SBJ Unpacks: Houston a test of new MLS ownership era

Tonight in Unpacks: Ted Segal has put five years and millions of dollars into the Dynamo, along with the NWSL’s Dash, at a time when MLS ownership demands aggressive investment. He’ll find out if it pays off with a post-World Cup bump, writes SBJ’s Irving Mejia-Hilario in this week’s magazine.

Also tonight:

• World Cup roundup: Sponsor cover-ups an unexpected story
• NBA, NHL enjoy landmark postseason viewership
• The end of the Brendan Sorsby saga
• Op-ed: The global game has outpaced the talent pipeline

Listen to SBJ’s most popular podcast, Morning Buzzcast, where Abe Madkour discusses the genuine joy around the World Cup now that matches are underway, big postseason viewership numbers for the NBA and NHL, Rory McIlroy’s comments showing he isn’t a fan for PGA Tour’s latest two-track tournament plan and more.

Houston is in the middle of the busiest soccer stretch in its history. Over 39 days, the city is hosting seven World Cup matches and an 8.3-acre FIFA Fan Festival expected to draw hundreds of thousands of visitors downtown.

For Ted Segal, it has become the clearest test yet of whether five years of investment in the Dynamo and Dash can convert the soccer‑curious into long‑term customers.

Since buying the clubs in 2021 for roughly $400 million, Segal’s ownership group has spent heavily on stadium renovations, expanded the business operation and repositioned Houston for a more demanding era of MLS ownership — one in which clubs are expected to invest far more aggressively in facilities, staffing, premium inventory and rosters.

“You can’t squander an opportunity that is so rare and unique,” Segal said.

When Segal took on Shell Energy Stadium in 2021, his first walk through the tunnel “took his breath away.” The stadium, a soccer‑specific venue dropped into East Downtown, was within walking distance of the George R. Brown Convention Center and the city’s entertainment district.

2026 FIFA World Cup Coverage

Explore Sports Business Journal’s World Cup hub, featuring news, analysis, and insights on the business behind the global tournament.

But the building needed work. Over the past five years, Segal’s group has spent more than $30 million replacing every seat, creating premium clubs and field-level inventory, and expanding climate-controlled spaces throughout the venue.

“We were woefully low on the premium side, woefully low on conditioned spaces,” Segal said. “In the Houston heat, people are seeking refuge.”

That approach aligned with Jessica O’Neill, who, as the organization’s president of business operations, said “the premium space is truly an arms race,” even as she pushes to elevate the general‑seating experience and lean into groups and youth clubs as a key growth engine.

Those investments reflect the new math of MLS ownership: Clubs can no longer rely on rising franchise values alone. Growth now requires modern buildings, premium inventory, deeper staffs and new revenue streams. In Houston, that has turned Segal’s five-year rebuild into a test of whether aggressive investment can unlock value in a market ownership believes has yet to realize its full soccer potential.

League executives have long viewed 2026 as soccer’s biggest test in America. Unlike 1994, which helped launch MLS, this World Cup arrives with a mature league still searching for its next growth curve.

For Segal, it’s a chance to showcase the domestic product to a global audience and “catapult MLS to the next level” in interest, talent and rights fees over the next decade.

O’Neill sees the World Cup as an opportunity for hardcore and casual fans. Families have been a core strength, but she believes the real growth lane is what she calls “social experience seekers.” Those are people who may not sit for 90 minutes of a match, but want to experience the moment.

“I’m obsessed with that, because we’re in the memories business,” O’Neill said. “We don’t have to replace your EPL or Liga MX club, but we are the local connectivity in your schools, at your soccer clubs, in your neighborhoods.”

In Houston’s crowded sports market, civic and business leaders see the World Cup as more than a month of games.

Houston First CEO Michael Heckman called tourism “the front door to economic development,” while Mayor John Whitmire credited Segal’s group with strengthening the city’s soccer ecosystem through stadium investments, youth programming and community initiatives.

Houston’s fan festival will run the full 39 days of the tournament, one of only a handful of host‑city sites operating for the entire stretch. Segal’s group plans to use the venue for World Cup watch parties, concerts and friendlies on non‑match days to funnel visitors and locals past the Dynamo and Dash crest as often as possible.

Local organizers have already raised more than $30 million in corporate support for Houston’s World Cup effort, surpassing their fundraising goal before the tournament kicks off, said Houston Hispanic Chamber of Commerce CEO Laura Murillo.

The challenge is steep. The Dynamo and NWSL’s Dash have ranked near the bottom of their leagues in attendance in recent years, even as both have shown gains under Segal’s group.

