Trump Warns Boston, LA of Relocating Major Events, TeamSnap CEO Peter Frintzilas

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0:41That's vanguard.com slash audio. All investing and subject to risk, Vanguard Marketing Corporation Distributor. Donald Trump is rewriting the Washington rulebook and reshaping the global economy. If you're trying to connect the dots behind the headlines, Bloomberg's Trumponomics podcast is here to help. I'm Stephanie Flanders, Head of Government and Economics at Bloomberg. Every week, I'll bring you a smart, focused conversation with reporters and experts from Washington, Wall Street and beyond. Listen to new episodes every Wednesday and follow Trumponomics wherever you listen. This is the business of sports.

1:21Sports are the greatest unscripted show on earth. The next generation of players really grew up with tech and believe in tech. Your face is your ticket. Your face is your wallet. Your face is your access to a club. These are such iconic and important buildings for businesses, for fans. COVID was one of the best things that ever happened to golf. The NFL is a bulletproof business. Racing's unique because there is absolutely no reason why we can't compete with the guys. Come on, is pro pickleball real? Are people really going to tune into this? If you're playing money ball with a huge bag of money, you're going to be really, really good.

1:52Bloomberg Business of Sports from Bloomberg Radio. This is the Bloomberg Business of Sports, where we explore the big money issues in the world of sports. I'm Michael Barr. I'm Damian Sassauer. And I'm Vanessa Perdomo. Coming up, we'll talk youth sports and a sports tech platform that supports over 25 million coaches, players, parents, and administrators across the country. We'll also get under the hood at Dick's Sporting Goods and figure out what is exactly driving its success relative to its competitors. Hmm. All that is on the way. But first, President Donald Trump is warning some cities that he could take some major international sports events away from them.

2:33At a White House event earlier this week, the president told reporters that he would consider moving the 2026 FIFA World Cup out of Boston and shift the 2028 Olympics from Los Angeles if he thought the cities weren't properly prepared or if conditions were unsafe. Here's the president on that issue. If somebody is doing a bad job and if I feel there's unsafe conditions, I would call Johnny, the head of FIFA, who's phenomenal. And I would say, let's move it to another location. And he would do that. He wouldn't love to do it, but he'd do it very easily. He'd do it. And this is the right time to do it.

3:05If I thought Boston was doing something that was going to cause safety conditions for the World Cup, I could say the same thing for the Olympics because, you know, we have events that are in different locations for the Olympics. It's based in L.A. If I thought L.A. was not going to be prepared properly, I would move it to another location if I had to. For more on this and what having these events mean to places like Boston and Los Angeles, we welcome Bloomberg's Free Taylor, who has done reporting on this. Welcome to the Bloomberg Business of Sports. Thanks for having me back. Let's just start from the beginning.

3:44Can he take away the games? It's not feasible. Operationally, it's nearly impossible. I'm not going to say anything's impossible, but this has been in the works for several years. You know, there are a bunch of contracts involved. There are international contracts. It would seem like I know him and Gianni Infantino, the FIFA president, are very chummy. So maybe he could kind of work that and get the FIFA president to move it if he if he desired. But the president himself, as far as we know, cannot move it. It's just too far along. So one of the things that struck me about the comments was that he said he also could move the LA Olympics, you know, if he so desired, but also was bypassing the fact that LA also has World Cup games.

4:38Right. So what is he? Do you think, you know, thinks there's something that's going to change the next three years that LA wouldn't be ready to host the Olympics, but they're fine to host the World Cup next year? I think that he is just kind of going for anything he can when it comes to these blue cities. You know, this isn't the first time he's targeted Boston or L.A. or, you know, Newsom or Boston Mayor Michelle Wu. So he has been trying to crack down in any way he can on them not complying with his mandates that he's brought up, you know, whether it's about immigration or, you know, just general crime or anything he's kind of he's kind of gotten some friction with them from anyone who's kind of standing in his way.

5:29So it's kind of, you know, to be seen, like, can he actually do it? We don't think so. As far as I know, you know, the people that I've spoken to have been like, well, this is just too far along. Like you said, yeah, LA is also hosting the World Cup games, and has been also gearing up for the 2028 Olympics, which takes years and years and years of preparation. There are nations involved like across the globe. So it's not just about the U.S. and it's not just about what Trump wants. Everyone kind of has a stake in this specifically when it comes to the Olympics. So, you know, it's just a little too far along.

