SBJ Unpacks: MLBPA’s Meyer takes swing at owners’ salary cap proposal

Tonight in Unpacks: Ahead of owners gathering in NYC this week, MLBPA interim boss Bruce Meyer declared Monday that MLB’s salary cap proposal would’ve cost players $500 million alone in 2026, reports SBJ’s Mike Mazzeo.

Also tonight:

• Eric Shanks has led Fox through some of sports’ biggest moments
• Sources: Football player added for college sports Senate hearing
• Fanatics’ World Cup move
• Op-ed: How companies can build brand visibility around events

Listen to SBJ’s most popular podcast, Morning Buzzcast, where Abe Madkour kicks off the week with the legislative session closing in Illinois without a stadium bill for the Bears, the NHL engaging in a reorganization among its top ranks, a big women’s sports weekend in Portland and more.

MLBPA Interim Executive Director Bruce Meyer said Monday that players would lose over $500M if MLB’s hard salary cap and floor proposal, which includes a 50-50 revenue split, were in place for the 2026 season.

“The cap system they’ve proposed is not just bad for all the reasons that we believe cap systems are always bad, but they’ve effectively managed to cobble together the worst system for players in any of the major sports, and it’s not even close,” Meyer told reporters.

For the first time in over three decades, MLB introduced a cap proposal as part of its counter to the union in labor talks, with the CBA set to expire Dec. 1. The union remains vehemently opposed to a salary cap, as it has been for decades.

Meyer said that the league’s proposal was worse than his recollection of the 1994 proposal that resulted in a strike and the World Series being canceled because it includes escrow, which he said basically makes everything non-guaranteed as it is tied to revenue.

“Our union has never been broken and never will be,” Meyer said. “You can take away a different lesson from our history, but that would be a big mistake.”

With the gap between the haves and have nots continuing to increase, MLB’s cap system included a $245.3M hard cap and a $171.2M floor. The league’s proposal also included local media revenue being fully shared.

“Our salary cap and floor proposal addresses our fans’ concerns by leveling the playing field while sharing baseball revenue with the players 50-50 like the other leagues. Under our proposal, major league players will receive more compensation in year one of the system than in 2026. We are ready to listen if the MLBPA wants to counter our proposal at the bargaining table,” MLB spokesperson Glen Caplin said.

The union said in its opening proposal that increased revenue sharing would guarantee every small-market team with a minimum of $240M in revenue annually.

Other key components of the MLBPA proposal include a minimum salary of $1.5M starting in 2027, the elimination of the qualifying offer, free agency for players with five or more years of service time who have reached age 30, and an increase in luxury tax thresholds (to $300M from $244M).

The union says the $240M in minimum revenue sharing would come with stipulations that those funds be used to improve on-field performance, with those teams having payrolls of at least $150M. The MLBPA wants to increase revenue-sharing to smaller-market teams, but also incentivize winning and allowing teams to keep more of their local non-media stadium revenues.

MLB has cited a $446M gap between the total payrolls of the two-time defending World Series champion Dodgers ($515M, including $169M in luxury taxes) and the Marlins ($69M) last season. The last small-market team to capture the Fall Classic was the 2015 Royals.

Still, the union believes owners do not care as much about competitive balance as they do creating fixed-cost certainty and increasing franchise values. Small-markets like Cleveland, Tampa Bay and Milwaukee have all had consistent success in recent years, though they have been unable to win it all.

“We do not accept the premise that there’s some sort of existential crisis going on,” Meyer said.

The league has yet to make proposals on reserve clause issues like free agency or salary arbitration. The union continues to analyze the league’s proposal, though it did make a presentation to its executive board.

As for next steps, Meyer said: “We don’t have a meeting scheduled at the moment but we’re going to be working on that. Even if we’re not making progress on the major economic components, there are a lot of other things to bargain over. We’re never going to refuse to meet or talk. We will [get something scheduled] in the near future.”

Meanwhile, MLB owners are set to convene in New York this week, with labor a significant topic of conversation.

Still, it’s clear that there’s a wide gap between the two sides, even with talks in the early stage.

“Very surprised,” Meyer responded when asked about the gap. “I thought they would try harder to make it look good and they didn’t even do that.”

