Digital and Social Media Sports
A business-minded look at digital and social media in sports
Watch or listen to episode 305 of the Digital and Social Media Sports podcast, in which Neil chatted with Shripal Shah, Chief Digital Officer, Next League, and author of Unlocking Fan Loyalty: From Frequent Flyers to Fanatics in the Age of AI
70-minute duration. Listen on Apple, Spotify and YouTube
Listen above and watch below
What if your best-performing content isn’t actually your best-performing content?
We’re in the era of big data and analytics, a time of greater appreciation and comprehension of measuring success than ever before. And yet the metrics we use to understand content performance are still evolving, still open to scrutiny, and we continue to chase the meaning of a post or piece of content’s value.
Nick Cicero has spent much of his career leading measurement frameworks and evolving, even revolutionizing, the paradigms we use to measure and analyze media. Along the way, the platforms, packaging, and consumption patterns have necessitated changes in how we consider content; however, the longstanding models, as well as the companies hosting or presenting content themselves, often lag behind their platforms’ own evolution.
Cicero has watched the evolution at the front of the pack, seeing the shifts happen in real-time, and understanding the need for measurement to evolve, too.
“The biggest challenge that we always had was we would have to use engagements as a proxy for interest,” said Cicero, founder and CEO of Mondo Metrics. “But we know that only like the 1% of people are really engaging, for example, relative to everybody. That’s why whenever we look at things like engagement rate and we use followers as the denominator, which a lot of people do, that is outdated and old, right?
“That’s a metric that has now evolved because, one, you can game it, but two, it’s not really relevant if all of your followers don’t have the chance to see all your content, and that’s changing. So we were using all of these proxy metrics to help us understand that…”
Engagement worked well enough in the early days. There weren’t any better options, anyway. But then the form factor for content diversified, making content trickier to measure. Video exploded and each platform decided what constituted a video view. Snapchat came along and disrupted everything, with the 24-hour lifespan and taps forward (and back), completion, and exits entering the picture. Cicero saw all this happening and sought a solution.
“We said, ‘Hey, what is a Story but a compilation of videos that you’re just playing back in a row once again over a 24-hour window of time?’ So if the first frames of the video and the day expire, and I’m missing the point of telling the Story, my Story is incomplete,” said Cicero, whose previous company, Delmondo (later acquired by Conviva), was the first to provide analytics for Stories. “So that’s where it gave us the inspiration to say, ‘Well, maybe we should be measuring completion rate. But how do we do that?’ That’s what caused us to start to blow things apart and look at what are new metrics that we can combine and relationships that haven’t been there before.”
The new models required new ways of thinking. But it was also just the industry, influenced by ideas espoused by leaders like Cicero, catching up to modes of thinking that should’ve been there all along. Does the sum of the views of the first frame or two of a cohesive Stories package really matter as much as those sessions where users actually complete the Story? Does it make sense to celebrate a ‘viral’ 3-minute piece of content that earns over a million views as a massive success if the majority of those views are only watching a minuscule portion of the video? If one team’s content grabs a few seconds at a time while another’s gets a few minutes, but they both display the same number of ‘views,’ is that really an equivalent result?
An oft-referenced remark offered by Netflix cofounder Reed Hastings in 2017 was that the streaming platform’s primary competition was sleep. While that thinking takes things to an extreme, it’s directionally accurate; we’re all competing for the discretionary, finite time people have in their social media sessions, their content consumption time, and the waking hours overall in their days.
“They all want to capture attention; they want to measure the most attention,” said Cicero, referencing Mondo Metrics’s work with podcasters, sports teams and leagues, and other brands and creators. “They want to take the biggest share of your attention from somebody else at the end of the day, and that’s why what we really try to preach is that we need to prioritize for watch time and quality time spent on these platforms, the amount of total consumption that might occur in a day, for example. Because those are the numbers that add up.”
Cicero elaborated further, adding another wrinkle to that ubiquitous term ‘engagement’: “I keep going back to that [idea] of depth of engagement,” he said, “and it’s like when I go into a viewing experience, and this is what we thought with Stories as well, like when I go into this experience of consumption, what am I doing? What are the other options that I have? What are the different paths that I take to continue on and move through that?”