Since 2022, the Dynamo and Dash have increased commercial revenue by 50%, driven primarily by ticketing and partnerships, while building one of MLS’s fastest‑growing season‑ticket bases. That rebound follows a decade in which Houston made the playoffs just once. Still, even with the recent gains, the club is not yet profitable, Segal said. It’s a brutal reminder of how dependent MLS teams remain on local growth and the future upside potentially created by the World Cup.

For Segal, that is the wager: Invest now and trust the growth follows. The World Cup won’t guarantee full buildings, but it will give Houston its biggest opportunity yet to prove the strategy works.

Levi’s can’t win the World Cup, but it won the social media conversation around the tournament this week with a cheeky response to its naming rights signage atop Levi’s Stadium being covered by a white bag.

Without offering an obvious explanation, the denim makers changed their Instagram profile picture to that very same bag, catching the attention of the account’s 10.3 million followers and many more in the soccer ecosystem beyond.

FIFA required host stadiums to cover signage of sponsors that aren’t affiliated with global soccer’s governing body. Brands that are FIFA sponsors, like Coca-Cola, Verizon and a host of AB InBev brands, like Budweiser or Michelob Light, were able to remain uncovered. During the tournament, the stadiums are referred to by their geographic location, Dallas Stadium instead of AT&T Stadium, for example.

Look Company and The Team Live (formerly Wasserman) won FIFA’s RFP for the “Venue Dressing Programme,” but some of the signage covering work was outsourced to local companies.

The cover-ups have become more noticeable in some cases than if the logos had just been left where they were.

MetLife Stadium’s cover-ups were clean and consistent, as were Mercedes-Benz Stadium’s. Those stadiums are hosting the final and a semifinal, so likely drew more attention from FIFA, which was responsible for commercially clean stadium cover-ups.

Other cover-ups were less artful, including the Levi’s bag job and a handful of signs at SoFi Stadium that were nearly translucent. The large SoFi sign outside the stadium and next to its retention pond was covered in FIFA 2026 World Cup branding.

2026 FIFA World Cup Coverage

Explore Sports Business Journal’s World Cup hub, featuring news, analysis, and insights on the business behind the global tournament.

Large sponsor branding on the roofs of Lumen Field and AT&T Stadium were covered, though Mercedes-Benz Stadium’s unusual Mercedes-Benz emblem roof remained uncovered from above (and closed).

In Houston, the timing worked out perfectly; NRG Stadium took down its signage, which will be replaced by Reliant signage (same company as NRG) as part of the venue’s name change headed into the 2026 NFL season.

One social media post noted the piece of blue paint tape covering the Gillette logo on their seat for the Norway-Iraq match. At least 60,000 pieces of tape would have been ripped and placed on the seats at the stadium normally home to the Patriots and Revolution.

At AT&T Stadium, a prominent Ford sponsorship activation featuring stacks of Ford vehicles was easier to cover than remove from the upper reaches of the Dallas stadium.

Even base camps weren’t immune from the requirements. Atlanta United’s Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta Training Ground is home to Uzbekistan as it traverses its first World Cup, but the Uzbeks wouldn’t know that. Atlanta United removed an Emory Healthcare logo from the sign adorning the recently renovated training facility’s primary entrance.

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The Knicks’ first NBA title in 53 years helped the league see its best NBA Finals viewership since Michael Jordan’s last championship in 1998, as well as the best overall playoff figure in 28 years.

The five-game Knicks-Spurs NBA Finals averaged 20.6 million viewers on ABC/ESPN, marking the best figure since Bulls-Jazz averaged just over 29 million for a six-game series on NBC in 1998. Knicks-Spurs was up 100% from a seven-game Thunder-Pacers NBA Finals last year (10.3 million).

The clinching Game 5 on Saturday night delivered 24.5 million viewers for ABC, which is the best NBA Finals Game 5 since Bulls-Jazz got 30.6 million on NBC in 1998. Saturday night’s game peaked at 33 million viewers during the game’s final moments at 11:15pm ET. The five-game Knicks-Spurs series generated over 15 billion views on social media, the best figure yet for an NBA Finals and nearly 3x the previous record set in 2025. Game 5 generated more than 4 billion views, surpassing the previous single-game record set during Game 4.

The NBA averaged 6.35 million viewers for all playoff games across ABC, ESPN, Prime Video, NBC and Peacock, which is the league’s best figure since 1998. This year’s NBA Playoffs are up 34% from 2025 as well.

