When Sports Storytelling Changes the Game | In the Game

Marcus Johnson (0:00)

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Welcome, everyone, to In the Game, an EMARKETER Sports Marketing Podcast made possible by Atmosphere TV. This is a conversation about the mic'd up era, how behind-the-scenes docu-series like Drive to Survive or Quarterback act as the ultimate top-of-the-fun marketing tool to convert casual viewers into obsessed fans. Hello, folks, I'm Marcus, and today I'm alongside senior analyst living in Westchester, Mr. Ross Benes.

Ross Benes (1:04)

Hey, Marcus.

Marcus Johnson (1:05)

Hello, fella, and senior forecasting analyst living out in Utah, Mr. Zach Goldner.

Zach Goldner (1:10)

Hello, hello.

Marcus Johnson (1:11)

Hello.

Today we're talking all about, gents, when sports became entertainment.

Sports used to be something you watched now, increasingly. It's a world that you can get immersed in, or there are worlds that you get immersed in, from Drive to Survive and Welcome to Wrexham to Hard Knocks and Heated Rivalry. Storytelling is turning athletes' rivalries and entire leagues into entertainment franchises and bringing new fans into the fold along the way. But what actually turns a casual viewer into an obsessed fan, and who owns that relationship when the story exists everywhere, from Netflix to TikTok? Today, we're asking whether all the ancillary content makes the games themselves more valuable, or not. Which sports are still leaving this opportunity on the table, and what happens when a sport becomes an entertainment IP machine? So, Ross, I'll start with you. Shows like Drive to Survive, as we mentioned, Hard Knocks, Welcome to Wrexham, Quarterback, Heated Rivalry. They've all made audiences care about sports they may not have previously followed. What do you think is the or are the secret ingredients?

Ross Benes (2:18)

Well, those shows are all quite different. You have dramas in there as well as docu-series.

But what they all tend to give you is an aspect of the sport that you don't see just from watching it. Now, Heated Rivalry, obviously, that's not based on a real person. So that's a little bit different than Hard Knocks, which is following an NFL mini camp of actual athletes. But they show behind the scenes and in a more intimate way than you tend to get otherwise. I think fans have always wanted that and now you're getting more locker room or access to even some of these people's lives, where you start to see athletes act like creators.

Marcus Johnson (3:02)

Yeah, access is a good word and you do start to feel the sense of intimacy. You start to develop a stake in what's happening. How about for you, Zach, what are the ingredients?

Zach Goldner (3:13)

Access was going to be what I was going to talk about here.

Marcus Johnson (3:16)

It's a secret sauce.

Zach Goldner (3:17)

I think it's a great entryway into a sport without actually understanding the sport first. Instead, I think the easiest way to get someone to care about a sport, isn't to sell them the sport itself, but to sell them the people that are doing the sport. So Drive to Survive, I think, is one of the best examples of that. If you were to tune into an F1 race without knowing anything about Formula 1, you're just watching 20 cars drive around in a circle for a while. But if you're watching the show, then you're understanding the characters, the rivalries, the strategy, and then suddenly the race is meaning something to you. So you don't have to be an F1 expert at first, but the show is helping you do the onboarding itself. The second piece to this, which I think is really important today's age, is that we're living currently in a reality TV era. People love getting access to worlds that they can't normally see.

We want to know what's like to be a real housewife, maybe some of us do, an NFL quarterback, an F1 driver, or being an owner of a professional team.

I think that's what really kind of combines all of us and our cultural desires, is to be someone or somewhere that we're not supposed to be.

Marcus Johnson (4:38)

Yeah, it's really this difference between selling the sport, Zach, to kind of what you were saying earlier, versus selling a story, and I think shows like Welcome to Wrexham, like heated rivalry, they've given audiences a reason to care.

Before, as is actually a point, they even understand the rules, the standings, how the game works. You're getting introduced, Ross, to USA, to characters, to relationships, to success, failure, rivalries, identity, to a certain extent. And the sport is just the forum where all of that happens.