Defense doesn't win championships. Defense wins games. Brands win championships. In ten years, the most consistently successful college athletic programs will be those with the strongest brands, not simply the strongest defense or most explosive offense from year to year. It's not just about x's and o's anymore. It about polarizing uniforms on the field and massive billboards in Times Square. It's about making your brand sexy to seventeen- and eighteen-year-old blue-chip athletes. And this is your guidebook on how to reach them. Inside, you'll find three simple brand-building steps that can take your program from bad to good or from good to great. Jeremy Darlow is a brand marketing professional who, during his time at adidas, has worked with schools like Notre Dame, Michigan, and UCLA, and athletes like Robert Griffin III, Dwight Howard, and Lionel Messi. He works to help NCAA athletic programs and athletes build and elevate their brands to elite levels. *** A must-read for anyone in sports marketing. This book sees the future and shows you how to get there. - Nate Scott, USA TODAY Sports, For the Win Win or lose, here's how to build a national reputation for your college sports brand - Al Ries, Author, Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind Brands Win Championships offers a practical primer on how to build your brand with story and perception - Tim Newcomb, Sports Illustrated Die hard fans-that one concept, that one overlooked idea-is just one of the big ideas you'll find inside this book that's not actually about sports - Seth Godin, Author, Linchpin

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * An insightful read...Walters is a larger-than-life character. --Sports Illustrated * This book is going to become the sports gambling bible...The formula's in the book. --Pat McAfee

The wild and massively entertaining autobiography of Billy Walters--the greatest and most controversial sports gambler ever (ESPN)--who shares his extraordinary life story, reveals the secrets to his fiercely protected betting system, and breaks his silence about Phil Mickelson.

Anybody can get lucky. Nobody controls the odds like Billy Walters. Widely regarded as the Michael Jordan of sports betting, Walters is a living legend in Las Vegas and among sports bettors worldwide. With an unmatched winning streak of thirty-six consecutive years, Walters has become fabulously wealthy by placing hundreds of millions of dollars a year in gross wagers, including one Super Bowl bet of $3.5 million alone. Competitors desperate to crack his betting techniques have tried hacking his phones, cloning his beepers, rifling through his trash, and bribing his employees. Now, after decades of avoiding the spotlight and fiercely protecting the keys to his success, Walters has reached the age where he wants to pass along his wisdom to future generations of sports bettors.

Gambler is more than a traditional autobiography. In addition to sharing his against-all-odds American Dream story, Walters reveals in granular detail the secrets of his proprietary betting system, which will serve as a master class for anyone who wants to improve their odds at betting on sports. Walters also breaks his silence about his long and complicated relationship with Hall of Fame professional golfer Phil Mickelson.

On a typical weekend gameday packed with college and pro sports, Walters will bet $20 million. It's a small sum for someone with his resources today, but an unbelievable fortune for the child who was raised by his grandmother in extreme poverty in rural Kentucky. By the age of nine, Walters became a shark at hustling pool and pitching pennies. As a young adult, he set records as a used-car salesman, hustled golf, and dabbled in bookmaking. He eventually moved to Las Vegas, where he revolutionized sports betting strategy and became a member of the famed Computer Group, the first syndicate to apply algorithms and data analysis to sports gambling. He built a fortune while overcoming addictions and outmaneuvering organized crime figures made infamous by Martin Scorsese's film Casino.

In Gambler, Walters shares everything he's learned about sports betting. First, he shows bettors how to mine the information we have at our fingertips to develop a sophisticated betting strategy and handicapping system of our own. He explains how even avid bettors often do not grasp all of the variables that go into making an informed wager--home field advantage, individual player values, injuries or illness, weather forecasts, each team's previous schedule, travel distance/ difficulty, stadium quirks, turf types, and more. Variable by variable, Walters breaks down the formulas, betting systems, and money-management principles that he's developed over decades of improving his craft.

A self-made man who repeatedly won it all, lost it all, and earned it all back again, Walters has lived a singular and wildly appealing American life, of the outlaw variety. Gambler is at once a gripping autobiography, a blistering tell-all, and an indispensable playbook for coming out on top.