Brendan Sorsby is no longer heading to Texas Tech, after all.

It was announced late Monday night the embattled quarterback will seek a spot in the NFL’s supplemental draft (the deadline to enter is June 22) rather than continue through the barrage of litigation that ensued over the last several weeks to ensure his eligibility despite placing bets on sports, including his own team.

“I am grateful for the support from my family, my Tech coaching staff, teammates, the community and so many others who have encouraged me to address and learn more about this important issue,” Sorsby said in a written statement. “As my journey continues, I remain fully committed to and focused on being the best I can be, both on and off the field.”

In a saga that included an outlaw football program, a billionaire oil baron and countless billable hours, Sorsby’s change of heart brings an end to one of the most tense recent episodes in college sports’ ongoing reshaping and the persistent fight for anyone — schools, conferences, the NCAA, etc. — to enforce any rules at all.

How’d we get here? Here’s a quick recap:

• March 11: The NCAA receives a tip from federal law enforcement via an online sportsbook that Sorsby has placed tens of thousands of dollars of bets between 2022 and 2025 and across his collegiate stops at Indiana, Cincinnati and Texas Tech.
• April 27: Sorsby enters rehab for gambling addiction after Texas Tech is notified of his prolific activity, which included 40 bets on his own team while at Indiana.
• May 18: Sorsby and his lawyer, Jeffrey Kessler of House settlement fame, file a lawsuit against the NCAA seeking a temporary restraining order that would restore his eligibility for the 2026 season.
• June 8: Lubbock County Judge Ken Curry grants Sorsby a temporary restraining order that will force him to miss the season’s first two games, but would permit him to participate in the rest of the season. The decision is met with immediate backlash from administrators across the country and eventually prompts a 21-minute video featuring Texas Tech President Lawrence Schovanec, AD Kirby Hocutt and coach Joey McGuire detailing their stance.
• June 15: The Big 12 files a complaint in federal court asking for authority to apply potential sanctions against Sorsby/Texas Tech should the Red Raiders chose to play him.

That brings us to Monday.

The morning began with the Big 12 filing suit against Texas Tech, the school president, athletic director, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and other involved parties. The skinny is that the league sought a federal ruling that would grant it the authority to punish Texas Tech should it play Sorsby, who had previously been deemed permanently ineligible by the NCAA prior to receiving the TRO.

The Big 12 presidents and chancellors, too, met Monday to discuss options in the ongoing Sorsby saga, though no determinations were ultimately made.

The entire episode reached a resounding resolution when Sorsby’s camp and Texas Tech billionaire board chair Cody Campbell put out statements around 45 minutes apart from one another related to Sorsby’s decision.

“The bottom line is that Texas Tech did absolutely nothing but act with complete integrity through this entire process,” Campbell wrote.

There will be plenty who take issue that assertion, but the more pressing question is what, if any, lasting impact will this saga have on college sports moving forward?

The TRO in Texas didn’t necessarily mean athletes could suddenly gamble on anything and everything, but it did bring a collective feeling of the sky falling around the industry.

If the NCAA — and by proxy, the schools and conferences — couldn’t enforce a rule as simple as banning players who gamble on their own teams, what good are any rules at all?

For all the talk about self-governance (looking at you, SEC and Big Ten), the Big 12’s fight with Texas Tech felt like a Ground Zero for what’s to come.

Round 1 was a win for the conferences. But like all modern blockbusters, a sequel almost certainly looms.

The sports industry has gone global. Its talent pipeline hasn’t.

That gap is no longer theoretical. It’s showing up in how organizations hire, how teams operate and how quickly the business of sport is evolving beyond the systems designed to support it.

Global is no longer an advantage in sport. It’s the baseline.

Across football, basketball, soccer, golf and motorsports, the industry is now defined by cross-border ownership groups, international fan development strategies and multimarket revenue models. Clubs and leagues aren’t just competing locally — they’re operating as global brands with commercial strategies built to reach audiences across continents.

That shift is accelerating in real time. The NBA’s work with FIBA to build a potential European league with multiple ownership groups already bidding across targeted markets signals how serious global expansion has become. Discussions around alignment with EuroLeague and franchise valuations reaching into the hundreds of millions reinforce a broader reality: The future of major sports leagues is being built across borders, not within them.

This isn’t isolated to basketball. From the NFL’s international expansion to Formula 1’s global media strategy, leagues across the industry are investing aggressively in international growth, not as an experiment, but as a core operating model.

The business of sport has evolved into a global, interconnected system.