Getting a user to watch the first few frames of a story or the opening part of a video is something to be celebrated. Retention, completion, and overall time spent make up a fuller picture, but you can’t consume content without starting it. You can’t completely view content without watching the middle, and you can’t complete it without watching the end. That’s the point, Cicero explained to me, articulating the anatomical makeup of content into discrete slices that can each be analyzed and optimized.
“I like to think about it in like those three buckets,” Cicero said. “If you look at a video, what metrics are at the beginning, middle, and end? And depending on what my goal is, I’m going to look at stuff differently, right? Like, if I’m struggling to get viewers on my channel, I’m probably going to look at the first [elements] — what is it in the title? What is it in the thumbnail? What is it in the hook that is working or not working? Okay, cool, so what if I’m getting millions and millions of views, but people are only sticking around and watching my YouTube videos for like 7 or 8 seconds? Well, then I might look at the middle to the end metrics, like, okay, well, how long is my video? What’s the retention?
“It’s so crazy sometimes that people will spend all this time and energy to make a 20-minute video and get a million views and have an average watch time of 10 seconds. What you’re basically telling me is that probably 90% of the people left, and you just had a few people who were really invested in it. You’ve got to try something different. It’s cool that it might have gotten a million views because it might have been a viral hook or something , but there’s no substance to it. So, depending on what your goal is, you almost need to look at a different slice of the video in that sense.”
It’s not just social media that’s experiencing a reckoning for measurement. Remember ten years ago, back in 2015, when Yahoo made waves broadcasting the first-ever NFL Game exclusively on a livestream? They reported massive numbers, buttressed by the fact that anybody landing on the Yahoo home page had the livestream autoplay, racking up those ‘views,’ along with the industry grappling with how to define viewership on such a new platform. Recall that traditional TV ratings like Nielsen generally report the average minute audience (AMA), the number of viewers watching, on average, every minute of the broadcast. How many social platforms report a view as a minute of watch time? Yep, none. As content delivery platforms converge, the concept of viewership and performance is evolving by necessity. And as sports teams and leagues, along with other digital-first content creators, mold themselves into media companies in their own right, they need to think less in terms of the old metrics.
“If you’re like a true media executive, you’re going to look at your time spent on YouTube and try to think comparably to television, right?” said Cicero. “Because if you’re ESPN or whomever, you’re like, ‘Okay, these many people spend this much time on television, but then they’re going and watching Pat McAfee live every day, they’re going and watching this. So we can’t not look at the depth. We can’t not look at the total consumption time that they spend with our brand.
“So executives see that, but then content teams see that now too, because they realize that, for the most part, it’s helpful to tell executives big numbers, vanity metrics. But as you start to dig in to look at what’s really effective and what’s not, that’s when you have to really dig into the details.”
Anyone working in content in sports grapples with the daily hamster wheel, the never-ending battle to produce the next piece or post in the battle for eyeballs and attention. The fortunate part of working in sports is the cycle is amenable to such constant output, where there’s always another game. But whether the sport plays over 160 games or fewer than 20, that still leaves a lot of blank space to fill. There are only so many mini mic questions (Team Conrad or Team Jeremiah?) and manufactured tentpoles (hey, schedule release content is fun and awesome).
But, again, as the transformation of sports teams and leagues turning into media companies continues, the opportunity arises for sports to think in catalogs, to consider longer shelf-life content that can capture fan attention (and drive incremental revenue) for weeks, months, and even years to come. Cicero addressed the challenges of the inherent ‘rat race’ nature of the daily battle for attention, as well as the opportunity to appreciate the LTV (lifetime value) of content. It doesn’t mean every piece of content needs to capture engagement for years to come, just that, where it can, that should enter into the strategy and ROI calculus.
“Sure, you’re going to pump out some highlights,” said Cicero, who, in addition to running Mondo Metrics, teaches digital analytics at Syracuse. “And definitely that works for TikTok and Instagram and those short half life platforms. But now as we move into YouTube, well, we need to start thinking about, is that piece of content going to have staying power, years from now?…
“When you go back to the evolution of measurement, I think now people are starting to realize that, yes, I have the churn and burn of the algorithm that I have to fight every single day, that kind of rolls with the flow of the world, the way that the media cycle works, the way that we’re hyper short attention-driven in that sense, because we’re in this rat race of the world that we live in.
