Trust, tech and the direction of sports media

21:04Nick Meacham:I previously hadn't been aware of like poly market and there's a couple of other of these sites where you can now, you can not just start betting on anything. And I think it's almost, and I think it's almost an unintended consequence of the legalization of betting in the U S it's opened this up. So you started with the fan duels and stuff like that. And I saw more negative reaction to sports betting. Part of it is I don't get U S television, but apparently you can't turn on a sporting event without being basically served 800 consecutive ads that's starting to overwhelm people but also some of the now that you have these poly markets where you're not just betting on prop bets and sports they're now betting on literally everything and i remember nick when we had our sports pro ott new york summit maybe 2022 2023 um one of the questions is i was right when some of the states are starting to legalize whether or not betting was good um i think we said for the sports leagues great because now all of a sudden there's been a legalized way for you to monetize something you know money's being spent on but you can't get access to but you had some questions about it concerns about it almost looking at from the uk perspective where they're starting to pull things back um you know start of next season the premier league you're not gonna be allowed to have betting on as a front of jersey sponsorship there's no more tv stuff like that it almost feels like the u.s has sped run that process and i don't think they're actually going to pull back in 2026 but it seems like some of those cracks that we talked about in 2022 become anything it's just i personally didn't know about polymarket um but i see that as a direct um response reaction to sports betting being legalized and just just found it really interesting nick not something i was aware of just had a bit more time to kind of explore things over two months i mean look i've seen some of the stuff that's

22:49Chris Stone:of course the u.s is the one driving this uh i'm gonna say ridiculousness on what people are allowed to bet on these days the one i saw which was linked to sports recently was uh again just now it's becoming content right so on my on my instagram feed someone to put a bet on will again this will be another nfl uh example but i think everyone will get it is that after the game will these two players embrace after the game for and for how long and then over under and it was jared goff and matt stafford for those uh americans who will know that and it was three and a half seconds i think the time was and so they film also live recording that moment and cheer at the when the result happens if they win or what have you so this is where we've got to it's about hugging after a game is what they were measuring but the stuff that's coming into market now is things are real estate value, stock market.

23:47Chris Stone:You can bet on stock market changes with other people. It could be everything. It could be the weather. It can be anything and everything these days. And we know that gambling is dangerous for society. Anyone outside the US who's been in a country where gambling has been legalized, everyone will be able to point to someone they know who has been affected heavily by gambling or heard terrible, terrible stories of people's lives being affected by it so there's no question that betting is bad for society but i remember yeah those those events we run particularly early on all the rosiness that every american was presenting about how exciting this will be and i'm like do you understand that obviously it's such a capitalist country that there'd be no focus on that and that's what i think ultimately will be um the will basically mean that the u.s will hold on to this betting momentum and movement longer than they should because it's too capitalist innate country not to and money gets money in the tax dollars etc from betting and it will be flowed into the appropriate coffers of state politicians and national politicians they're not going to be looking to give up on that anytime soon and we've seen how it has now started to spread very publicly across professional sports now with the types of money that is being spent and then the possibility of players being bribed or or blackmailed in some instances like that's never going to stop it's been an issue for generations and will continue to be an issue but probably all the more public because you will hear them even say that look we can track in more than ever and yeah that that is that is true but there's now more opportunities to uh to basically sort of try and dodge the system right so it's a mess it's going to get worse um before it gets better and i don't know what it would take for the u.s to reset its approach i think what will happen is you'll see basically lots of measures to try and help tracking of it um and that will be about it for a very very long time i don't know what would happen i think you're gonna need some incredible leader to come in in 10 years time or say enough enough is enough but it might be too late for many people by then

26:09Nick Meacham:well it's interesting you you talked about trust earlier as part of authenticity and we saw this happened with the nba had the the whole betting scandal go on while i was away and that undermines trust and you know things like let's just say jared goff has a cousin who's very into gambling and says to him hey there's a bet out there saying you're gonna talk to matt stafford for three seconds can you make sure to speak to him for four um it does start to under it it's it's too easy i mean not to make this political like i saw something someone made something like a few million because they bet on the u.s coin into venezuela by a certain date and it's sort of like how would anybody know that like and just you get it we're not going to go to that but like it's so easy if like i always found it really interesting like what color tie is troy aikman gonna wear if i'm troy aikman i'm calling up whoever and be like hey i'm wearing a you know purple tie like Like, it's just, it is a little concerning.

