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Playing On The Global Stage

Businessweek this week put out their Top 100 Power Brokers In Sports, and in that was a Top 25 worldwide (meaning outside the U.S.).  The list is a great one for anyone to have on hand as sports becomes more global, and continues to show the domination of motor sports (notably F1 despite its financial issues) and soccer as the world players.  In an Olympic year, the key Olympic players also move up the list, and the presence of Yao Ming (the only basketball element) and Lalit Modi show the continued diversity into the Far East and the power the Indian and Chinese markets will have going forward.  One interesting aspect is that there are only four names probably…David Beckham, Maria Sharapova, Roger Federer and Yao…that the casual sports fan in the United States may know.  The smart marketer or ardent fan will at least know almost all, but as brands expand (no names from the Middle East made the list, something that will change in the future) both globally and into this country (as non-American brands look to capture the sports marketplace here) this list and its offshoots will become increasingly more valuable, and the crossover from this list to the largely American 100 will become much bigger.  The entire list as well as the features can be seen here. 

Some other good reads…Helene Elliott has a great read on Alex Ovechkin and his value to the NHL…while Senator Barack Obama went digital this week, Senator John McCain continued his fight for boxing regulation, with wsj.com having a good look at the reasons…Iowa football coach Kirk Ferentz sent a great message this week, suspending his son from the football team for underage drinking…and si.com has a good look back at the 20 years of hoops in Orlando, Charlotte/New Orleans, Miami and Minnesota and all the twists and turns the four franchises have had since the expansion was announced.