“But then at the end of the week, we are here on a Friday afternoon, if you really take a step back when you have some free time to breathe and think of a piece of content that you want to watch, then that’s where people are starting to think about this more. That’s when people really care about average watch time, and the minutes consumed, the quality of the content that’s going out there. And I’m excited by that. Because it means that people who would typically have been making a lot of social content, or maybe never got the chance to get on TV, are bringing really quality storytelling into these platforms and spending more time. So I see this as a really strong evolution.”
Next time you see a video popping off with “views” or a post that racked up impressions, remember that’s not the full story. The era of vanity metrics is fading; depth of engagement is where true value lies. The ways we measure content have changed for the better, and there’s no going back.
We’ve mastered the science of capturing attention; the real challenge now is keeping it.
On episode 304 of the Digital and Social Media Sports Podcast, Neil chatted with Nick Cicero, Founder and CEO of Mondo Metrics.
What follows are some snippets from the episode. Click Here to listen to the full episode or check it out and subscribe to the podcast via Apple or listen on Spotify or YouTube.
Watch or listen to episode 304 of the Digital and Social Media Sports podcast, in which Neil chatted with Nick Cicero, Founder and CEO of Mondo Metrics.
110-minute duration. Listen on Apple, Spotify and YouTube
Listen above and watch below
What does it mean to have a content strategy in sports?
For some, the question may conjure ideas of content pillars or buckets. Others may think in fan development, segmentation, and player marketing. Another notion would consider the most common key performance indicators (KPIs) like reach and engagement. Still others may cite business objectives like brand building and revenue generation.
The thing is, it’s all of the above, and then some. Content serves many masters in 2025, more than ever before. Because it can. Thoughtful content strategy can and should accomplish all those aforementioned objectives. But it’s a strategy, not a catch-all goal for every post and piece of content. Creators create, producers produce, and managers manage. Well, duh. But speak to somebody like Alec Palmer, the Senior Manager of Social Content for the LA Kings, and you’ll appreciate how content strategy is an organizational strategy, transcending the tweets and TikToks that populate fans’ feeds.
Palmer came up as a content producer, picking up skills in college that kick-started his career path. His background, now coupled with years of experience managing content, makes him particularly well-suited to balance the never-ending content needs for a sports team in 2025, while still making the producers feel they have the agency and freedom to be creative.
“There’s an understanding of, Oh, he does know what goes into shooting this video,” said Palmer, who joined the Kings in late 2021. “And maybe he doesn’t know the entirety of like, what all goes into a red camera and a whole studio and production setup, but there’s enough where they know where, if I’m pressuring them to get something done or asking them to do something, it’s something I would ask myself to do as well. That’s what I hope comes through to my team, and even cross-departmentally, is I know what it takes, and I know I can step in at any time, and that trust that builds…
“We want the producers to have an innate green light,” Palmer explained. “That obviously can get you in some muddy waters when you need to rein someone in and be like, ‘I need you to do this thing,’ but we look at it as, like, the risk is worth the reward of like, Hey, we might lose a producer or two on a tangential project that doesn’t play out, but most of the time it’s going to work out in some fashion. That’s where we really hone it, like [harping] on communication…”
Palmer looks after the big picture while helping the content team to bring to life creative projects that fit with organizational goals. Such alignment is essential to getting buy-in and resources to take ambitious, creative swings in content, and tell stories that can drive convertible KPIs and create meaningful engagement that drives lifelong fandom.
That’s how Palmer and the content team found themselves in Switzerland this past summer. The team saw some other teams producing similar content, all-access content series, and remote shoots in player hometowns, and the Kings knew they wanted to tell their players’ stories with such a rich tapestry. Requesting to fly thousands of miles with a content team is not an insignificant ask, but when you have a plan and can connect the initiative to important objectives for the organization, the picture becomes pretty clear.
“We pitched [the idea], it was going to be expensive, we didn’t have the money,” said Palmer in describing the pitch to profile players in their hometowns. “In that pitching process, we said, ‘Here’s the content we would pull from these. Here’s roughly the amount of deliverables. Here’s the crew and the staff that would go; here’s the rough budget. And also here’s the story we’re telling and why this story is important.’…”
It’s understanding the why behind content that gets at the heart of strategy. Too often, reports and KPIs are reduced to a few surface-level numbers that, left unchecked, can lead to perverse incentives. If it’s just about hitting a certain number of engagements, impressions, and views, that leaves out a whole lot of substance. The goal isn’t to hit certain metrics, it’s to hit certain metrics that can tie to the actual goals. Hitting big numbers alone isn’t a strategy. Palmer talked about the blend of art and science in presenting reports and defining success in his position with the Kings.