27:02Nick Meacham:And it's just, I've seen, I just saw more of it over the last couple of months while I was off again, probably just because I had more time to scroll through things. And just, yeah, it's an interesting moment.

27:12Chris Stone:Yeah, look, I think there's some good examples I've heard of this. And I think it's at the top end when these players and personalities are getting tens and tens of millions a year, I actually think they're the ones that you need to worry about least. And there is a lot of measures that are being taken by organizations. I will defend, I've been very negative about, but I would say there is a lot of work being done to uncover these opportunities. So if they start to see trends on someone betting on Troy Eggman's tie every week, they will look at who that is and then do research into them, particularly if it's needle moving gambling to determine if it's something they need to focus on and investigate.

27:52Chris Stone:So I think that is one thing. I think what it can start to get tricky is if you think particularly in like team sports um where there might be players who are earning the minimum wage in those respective sports and it could be all right using an american football analogy all right in you're in special teams just miss a block try and miss every block in the special team for example and lead to a potential opportunity for a special teams touchdown which is you know there's lots of plays it's just a higher likelihood doesn't mean it's a guaranteed win but there can be things that you can move the needle five ten percent by just getting people to just do a little bit different to what they would and still be got quote unquote doing their job i think those people are on the lower end of the spectrum because in in professional sports particularly in the us the top end gets all the money and at the bottom end you know people will say they're very well paid but the minimum wage is one fiftieth of what they're getting paid at the top end naturally that's going to lead to opportunities and pressure coming from different directions so um sports has got a tough predicament it has but it has for generations this is nothing new i come from australia and australia is has a extremely high betting culture a bit as big or bigger than the u.s um in terms of it's ingrained into society far further with pubs and bars all having betting and gambling available and poker machines etc um and it can be a lot of fun to gamble like i'm not saying sitting here saying i don't bet i bet sometimes for fun um but my point is that it doesn't help some of the things we've said but what it does do is it drives entertainment value in the same way fantasy sports does it drives increased levels of revenue for sport which it's really after right now so it has a lot of positives that it can bring to the industry it comes with some negatives um along the way that everyone i think everyone now gets a good feel of what that is yeah one of the other

29:52Nick Meacham:things i followed along the way nick be interested to get your thoughts primarily was around what is going to happen um with the sale kind of around warner brothers you know there's talk that netflix just wants to buy part of it paramount wants to buy all of it we'll ignore the political side of it but there's all this and we talked i think our 200th episode about all the mergers and acquisitions, but we're also seeing Netflix doing more and more spending in sports. There were stories about The Zone wanting to cut some of their rights and potentially more an IPO and all of this, what we've seen, it's all about profitability.

30:25Nick Meacham:You know, it's no longer, I guess, you know, the more investors get involved, the more it's about sort of turning a profit and that focus there. And maybe I'm just a little bit concerned what happens with the smaller guys, because that's one of the things I think we've sort of talked about is, and maybe this is an example with DAZN cutting the Belgian Pro League, the argument being that ultimately it's not profitable for them. And does that start a cascade effect where we're already kind of seeing some of the top properties get pushed to the top, leaving less and less for the smaller organizations, which is where SportsPro comes in, because you can learn about your D2C strategy and meet lots of great tech vendors.

31:00Nick Meacham:But at the same time, Nick, I don't know if all these mergers and all these acquisitions and this drive towards profitability is necessarily good for sport in that sense, If that makes any sense to you, Nick.

31:13Chris Stone:Yeah, I don't think it's necessarily a good thing. I think there's more instances than not where investment coming into sports in general has been a negative for sports at a sports property level. Where it has done and provide a lot of benefit for investors and for companies in sports. It's ones that are servicing more the server side or the broadcaster side. And particularly as it relates to those sports media. I do think you're going to see a lot more activity around mergers and acquisitions in the next 12 months. I think we saw a little bit of a building in the early, sorry, in 2025. I think you're going to see more of it in 2026.

31:50Chris Stone:I think there's a lot of companies right now that have launched that are trying to build something that is ultimately acquirable by someone who wants to buy an audience and to buy content and buy something. that might add value or add an extension onto their existing proposition. And so I think that's going to be a really big focus. Also, and this is the big reason, you talk about profitability, since basically that moment when Netflix had a bad month, a bad quarter, and then their price went down, they brought in advertising, now they've skyrocketed ever since. that led to a market-wide shift in mindset for streamers to basically go, we're not going about scale anymore.

