Crisis Management, Horse Racing, NBA teams, New York Times, Olympics

A Star, Big Money, International Appeal, No Language Barrier and Controversy…”The Sport of Kings” Rides A Big Brown Comback…

The beauty of the racetrack is unmistakable.  Anyone who has ever spent a summer late morning and afternoon at some of the world’s great sporting venues never forgets it.  However a sport that seemingly had everything…money, international interest, drama, great branding, gambling, majestic athletes…lost its way through mismanagement and the ability to keep up with the changing times, to say nothing of the large investment needed to raise and breed horses and find the proper venues to run them and show profit.  Recently things have begun a changin…a tragedy, a charismatic athlete and all the drama that leads to a once in a lifetime event may align the moon and the stars for the sport to make a comeback on the PR and marketing side. The drama of Big Brown’s win at the Kentucky Derby, combined with the tragedy of Eight Belles, gave the sport ample coverage of every kind leading up to Saturday’s Preakness.  Then Big Brown’s win, combined with some good positioning by the NTRA (nice job to explain positioning in Bill Rhoden’s Sunday New York Times piece with Alex Waldrop)  and solid activation by Big Brown’s sponsor UPS, took the opportunity to another level.  Now the sport gets to ride two weeks of anticipation, activation and hype to the Belmont Stakes, and has the added opportunity of an invigorated Breeders Cup (and its 25th anniversary) to continue to build across the summer and into the fall.  The importance of star power, as John Rowe pointed out in Sunday’s Bergen Record  has now arrived, as has the influx of strong foreign investors and companies (a great entree for non American brands looking to activate in the United States) and American innovators like billionaire Jess Jackson (interesting piece in Friday’s WSJ on his role in breeding for the future of the sport) . If the NTRA can continue to position the drama, and give good counsel on the positioning of the sport, the beauty and majesty of the “Sport of Kings” may be a story to watch for marketers this summer.

Some other good reads last few days…also on the horse racing front, Sports Illustrated had a great look back at the trotter Dan Patch and his majestic place in the sports world at the turn of the last century…the Wall Street Journal has a good piece on Visa’s campaign and activation going into the Olympics…with the Oregon primary upon us, Senator Barack Obama weighs in on the Trailblazers recent success and his opinion on why they will be ones to watch next year, interesting considering what a political hotbutton the team was in the community only a year or so ago…