“People learn in all different ways; people understand performance and success in all different ways,” he said. “So when you’re presenting something back, you need to be able to tell the anecdotal and the qualitative successes or failures, and the quantitative and the analytical successes and failures, and sometimes they may be in contention with each other. That’s something where you are the expert, you have to explain why and why that might be okay, or why it might not be okay…”
Palmer continued, also later noting that within the content strategy are nods to marketing, ticket-buying, and other revenue-generating elements: “So what we look at is, yes, we’re always looking at analytics. We have our paces, we have our KPIs, and generally we’re hitting them. But there are also things we are accepting where it’s like we’re taking a risk that this might not perform or it might perform, or it performs to average, but it’s important to tell the story about our team, or about the game, or about this player, because that is what helps drive fandom. And it’s also the age-old question of how are you driving revenue?”
The approach to content strategy is also a massive part of the picture, alongside the marketing-driven elements. In the best of conditions, they all work together. So while storytelling is inherently integral, the way content is presented, the copy used, the tone and voice that emanate, it’s absolutely critical in driving fandom and partnerships.
For years, the Kings had a distinct brand. As Palmer recounted in our interview, the Kings are often credited with starting a pivot for brand communication on social. A new era that welcomed comedy, snark, and sometimes savage or even self-deprecating, instead of the overly formal, official-sounding brand representations and tone of years past. But the LA Kings team that Palmer joined was different from the dominant team of the 2010s, which captured multiple Cups and grew over a massive fan base that loved the Kings’ distinct voice across social (and all fan touch points, really; the in-arena presentation also echoed those LA Kings vibes). It felt like there was a disconnect, as Palmer explained.
“They were going through a rebuild,” he said. “And what was happening was the sarcasm, the poke fun at ourselves wasn’t landing with fans as much. And it started not to land internally as well. Without getting into too many specifics, it was okay, well, we need to change this without losing this thing that got us here. It’s the same thing with the Kings, like the Kings have been known forever as this ‘we’re going to beat the living hell out of you’ on the ice. Our guys are bigger, faster, stronger than everyone, and we’re going to play great defense, and we’re going to just grind you till you can’t go anymore. That’s how they won their Cups. And that has changed and will change, but there’s always this mindset.
Palmer discussed the way the Kings evolved the brand, while remaining authentic and credible for fans.
“So that’s kind of how we approached it. It was, okay, we can’t lose this entire funny sarcastic, fun personality, but we have to make some changes to better suit what’s happening on the ice,” he said, later emphasizing the Kings’ approach to proudly wearing their Kings fandom and leaning into the ups and the downs. “We overcorrected right away to kind of peel so much back, and I was like, Let’s just start fresh, almost. Let’s pull back. And it’s going to be kind of uncomfortable to start, it’s going to be frustrating. Let’s pull back right away to just like a cookie-cutter, let’s start getting back to the team, and let’s reintroduce things, because we had no idea where that line was anymore. We had no idea where the line was that was too much or too little. So we had to reintroduce and kind of build and build and refit that boundary, and we hit that line…
“Over the years, we stripped that back and we started adding it in…As the team got better, we were able to do more and more, and we’ve now developed this kind of voice of we are the best and this idea of we’re going to beat you up. We’re not arrogant. We’re confident in what we do. We’re going to grind you out on the ice, we’re going to be able to just, you know, push through you, and we’re bigger, better, faster, stronger. So this mindset of being that on the ice, we thought, how can we relate that to our social presence?
“We kind of operate, and this is more internally, it’s not quote-unquote our written social strategy on the wall, but we operate as: Be a fan, be intentional, and be excellent…”
The optimal content strategy compounds. All of the elements explored in this article work together, enabling the sum of the whole to be greater. That’s a bigger story than any surface-level metrics can tell.