32:39Chris Stone:We need to be focused much on being a well-run profitable organization, right? Now, there's still a bunch of organizations who have been still focused on scale, but are trying to get to the profitable point whilst trying to balance both, basically trying to balance growth whilst getting to profitability. DAZN is one of the big examples of that there. And I think where it's going to be interesting is also from this merger and acquisition perspective is looking at businesses where, okay, what cost savings can we accrue by putting these two together? So these two sets of businesses are generating X amount of subscribers and revenue.

33:20Chris Stone:What sort of efficiencies can we execute from a cost perspective that's going to basically make the net value much more profitable? It's a quite basic merger and acquisition approach. But for streaming and for sports, I think it's going to be a real priority in 2026. So, yeah, that's going to be, I think, something you're going to see a lot of more smaller, medium size, just getting mopped up by others. And what you might see some of those being, for example, there's quite a few instances where DAZN picked up organizations just basically in a share deal. So they didn't really put any money on the table.

33:56Chris Stone:They just basically gave a portion of DAZN shares in return for their organization and then mopped up that company and those rights and that audience as part of that deal. I think you might see a few more of those happen with a few players like DAZN because it gets people who are losing money, who've been trying to get the profitability out of trouble to wash their hands of things. In the same way, I think DAZN will be looking for that opportunity from someone in 2026 quite heavily. So I think you're going to see a lot of movement around that. Is it good for sports? I think to be confirmed, I'm not sure.

34:38Chris Stone:Having more platforms innately will provide more opportunities to reach new audiences. We know that. And more competition for rights. But like we've seen in Europe, especially in Europe, but also in even other markets, if you're not in the top tier, you're not getting much of that media rights pie. So I don't know. I'm not sure if it's good for sports. It's better for consumers to have less platform serving stuff. But I don't know. I just feel like it's a tricky, tricky time for everyone involved.

35:08Nick Meacham:You think, because I listened to the podcast with Swedish Wands Hockey League moving to YouTube, do you think some of those moves ultimately benefits YouTube? Because it does seem as it almost pushes that lower tier. Like I said, I think one of my concerns is the big players are only interested in the biggest ones. It does leave this sort of, I don't want to say vacuum, but kind of this, I don't know where I'm supposed to go. Does that open the world for someone like YouTube to really basically just mop up everything from tier two downwards?

35:42Chris Stone:I mean, that's definitely, I think, what they're hoping for and hoping to see play out. I'm interested to see how far we get in 2026. We had a lot of interesting case studies pop up through the year, which we've given a lot of time to. We will give a little bit more time to work out how to best approach YouTube. But the monetization bit is still a challenge for many who are trying to launch on those platforms, particularly from a lower subscriber base that they have. And YouTube is longer form. It is TV, depending on how you want to look at it. But the thought of watching a test match, a cricket match on there for eight hours a day for five days is still a tough pill to swallow, I think, for me.

36:24Chris Stone:So I'm intrigued to see how far we get with YouTube. that's only going to be able to play out as a viable monetization distribution strategy

36:33Nick Meacham:if it comes with the ability to really crank up digital sponsorship revenues because

36:38Chris Stone:the money direct from YouTube is pretty poor still so you need to be able to talk the right language and get brands on board to really sponsor that feed of content that you are producing and remember YouTube take a pretty hefty chunk of that revenue as well if you do do a deal with them so i think you're going to see more and more trial and test youtube i think you're also going to see more go non-exclusive some more a bit like what the bundesliga did in the uk where you'll see them pop up on a bunch of different platforms whether it's like bbc in their instance bbc youtube and maybe sky and a few others they have basically different streams going on in different places i think you'll see that i think you'll see non-exclusive uh visibility across youtube and other platforms whenever a meteorite still can't really be agreed um to the level that they want and then use that wider exposure wider reach to drive better engagement with audiences and better commercialization through digital related inventory um but they will need to sell themselves like when we talked when i talked to kazay tv um the other day for example you know kazay tv is youtube native being super strong on that platform but the bulk of the revenue absolutely comes from brand deals, direct brand deals, not through programmatic and automated revenue streams that YouTube gives.