6:07It would it would take it would take a lot of effort to really, truly peel it back. He can't just simply be like, well, let's just move it somewhere else. Well, I mean, I mean, Sri, I take your point on the operational infeasibility of moving an event such as this. Take that, you know, that's writ. But I think, you know, we have to take a step back and look at what he's what he's arguing. He's saying that conditions are unsafe. So in the case of Los Angeles with the Olympics, for example, he's saying that Newsom can't protect them from wildfires. My point is, if the president fears for the safety of, I don't know, the citizens of Boston, I mean, can't can he legally just stop it?

6:42Can't he do that? Of course he can, you know, he can propose it. Right. But Trump can basically say he's going to do anything. Right. You know, I guess with the transit projects, like, for example, with congestion pricing, he said, I'm going to stop that. And, you know, you know, he was sued. Like the courts got together and were like, actually, no, we're going to block this from happening. So there is intervention that will likely take place and not just from these cities who are being impacted, but probably the nations who, like I said, have a stake in this, have a financial stake in this, have already put a lot of money towards it, are already preparing to come here for the game.

7:23So it's just not feasible. Is it legal? That's still kind of up for debate. FIFA put out a statement that was this blanket statement that said, essentially, the U.S. government and safety concern, they are basically in charge of safety and they have the right to do this. But Shree, tell me, like, what you think on that? Is it more so they're like, listen, we know it's not going to happen. So we'd rather just not make an enemy out of Trump. I think that is the situation. I think that's been the situation for a lot of entities and politicians and cities and states that have been targeted by Trump on just virtually anything.

8:02I think that the current stance that a lot of these folks are taking is like, yeah, like you said, I they don't even know if this because this is kind of unprecedented. Like they don't even know if this is a possibility or how this would go, how long it would take. Like, you know, what's they know what's at stake, but it's so far along that it's extremely unrealistic that he can snap a finger and it'll all go away. Well, I see. That's the thing. You have so many governing bodies and you have very strong governing bodies, which brings me to the point. If you are a supporter in Boston and you just heard the president say that you're thinking, hey, man, we got a lot of coin going into this.

8:46How much money is Boston expected to make with the World Cup? So Boston itself is expecting to get a$1.1 billion economic windfall from this. So it's – and I think L.A. with the Olympics, not even the World Cup, but with the Olympics, I think L.A. as a city is expecting about$18 billion, up to$18 billion from some projections that I've seen. So there's a lot of money on the table here that they're like, OK, we're putting in all of this effort. This is going to be our return on investment. And that kind of benefits these regions, even if temporarily. Like it's creating jobs and the hotel sector and the hospitality sector is going to see like a big boost.

9:36And I just don't think that not only is it not feasible to kind of just do it overnight, but it is detrimental to the cities. So I think that Trump is trying to scare blue cities and their leaders, which he kind of has been doing. Boston has been kind of a punching bag for, I mean, this whole year when it comes to just like a swath of his policies. So I'm not surprised that he has targeted Boston in this situation. I'm sure if – he's targeted Chicago and he's targeted Portland. If we're trying to see a pattern here, it's all blue cities and blue states where he's like, you don't agree with me.

10:25You're not complying. I'm going to find a way to hit you where it hurts. If he can actually do that in time and derail something that's happening in mere months, I would be very, very surprised if he was able to really get this off course. Well, it would have to happen very soon. Exactly. And we have yet to see a city step up and be like, hey, we're ready. So let's play a game here and see who would actually like. is it the matter of anyone basically with an NFL stadium could step up and be like, hey, we're ready? Well, in all fairness, these these cities kind of put in their bid when Biden when the Biden administration was was was still in the White House.

11:15So, you know, this has been long before Trump. So I do think that, you know, in these cities defense, it takes a very long time to prep. They're not ready yet, which you and I have talked about. Like they're still not ready. When they will be ready is another conversation. But I don't think that any other city has been like has gotten the funding and has really been, you know, prepping to do this in the same way. Maybe maybe, you know, a city that hosts the Super Bowl often. I mean, but, you know, Vegas, Vegas, that would be fun. Vegas. Look, I mean, you make a great point, Sree, in that preparation is everything.