So, consider all the dots to connect for a content strategy. Create platforms that showcase to fans what the brand is all about, build avenues for connections, develop fans for life. Content is the most valuable currency we have; make the most of it.
WATCH/LISTEN TO THE FULL INTERVIEW WITH ALEC PALMER OF THE LA KINGS (TREMENDOUS)
On episode 303 of the Digital and Social Media Sports Podcast, Neil chatted with Alec Palmer, Senior Manager, Social Content for the Los Angeles Kings
What follows are some snippets from the episode. Click Here to listen to the full episode or check it out and subscribe to the podcast via Apple or listen on Spotify or YouTube.
Watch or listen to episode 303 of the Digital and Social Media Sports podcast, in which Neil chatted with Alec Palmer, Senior Manager, Social Content for the Los Angeles Kings.
112 minute duration. Listen on Apple, Spotify and YouTube
Listen above and watch below
It’s easy to fall into a trap after years of working in sports (or any industry). It’s just difficult to see things from an objective point of view, taking on the perspective of the ‘normal’ fan or consumer.
That’s why I love peppering friends, family, and, heck, complete strangers with questions about their experience as sports fans. Avoiding an insular point of view is critical to effectively understand the fan experience — the motivations, challenges, and opportunities. And that’s why each year when my Digital and Social Media Sports Podcast hits a milestone (12 years this year!), I’ve had friends and family members appear on the pod to ask about their relationship to sports and experience as a fan. I learned from my brother, an avid fantasy player and diehard San Diego Padres fan, my mom, a non-sports fan who became one of the biggest Anaheim Ducks fans you’ll meet, and, this year, my brother-in-law, Richard Schulman.
Rich grew up a sports fan, cheering on the Los Angeles Dodgers and Lakers. He became a big fan of Cal during his undergrad experience in Berkeley. For years, he’s always been aware of the sports zeitgeist, tuning into the biggest events and having enough knowledge to carry on a conversation about the sports news of the day or debate the biggest topics. Today, he’s a father of four, working (quite successfully!) in real estate, challenged for time to follow sports, but a season ticket holder for Angel City FC, because he’s raising girls who love to play soccer (and go to ACFC games with their friends).
I came away from my interview with Rich with a ton of insight about what it’s like to be a time-strapped father trying to balance keeping up with sports while keeping up with his kids, who adopted a team that didn’t exist when he was growing up, because it’s fun to do with his daughters. Here are some key lessons and takeaways:
The days are still 24 hours as one starts to build a family, but the days are necessarily more managed and time feels more crunched. Rich can recall days in the past when he’d settle in to watch a day of sports or attend a game not knowing what time the game would end, but now such uncertainty is downright daunting. That’s part of the appeal for Angel City games (and Savannah Bananas games), he explained.
“Now I’m constrained on time. Like, I took my seven year-old to a Savannah Bananas game. I’m sure you’re familiar with them; and the same with soccer, it’s like you get there and you sit down and exactly two hours later you’re walking to the car.
“I can take my kids to an Angel City game, which is the women’s pro team in LA, it’s like on a schedule. It’s like 7:00 game; I like to go early with the kids, we can walk around; but I can leave my house at 6:00, I can sit down at 6:30, the game starts at 7:00, the game is over by 8:45, I’m home by 9:30. It’s a pretty tight time. And the kids like it…
“So sports now has to fit into a box. Like, I can watch playoffs. But you know, I used to watch college football Saturday all day, and I could just watch a random three-hour football game. You can’t do that anymore.”
Takeaway:
We’ve already seen Major League Baseball, in particular, take proactive steps to limit the duration of its games, introducing a clock to the sport that had been distinct by its lack of a countdown time function. Recognize that parents, in particular, are balancing mealtimes, naptimes, and school nights. Part of the appeal of sports is the escape, leaving worries and clock watching aside, but that’s often not realistic for busy parents (and many adults, in general). While we can’t build in assurances, we can be more proactive about helping fans fit in their sports, whether that’s providing average duration and end times, recognizing some fans won’t stay or watch the full game (in person or at home), and helping them still be fans and have enjoyable, stress-free experiences nonetheless.