37:58Chris Stone:So that's the bit that sports has to upskill itself on, be able to sell, has to push and educate advertisers to be able to increase their investment into that platform. I talked to one exec recently that took them well over a year to get a pretty big tech company to a great deal because they didn't have traditional sponsorship budgets but they did have advertising budgets that they could tap into and so they were able to find a way of turning traditional advertising dollars into sponsorship revenue because the deliverables would be through digital related advertising through youtube or like so i think you're going to see all this kind of work going on to basically bridge this challenge and this gap to make youtube more appealing and drive more more value um but are we going to see a revolution in the next 12 months i i would love to see someone be bold and try it but i i wouldn't it would be done on the basis of basically that they're going to drive audience from and they have to monetize elsewhere it ain't

38:59Nick Meacham:going to come directly from the platform itself yeah the last thing i had barked down for us to talk about nick is the the world cup now i've been super excited about the world cup um for a couple reasons one i falsely believe that when this was first announced that by 2026 the u.s would be good that is clearly not the case um uh i think there are a lot of people that were hopeful that like this would be a a coming out party for soccer in the u.s i i don't think that's going to happen based on our results and just like you know having the world cup in your home country it's something to celebrate right like people get really excited about the world cup or the olympics you know to host it's a big deal i'm very excited about that but some different things came up along the way.

39:41Nick Meacham:The first one that kind of struck my interest was the ticket pricing. Just how extortionate that is. We won't get overly political, but I think I don't know what's going to happen if they pass some of these things from a visa perspective. I'm supposed to go home with my wife this summer. I don't know if that's going to happen, if they're going to ask her to turn over DNA, which has been one of the things that's been reported. There's already countries like Senegal that are going to be in the World Cup that they've already said, and I think it's not only just Senegal, there's two or three others that they've already said no visas to.

40:14Nick Meacham:So like having a world cup where people aren't invited and then we won't even get into the peace award, whatever that is. But I guess where I'm getting at Nick with this and just, it, this is a sports show, but it is sometimes impossible to avoid the politics. And where I'm sort of curious from your perspective is we talked about that authenticity. We talked about sports being escapism. What is, how serious is the potential impact when politics becomes potentially too involved or becomes too commercial? What happens if the pricing for tickets is so absurd that you get half filled stadiums? I think people kind of dismissed it for the club world cup because it's new event.

40:54Nick Meacham:People don't really know it yet. Wait for the next four years. You'll see it grow. That excuse isn't going to exist if the world cup doesn't have sold out games and this whole idea. And then almost like we've talked about all these different things like is sports being too commercial is the world cup potentially going to be that example of what is every four years arguably the biggest event in the world can the outside tarnish the purity of sports and like i'm just i don't know nick like i am a little little just nervous because like i just don't hear pot normally like you think world cup everyone at least in the uk is thinking about going to the beer garden you know they're excited to watch football i just i don't know nick maybe maybe i'm just too pessimistic maybe i've been quote unquote doom scrolling too much but i just i feel like there's more politics involved in sports than there has been in the past and the u.s and the world cup's not the only instance there's plenty of sports washing people arguing about the acquisition of newcastle and uh things like that like this isn't the only one it's just as i was away saw lots of stories about ticket pricing and do you know who Alexi Lawless is yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah U.S.

42:04Chris Stone:great U.S. men's player right

42:06Nick Meacham:yeah well I saw a really interesting Twitter thread where basically he was like if you can't afford it suck it he was like sports is a product it's not about the fandom which became really interesting because we talk about you know people in Europe particularly in England and other countries very passionate about football that it it's not about the money it's about the fandom whereas like Alexi Wallace was like, well, cup's a product, get over it. And that just sort of dynamic of like, he's right to a degree, but I despise the argument behind it. Just, I don't know. It just, it feels like some things are coming to a head.

42:40Nick Meacham:This is probably like with the death,

42:42Chris Stone:I'd say, I'm going to call it the death, which is a bit dramatic, but the death of say pay TV as like the primary breadwinner or funder of sports through the production of media rights investment that we are seeing across the board. I think this is the last current area where you are seeing that bridge, that gap between a general consumer and the chase for the capitalist dollar become as wide as it's ever been. and it's not a good look for sports, it does drive negativity and skepticism and pushes fans away, even if they were never going to go to the game to begin with. It's a mindset about the sport's authentic value to the fan, to the consumer.

43:30Chris Stone:Fans want to feel like they are thought of first, not last, right? That's innately like any club, any team wants to feel like if you're a passionate supporter of a club, you want to feel like they care about you and that that relationship is reciprocated. In the case of ticketing and particularly the FIFA World Cup, it's clear that is not the case. They are running a model, dynamic ticketing and the reselling component. Have you heard anything about the resale component?

43:57Nick Meacham:Maybe, but describe it to me anyways.

