Field Notes: 4 People Moves, 3 Announcements, 2 Things Worth Your Time, and 1 Stat That Matters in the Sports Economy.
Curated and delivered every other Thursday.
4 People Moves
Allen Chen: This is why we follow the talent. If I'm a VC bullish on collectibles, I'm sending this Fanatics-exec-turned-stealth-founder a DM today.
Betty Chu: A lot of coverage lately on companies hiring "storytellers." This one makes sense for Monumental — when you own teams, media networks, and venues, you need a communicator who can thread the needle on how it all fits together.
Kyle Schlogl: Emerging leagues like the PLL need a serious YouTube strategy — not just because it’s the king, but because it’s where you build the off-field content that makes a league stick. I’ve written before about how a Full Swing-style docuseries following stars from Yale, Princeton, Notre Dame and UVA would be must-watch content. This hire says the PLL is going after it.
Alison Flynn: Over the past year, The IRONMAN Group has attracted talent from serious organizations like Fanatics, USTA, and the Mets. Companies in this endurance category have a real opportunity in front of them thanks to the Ozempification of society. I agree with Packy McCormick on this one — he nailed it in his recent piece, “Scarce Assets”:
“As more things that were traditionally scarce become abundant, we’re going to keep seeing this playing out across… everything.
Thanks to GLP-1s, skinny isn’t what it used to be. So what will be scarce when you can take a shot or a pill to look fit? As popular as marathons and fitness competitions have become, I bet they become even more popular. You can’t fake a sub-2 hour marathon.”
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3 Announcements
William Blair Announces Acquisition of Inner Circle Sports | William Blair
William Blair, a firm that turned 90 last year, wants in on the sports frenzy — and buying beats building. ICS has been advising on the biggest control transactions in team sports since 2002; you don’t replicate that deal sheet by hiring laterals.
Grant Horvat Joins Rickie Fowler & Other Elite Names as He Signs With $2 Billion Giant | Yahoo! Sports
Fresh off its rebrand and in the middle of its reported $3B+ auction, The Team (FKA Wasserman) is leaning into YouTube golf. Good Good wasn’t even started until the end of 2020, and now Horvat is on the same roster as Rickie Fowler, Tony Finau, and Viktor Hovland.
Ogilvy Sports & Entertainment Expands Offering with Article 41 Investment, Names Vickie Segar Global Chief Sports & Entertainment Officer | Ogilvy
Same playbook as William Blair this week: legacy giant seeking increased sports economy capabilities…buy-don’t-build. Ogilvy gets NIL infrastructure overnight; Article 41 gets WPP’s global brand roster. When the world’s most iconic and creative agency network is staffing up around student-athletes, we know the category has graduated.
2 Things Worth Your Time
McLaren Golf: Why is an F1 team making £360 golf clubs and is it a risk for Justin Rose? | The Athletic
McLaren only sells 3,000-5,000 units per year. Scarcity drives the appeal. Selling £360 golf clubs through fitting centers is the opposite business model and potentially dilutive. World-class IP gets them instant credibility in a new category, but Ferrari isn’t doing this for a reason. The category is also brutal: Nike had Tiger and quit clubs by 2016. Bridgestone successfully extended into golf, but they make tires, not supercars.
Bonus: I can think of someone who’d be all over these…
Oura lands the US Open and pushes tennis into a new era of wearables | Hard Court
Whoop sparked the wearables debate in tennis this year, yet Oura secured this Grand Slam partnership. In a category where rights holders are still nervous about how in-match biometric data gets used, shared, and monetized, the brand selling sleep and recovery is a cleaner “yes” than the brand selling performance. That framing just unlocked one of the biggest accounts in the sport.
1 Stat That Matters
0.1% – The percentage of the accounts on Polymarket that have earned 67% of the profits. (Charlie Bilello)
VCs talk about how the 80/20 power law has shifted to 90/10 or even 95/5 in recent years. But 0.1/67? You just know some math kids are absolutely printing on these apps from their dorms at Caltech or MIT.
Pull of the Week
LeBron goes to WWE Raw one week into his NBA career
Most 2003 video ever. It is insane that this guy is still playing — his son/teammate Bronny is now three years older than LeBron was here.
ICYMI: This week’s episode with Dylan Robbins, Founder & CEO of Lucra ⬇️
I’ll be publishing Field Notes every other Thursday.
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If you’re building, investing, or advising within this ecosystem — please reach out!
Email: underthenumberpod@gmail.com.
– Brent