There are days when there’s an exciting buzzer beater or an unreal comeback, and it feels like everyone has to be aware of this, right? But the reality you are the minority if you’re refreshing the Twitter feed every few minutes or locked into notifications for Adam Schefter and Shams reports, and planning your weekends around sports. There are certain transcendent news stories that break through for Rich, however; I offered the Luka Doncic trade, as an example. And while Rich rarely finds time to sit down and watch most of ant game, the playoffs, especially when they involve his team, can be an exception to the rule.
“For something big like [the Luka Doncic trade], like that’ll show up on the regular news or my social feed will pop because I have friends who care more than me about it…But now it’s crazy that people would even think about spending that much time watching.
“You know, when the playoffs come around, I’ll get interested. I watched most of the Dodgers playoff games last year. Except, of course, the game they won the World Series, I was at soccer with the kids and they went down 5-0. I’m like, Well, I guess we’re not watching that game. We’ll just watch tomorrow’s game. And then on the drive home, they tied the game. But I watched the whole game one with the kids with the Freddie Freeman Grand Slam, so they all saw that.”
Takeaway:
When I worked on the team side, I often reminded myself that, as unlikely as it seems, some fans really were learning about big news for the first time from the team’s social posts or emails or text alerts. Don’t take for granted the median fan of the team is as informed as the top 1-5% who engage with every post and have their fandom listed in their IG bio. But do recognize, too, that less-engaged fans often still have avid, informed fangelists in their social circles or friend groups that are on top of things. They’re the ones pinging the group chat or whose posts make it to the Facebook feed of their friends and family; help those vocal fans be the messenger.
There are lot of reasons fans decide to become season ticket holders across any professional or collegiate sport. Just as there are myriad reasons fans enjoy attending games. For Rich, going to Angel City games was not necessarily because his daughters, avid soccer players themselves, wanted to see professional soccer; it was a social outing with friends. For young kids, and by proxy their parents, sports are an early social vehicle (along with school, of course). Friendships are formed through playing sports, and attending sports events are great, novel ‘play dates,’ where friends can have new experiences and make memories together.
In addition, make special note of the difference Rich saw in the way his girls responded to Angel City (NWSL) and LAFC (MLS). It’s great that we tend to see both little girls AND little boys enjoy women’s sports, and interesting (and powerful) for little girls to be awestruck by seeing women as superstars, competing in front of big crowds at the highest level.
The decision to invest in season tickets ties together a lot of the aforementioned ideas in this piece — predictability, social, and convenience.
“We had gone to some LAFC games, me and the girls. We had friends that had tickets, so we would occasionally go with them on their tickets or buy tickets near them, and they liked it. I mean, it was neat for them. It was really interesting when Angel City came around, the same friend and another friend got season tickets and we thought, Oh, we’re not going to go to all the games, and then we went and the girls had a much better reaction to girls playing soccer than boys playing soccer, which to me, maybe it sounds obvious; I was surprised just because, like, I didn’t really ever think about it. We had pretty good seats. It’s a small stadium, it’s a nice, intimate venue, but you’re still like 100 feet away from a player. And if they do a throw in right underneath your seats; like, I can throw a baseball probably to the players that are closest to us.
“But [my daughters] really responded. So then we ended up getting [season tickets]…“There’s only like 10 or 12 home games, so it makes sense, once you start going to them. You can have your tickets that you want to have…We like to have the same seats, next to friends. The seats are good, it’s reliable, I don’t have to worry about going online. You know, Ticketmaster is still a poor experience to buy tickets. So it’s just nice to see, Okay. I have my tickets, I don’t have to think about it.”
Takeaway:
For many fans, sports events are a third place. It’s where you see or spend time with friends, sometimes it’s the only place you see certain friends. How can we better integrate this behavior into sports? Could purchasing tickets (especially directly from the team) be negineered to make it easy to be paired with another buyer or could we rethink what ‘group sales’ means when it’s 2-3 families instead of a company, church, or youth team? And while season ticket membership benefits are great (I spoje with Rich about some cool experiences on the field his girls get to have because of season ticket member or group sales benefits), don’t overlook the little things — the convenience, the reduction of stress, the reliability.