In the last two decades, innovation, data analysis, and technology have driven a tectonic shift in the sports business. Game of Edges is the story of how sports franchises evolved, on and off the field, from raggedly run small businesses into some of the most systematically productive companies around.

In today's game, everyone from the owners to the marketing staff are using information--data--to give their team an edge. For analysts, an edge is their currency. Figuring out that bunting hurts your offense? That's an edge. So is discovering metrics that can predict the career arc of your free agent shooting guard. Or combing through a decade of ticket-buying data to target persuadable fans.

These small, incremental steps move a sports franchise from merely ordinary to the leading edge. Franchises today are more than just sports; they integrate a whole suite of other businesses--television and digital content, gambling and real estate, fashion and apparel, entertainment, catering and concessions, and much more. But an optimized franchise has no room for error. Teams must do what the numbers say, reducing the element of chance, limiting those random moments of athletic heroism that make sports thrilling to watch. Optimization also means the franchise's main goal isn't championships anymore; it's keeping you, the viewer, engaged with the product.

Drawing on extensive interviews with franchise owners, general managers, executives, and players, Bruce Schoenfeld introduces dynamic leaders who are radically reimagining the operations of these decades-old teams--and producing mind-boggling valuations. He joins the architects of the Golden State Warriors dynasty for an exclusive reception before tip-off. He stands among the faithful at Anfield, watching Liverpool's analytics guru size up a prized midfielder. And he watches the president of the Chicago Cubs break ground on a new DraftKings gambling parlor at Wrigley Field, not ten miles from the site of the original Black Sox betting scandal.

Essential reading for anyone interested in sports, business, or technology, Game of Edges explores a world where winning the game is only the beginning.

The athlete's guide to building a personal brand and a future beyond sports.

Athletes Are Brands Too teaches athletes at every level how to build a brand that can lead to success in life, regardless of what happens in their athletic career. One part road map, one part call to arms, this guide gives athletes the tools to build their influence, beat the odds, and leverage their athletic accomplishments well beyond sports.

A fascinating tour of Oakland sports history and a look toward the future of professional sports in the East Bay.

Oakland is a sports city like no other. It is the only city in America to be abandoned by the same team twice, with the Raiders most recently leaving for Las Vegas. The Golden State Warriors, who crossed the bay in 1971 in search of better digs, have now returned to San Francisco with trophies in tow. The long-fought battle to keep the Oakland Athletics in the East Bay may narrowly save the city from a hat trick of departures.

And yet, Oakland has produced more than its share of success in the form of 10 national titles across the NFL, NBA, and MLB. The city is gritty, gutsy, and self-preserving, with a blue-collar mentality and a gold standard under that collar. Bolstered by the Silicon Valley tech boom, Oakland has become one of the most desirable places to live in the entire country, all while its sports fans increasingly find that, in the famous words of Gertrude Stein, There is no there there.

What is it about Oakland that inspires such wanderlust in its professional teams? Featuring numerous conversations with luminaries across sports, politics, and economics, this new book explores Oakland's fascinating and paradoxical identity as a sports town while illuminating a cast of characters as diverse as the city itself: rogues, superstars, movers and shakers operating on and off the field, and, of course, the fans.

Through the insight of venerated Oakland Tribune scribe Dave Newhouse and sports business leader Andy Dolich, readers will come to appreciate the many quirks and challenges that define The Town.

The sports industry provides a seemingly endless set of examples from every area of microeconomics, giving students the opportunity to study economics in a context that holds their interest. Thoroughly updated to reflect the current landscape, introducing core economic concepts and theories, and applies them to US and international sports.

Discover the strategy behind Major League Soccer's rapid rise as it aims to compete with global football giants.

Major League Soccer, armed with its massive Apple sponsorship, the imminent arrival of the 2026 FIFA World Cup in North America, the hosting of the COPA America tournament in 2024, and the signing of the game's GOAT, Lionel Messi, could make MLS one of the world's biggest leagues and one, within the next five years, capable of keeping credible company with European leagues such as La Liga, Serie A, Ligue 1, and Bundesliga.