The question is whether the next generation of industry professionals is being prepared for that reality.

In many cases, it’s not.

Most talent development models are still built for a domestic, classroom-first environment. Students learn frameworks, terminology and case studies, but often without meaningful exposure to how those ideas translate into real-world operations, especially in international contexts. Even when experiential learning is part of the equation, it’s frequently limited in scope or disconnected from how organizations actually function day to day.

That creates a widening gap between what the industry demands and how talent is actually being developed.

And that gap matters.

Teams, leagues and agencies aren’t just looking for candidates who understand sport business in theory. They need people who can operate inside complex, fast-moving environments who understand how fan behavior shifts across markets, how sponsorships activate differently across cultures and how revenue strategies must adapt in a global context.

Those aren’t skills you develop by sitting in a classroom alone.

They’re built through exposure, repetition and real-world experience.

This summer, I’ll be leading a group of students through a 30-day immersive program embedded with Como 1907 in Italy. The structure is simple: Students aren’t just studying the sports industry — they’re operating within it. The club itself has been intentional about building a global brand, making it a relevant environment for students to see how international growth strategies are not just discussed, but executed.

They’ll observe match-day operations, engage with club executives, analyze branding and sponsorship strategy and see firsthand how a European football club approaches growth, fan engagement and commercial development. They’ll experience how decisions are made, how departments interact and how global strategy is executed in real time.

More importantly, they’ll be exposed to a perspective that is fundamentally different from what most U.S.-based students experience.

That kind of exposure isn’t just valuable. It’s becoming necessary.

Because the gap between domestic preparation and global execution is becoming more visible. Organizations are operating across borders, but talent pipelines are still largely confined within them. The result is a mismatch between the skills being developed and the skills required to succeed.

And that mismatch isn’t just an academic issue. It’s an industry issue.

As sports continues to globalize, the ability to think and operate beyond a single market will become a baseline expectation. Understanding different business models, cultural dynamics and commercial approaches won’t be a differentiator. It will be required.

Experiential learning is moving in the same direction.

What was once considered a value-add is quickly becoming table stakes. Employers are placing more value on candidates who have operated in real environments, who understand how organizations function from the inside and who can contribute from Day 1.

That shift has implications on both sides of the equation.

For educational institutions, it means rethinking how talent is developed. Classroom learning still matters — but it can’t exist in isolation. The next generation of programs will need to integrate applied experiences, industry partnerships and global exposure in a more intentional way.

For the industry, it means recognizing that talent development is no longer just the responsibility of universities. Clubs, leagues and organizations have a role to play in shaping the pipeline through internships, partnerships and immersive opportunities that provide real access and real responsibility.

The organizations that engage in that process will have an advantage. They won’t just be hiring talent, they’ll be helping develop it.

And for students entering the field, the expectation is changing.

It’s no longer enough to understand the industry from a distance. The path forward requires engagement, adaptability and the ability to operate in environments that are increasingly complex and global in nature.

The industry has always evolved. What’s different now is the pace and the scale at which that evolution is happening.

The talent pipeline needs to catch up.

Because the programs and organizations that adapt to this reality will help define the next generation of sports business leaders.

The ones that don’t will fall behind the very industry they’re supposed to serve.

Matt DiFebo is an assistant professor of practice and director of the sport business program at Stetson University, founder of FanSummitGlobal Sport Consulting and the former founder and president of IMG Learfield Ticket Solutions.

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• Longtime Japanese sports media executive Shimon Hoizumi has been named managing director/Japan at MLB, Mazzeo writes.
• Mazzeo also reports the Women’s Pro Baseball League has a deal for its inaugural season with sports authentication platform The Realest that includes a trading card line, a first-year logo and Opening Day patches.
• MLB Network added former Nationals GM Mike Rizzo as part of its Draft Combine coverage on June 23, writes SBJ’s Richard Deitsch.
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• Motor City Golf Club, the newest ownership group in TGL, also bought a team in the soon-to-launch WTGL, the fourth club in the women’s indoor golf league, notes SBJ’s Joe Lemire.
• The Laver Cup, the annual three-day, team-based tennis tournament launched by Roger Federer’s Team8 agency in 2017, has a site and date for its 2027 edition, reports SBJ’s Rob Schaefer: L.A.’s Intuit Dome, from Sept. 24-26.
• Deep Blue Sports + Entertainment and Mondo Metrics are stepping in to fill a data gap in women’s sports, partnering to launch the Women’s Sports Index, writes SBJ’s Rachel Axon.
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