[Still thinking about the remark about the ‘different response’ his girls had to watching women play, too]
Sports fandom has evolved in the last couple of decades, and many fans tend to follow athletes as much as teams. But, especially for kids at that vital age range (~ 8-11 years old, give or take), there is a greater correlation between proximity and their favorite players. There’s still a bit of magic for little kids to meet any professional athlete, they’re demigods even if kids don’t know their names. And while fans may follow stars like Messi or Ohtani or LeBron wherever they go, for little kids, it’s the star players they’re able to see IRL that have a higher likelihood of capturing their young hearts. With all that in mind, it’s worthwhile to note what Rich says about the flux nature of the Angel City roster and how that affects the propensity for the kdis to get to know players by name and, in turn, want to follow them (and the team) more avidly on and off the pitch.
“[The girls] don’t follow it like I used to follow sports, but they know the best players, like the main starting players. Angel City seems to have a constantly changing roster of players, so it’s been a little challenging to attach. But like, you know, let’s say Alyssa Thompson is their best or most notable player, like when we met her at the stadium after the game, they go down and try to get autographs, they’re really excited. Hannah recognized her and her sister at the mall, and we tracked down Alyssa Thompson at the mall…“But they probably couldn’t tell you 11 players on the team and we don’t really follow — like, Angel City has not been successful at winning soccer games. So we haven’t really been following their games that we don’t go to…
“[His daughters] get excited even when they meet [any] player. You know, they got an autograph last week at the game, and we don’t know who the person is. I have a picture of her, I have to figure out who it was. But she was excited, it was a former player who signed her jersey. So sometimes, if they go down to the field, they’ll get a signature from some of the other team, like the backup goalie from their team, but they’re still excited.”
Takeaway:
There’s not much we can do about the dynamic nature of rosters these days (incidentally, Rich also lamented his Cal fandom diminishing as the program’s top football players annually enter the transfer portal). The issue is a big one in sports — the dilution of unconditional love for a team, exacerbated by closer ties to individual players, the majority of whom won’t be on the team for their entire careers. But the good news is that because of that smaller world for young kids, when they’re at the age that their lifelong fandom can form, they’re more likely to latch onto the local team and its players. Make it easy for young fans to fall in love with the team, every last one of them. One of the best parts of women’s sports, especially, is before and after each game, a lot of the athletes (including the superstars) make time for kids, giving them lifelong memories and special moments that can form powerful connections. Give more kids more opportunities to make lifelong memories that involve the team, stories that’ll be etched in stone and in their hearts and minds for life.
I wanted to include these additional quotes, but without extensive analysis.
The first represents the challenge of trying to balance sports participation for four kids. At a time when sports specialization is increasingly prevalent, and increasingly questioned, Rich’s girls have primarily stuck to soccer. Parents drive a lot of early exposure to sports and recreational participation, and it’s not easy when the kids and their social and sports and other obligations start to pile up. But also take note of another theme from my interview with Rich, how soccer has become a fulcrum for friendships. Specialization and playing club soccer and tournaments isn’t about just about playing more soccer, it’s spending more time with their friends.
“I don’t know how people do it with multiple sports. I mean, I know it’s probably better for the kids overall. It’s probably better for their sports. But at some point you have to say you gotta play soccer year round if you want to advance in soccer. Like, it’d be neat if you also had time to be like a swimmer and a volleyball player, but with four kids, it’s just not going to happen….It’s not really challenging because, you know, they are invited to play on an all star team and they get excited for that, and they generally tend to become friends with the other all stars. So it’s like you want to do more soccer with your friends? Of course.”
Rich has taken his kids to a handful of different sports events over the years, so we talked about the experience of being a parent and taking a young kid (or group of kids) to a game. What’s the right age to start taking them, how the kids experience it, and what their particular experience with Angel City is like.
“Probably around 6 or 7 [is the right age to start taking kids to games]. I mean, Leah will watch a whole game, but last game we went to, they wanted to go buy candy, and I’m like, there’s 20 minutes left in the game, you’re not going to go buy candy. You know, wander the stadium and go buy candy and miss the whole game. So you know, something like that…
“[Angel City] has a lot of stuff going on before the game, which is nice. The food options have dwindled as attendance has trailed off. They always have a local musical thing happening. They have some celebrity fans they highlight, which is neat. But they should focus on putting out a winning product on the field and that will kind of solve [things].”
Thank you again to my brother-in-law, Rich, for being a great dad to my nieces and nephew, and for helping us celebrate 12 years of the Digital and Social Media Sports Podcast by offering his experiences and opinions as a fan and father!