July 12, 2024

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The former logo of the Commanders may take center stage at the beginning of the NFL season. … Lake Tahoe is home to one of the hottest celebrity events in sports and entertainment this weekend. … USA Basketball is gaining momentum off the court ahead of the Paris Olympics. … It’s been 45 years since the now infamous Disco Demolition Night. … And Front Office Sports Today explores the NBA’s forthcoming media-rights deals.

— David Rumsey [[link removed]], Eric Fisher [[link removed]], and A.J. Perez [[link removed]]

Parts of the Commanders’ Past Finding Their Way Into Harris Era [[link removed]]

Brad Mills-USA TODAY Sports

The Commanders remain in the midst of significant change under owner Josh Harris (above), marked in large part by an attempted on-field rebuild, a long-running search for a new stadium, and perhaps a new name.

But the weight of and the fan allure for the team’s glory days—particularly the Joe Gibbs era that resulted in three Super Bowl titles and helped fuel last year’s record-setting $6.05 billion sale—are still rather close at hand for the Commanders.

As training camp is quickly approaching with rookies due to report on July 18, the team has made two notable moves this week to honor its past.

The family of Walter “Blackie” Wetzel—the late Blackfeet Nation member who helped design the logo used from 1972 to 2020—is expected to be in attendance at the team’s home opener on Sept. 15, when a plaque acknowledging Wetzel will be unveiled at Commanders Field, Ryan Wetzel, a grandson of the late Walter Wetzel, told Front Office Sports. A Commanders spokesperson said “conversations with the Wetzel family are progressing well, but we cannot confirm details at this time.” The team also has announced [[link removed]] the return of its traditional, and widely popular, gold pants. While uniform changes are a regular occurrence for many teams, shifts like this for the Commanders carry extra weight. That’s particularly the case given the fans’ love of the franchise’s past, as well as the sensitivity around many elements of that history, including its former logo, the “R” name, and the combative and controversial era of former owner Dan Snyder. Fan Unrest

Harris has often been forced to navigate the team’s past-present tightrope since he was unanimously approved by NFL ownership last July. At his introductory news conference, Harris said the team’s old “R” name when referencing [[link removed]] the Commanders’ past accomplishments.

The Wetzels, meanwhile, have seized on the unpopularity of the Commanders name—a moniker that has the support of only 16% of the fan base, per a recent Washington Post survey [[link removed]]—in hopes that a potential name change could incorporate the old logo. Beyond the visit and a plaque, the Wetzels and Montana Sen. Steve Daines (R., Mont.) have continued to lobby the Commanders to bring back the logo in some form.

“The Commanders are listening,” Ryan Wetzel said. “We’d like to see the logo come back in some form. As to what capacity, I don’t know. They’ve been a little coy about that in our conversations.”

“Let’s restore the logo to a place of pride!!” Daines wrote [[link removed]] in an X post Wednesday.

Multiple NFL sources told FOS that the return of the old logo remains off the table and restoring the old “R” name is a complete nonstarter, however. The Commanders continue to have conversations with the Wetzels in hopes of finding a way to further recognize Walter Wetzel short of bringing back Native American imagery, a divisive issue that led to the name change in the first place.

Not All Is Great

Daines, meanwhile, remains a key figure in the Commanders’ still-uncertain stadium deliberations. He has threatened [[link removed]] to block the RFK Stadium bill that passed [[link removed]] the House earlier this year unless the Commanders give proper recognition to the descendants of the Indigenous leader who helped create the logo.

If the Commanders manage to thread the needle by appeasing the Wetzels, Daines will still need to back off his opposition to the bill that doesn’t even guarantee a stadium will be built on the RFK Stadium site.

One of the Hottest Celebrity Wait Lists Is a Golf Tournament [[link removed]]

American Century Championship

Travis Kelce has had quite the summer, supporting girlfriend Taylor Swift at several stops along the European leg of her famed Eras Tour. This weekend, Swift will be performing concerts in front of 75,000 fans in Milan. But her boyfriend will be a headlining act for his own crowd of 70,000+ nearly 6,000 miles away.