In late 2011, Eric Shanks found himself in Switzerland in a surreal situation.

Shanks had been named president of Fox Sports the year before, and he was now contending for his first major rights deal: the FIFA World Cup. Soccer’s global governing body had invited the major American sports networks to Zurich for negotiations.

“It’s a bit like a movie script where for some reason, everybody stays in the same hotel, and you’re seeing in the lobby all of your competitors having their own meetings, you’re wondering what they’re talking about,” Shanks recalled. “You get called in to give your presentation, and then at some point in the night, you’re expected to drop an envelope off in the meeting room with your number. And then everybody just kind of sits and waits until you get a phone call.”

Fox had little hope of emerging victorious. ESPN had control of the tournament’s domestic rights from 1994 through 2014, and just about everyone expected the network would remain the home of the World Cup for years to come.

Rather than sit by the phone awaiting the bad news, Fox’s negotiating team of Shanks, Randy Freer, David Nathanson and Claudia Teran instead spent the next day as tourists at the famed Rhine Falls.

“We thought we had absolutely no shot. We would just get on the plane and go home a loser,” Shanks said. “Then we got back to the hotel and got the call that, ‘Hey, we’re going to go into contract with you.’ And we were like, ‘Holy crap.’”

Fox’s winning bid of a reported $425 million secured the men’s World Cups in 2018 and 2022, as well as the women’s tournaments in 2015 and 2019. Shanks remembers John Skipper, formerly the president of ESPN, inviting him to dinner that night in Zurich. Skipper has since suggested Fox’s success was enabled by bribery, but he nevertheless speaks highly of his competitor. Fox has long denied any wrongdoing.

“None of my anger, nor any of my cynicism, has ever been directed at Eric. I was actually happy to see him,” said Skipper, who noted Shanks was always straightforward and friendly. “I just suspect there were some things going on that neither he nor I knew about.”

Beyond being “a standup thing to do,” Shanks said the sit-down in Switzerland also provided valuable early insights into what to expect from FIFA.

In the years since, Shanks and Fox have taken the world’s most-watched sports property to new heights. Skipper wryly offers his version of high praise: “They have produced the second-best World Cups of all time.”

That initial Women’s World Cup in 2015 saw the Americans claim victory for the first time since 1999. The 25.4 million viewers who tuned in to the final against Japan remain a domestic soccer viewership record.

Fox’s broadcast of the 2018 men’s World Cup showed modest gains over prior events despite the United States failing to qualify, and the latest edition in Qatar in 2022 set numerous records. That tournament averaged some 3.6 million viewers for Fox across 64 matches, a 30% increase over 2018, and the final between Argentina and France drew 16.8 million English-language viewers across broadcast and streaming, the most ever for the men’s title game.

“I think with the power of broadcast television at Fox, the promotion that we put into it and then having our first one be a pretty classic performance by the [U.S.] women’s team caught the nation’s attention,” Shanks said.

In 2015, FIFA extended with Fox through the 2023 women’s World Cup and 2026 men’s tournament without even taking those rights to market. The host nations for those events had yet to be selected.

Thus Shanks found himself in another surreal scenario in 2018, when one day before the start of the World Cup in Russia, he and the Fox Sports production team stood in the Kremlin as a united North American bid was awarded hosting rights for 2026. It immediately set the stage for what will undoubtedly be the largest event in the history of Fox Sports.

This summer, Shanks will oversee an unprecedented 340 hours of first-run programming across 39 days. Fox will broadcast 104 total matches — 96 of them before getting a single day off — and have more than 1,000 staffers spread across 16 competition venues in three countries; Fox’s studio in Los Angeles; its distribution center in Tempe, Ariz.; and FIFA’s International Broadcast Center in Dallas. Broadcast plans include the hotly anticipated on-air debut of Zlatan Ibrahimović and a nightly show hosted by James Corden.

David Hill, Fox Sports’ legendary founding president and Shanks’ mentor, said Fox’s coverage will “blow the world’s socks off,” and he believes Shanks is uniquely suited for the task. Not only is he a natural leader, but Shanks, like Hill before him, is the rare network head with a creative background.