43:59Chris Stone:Yeah, sure. So basically, firstly, they're running dynamic ticketing, which basically means that prices go up or down depending on supply and demand. So if there's huge, huge demand and they're not really managing who's buying what tickets, anyone can buy tickets and then put them on the market to resell. But they are running their own resale marketplace, basically, where you have to put those tickets back on the marketplace to resell. The thing is that FIFA gets a cut every time there is a sale, every time there is a transaction for those tickets. so the this is stuff i've seen online is basically the the notion is that fifa gets almost wants to see people resell their tickets and and sell them to someone else because they get more and more cut now i don't know if that's actually the case that's only things i've seen online but my point is none of that is good optics for them and for the sport of football longer term however we've known for a long time that actually sport is has been political for a a long, long time right now.

45:01Chris Stone:And I just think it's another example rather than it being a particularly more political moment than it used to be, but exacerbated by the fact you have Gianni Fettino and Donald Trump together on stage together, like as political as it comes. So what's my point here? I guess my point is political is going to stay political. FIFA has shown for quite a while that they chase the money. There's pressure on the leadership to generate more and more revenue and income for all of the nations to be able to receive. And the same way we saw what happened with the FIFA Club World Cup and all that played out there, that was basically going to put a huge revenue number on its head and Gianni Witton Fortuna had to find a way to make that happen and fair play to him to do that.

45:48Chris Stone:But I think ultimately the World Cup will be delivered successfully. It will have an equal amount of, oh, some games will be a little bit empty. most will be full it both when you've got people leaders let's call them like those two that i mentioned earlier in place they will make them successful they will tell everyone it's successful um whether they are to the level they could be just from like an energy and enthusiasm perspective i don't know i think you're going to hear lots of storylines about these costs continue to play out through the competition and we're not even talking about the fact that adding these hydration breaks, which are basically just they found a loophole to get ad breaks into the matches.

46:33Chris Stone:So broadcasters can generate more income off the back of it. And no doubt FIFA will benefit from that. So we live in a capitalist world. The US is the most capitalist of its type, country of its type. And it finds as many ways it can to maximize the value of those rights. So I think ultimately will be a success because it's in the U S four years from now. Um, who knows, but, uh, for now the U S will make it work. I'm sure of it.

47:01Nick Meacham:Yeah. Well, Nick, I promise I'll be more, um, positive throughout the year. It's just, yeah, just, just had some thoughts and, you know, just, you know, you and I, we typically cover the news. We do big interviews. You know, I thought I'd just be kind of, um, I don't know if nothing else give me the platform to share some of my thoughts, but just like, those are just some of the different things that came up across my timeline over the two months um and maybe i should spend less time on social media um so you don't have such a negative spin maybe maybe that's what i need to do and just go out and touch grass because the one thing i did do while i was on the tourney nick had so much fun with i think i've mentioned this before um me and my boys do a football day over christmas every year um and we go to an east dolich hamlets game um which is in southeast london it's non-league football still gets a couple thousand people anyways because it's non-league You can have a beer, which if you don't know, I mean, most of you probably do.

47:53Nick Meacham:You can't normally drink beer at a Premier League game. So the fact that you can go and have a beer, like that was still really fun. I still have a lot of fun with sports and, you know, it's I still love it. I still think it's great. But it's just they were just there are stories, Nick. There are things I just I had to get off my chest after two months off and just seeing things.

48:10Chris Stone:Well, look, I understand. I don't just need to vent and get it off your chest and you can look forward and turn that negative energy into positivity. but look, I think our job is to be able to balance between the positives and the negatives. That's what people want to hear from us is what's going on, whether it's good or bad, and point them, hopefully, give them a bit of an idea of what is really going on in this industry. So we need to keep keeping that balanced approach. So I'm all for it.

48:38Nick Meacham:Well, everyone, I know this technically wasn't the first episode that was released of 2026, but it's the first episode Nick and I have done and recorded in 2026. So it's good to be back. looking forward to a very exciting year like i said there's gonna be lots of mergers and acquisitions for us to cover there's going to be the olympics there's going to be the 2026 world cup superbowl is just around the corner there's going to be lots and lots of things over the course of the year that will be exciting for us to cover things that we won't even be able to expect and you know you just count on us to be able to provide that content on a weekly basis absolutely

49:08Chris Stone:thanks again everyone for listening to us for the last few years as well we really appreciate all your support and I think this is going to be as interesting a year as we've had for some time across sports and sports media so stay with us