In The Rise of Major League Soccer: Building a Global Giant, experienced sports business experts Rick Burton and Norm O'Reilly dig into the slow but sure growth of Major League Soccer in North America and the advent of major European teams like Manchester United, Real Madrid, Chelsea, FC Barcelona, Arsenal, Inter Milan, Bayern Munich, Liverpool, and others attracting huge fan bases in the United States. For soccer enthusiasts, sports business professionals, and anyone curious about the future of American sports, this book is an essential read that captures MLS's journey to becoming a global powerhouse.

A book] NFL fans in general and Browns' fans in particular will definitely want to read ... a fascinating, behind-the-scenes look at how the new Browns were created and what's kept them from making the progress everyone expected. -- Houston Chronicle

Your team never had a chance.

Terry Pluto, one of Cleveland's top sportswriters, takes a hard look at the unhappy beginnings of the new Cleveland Browns franchise. This book chronicles the backroom deals, big-money power plays, poor decisions, and plain bad luck that have dogged the venerable team since Art Modell skipped town in 1995.

When the new Cleveland Browns took the field in 1999, it was supposed to be the dawn of a grand new era of football in Cleveland. Instead, it was a rude wakeup call.

Legions of loyal fans--once heartsick, abandoned, and disgusted at the loss of their team in 1995--were ready to forgive the past and embrace the future ... a new owner, a new team, a new stadium. They just wanted their Browns back. But it soon became clear: Browns fans got a bum deal. The NFL had traded one of the most storied teams in football history for a franchise mired in mediocrity.

These fans, after owner Art Modell skipped town with their beloved Browns, became the only fans ever to take on the NFL, demand their team back--and win. Yet while they were celebrating the supposed victory that kept our name, our colors, our team in Cleveland, fans should have been looking over their shoulders and keeping a close watch on the NFL. There would be few reasons to celebrate in the years to come.

How much longer would they have to wait for a return to glory? Pluto sifts through the clues and looks for answers. This is a book the NFL does not want you to read.

Data and analytics have the potential to provide sports organizations with a competitive advantage both on and off the field. Yet even as the use of analytics in sports has become commonplace, teams regularly find themselves making big investments without significant payoff.

This book is a practical, nontechnical guide to incorporating sports data into decision making, giving leaders the knowledge they need to maximize their organization's investment in analytics. Benjamin C. Alamar--a leading expert who has built high-performing analytics groups--surveys the current state of the use of data in sports, including both specifics around the tools and how to deploy them most effectively. Sports Analytics offers a clear, easily digestible overview of data management, statistical models, and information systems and a detailed understanding of their vast possibilities. It walks readers through the essentials of understanding the value of different types of data and strategies for building and managing an analytics team. Throughout, Alamar illustrates the value of analytics with real-world examples and case studies from both the sports and business sides.

Sports Analytics has guided a range of sports professionals to success since its original publication in 2013. This second edition adds examples and strategies that focus on using data on the business side of a sports organization, provides concrete strategies for incorporating different types of data into decision making, and updates all discussions for the rapid technological developments of the last decade.

The New York Times bestseller about what would happen if two statistics-minded outsiders were allowed to run a professional baseball team--now includes a new afterword by the authors.

It's the ultimate in fantasy baseball: You get to pick the roster, set the lineup, and decide on strategies -- with real players, in a real ballpark, in a real playoff race. That's what baseball analysts Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller got to do when an independent minor-league team in California, the Sonoma Stompers, offered them the chance to run its baseball operations according to the most advanced statistics. Their story in The Only Rule is it Has to Work is unlike any other baseball tale you've ever read.

We tag along as Lindbergh and Miller apply their number-crunching insights to all aspects of assembling and running a team, following one cardinal rule for judging each innovation they try: it has to work. We meet colorful figures like general manager Theo Fightmaster and boundary-breakers like the first openly gay player in professional baseball. Even José Canseco makes a cameo appearance.

Will their knowledge of numbers help Lindbergh and Miller bring the Stompers a championship, or will they fall on their faces? Will the team have a competitive advantage or is the sport's folk wisdom true after all? Will the players attract the attention of big-league scouts, or are they on a fast track to oblivion?

It's a wild ride, by turns provocative and absurd, as Lindbergh and Miller tell a story that will speak to numbers geeks and traditionalists alike. And they prove that you don't need a bat or a glove to make a genuine contribution to the game.