“There are a lot of executives that don’t know what it’s like in a control room. They don’t know what it’s like in a studio. They can’t walk in and know instinctively that something is right, or instinctively that something’s wrong,” Hill said. “That’s the ability Eric’s got, simple as that. You have to be cruel to be kind at times, and Eric is a tough dude. He doesn’t take any shit, and I think everyone that works with him appreciates it.”

Sports and storytelling

Shanks is perhaps best known in sports business for his ambitious dealmaking, from negotiating multiple landmark NFL rights agreements to taking a 61% ownership position with the Big Ten Network. But at his core, Shanks is a storyteller. He proudly maintains the title of executive producer, and he says he still gets antsy when he’s not in the truck during a large-scale production. His and Fox’s creative focus earns plaudits from the highest ranks of the industry.

MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred said Shanks is committed to maximizing exposure for his rights partners.

“We have been appreciative of the fact that Fox has put its best promotional foot forward with respect to baseball for many, many years,” Manfred said. “We get really high-quality production from them. … The Field of Dreams Game would not have come off the way it did without Fox. It was obviously our game and originally our idea, but the event itself was what it was in large part because of the partnership with Fox.”

The sentiment is echoed by IndyCar owner Roger Penske, who said Shanks “comes up with an idea a day.”

“It’s Blackhawk helicopters flying down the straightaway over the cars. Having all of the Fox morning shows and nightly shows coming out to the speedway. Having [Tom] Brady here and Gronk in the Snake Pit,” Penske said. “That all came from Eric and his ideas. And all the technical shots we have now of the car, he’s brought that over to us, too. The viewer is much more engaged because there’s more knowledge.”

Penske added that this summer’s Freedom 250, IndyCar’s unprecedented street race in Washington, D.C., was originally Shanks’ suggestion.

Shanks’ creative excellence and passion for both sports and media stretch back to his formative years in the Midwest.

Born David Eric Shanks, the Fox Sports boss grew up in rural Brazil, Indiana, about an hour’s drive west of Indianapolis. A sports fanatic, Shanks cheered for the Pittsburgh Steelers — the Colts didn’t relocate to Indy until he was 12 — and would skip school to catch races at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. His first internship was at the track, and he covered and photographed sports for a local newspaper and worked as a DJ at local station WSDM-FM.

Even then, he was finding ways to engage with an audience. After being dumped by a high school girlfriend, Shanks spent six hours in the DJ booth fielding listener heartbreak stories and playing nothing but Nazareth’s “Love Hurts.”

“I would play the song, I would take other breakup stories. I would listen to the guy tell his story about getting broken up with and I would be like, ‘Dude, it sucks, but you know what? Love hurts.’ And I would hit the button again,” Shanks laughs. “It was one of the greatest nights in Brazil, Indiana, radio history.”

Shanks played both quarterback and defensive back at Northview High School, where he believes he still holds the record for most interceptions made and thrown. He hoped to play ball at Indiana University, but his efforts to walk on under coach Bill Mallory didn’t go far.

Instead, Chuck Crabb, the school’s longtime PA announcer and a Brazil native, helped Shanks land a job with the athletic department. Shanks, who says he was “enamored” with storytelling, was also enrolled in IU’s media school and produced documentaries for a student television station, including one on former Indiana senator and presidential nominee Wendell Willkie.

Though Shanks didn’t yet see a career path in sports media, his two loves crossed time and again. In fact, he was tasked with guiding director William Friedkin and producer Ron Shelton while they were on campus working on “Blue Chips,” the 1994 film featuring Shaquille O’Neal and Bobby Knight’s Hoosiers. Shanks spent the ensuing summer working as star Nick Nolte’s driver, and he’s credited as a production assistant on the film.

Even more critically, Shanks served as the IU athletic department’s liaison for networks that came to town for game broadcasts, often sitting in the production truck or at the announcers’ table to help with statistics.

“Then CBS started saying, ‘Well, hey, next week there’s a game at Purdue, would you want to drive up? Or would you want to drive to Illinois?’” Shanks recalled. “Next thing you knew, I was doing a ton of work for CBS while I was working at school and still going to classes. After a while, getting to know everybody, CBS came and asked me if I would go to the Olympics in Norway.”

