanism that it argues fits the definition of daily fantasy. Labeled as “Pick ‘em Arena,” it has replaced its original product in 17 states and D.C., or half of the 36 U.S. jurisdictions in which it operates.

Following a similar playbook to the one that led to broad acceptance of FanDuel and DraftKings, the pick ‘em operators have lobbied state regulators to amend their fantasy definition to include them, or create a new category that would encompass them.

In North Carolina, where I reside, sports betting is legal and regulated, while daily fantasy is legal, but not regulated. As a result, 18-year-olds who can’t have a FanDuel, DraftKings or BetMGM account can open one with PrizePicks, Sleeper and other sites, where they can legally bet the same three-player parlay as their parents.

“We’ve made that point to legislators and regulators over the last few years and [the response] is often a lot of people putting their hands up,” Kudon said. “There have been states that have acted. But then those states allow it to go to peer-to-peer, and I’m not sure that’s so different. It still looks, feels and acts like a sportsbook. And one of the most lucrative parts of the sportsbook. It has been infuriating to have those conversations in states and see either no action or those sites continue to operate for years.”

No matter how gambling regulators respond in states that have legalized sports betting, it is unlikely there will be any regulatory response in those that haven’t, leaving 40% of the U.S. as fertile ground for those who craft products that tread the line between a bet, a contest and an investment.

“We’re going to need to see California and Texas both have legal sports betting for any of this to be resolved,” Kudon said. ”Because right now, that is a huge honey pot for companies to find their way into this market. You only need to operate in California and Texas and you’re in great shape. Until something is done in those states, whether it’s through prosecution and criminal enforcement or legalization ... I just don’t see any other end to this.”

There’s nothing more exhilarating for baseball fans than watching a grand slam. The cameras follow the ball and hitter, letting the excitement build until the crowd goes wild and the players ambush the hitter at home plate with bear hugs and high-fives.

But however exciting they might be for fans, grand slams are not a go-to for coaches. Historically, scoring runs has depended on getting runners on base with singles and doubles and then moving them around. Smart coaches set things up for the big home run, but they’re not banking on it.

CEOs get this. They’d rather watch a no-hitter because of the high skill involved than a once-a-season grand slam that relies heavily on luck. Yet so many of them expect media home runs with every single company announcement or piece of thought leadership instead of incorporating the lessons of baseball into their public relations strategy.

The truth is, no PR campaign has to live or die by the Wall Street Journal or CNBC. In fact, swinging for the fences often leads to a strikeout. This burns a lot of money, time and energy that would have generated a lot more ROI by getting many singles and doubles in medium-tier outlets.

Making contact: Putting hitters in the right order

The first step to success is stepping up to the plate and making good contact with the ball. Just like your initial marketing spends are merely meant to test the market, you can test your message with trade or regional media outlets. All it really takes is a bit of tailoring: Regional newspapers are more likely to listen to pitches from an institution or individual who impacts the local community, and trade publications will appreciate in-depth knowledge, data and other value-add insights for the companies that rely on their outlets for forward-looking analysis and trends.

Just like how a few singles load the bases for a grand slam from the power hitter, these smaller wins build the foundation for bigger successes in two ways:

• They’re a stepping stone of credibility because they develop an archive of past coverage. Podcasts and TV stations want credible people on-air, and when producers and other gatekeepers see that the spokesperson has a nice, long paper trail of quality placements, they know they’re working with someone who knows their stuff.
• Small and medium placements also create a Google Roadmap through SEO, social media and website content that builds brand trust with customers and moves people down the sales funnel long before the big hit happens.

Scratch singles, stand-up doubles and the occasional triple put everyone in position to increase the chances of a notable return on your PR investment.

More chances for success

CEOs know that a company with only one contract lives and dies by that contract. That’s why leaders strive to earn new business and diversify revenue streams.

Putting all of your eggs in one PR basket carries the same risk: When all you do is swing for the fences, and you miss, your media campaign is dead. You’ve squandered the opportunity to shape narratives, improve the digital footprint and use marketing to spread your media coverage.

Now, imagine for a minute that your brand eventually does hit that home run. Just like having runners on base, the impact will be a lot more powerful with a healthy stockpile of audiences already paying attention.

Mid-tier outlets are easier to get placements

As you can probably guess, everyone and their brother is trying to get into the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and similar outlets. That means that even the most compelling pitch has a slim chance of getting a second glance -- never mind coverage.

Outlets that aren’t major national brands but still important to niche audiences, like trade outlets and regional papers, are always looking for good scoops to beat the big dogs and break the story. Reporters and editors will appreciate the chance at an exclusive that will also earn backlinks when other outlets cite their coverage.

Mid-tier trade publications have high levels of trust with target audiences

Top-tier outlets get a lot of eyeballs -- that’s why they’re top-tier. But one of the strengths of many mid-tier outlets is that they focus on the specific demographic, region or industry you’re trying to reach. These outlets have a high level of trust with their audiences because that’s where people turn for verified news that affects their jobs and local communities. For example, hospital executives find more value in a deep dive at a trade outlet than a more general op-ed targeted to the national public.

Multiple hits create surround sound marketing content

A big media hit is like a solo firework: It creates a lot of noise all at once, but once the flash is gone, the sparks fade out, and the excitement is over. However, the digital era makes for a thrilling pyrotechnics show that lasts.

That’s because every media placement has the potential for repurposed marketing content. Each article, interview or op-ed is an asset for posting on the company website or social media pages and adding to the newsletters that reach investors and other stakeholders.

Plus, a series of placements creates a Google footprint. Remember the SEO benefits that accrue from smaller-tier placements? Audiences looking for brand or industry specific information will find what you’re saying and offering much more easily with a well-laid trail.

Singles, doubles and steals set up the grand slam

Many factors play into business success, baseball victories and earned media. You can swing for the fences all you want, but you really have to hit the sweet spot -- and even then, the grandeur of a home run means nothing if you’re two runs behind and nobody’s on base. It takes singles, doubles, steals, walks and the other team’s errors to fully set up for the grand slam.

In the same way, securing top-tier press in the digital era requires smaller, diverse placements that are incorporated into the overall marketing and branding strategy. It’s the only way to create credibility to shape your narrative -- not just with customers and investors, but with the media gatekeepers who call the balls and strikes in the press.

Dustin Siggins is founder of Proven Media Solutions.

• CBS averaged 15.3 million viewers for the men’s Final Four on Saturday night, per Nielsen fast-national data, marking the doubleheader’s best figure since 2017 (well before out-of-home metrics were factored in), reports SBJ’s Austin Karp.
• The NFLPA hired longtime Washington insider Liz Allen as its new chief external affairs officer, filling the gap left by George Atallah’s departure in January, writes SBJ’s Ben Fischer.
• TelevisaUnivision was unable to air Saturday night’s Liga MX match between Club América and C.F. Pachuca in the U.S. after the network found itself caught in the middle of a dispute between Pachuca and the club’s former Mexican broadcast partner, Grupo Lauman, notes SBJ’s Alex Silverman.
• The Red Sox spent nearly half a million dollars on baseballs during the 2024 regular season, a bit of trivia revealed on the Netflix docu-series “The Clubhouse: A Year with the Red Sox‚” reports SBJ’s Mike Mazzeo.
• Lionel, NASCAR’s toy car licensee, raised prices further following President Trump’s tariff announcements last week, notes SBJ’s Adam Stern.
• NCAA President Charlie Baker doesn’t envision departing any time soon, even amid speculation he might make a run at the seat of Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) 2026, writes SBJ’s Ben Portnoy.