11:59The amount of money that's already been invested to get these cities game ready. I mean, it's it's I mean, it's a lot of money ready. We're talking tens, if not more millions of dollars. And so look at what the federal government has just done to the city of New York, you know, withholding funds for the big transit project. That's 18 billion. I mean, right there. So it's not like we can discount that this can't happen. If Trump is successful in moving the World Cup games, I don't think that they would happen on time. I don't think people have already bought tickets. Like it's not even about the cities and the nations across the globe that have that have a financial stake in this.

12:32But it's also people have prepared their own pockets. The fans are also kind of setting themselves up to be like, oh, I'm you know, I'm going to follow my team or I'm planning on being in Seattle or, you know, so on and so forth. So it has already trickled down to the fans. So that's not going to go over well either. And to your point about Trump and how he's kind of, you know, set out to to pause these transit, you know, projects in Chicago and in New York, you know, he can withhold the funding for sure. But what I've heard in my reporting on that is that a lot of these projects, when Trump was coming into office, they were like, we're going to try to really hit the ground running and get funding to get us further along so that Trump can't do what he's trying to do now.

13:24Like they have enough or they say they have enough leaning into for the next few. Right. They're like, we have enough financial runway that it's going to be too late for him to step in and be like, never mind. So that's kind of the posturing, I think, with New York specifically and also Chicago. And I think that's the same situation here. There's just too much. They're too far along to where it would just not be operationally feasible. Our thanks to Bloomberg Shree Taylor for joining us. Coming up on the show, we turn to what Dick's Sporting Goods is doing right. For Damien Sassauer and Vanessa Berdomo, I'm Michael Barr.

14:05You are listening to the Bloomberg Business of Sports, Bloomberg Radio around the world.

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15:29real estate modelies, crypto, you really need to hear these conversations. Sometimes it's behaviorists like Dick Thaler or Bob Schiller. Sometimes it's fund managers like Peter Lynch, Bill Miller, Ray Dalio. Sometimes it's authors, Michael Lewis, author of The Big Short, and Moneyball. Regardless of the conversation, these are the folks that move markets each week. That's the Masters in Business podcast with me, Barry Ritholtz. Listen on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is Bloomberg Business of Sports from Bloomberg Radio. This is the Bloomberg Business of Sports where we explore the big money issues in the world of sports.

16:15I'm Michael Barr. I'm Damian Sassauer. And I'm Vanessa Perdomo. Dick's Sporting Goods is doing something right. They've added a ton of stores at a time where online shopping is dominating sales, and a lot of it has to do with parents spending money on kids' sports. Bloomberg News Global Business of Sports reporter Ira Budwe has a new Bloomberg Business Week feature that takes a closer look at what's going right with Dick's Sporting Goods. And he is here now to talk to us about it. Ira, welcome back to the Bloomberg Business of Sports. Thank you. You wrote an article, a great essay, The Secret to Dick's Sporting Goods,$13 billion boom.

16:56Well, what's the secret? The secret is people like me spending more money than they should because their kids play sports and they are constantly at Dick's. And it's a great – the reason I wrote this was because I have this – I wouldn't say love-hate, but it's like I can't get away from the store. But I kind of like it. I enjoy myself. But you look back at my own spending there because it's all tracked by their loyalty app. And it's like, wow, I've spent like three grand in the last two or three years on a whole bunch of things there. It just adds up fast. It's so interesting because I think one of the other things that you had mentioned was in this world of online spending, people are still going into the Dick's Sporting Good stores.

17:43Why do people go in person? Yeah, I mean, I think a big part of their success is that they sell stuff that you want to touch it before you buy it. Now, other sporting goods chains have died, so they've done other things well. R.I.P. Models. I used to spend my whole life there. So it's not like they just fell into this. But I think part of the reason they've been able to find this formula is that people want to feel a glove before they buy it. They want to feel cleats on their feet before they buy them. And it's a little bit more immune to online commerce than like a T-shirt or other things where you just order in three sizes and send the two back kind of thing.