The 1994 Lillehammer Games provided Shanks a chance to rub shoulders with the likes of Pete Macheska and Rich Russo, both of whom went on to enjoy long careers at Fox, as well as Tim Scanlan, now vice president of sports broadcast for Octagon, and Keith Pelley, recently named president and CEO of the Toronto Maple Leafs. But Shanks especially impressed producer Richie Zyontz.

It turns out a young Shanks was an early internet adopter and able to get Zyontz, a die-hard New York sports fan and self-proclaimed “hall-of-fame luddite,” box scores for the Knicks and Rangers while abroad. Later that year, when Zyontz had to staff a crew after landing at the newly launched Fox Sports, he knew where to turn.

“I got hired as a producer, and Ed [Goren] and David Hill, they were tied up trying to put together a sports division. So they kind of gave me the autonomy to put together what was then considered the B crew,” Zyontz said. “I needed to fill out my crew, and I needed a broadcast associate. And I’m thinking, gosh, what about that kid from Norway? He was pretty sharp. … So I contacted Eric, and he said to me, ‘You know what, I was just about to call you.’”

Shanks had returned from Norway only to discover that he had missed too many classes to graduate on time. Rather than make them up, he departed IU without a degree and moved to New York, initially to work as a researcher for CBS. When Zyontz called, Shanks jumped at the chance to join the upstart Fox Sports.

Climbing the ranks

By 1993, Rupert Murdoch’s Fox Broadcasting Company had been on the air nearly a decade, but was still seen as a clear underdog to the big three of ABC, CBS and NBC. That changed in December of that year, when the network outbid CBS for the NFL’s NFC package by agreeing to pay a then-stunning $1.6 billion over four years.

That pivotal moment led to the creation of Fox Sports, which became a melting pot of production and on-air talent from across the industry. Shanks, who was there from the start, got a front-row seat to the impact of talents like Terry Bradshaw and John Madden. He also learned that the analyst, not the play-by-play announcer, ought to be the center of attention. That ethos clearly remains strong today, as demonstrated by Fox’s ardent pursuit of Brady for its lead NFL booth and Ibrahimović for studio work during this summer’s World Cup.

Shanks spent his early years at Fox on the road with production crews. Fox’s NFL broadcasts brimmed with cutting-edge innovations, but Shanks also quickly discovered a disconnect between the truck and the studio back in Los Angeles.

“The communication was bad. You never got the materials that you needed to get, you’d get headshots that were wrong,” Shanks said. “We had this incredible graphics package that other networks had never seen before. We had headshots for starting lineups, which wasn’t really a thing. And so I’m calling up the starting lineup for the Eagles and there’s no Randall Cunningham. I’m like, how do we not have Randall Cunningham?”

Shanks proposed that he could instead serve as a go-between for the truck and HQ. That role not only gave him a chance to further flex his creative muscles, but it also allowed him to engage directly with the network brass in Los Angeles. He was climbing the ranks before long.

Shanks went on to produce the popular “The Best Damn Sports Show Period,” one of the first personality-driven studio shows. He also spent a year working on an interactive television joint venture led by James Murdoch. Though that project ultimately didn’t go far, Hill was nevertheless blown away by his rising star.

“He did the most magnificent job. He understood the editorial, he understood the technical, he was a great team leader and he impressed the daylights out of me,” Hill said. When Hill got a call about the newly launched Sky Italia needing a sports head, Shanks was the obvious pick.

“I said, ‘I have a young guy here who I think is going to make a first-class executive, and this would be perfect for him to learn,’” Hill shared. “So I call [Shanks] in and say, ‘How’s your Italian?’ And he said non-existent. So I said, ‘Well, you better get yourself a dictionary, because you’re headed to Milan tomorrow.”

In late 2001, weeks before his 30th birthday, Shanks boarded a flight to Italy. There, he built a new sports network from the ground up, overseeing the acquisition of Serie A rights and producing NFL Europe games. He also got his first exposure to a live look-in show, which ultimately inspired the creation of NFL RedZone several years later.

“His greatest achievement was to create a functioning sports division in a country where he didn’t know the language,” Hill said. “Think about that: You walk in, you have no idea what you’re doing, you have no idea of the language, you have no idea of the culture. And yet within six months, you’ve figured it out. You’ve started making hires, you’ve started getting contracts in, you’re starting to put it to air.”