Between 2012 and 2016, Mercer University Athletics (NCAA Division I member of the Southern Conference) experienced success on the field, expanded sport offerings, and achieved in the classroom. Building the Bear delves into the success of the Mercer Athletic Foundation - the fundraising arm of the Mercer Athletic Department charged with supporting 16 sport programs.

Topics covered include setting priorities and goals, developing programming, major gift strategies, donor cultivation and stewardship, drafting an annual calendar, marketing a fundraising operation and coordinating special events. One unique aspect of this read is the thinking behind football specific programming which came about with the return of Division I FCS football to Mercer's campus in 2013.

Written by Brian Gerrity, the Mercer Athletic Foundation Executive Director and Senior Associate Athletic Director, Building the Bear fills the gap between the classroom and workplace. Written in part to provide a resource for young development professionals, this is a must read for aspiring collegiate athletic administrators and sports management undergraduate and graduate students. This read is a combination of text and infographics and is a real-world example of the power of strategic thinking.

Building the Bear uses real life examples and actual strategies employed to raise funds at the Division I level. Part textbook and part case study, this read is concise, thoughtful, and packed with real world examples of the methodology behind athletic development. Building the Bear covers the steps taken to build a mid-major fundraising arm from a sleepy annual fund to a dynamic fundraising arm.

A critical look at the tension between the larger role of the university and the commercialization of college sports

Unwinding Madness is the most comprehensive examination to date of how the NCAA has lost its way in the governance of intercollegiate athletics--and why it is incapable of achieving reform and must be replaced. The NCAA has placed commercial success above its responsibilities to protect the academic primacy, health and well-being of college athletes and fallen into an educational, ethical, and economic crisis.

In the last two decades, innovation, data analysis, and technology have driven a tectonic shift in the sports business. Game of Edges is the story of how sports franchises evolved, on and off the field, from raggedly run small businesses into some of the most systematically productive companies around.

In today's game, everyone from the owners to the marketing staff are using information--data--to give their team an edge. For analysts, an edge is their currency. Figuring out that bunting hurts your offense? That's an edge. So is discovering metrics that can predict the career arc of your free agent shooting guard. Or combing through a decade of ticket-buying data to target persuadable fans.

These small, incremental steps move a sports franchise from merely ordinary to the leading edge. Franchises today are more than just sports; they integrate a whole suite of other businesses--television and digital content, gambling and real estate, fashion and apparel, entertainment, catering and concessions, and much more. But an optimized franchise has no room for error. Teams must do what the numbers say, reducing the element of chance, limiting those random moments of athletic heroism that make sports thrilling to watch. Optimization also means the franchise's main goal isn't championships anymore; it's keeping you, the viewer, engaged with the product.

Drawing on extensive interviews with franchise owners, general managers, executives, and players, Bruce Schoenfeld introduces dynamic leaders who are radically reimagining the operations of these decades-old teams--and producing mind-boggling valuations. He joins the architects of the Golden State Warriors dynasty for an exclusive reception before tip-off. He stands among the faithful at Anfield, watching Liverpool's analytics guru size up a prized midfielder. And he watches the president of the Chicago Cubs break ground on a new DraftKings gambling parlor at Wrigley Field, not ten miles from the site of the original Black Sox betting scandal.

Essential reading for anyone interested in sports, business, or technology, Game of Edges explores a world where winning the game is only the beginning.

In Live Sports Media: The What, How and Why of Sports Broadcasting, Dennis Deninger provides an all-encompassing view of the sports television industry from his own perspective as an Emmy Award-winning producer at ESPN, at a time of seismic shifts in the industry. Technological advances and the proliferation of sports content across multiple media platforms have increased accessibility to sports events of all kinds across the world. Shifts in viewing habits and audience preferences are changing the dynamic of sports media and the sports industry as a whole. The result: more power for some sectors and diminished power for many others, to which professionals in the field need to rapidly adapt.