18:19Well, Ira, let's put some numbers around just exactly the scale of Dick's. Starting out in Binghamton, but I mean now it's got, what, 720 stores. Annual sales have doubled to$13 billion since 2019. Profits have tripled over the period and they just announced their intention to purchase Foot Locker. Yeah. So, I mean, for me, I mean, like, where's all the money coming from? Is it really coming from just us? What's the demographic? Like, what's their sweet spot? Who are they catering to? They have done a good job of hitting the middle to upper middle class customer who has been very resilient. So if you look at the brands that they carry, it's on running.

18:57It's Nike. It's Yeti coolers. It's stuff that is not on the cheap end of what they offer. They have a house brand that kind of so that they can hit that customer. and Ed Stack, their longtime CEO, the son of Dick Stack, the founder, he said, look, we want to serve that customer who's at the middle to lower middle, but really our core is the upper middle demographic. Well, I think what was so interesting was, I mean, you met with the son of the founder, son of Dick Stack. And in the early days when they were deciding, I mean, get this one, Vanessa, when they were deciding where to build a Dix, they looked for Best Buys.

19:34Is that right? And like, I don't think Ulta Beauty, but they looked for like where the foot traffic was there. And then they went around the town. Is that right? To look for like people building play sets or building pools or something. I mean, is that right? Yeah, he said it was two things. They started with where's a Best Buy? Because that's just like a good proxy for like, they've done their homework, right? And then they would drive around the neighborhood where there was a Best Buy and just look for swing sets in yards. Brilliant. Because that was a sign of kids. and they know that families are just so key to their business.

20:06So that's, they know that, like when I told him how old my kids were, I have an 11 year old and a 13 year old, they both play a lot of sports. He was like, well, we love families that age because you're going to be doing this for a long time, you know? And he knows he's had, he had five kids who all played sports. He's kind of done with that part of his life, but he knew exactly, you know, how he. Well, I mean, Michael Barr knows this, you know, we're in the world of finance here. And, you know, if you look back into the early days of mortgage-backed securities and things like that, you know, you'll ask people at BlackRock and Morgan Stanley and they'll tell you the truth.

20:36They used to travel around town and be like, oh, this person's building an extension on his house. They're going to prepay on their mortgage. Let's buy these bonds, right? So, I mean, it works. You know, I mean, come on, Michael Barr. Well, that philosophy works well. And this is something else I didn't know. Yes, because I'm stupid because, you know, I didn't realize this. the Dick's House of Sports Stores. They're double the size of the standard locations. I didn't even realize there was a sports store, so to speak. Well, what is that? This is a new concept. They have started to, they describe it as sort of disrupting their own business.

21:12They tried to build a store that was better than what they had. And they've done about 20 of them. And so I went down to the one near Pittsburgh, near their headquarters, where they used the shell of an old Sears. So it's more than 100 ,000 square feet. And what they've done is they've added rock climbing walls. There's a turf field outside. There's batting cages. There's places to putt and rip open packs of cards. And so they're basically leaning into the experiential part of this. And I think it's pretty clever because in my experience, a lot of the times my kids want to go there and you see other middle schoolers there just horsing around with stuff.

21:47And I'm sure that for store managers it's a headache, but they're trying to turn that bug into a feature, right? They know that they can pull people in with all this stuff for the kids to do. And while the kids are doing that, I'm walking around looking at maybe a pair of running shoes attempting me. So it's a pretty clever strategy. I saw one the other day that had the turf field on the outside. And I was so confused. And I was like, did they just put a random soccer field on this wall? Do you remember the McDonald's? The McDonald's that used to have a whole bowl. Well, that was the best. But, like, I mean, those were the best.

22:21But, like, the turf field, like, they don't have, like, games and stuff there, do they? It's interesting how they program it. They will invite, like, leagues and camps to come. But they said that in this one outside Pittsburgh, people have learned the schedule and there's free play time. And people will just show up and play, you know, touch football or soccer or use the track. If you're looking to buy a bicycle from them, they will bring you up and put you on the track and you can ride it around there. So they found a lot of ways to use it. And customers have already kind of discovered it. And it's bringing people there just to just to play.