“I would wager that the experience that Eric got — starting that division from nothing, and learning the language and gaining the trust — prepped him for this huge job more than anything else,” Hill added.

Creative innovator

By the time Shanks returned stateside in 2003, Hill knew he’d found his sports network’s future president. But he said his plan to send Shanks to New York to learn the advertising business was overruled by Fox’s Chase Carey, who was about to take over as CEO of the newly acquired DirecTV. He saw in Shanks a capable lieutenant.

Just days after returning from Italy, Shanks began as executive vice president of entertainment for DirecTV, and the move couldn’t be timed any better: The satellite television provider was in the middle of negotiating a new Sunday Ticket deal with the NFL. Shanks, leaning on his experience overseas, ensured DirecTV’s contract included a two-sentence clause guaranteeing the right to air live look-ins to every NFL game, laying the foundation for NFL RedZone.

Hans Schroeder, the executive vice president and COO of NFL Media, said Shanks is “one of the most creative sports executives there is.”

“When you bring anything to Eric with a challenge and a creative opportunity, you’re going to get a ton of ideas, a ton of passion, a ton of excitement about figuring out ways to innovate,” Schroeder said. “He’s always looking to push the envelope, always looking to find ways to improve.”

Innovation is a hallmark of Shanks’ time at DirecTV. His name is on at least 20 patents issued to the company, and he drove DirecTV’s deal with Augusta National for a multiview broadcast of the Masters.

His focus on innovation remains strong since being named president of Fox Sports in 2010, succeeding Ed Goren in the role. At just 38 years old, Shanks was believed to be the youngest sports network head in history.

Shanks has since traded in the title for CEO. Brad Zager, Fox Sports’ current president, said he’s most impressed by his boss’ “thirst to be at the forefront” of technology. In fact, the walls of Shanks’ office at the Fox studio lot in L.A.’s Century City are adorned with plaques of his various patents.

“There’s a reason why we do more in 4K than anybody else. There’s a reason we’re embracing AI as much, if not more, than anybody else,” Zager said. “[Shanks] is always talking to me about innovation, he’s always talking about moving forward and making sure we don’t rest on our laurels. … I don’t think that’s ever going to slow down. That’s just who he is.”

Those efforts will be on full display this summer.

In 2022, Fox Sports unveiled Stage A, the world’s largest permanent volumetric stage, an LED-powered replacement for green screens. Or it was the largest, until Fox broke its own record last year. Stage B, a massive 54-million-pixel set just down the hall, will serve as the studio home for the 2026 World Cup. Shanks wouldn’t disclose Fox’s investment in the build-out, but he seems like a proud parent as he shows off the set’s capabilities, which include augmented reality graphics.

“Part of it is being able to show viewers what they couldn’t normally see, and then just bringing things to life in a new way,” Shanks said. “A lot of the traditional stuff is super important. … But for as much as we focus on that, there’s also a super geeky side here.”

Vision and passion

Beyond the reproductions of his patents, Shanks’ office also features a framed Peyton Manning jersey and hints of his fondness for hunting and cigars. He no longer rides motorcycles — he said his wife, Brenda, insisted he trade in his three bikes for three kids — but was recently awaiting the delivery of a new special-edition Corvette, his wife’s birthday gift.

Shanks’ eldest, daughter Maisie, recently departed the nest to pursue a career in wildlife rehabilitation. His two sons are still in high school. The family lives on an active avocado and citrus farm around 80 miles north of Los Angeles in Ojai, where Shanks is also an owner of the Ojai Valley News, a local newspaper with some 2,200 subscribers. Shanks believes it’s California’s oldest independently owned paper.

Though he never finished his college education, Shanks, now 55, loves returning to campus twice a year to teach a class at IU. He admits he’s hoped the school would grant him an honorary degree, though it hasn’t materialized yet.

“I hosted an event there a few years ago, and the head of the media school was there and he said, ‘Hey, I hope you don’t mind, but I looked up your transcript.’ And I am thinking to myself, all right, this is it, don’t act too excited,” Shanks recalled. “And the guy said, ‘I talked to the dean of admissions and the dean of students.’ I’m like, holy shit, here comes the honorary degree. And he said, ‘We’ve all decided that you can finish online at your own pace.’”