This second edition has been substantially updated to explore the impact of COVID-19 disruptions on sports and the growth of women's sports broadcasting and evolving sports, as well as political statements made in sports: Black Lives Matter, and taking a knee. It illustrates the origins, impact, reach, economics, production, and presentation of sports on video media - including, but not limited to, television. It takes the reader behind the scenes to describe the forces and processes that have shaped and continue to change sports content, its delivery, and how it connects with fans. Dennis Deninger draws from his experiences as an expert in the industry to expose how the choices and decisions that are now being made affect the programming, content, storytelling, production, advertising, and delivery of the sports broadcasting that we will see next season and how it will evolve in the years to come.

This practical, entertaining book provides insights into sports broadcasting that sports management, media, and journalism students and learning practitioners will not find anywhere else.

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A university's athletic training room is meant to care for and heal college athletes and ensure they are receiving the help they need. Although sports medicine staff members are sincere in their goal of centering athletes and providing the best healthcare possible, organizational constraints affect their approach. Chief among them is the pressure sports medicine staff members feel to keep athletes from profit-generating sports healthy enough to perform.

Body Factory enters an NCAA Division I athletic training room to examine the disconnect between what the NCAA states as its goal of athlete healthcare and what is actually happening. Kaitlin Pericak conducts observations in this space and interviews injured athletes and sports medicine staff members to show how institutional control over best interests often ends up exploiting the individual athlete. The influences at work are part of a neoliberal paradigm that explains why interest in an athlete's care is greatly diminished once they are injured and can no longer play.

Body Factory considers how race, gender, and health before and after injury are deciding factors in these university training centers. The bureaucratic organization has a goal of maintaining power to generate profit, and Pericak shows this is almost always at the expense of the athlete.

The burgeoning global sport industry is a $500 billion business with no signs of slowing down. For the upper-undergraduate and graduate sport management student exhibiting a penchant for finances and a passion for sports, the field of sport finance presents tremendous career opportunities.

No other textbook connects financial principles with real-world sport finance strategies as effectively as Sport Finance, Fifth Edition With HKPropel Access. Emphasizing a more practical approach, the fifth edition goes beyond the what and how of sport finance and dives deeper into the why--the reasoning behind the principles of sport finance--providing students with an even more comprehensive perspective on what drives the financial success or failure of any sport entity.

The text is organized into five areas, focused on the hard skills tomorrow's sport financiers must master to perform their role: increasing revenues and decreasing expenses, developing budgets, understanding financial statements and ratios, obtaining funding and managing cash, and building a financial strategy. Each section features an insightful introduction by a renowned industry professional, providing a real-world perspective that's sure to pique readers' interest. Chapters addressing revenues and expenses include budgets from the sporting goods industry, intercollegiate athletics, and professional sports.

The sport industry landscape has changed significantly since the previous edition was published, and the fifth edition reflects the new realities affecting today's sport organizations. Addressed are name, image, and likeness (NIL) rule changes; esports; cryptocurrencies; non-fungible tokens (NFTs); sport gambling; the proliferation of broadcasting rights and the sneaker market; and the impacts of COVID-19 on the sport industry.

The fifth edition's practical takeaways are especially prominent with the addition of related online resources available to students and assignable by instructors via HKPropel. One highlight is Two-Dollar Team, an Excel-based simulation that introduces students to assets and liabilities, revenue and expenses, budgeting, cash management, and borrowing and reveals how these specialties work together in developing financial strategies. Three other assignable class projects involve personal budgeting, expenditures, and a stock market game. Other new features include five brand-new case studies and a profile of a typical health club, Florida Fitness Club, in which students are challenged to put their learning to the test by reading and understanding financial statements, setting budgets, and identifying strengths, weaknesses, and growth opportunities for the fictional facility.

Sport Finance provides students with a thorough understanding of the financial and economic aspects of the sport industry. By analyzing sport business entities and structures, financial statements, and funding sources, students will acquire the skills to make more informed and effective financial decisions, better manage the risks, and recognize opportunities in the world of sport.

Note: A code for accessing HKPropel is included with all new print books.