Kelce is one of the top draws at the American Century Championship in Lake Tahoe, a long-running celebrity golf tournament that has quickly become one of the hottest VIP invites in sports and entertainment in recent years. “The waiting list is off the charts,” says Hall of Fame pitcher John Smoltz, who has competed in the tournament most years since retiring in 2009 and is typically at the top of the final leaderboard.

The A-Team

This week, first-year participants are highlighted by Alex Rodriguez, Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence (fresh off his five-year, $275 million contract extension), and Rob McElhenney, the actor who’s grown even more famous as the co-owner of Welsh soccer club Wrexham. Tony Romo (above) has won the tournament three times, and he is annually joined by fellow sports stars like Aaron Rodgers and Charles Barkley, as well as household Hollywood names like Ray Romano.

Steph Curry won the American Century Championship last year, as a record 76,810 fans attended the three-day tournament. He’s getting ready to play for Team USA in the Paris Olympics, though, so his absence created one of about a dozen or so coveted spots that open up each summer.

“I can’t tell you how many people that will text me, or ask me, ‘How do I get in?’” says Kathryn Tappen, a tournament regular and reporter for NBC Sports, which owns the event.

“It’s a very challenging process,” NBC Sports executive Jon Miller tells Front Office Sports. “We have a group of people who work on this year-round, and they’re constantly out there looking for new names.” Less than 100 spots are available, and this year, 12 are taken by active NFL players or coaches, also including Davante Adams and Josh Allen. “Ideally, if you’re bringing new people in, they need to be relevant and recognizable names,” says Miller.

‘Strike While the Iron’s Hot’

“It was not that simple,” Super Bowl–winning quarterback Joe Flacco says of his efforts to secure a spot in the field, which is a stark contrast to years past. “I remember, early in my career, getting little cards in your locker about this tournament and not really thinking too much of it.”

The 17-year pro signed with the Colts this spring after a late-season run leading the Browns to the playoffs returned Flacco to the national spotlight. An old teammate of his, now retired tight end Dennis Pitta, encouraged Flacco to try to play. “Because [last season] happened to be a little bit of a story, he’s like, ‘Dude, you’ve got to strike while the iron’s hot.’” After a few phone calls, Flacco’s publicist pulled the right strings, and he’s teeing it up with Pitta as his caddy.

There’s Always Next Year

NBC launched the celebrity golf event in 1990 to fill summer programming space after the network lost MLB media rights. But it turned into such a success that it became an annual tradition, offering $750,000 in prize money, and is now a consistent money-maker for NBC. Last year’s final round, which included some raucous scenes [[link removed]] after Curry made a hole-in-one, averaged 1.4 million viewers.

“I don’t want Jon Miller’s job ever, with regards to telling people they can’t play in this tournament,” Tappen says. “Because he’s getting phone calls all year long with celebrities wanting to play.”

Maybe the waiting list isn’t so bad, though.

“That’s never a comfortable conversation or an easy thing to have to deal with,” Miller says. “But just because you miss one year, doesn’t mean you’re going to miss every year.”

SPONSORED BY CHAMPS SPORTS

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FRONT OFFICE SPORTS TODAY NBA Media Rights on Finish Line

Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

The NBA is on the cusp of signing media-rights deals totaling $76 billion over 11 years. Front Office Sports’ Tuned In columnist Michael McCarthy provides the latest reporting on the transformative deals and how Warner Bros. Discovery still has two big decisions to make.

🎧Watch, listen, and subscribe on Apple [[link removed]], Google [[link removed]], Spotify [[link removed]], and YouTube [[link removed]].

ONE BIG FIG Hitting the Jackpot

Candice Ward-USA TODAY Sports

20,756

Attendance for Team USA’s exhibition game Wednesday night in Las Vegas against Canada, representing the largest turnout for a basketball game at T-Mobile Arena. The U.S. men’s basketball team has been somewhat overshadowed in recent weeks amid other discussion about the Paris Games such as the return of star gymnast Simone Biles to the Olympic stage, Caitlin Clark being left off [[link removed]] the women’s basketball team, and NBC Sports’ lean [[link removed]] toward celebrity-driven marketing of the event. But the men’s basketball team still features NBA superstars such as LeBron James and Stephen Curry, and USA Basketball’s 50th-anniversary party earlier this week included a surprise appearance from former U.S. President Barack Obama (above), who also sat courtside for the U.S.-Canada game.