“I was like, ‘Well, thanks.’ But if I do want to finish my degree, I’m going to move back to Bloomington and have a great time,” Shanks laughs. “I’m going to be Rodney Dangerfield doing ‘Back to School,’ I’m going to start my own fraternity.”

If he’s disappointed, it certainly doesn’t show. Ever the creative, Shanks knows what engages an audience.

“I think it’s a better story not having it,” Shanks shared with a grin. “Because if they give you the honorary degree, the story’s over. But now the story continues, which is great. So maybe when I’m dead.”

And storytelling unsurprisingly remains a focus in the weeks leading up the start of the World Cup.

About a month before the kickoff match, Shanks emerged from a planning meeting with Zager and VPs of production Judy Boyd, Zac Kenworthy and Joel Santos. They reviewed minute-by-minute rundowns of Fox’s opening night and the U.S.’s first game against Paraguay. Planned original content includes a retrospective of the U.S.-hosted 1994 World Cup and a feature from Tom Rinaldi about how FIFA grew the turf for every World Cup venue.

Zager explained that there’s simply no blueprint for an event of this magnitude, and that, since the final day of Qatar 2022, Shanks has “made sure we were not just checking boxes, but creating new boxes to check by producing this in a way that gives it the grand scale that this event deserves.”

“That all started with Eric and his vision, and his passion for soccer, his passion for the World Cup, his passion for production, his passion for Fox Sports,” Zager said. “That’s what people at home are going to see this summer. All of those things that Eric is not just passionate about, but really excels at, coming across the screen as people enjoy the World Cup.”

A witness list for Wednesday’s college sports-centric hearing before the Senate Commerce Committee is being finalized with a new name attached.

Utah defensive end Lance Holtzclaw is slated to be among those in D.C. this week to provide an athlete’s perspective, sources told Sports Business Journal on Monday.

Holtzclaw is not a household name. He is a current Power Four football player who has lived through the transfer-portal era and can speak to how NIL, eligibility and roster rules affect athletes outside the sport’s superstar class.

A wider list of witnesses that includes former Alabama head coach Nick Saban, ex-West Virginia President Gordon Gee, Pac-12 Commissioner Teresa Gould and Notre Dame Athletic Director Pete Bevacqua had previously been reported and was confirmed by SBJ.

The hearing comes a week after Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) introduced the Protect College Sports Act in an effort to address a slew of challenges leaders in the industry have lobbied for in recent years.

The bill touches on everything from opening the door to pooled media rights, re-instituting the one-time transfer rule, a five-year athlete eligibility clock and embowers the NCAA and College Sports Commission to create scrutiny around and prohibit third-party NIL deals.

“The issue is that the era of NIL and revenue sharing has let the boosters out of the box again,” Cantwell told SBJ last week. “... We thought it was important not only to put the rules in, but then to make sure that the NCAA enforce them. So, we’ll see how that goes, but we think an unlimited arms race and lacking of definitions was a really bad idea.”

The actual path to ratification, of course, has its challenges. The bill would need 60 votes in the Senate and a simple majority in the House.

There’s also a matter of timing. Congress heads for a recess in August, leaving effectively just June, July, September and October for legislation to make its way through Congress before midterms project to impact those in both chambers.

When FIFA named then-nascent ADI Predictstreet as the official prediction markets platform for the World Cup early in April, many wondered what that would mean in the U.S., where the federal government’s regulation of event contracts would preclude the Abu Dhabi company from securing a license in time for the tournament.

We learned the answer this week when Fanatics revealed that it had secured pass-through rights that will allow it to offer the only official World Cup event contracts, co-branded with Predictstreet on its Fanatics Markets app and site. Brokered by Fanatics, the contracts will trade on an exchange operated by Crypto.com, regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

While Kalshi, Polymarket, PrizePicks, DraftKings and many others will have World Cup prediction products — functioning as a workaround in states in which online sports betting remains illegal, such as California and Texas — only Fanatics will be able to use official FIFA marks and licensed content on its app and in advertising and promotions.

You can check out the hub and its early markets here.

Fanatics Betting and Gaming CEO Matt King said the two began discussing options shortly after Predictstreet announced its FIFA deal, which came about a week before it launched a crypto-based site that isn’t available in the host U.S. It was issued an exchange betting license by Gibraltar gambling regulators last month.

