From Weird to New Normal: Five Sports Stories
"The day before something is a breakthrough, it's a crazy idea." - Peter Diamandis
Some things we consider weird might soon become the new normal. That’s what the coronavirus is doing for many industries and the examples from sports are some of the most odd, jarring, and wild. How far could things go? Check out these five recent sports stories.
1 - Cardboard Fan Cutouts, Mannequins and Robot Drummers
A few weeks ago, Taiwan became the first country in the world to reopen their baseball season. Only 200 people were allowed in the stadium—including players, coaching staff, reporters, game officials and cheerleaders. Making up the rest of the ‘attendees’ were cardboard fan cutouts, mannequins, and robot drummers. It’s like a cross between Black Mirror and cyberpunk Tokyo.
Bundesliga team Borussia Mönchengladbach offered something similar. Fans of the team are now able to purchase lifesize cardboard cutouts featuring their own photos. These cutouts will temporarily live on display at the stadium with the proceeds going to charity and supporting local organisations. Each cardboard cutout costs €19 and around 8000 orders have been made so far.
When people are allowed to start attending games in person, there’s no way that things will be the same. Stadiums might have new regulations regarding the health and safety of their facilities. Stadium capacity could be reduced in order to facilitate milder versions of social distancing, so I could see a world where fewer seats per stadium is made up by more spread out seats. And the space between seats could be made up by cardboard cutouts and mannequins…?
2 - NFL’s Virtual Draft
Last Thursday, the annual NFL Draft went completely virtual. Commissioner Roger Goodell announced each draft pick live from his own home. Each player was given a care package prior to the broadcast, where the NFL provided specific cameras, microphones, and basic equipment for players to record their own reactions. The entire event was broadcasted on ESPN and successfully raised money for charities related to Covid-19. It also broke a ratings record with 55 million viewers over three days, becoming the most watched NFL Draft in history.
It was heartwarming to see players and their families celebrate from their own homes, and in my opinion it was an even more authentic experience to look into their actual living rooms. Honestly, I thought it was better than the regular NFL draft. Watching the reactions felt like watching a Youtube clip compilation of emotional family moments. Less wacky than the regular draft, but definitely more heartwarming.
This wasn’t a huge disruption to the NFL and it ran more smoothly than most people predicted. While part of this could be temporary thanks to the coronavirus, the virtual NFL draft did set new ratings records and might get us thinking that potential size of virtual sports viewing is underestimated. It would also save costs if every sports organisation increased the percentage of events and conferences they host virtually.
3 - NBA Horse and NBA 2K
The NBA was the first major sports league in the US to postpone their season. Since then, two NBA initiatives have been launched to experiment with new ‘versions’ of the game: Horse and NBA 2K.
Horse is a game where players challenge each other to replicate different shots around the basketball court. So Horse was played in isolation, where two players competed against each other by livestreaming different shots they were making from their respective home basketball courts. The NBA hosted a round robin tournament mixing current and former players from the NBA and WNBA.
Simultaneously, the NBA hosted a 2K Players tournament, broadcasting players competing against each other in the video game NBA2K. Mike Conley Jr. from the Utah Jazz became the inaugural NBA Horse Challenge Champion and Devin Booker from the Phoenix Suns won the NBA 2K Players Tournament.
Compared to other leagues, the NBA was actually trying a new variation of the sport of basketball, which is a bold move. Yet it’s also puzzling because most people would agree that Horse is not exactly the most compelling content. There was actually a H-O-R-S-E competition at the NBA All Star weekend from 2009 to 2011 but it was cancelled for not really being entertaining. They should’ve learned.
And as you can see from the video views, the 2K tournament had more than double the viewers of the Horse tournament. It’s easier to tap into currently existing consumer behaviour rather than trying to create new consumer behaviour. Hundreds of millions of people already watch esports like NBA2K, and not many people are begging for more virtual Horse tournaments.
It’s good to frame these two experiments as a physical variation of basketball (Horse) and a digital variation of basketball (NBA 2K). And part of what made the virtual NBA 2K tournament more successful is that it was just so much more raw. The players were trash talking each other and you could see their fierce passion to win the game, rather than the more mundane and awkward interactions of Horse. This should help remind us that virtual does not mean less real.