TIME CAPSULE July 12, 1979: A Promotion Gone Awry

Detroit Free Press via Imagn Content Services, LLC

On this day 45 years ago: The White Sox’ Disco Demolition Night promotion at Comiskey Park devolved into a riot, helping change the face of both baseball promotions and stadium security for decades to come. The brainchild of Mike Veeck, team promotions director and the son of owner Bill Veeck, and local disc jockey Steve Dahl, Disco Demolition Night was designed to tap into broader anti-disco sentiment and drive more attendance in what would be a losing White Sox season. The core idea of the promotion involved fans bringing disco records to the game, which would be collected and then detonated on the field between games of a doubleheader against the Tigers.

The club expected to draw about 20,000 for the first game, a figure roughly 25% above its season average of 16,211. But attracted by both the promotion and discounted 98-cent tickets for those turning in records, 47,795 people arrived instead, with thousands more lingering outside the stadium. After the albums were exploded between games, an estimated 7,000 fans stormed the field, tearing up the field and resulting in dozens of arrests and injuries. With the field in tatters, the White Sox forfeited the nightcap of the doubleheader.

There have been numerous legacies stemming from the incident. Mike Veeck, after taking extensive criticism for the fiasco and suffering several years of personal and professional struggles, went to become an influential figure [[link removed]] in minor league team ownership. He would redefine over-the-top marketing through his “Fun Is Good” mantra that has a much more jovial vibe than Dahl’s darker, anti-disco tone. Stadium security in many sports would see a tightening to help prevent the mass entry of fans onto the field like this one. Disco itself, which had been a cultural touchstone for several years, quickly faded as many radio stations immediately shifted toward other formats.

Disco Demolition Night, meanwhile, has been chronicled and revisited multiple times over the years, including in a PBS documentary [[link removed]], another on Netflix focused on Mike Veeck and his rehabilitation, and a book [[link removed]] that involved Dahl. Many of the retrospectives have delved into issues of race and sexual orientation intertwined with the anti-disco sentiment.

SPONSORED BY CHAMPS SPORTS

Fox Sports has gone all in on international soccer tournaments in recent years, and the major financial investment is paying off big time. The semifinals of Copa América and Euro 2024 began this week with plenty of star power left in both tournaments, and they have already produced record viewership for Fox, which owns U.S. media rights to each event.

Check out [[link removed]] the Summer of Soccer hub to read the full article and stay up to date on all the action.

Conversation Starters Bill Belichick’s next sports media venture is set: The legendary football coach will join the cast [[link removed]] of Inside the NFL on The CW this season. Colorado coach Deion Sanders is worried about some players’ attitude toward name, image, and likeness. See what [[link removed]] Coach Prime said at the Big 12 media days. Think you can make a dynasty out of a small school? We’re giving away two copies of the highly anticipated EA Sports College Football 25 video game. Enter here [[link removed]] for a chance to win. See rules here [[link removed]]. Editors’ Picks Teenage Sprinting Prodigy Sues Gatorade After Positive Test [[link removed]]by Dennis Young [[link removed]]Issam Asinga alleges Gatorade gave him contaminated gummies. Will They or Won’t They? TNT Must Match Bids or Say Goodbye to NBA [[link removed]]by Michael McCarthy [[link removed]]A spurned media partner has sued the league before. Everything You Need to Know About the Jaylen Brown–Nike-Olympic Beef [[link removed]]by Dennis Young [[link removed]]It starts, as it often does, with a carefully parsed emoji. Question of the Day

Should the Commanders change their name again?

YES [[link removed]] NO [[link removed]]

Thursday’s result: 35% of respondents said they plan on watching some NBA Summer League action on TV this month.

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