“For us the biggest thing was the fundamental question of, ‘Does working with Predictstreet allow us to deliver a better fan experience for soccer fans in the U.S. during the World Cup who want to trade prediction markets?’” King said. “Given the rights they have, the answer was absolutely yes. Once you answered that question the answer was pretty easy.”

The World Cup marks the first major event since prediction apps offered by DraftKings, FanDuel and Fanatics began expanding their sports menus, girding for a fight for customers in California, Texas, Florida, Georgia and other states that their sportsbooks had been boxed out of as attempts to legalize — or in the case of Florida, open to more than one operator — online sports betting have stalled.

DraftKings and FanDuel have both said they expect to spend $200 million to $300 million launching prediction markets, likely beginning during the World Cup and accelerating at the start of football season.

“What we’re going to witness this summer all the way through football season is an advertising avalanche like we have not seen in a very long time,” King said. “The benefit we have is we’re in this for the long game. You’re not going to see us trying to go toe-to-toe with people that are going to spend what we would think are uneconomic dollars on advertising.

“It will be a bit of chaos, I’m guessing, this summer and into the fall.”

Fanatics ramped up its TV ad spend last fall with a campaign featuring Livvy Dunne, which it followed with a splurge on a Kendall Jenner Super Bowl spot. But its TV frequency still paces well behind DraftKings and FanDuel. Instead, it focuses on integration with the broader Fanatics ecosystem, with a focus on FanCash, a loyalty program that allows bettors and buyers to earn reward money with each bet or purchase. FanCash earned from placing bets can be spent on merchandise, and vice versa.

“We’ve found FanCash to be a huge reason why people are switching to using the sportsbook,” King said. “And the ability to bring that to prediction markets [has us] super excited because we think the same will hold true there. There are no loyalty programs in prediction markets. And so, we think we can offer something that we know is really compelling to sports fans.”

The strategy appears to be working. Our tracking in 15 states that report handle by individual sportsbooks showed Fanatics pulling ahead of BetMGM and into a podium spot at the start of last football season. A rebound put BetMGM back ahead in January, but Fanatics held a 10% share to BetMGM’s 8% in March.

Now comes the battle to accumulate share among the 45% to 50% (depending on how you count Florida, which has legalized but still will be a prediction market hotbed) of U.S. adults who can’t bet legally from their homes.

Sportsbook and prediction market operators are optimistic that the World Cup will drive volume during what is typically their slow season. Soccer represented about 5% of U.S. handle in the last two years, peaking at 8% to 9% in the summer months, when basketball drops off. Not surprisingly, Fanatics reports that only 4.7% of its soccer handle comes from MLS.

To grow that handle appreciably, and attract signups for predictions accounts, operators will have to engage the vast swath of bettors who rarely bet on the sport.

“If you watch soccer and have any inclination to bet, you’re probably already betting [on it],” King said. “But, similar to March Madness, you definitely get people who are bettors that don’t normally follow college basketball who will make a bet, because they are following March Madness. I think you’ll get that here.”

Miami has established itself as one of the world’s premier destinations for major sporting events. From international tennis and Formula 1 racing to the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the city has fast emerged as a magnet for athletes, media, executives, and fans from around the world.

Miami’s global brand appeal, international connectivity, tourism infrastructure, and long list of world-class venues — coupled with an expanding pool of multinational corporations doing business here — is driving this trend.

With South Florida’s calendar of events getting busier and the “get-in price” for official sponsorships increasing, small, midsized, and regional businesses that lack seven-figure marketing budgets are at risk of getting priced out. Fortunately, there are countless opportunities to tap into the hype surrounding these events without breaking the bank.

Thought leadership tied to the moment

Business and civic leaders charged with shaping their local economies can share insights about how these events impact industries such as real estate, hospitality, tourism, logistics or infrastructure. Publishing op-eds, participating in interviews or offering commentary on the economic ripple effects of global competitions helps position company leaders as credible voices in the broader conversation.

For example, real estate firms may discuss increased hotel demand and development trends, while hospitality leaders can speak to tourism patterns and visitor spending during event weeks.