22:57Yeah, that's crazy. And I think the other thing that we really need to know here is like last year, parents spent more than 40 billion dollars on their kids in youth sports. Right. And it's an increase from 46 percent since 2019. But that can't just be like pandemic spending. Right. Why such a big increase? Do you think it is? Yeah. I mean, this is a booming industry and it's interesting because I think some of it is driven by it's been kind of professionalized and there's like a kind of luxury aspect to it. In baseball in particular, there's all this stuff now that the bats cost more. You have sliding mitts, you have heart shirts, you have all this extra equipment, elbow guards that I never had as a kid.

23:35And so the sort of baseline cost and then what you can spend if you want to go for it, the deluxe is both have gone up a lot. Well, I'd be curious to know what percentage golf is of total revenue, because I'm sure with, you know, golf has become super popular since the pandemic. And they they have become with their in-house simulators and everything. I mean, they fit for I mean, they become a go to for a lot of golfers out there. So I'm sure that's helped as well. But, you know, before we lose you here, Ira, talk to us about Game Changer. You know, what is Game Changer? I mean, you know, we heard about Dick's, you know, investment in Unrivaled, the youth sports conglomerate, you know, Blitzer, Harris and all that stuff.

24:10Like what else are they doing to approach that youth sports segment? So they're basically trying to create as many ways of interacting with sports parents and with young athletes as they can. They know that it's a big part of what comes into their store and who their core customer is. So several years ago, they bought Game Changer, which started out as this app that lets you basically score a baseball game on your phone. So if you're doing a youth baseball game, you don't need an old scorebook. But it's grown into something where you can watch the game. You can hang your phone behind the backstop and then grandma at home can watch the kid's game.

24:46And all these other features, registering for tournaments, keeping track of rosters and so on. So Dick's bought that and it allows them to sync it up with their loyalty program, for instance. And when you open Game Changer, they can try to sell you the bat that they know you're going to need. and um it they told me that you know the person who has both their loyalty scorecard app and game changer spends twice as much as the person who just has the loyalty app so they know these movements right like if they have a game in you know yeah i don't know you know a bunch of kids have a travel game you know you're going to delaware for the weekend you know like there's a dicks down there like hey we know you're gonna maybe need some extra balls or extra batting gloves or whatever right or a hotel or there's all kinds of options right yeah and so between game changer and unrivaled which runs leagues and camps they kind of can watch the whole journey and have a lot of ways to you know target customers and sell to them and keep in touch it's those products that i don't think about that dick sells that really are important i mean coolers and you know for example it's like okay you're watching your kid play blah blah blah blah blah and you've got to bring in a cooler because you have some so you don't want it yeah you don't want to carry a can of beer and let everybody see it you need to write like a part you know you know the trick oh yeah the products that they sell it's a lot now last time i went to by the way a message the dicks sell more bowling equipment because i went to a dicks one time and they said no we're not gonna sell any more bowling equipment and i'm like all right so but but they have really done one whale of a job ira in in cornering the market and i have to salute them on that yeah i mean they are the standout in not just like sporting goods but in big box retail they're one of the main standouts of the last 10 15 years i think the interesting thing to me in your piece was and you said it about baseball and like that wall of baseball gloves all being different colors all the things and people spending all this different money.

26:55But there was also this problem that we thought for a long time that kids weren't getting into baseball. They didn't like it. Or does it just not follow into fandom of the MLB? Or is it like new people like a jazz chism who wears like bright colored stuff that is really changing that for them? Yeah, it's sort of like it's a social media phenomenon. I think in Savannah bananas are a big part of it. And I just think there may also be a – I think there's a bit of a baseball revival on now if you just look at the interest in these playoffs. But certainly in my experience, like the amount of drip that these kids bring with them to a baseball game is different from when I was a kid.

27:34So it's thriving in that regard. Well, I'll tell you this. You know, with my children now being a bit older than you and on the other side of this equation, you know, when I drive by, you know, the Dixon White Plains, New York, I actually get a little bit of a tear in my eye because I don't go in there nearly as much as I used to. I mean, I used to live in that place, but, you know, I'm glad you still get to go. I think it's slowly winding down for me a little bit already, just in terms of the amount of times where the kids are like, can we just go there? You don't have anything to buy. My kids are middle schoolers now, so that's maybe not as, but it still happens.