Impelled by runaway spending and rampant corruption, America's much-beloved games of college basketball and football are being threatened. The specter of billion-dollar sums being showered on coaches, voracious athletic directors, hordes of support staff and lavish comforts for fans has led to a near-deafening roar to pay the players. The injustice of such sums being amassed, in the main, from the labor of young men of color many of whom come from disadvantaged backgrounds cannot be justified; and yet, American society has allowed this intractable problem to fester for more than half a century. Lured by the glitter of untold riches, naive young players enroll year after year in colleges and universities expecting the ultimate reward of a highly paid career as a pro. Only a minuscule few will advance that far; even fewer will reap significant financial rewards. Instead of educating them, colleges and universities force them into full-time athletic jobs in which their labor is shamelessly exploited.

Small wonder that outraged critics demand compensation for the players, but these same critics only present vague answers when asked how such a radical change would work. College Sports on the Brink of Disaster, first published as Marching Toward Madness and now newly updated, cites twenty-one reasons why the pro-pay position is wrong, among them the prospect that the player talent pool will be concentrated to even fewer rich schools; recruiting wars will lead to more frequent scandals; and the regulatory powers of the NCAA will exponentially increase. Worst of all, pay-for-play will encourage schools to shirk even further the imperative to educate the young athletes.

College Sports on the Brink of Disaster presents comprehensive reforms to end cheating and corruption in college sports, to put academics first, and to end the peonage of non-white athletes once and for all.

For over 25 years, Contemporary Sport Management has been the most comprehensive, authoritative introductory text in the field, and the improved eighth edition promises to serve the needs of sport management students even better.

Sixty contributors representing a diverse array of scholarly and practitioner backgrounds have teamed up to deliver a timely text to keep pace with the ever-changing sport management landscape. Nearly a third of the contributors are new to this edition, adding fresh perspectives, examples, and experiences to the mix.

This full-color text is organized into three parts and aligns with Common Professional Component principles set forth by the Commission on Sport Management Accreditation (COSMA). Part I, Introduction to Sport Management, provides an overview and covers the foundational elements of the field. Part II, Sport Management Sites, exposes students to career opportunities through various sport entities, including interscholastic, intercollegiate, and professional sport organizations and agencies. In part III, Sport Management Functions, readers learn about the core functional areas of sport management, including sport marketing, communication, sales and consumer behavior, analytics, finance, facility and event management, and law.

Much has changed in the sport industry since the previous edition was published: name, image, and likeness (NIL) rules; social justice and inclusion initiatives; conference realignments; billion-dollar media rights deals; opportunities for women in sports; and the proliferation of artificial intelligence, sport analytics, and virtual reality and augmented reality--just to name a few. Each chapter incorporates new content, case studies, and sidebars addressing these and other trending topics. Other additions include a section on sport tourism and a new chapter dedicated to esports, discussing its ecosystem, global expansion, and career opportunities.

Supplementing the text are online learning materials delivered through HKPropel that are designed to increase student engagement and enhance understanding of chapter content. More than 200 activities, Case Studies in Sport Management journal articles, and case study sidebars underscore key concepts and challenge students to think critically about sport management so they can develop insight into issues they will encounter in their careers. Case studies new to this edition examine the 2026 World Cup, marketing of women's sports, facility management, and player safety.

Contemporary Sport Management has long been a favorite of instructors and students, propelled by its engaging content and visuals, full-color design, robust pedagogical aids, integrated online learning tools, and extensive instructor ancillaries. The updated eighth edition continues that tradition, broadening students' understanding of today's sport management issues and preparing them to enter the profession.

Note: A code for accessing HKPropel is included with all new print books.

There is a lot of mystery that surrounds sports agents and their roles in the lives of their high profile clients. Many perceive the life to be glamorous, spending time with celebrities and earning a lot of money for doing easy or very little work. The Life of a Sports Agent reveals how very wrong this perception is.

Having been a high profile sports agent for nearly 10 years, with clients such as James Anderson, Sam Quek, Nile Wilson, James Taylor, and Simon Mignolet, Luke Sutton has an incredible insight into the world of sports management across a number of areas. In his new book, The Life of a Sports Agent, Luke reveals stories and personal experiences about the sporting stars he has encountered, both the good and bad, and his very honest opinions about them.

This book also aims to give people a true look into how this mysterious industry works, and highlights the important lessons Luke has learned during his career. The Life of a Sports Agent follows Luke's 2019 autobiography, Back from the Edge.