4 - The Ugly Realities of Virtual Racing
In many ways, virtual motorsport is pretty similar to physical motorsport. Both Formula One and NASCAR have embraced virtual racing and are hosting several ongoing Virtual Grand Prix and NASCAR iRacing events. Much like the NBA2K Players Tournament, a lot of entertainment came from seeing drivers trash talk and display raw emotions. But while these motorsport organisations have transitioned to virtual smoothly, there have been some unexpected PR downsides.
NASCAR driver Bubba Wallace was one of the drivers who participated in the eNASCAR iRacing Pro Invitational Series. In the middle of a race, his car was rammed into a wall by another driver and after getting frustrated he rage-quitted. In case you don’t know, a ‘rage-quit’ is what happens when you are angry and frustrated with how poorly you are performing in a video game that you get so upset that you leave the game. So Bubba unexpectedly quit the game and refused to continue driving.
One of Bubba’s sponsors, Blue Emu, dropped their sponsorship deal with the driver and released this statement shortly afterwards, “Bubba’s actions were disrespectful to iRacing, NASCAR, and especially their fans. That’s why Blue-Emu discontinued its sponsorship.” Separately, Blue Emu executive vice president Ben Blessing was quoted as saying, “…you find out you aren’t sponsoring a NASCAR driver, you are sponsoring someone like my 13-year-old son who broke his controller playing some game where he builds houses.”
This is the first time someone has lost an actual sponsorship deal for something they did in a virtual NASCAR competition. It wasn’t the last time and also wasn’t the most extreme.
A week after the Bubba Wallace incident, another NASCAR driver Kyle Larson was caught using a racial slur during a live online broadcast of an iRacing event. It’s unclear whether he thought he was muted, but the first person to reply to Kyle Larson was fellow driver Anthony Alfredo who said, “Kyle, you’re talking to everyone, bud.” Larson has since delivered apologies over social media, been suspended without pay by NASCAR, and was fired from his driving team.
Virtual sports has shown the personalities and character of drivers in ways we did not expect. Is it likely that Kyle Larson would have said a racial slur while driving in a regular live physical NASCAR race? Probably not. Would Bubba Wallace have been able to rage-quit in real life? No.
For some drivers like Bubba Wallace and Kyle Larson, virtual racing can be quite an adjustment in ways they probably didn’t realise. Your brand as an athlete is exposed to many different vectors of media you were not able to anticipate in your training. My take is that people in traditional sports underestimate the levels of engagement and scrutiny you will find in virtual sports.
The best way for motorsports organisations to generate revenue during the coronavirus is still through sponsorships. If sponsors don’t feel a certain degree of brand safety with virtual races and there are already two major NASCAR examples of drivers behaving badly, maybe they’ll look to spend their sponsorship dollars elsewhere?
5 - UFC’s Fight Island
The President of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Dana White was very vocal in his reluctance to stop the UFC’s April events. It took senior management from ESPN and Disney to personally instruct White postpone future events after he hosted a March fight in Brazil at a stadium without fans.
While the next fight is scheduled to take place in Jacksonville, Florida on May 9, Dana White is reportedly in the process of hiring or purchasing a private island to host fights. Dana has told the media he expects ‘Fight Island’ to be ready to host fights by June and contain facilities fully equipped to host UFC events. This includes training facilities, a hotel for fighters, and an octagon on the beach. By picking an isolated island, Dana White has found a novel technicality that allows him to put on UFC fights.
The premise of ‘fight island’ might sound familiar to you. The video game and film series Mortal Kombat was based around this exact idea and many enthusiastic fans have drawn this comparison.
Dana White and the UFC could probably just host fights in Taiwan, one of the countries most successfully combatting the coronavirus. And of course, Taiwan could supply the UFC with cardboard fan cutouts and robot drummers while the entire event is livestreamed on Twitch.
There are A LOT of eyeballs focused on the sports industry. It is one of the most fundamental parts of human culture and it’s not an exaggeration to say that literally billions of fans across the world wish sports could restart right now. But until Fight Island is ready or until a genius invents a completely new Covid-compliant sport (please, no more Horse), we will have to rely on e-sports and livestreaming for now.
Personally, I think we are all underestimating the changes that consumer behaviour will bring to the sports industry. We will have to wait a little bit longer before we start seeing the lasting effects of the coronavirus. While the previous five stories drift into the realm of the weird, they will soon resemble our future reality, our new normal.
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