Strategic media engagement

Major sporting events also bring a surge of national and international media interest. While sports reporters will tend to focus on the competition itself, business, lifestyle and travel journalists often explore the broader economic and cultural impact of the host city.

Companies that provide local expertise, industry insights or commentary on business trends tied to sports tourism can position themselves as valuable sources for journalists covering the event from a broader perspective.

For communications teams, these moments offer an opportunity to pitch stories that connect industry trends to the global spotlight currently on the city.

Corporate hospitality and relationship building

One strategic advantage of aligning with major events is the high concentration of business decision-makers in one place. Executives, investors, clients and industry leaders frequently travel for these events, creating natural opportunities for networking and business development.

Increasingly, companies are timing flagship programming around these moments to capitalize on the influx of visitors already in town. In a recent example, Miami law firm Bilzin Sumberg hosted its annual real estate conference during the week of the Formula 1 Miami Grand Prix and featured Related Ross CEO Steve Ross as keynote speaker. Ross, whose leadership spans real estate, professional sports and entertainment — including ownership of the Miami Dolphins and Hard Rock Stadium — was instrumental in bringing Formula 1 to Miami. This put the firm in position to leverage the event and its relationship with Ross without relying on official sponsorship rights.

Private receptions, executive dinners and industry roundtables held during event weeks similarly create meaningful engagement opportunities when many key stakeholders are already gathered in the same market.

Digital and social media storytelling

Even without official branding rights, companies can still participate in the conversation online.

Digital platforms allow organizations to highlight their presence during major events, share perspectives about the city’s global moment and showcase client or community engagement. Behind-the-scenes glimpses of networking events, commentary about the economic impact of the competition, or reflections on a city’s evolving role in international sports can all help connect a company’s brand to the larger narrative.

The goal is not to replicate sponsorship branding, but to align the company with the excitement and momentum surrounding the event.

Community and cultural engagement

Major sporting events spark activity far beyond the venue itself, creating opportunities for businesses of all sizes to participate in the broader cultural energy surrounding the competition.

Across Miami, restaurants, hospitality groups and cultural destinations increasingly create programming tied to marquee events, recognizing that visitors experience these moments as part of a larger citywide atmosphere. During Formula 1 Miami Grand Prix weekend, for example, Monte Carlo nightlife concept Selva hosted a race-day watch party in Brickell featuring premium seating, immersive audio and curated hospitality programming designed to extend the race experience beyond the track.

The opportunity is not limited to large hospitality brands. Local businesses are increasingly finding creative ways to align with major events and reach international audiences. Navi Coffee & Flower, a Coconut Grove-based concept, partnered with Cadillac and Jim Beam as a featured local vendor at the official Formula 1 Team Headquarters in the Miami Design District — demonstrating how smaller brands can leverage event-driven visibility through strategic collaborations.

Restaurants have also embraced the moment. Miami eatery Chevre capitalized on race-week traffic by promoting its viral “Golden Glizzy,” a luxury hot dog featuring wagyu beef, truffle and caviar that gained popularity during the Miami Open and continued attracting visitors during Formula 1 weekend.

Nonprofits are also getting creative. Education organization Achieve Miami recently teamed up with FIFA to launch a series of programs that that use the power of sport to instill discipline and teamwork in children and youth. This initiative is serving as a powerful branding and marketing tool for the nonprofit ahead of the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

The strategic takeaway

The most successful brands are those that understand that the value of major sporting events extends far beyond official sponsorships. For companies willing to think creatively, these global moments offer opportunities to elevate their voice, “strengthen’” relationships, and participate in conversations that reach far beyond the stadium.

Victoria Cela Goudie is an account director and Wylie Nelson is an account executive with Schwartz Media Strategies, a Miami-based integrated communications firm.

• Sports Business Journal released the 2026 class of Forty Under 40 in this week’s magazine. The 2026 class includes 16 women, the most ever featured in Forty Under 40.
• GSE Worldwide is adding veteran events executive Jeff Newman as its SVP/properties and sales, where he will work across GSE’s properties, hospitality and experiential businesses in a hybrid operations and revenue role, reports SBJ’s Irving Mejia-Hilario.
• Game1, a predictive AI platform for developing and scouting youth soccer players, is expanding its product from Europe to the U.S., notes SBJ’s Joe Lemire.