Menu
Download the app

SBJ subscribers – Enhance your experience with the revamped iOS app

Franchises

WNBA Dream Owners Using Brand As Selling Point

WNBA Dream co-Owners Kelly Loeffler and Mary Brock said that they “are mindful of the team's mission to empower girls to play sports and provide positive role models for them to emulate,” but note that is “not their main selling point for the team,” according to Michael Cunningham of the ATLANTA CONSTITUTION. Brock said, “I think Kelly and I feel strongly about developing the brand, and the brand is good basketball." The team appeared in the WNBA finals the past two seasons and reported attendance this season at Philips Arena “decreased by more than 25 percent from Dream's inaugural season” in ‘08. Year-over-year, there was a slight increase in average attendance this season from 6,293 to 6,487, which ranked 10th in the 12-team league. The Dream “would need to average about 8,500 spectators per home game to turn a profit.” The team “lost $3 million in 2009 and presumably less with the deeper playoff runs last year and this year.” Still, the Dream owners said that they “are committed to the team for the long haul.” Brock: “This is only our fourth year. We think in four more years we will be in an unbelievable position” (ATLANTA CONSTITUTION, 10/11).

MAINTAINING MOMENTUM: In Minneapolis, Rachel Blount writes the WNBA Champion Lynx “won over Minnesotans with a summer of exquisite basketball,” but it remains to be seen “whether their popularity has staying power, or whether this will become just a fleeting moment in time.” Though the Lynx' profile “rose substantially this season, the team -- and the WNBA as a whole -- have been making steady gains for five years.” If the league is to “sustain its growth, it must continue to open eyes and minds to the expanding quality of the women's game.” The Lynx, who “already have sold more than 600 new season tickets and renewed 90 percent of existing ones, give hope that it can” (Minneapolis STAR TRIBUNE, 10/11).

SBJ Morning Buzzcast: March 25, 2024

NFL meeting preview; MLB's opening week ad effort and remembering Peter Angelos.

Big Get Jay Wright, March Madness is upon us and ESPN locks up CFP

On this week’s pod, our Big Get is CBS Sports college basketball analyst Jay Wright. The NCAA Championship-winning coach shares his insight with SBJ’s Austin Karp on key hoops issues and why being well dressed is an important part of his success. Also on the show, Poynter Institute senior writer Tom Jones shares who he has up and who is down in sports media. Later, SBJ’s Ben Portnoy talks the latest on ESPN’s CFP extension and who CBS, TNT Sports and ESPN need to make deep runs in the men’s and women's NCAA basketball tournaments.

SBJ I Factor: Nana-Yaw Asamoah

SBJ I Factor features an interview with AMB Sports and Entertainment Chief Commercial Office Nana-Yaw Asamoah. Asamoah, who moved over to AMBSE last year after 14 years at the NFL, talks with SBJ’s Ben Fischer about how his role model parents and older sisters pushed him to shrive, how the power of lifelong learning fuels successful people, and why AMBSE was an opportunity he could not pass up. Asamoah is 2021 SBJ Forty Under 40 honoree. SBJ I Factor is a monthly podcast offering interviews with sports executives who have been recipients of one of the magazine’s awards.

Shareable URL copied to clipboard!

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Daily/Issues/2011/10/11/Franchises/WNBA-Dream-Lynx.aspx

Sorry, something went wrong with the copy but here is the link for you.

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Daily/Issues/2011/10/11/Franchises/WNBA-Dream-Lynx.aspx

CLOSE