Here we stand with four teams left, each series destined to be a grueling battle for its league-respective pennant. Coincidentally, the four teams with the most Twitter followers heading into the playoffs are the four that remain. By this logic, we ‘ll be looking at a New York Yankees/San Francisco Giants World Series in due…
Tag Archives | Baseball
Yicketty! Hall of Fame Influencer Joins Twitter During Retirement Season
After about 18 and a half seasons in Major League Baseball, Chipper Jones (@RealCJ10) launched his personal, verified Twitter account. To be fair, the 140-character social media site has only been online since July of 2006 and only popularized in the last few years. In the approximately 120 days @RealCJ10 has been active, Chipper has…
Sports Job Interview with Travis LoDolce, Sr. Manager Digital Marketing – Oakland Athletics
Travis LoDolce is a bit of an anomaly in the sports world. As senior manager of digital marketing, he is in his 11th season working for the Oakland Athletics. During those 11 years, Travis has seen his career flash before him in an award-winning movie, and skills beyond his job description take him to a…
America’s Favorite Pastime Serves Up Lots of Leadership Skills
Guest post submitted by Jason Monaghan Can baseball really offer that many lessons in leadership skills? Absolutely. Baseball encompasses a long, grueling season, where players and managers work tirelessly to earn a spot in the World Series. If their strategy for a particular game doesn’t work, they change pitcher, catcher or batting lineup, coveting the…
An Interview with San Francisco Giants’ Director of Social Media
The San Francisco Giants enjoyed a banner year in 2010: they won the World Series and embraced social media as a means of engaging diehard fans at AT&T Park and across the country. We sat down with Bryan Srabian, the Giants’ Director of Social Media, and asked him about the successes in 2010 and the…
Overtime Post – The Ron Santo Edition
It’s been a tough couple weeks in the sports world. Legendary NHL Coach Pat Burns and esteemed sportswriter Jim Kelley both passed away this November due to Cancer. Although it’s easy to get lost within a game either as a player, sports professional, or simply a fan, incidents such as this really remind us that…
The Overtime Post – The Biggest Loser
Welcome to the second week of the Overtime Post, where we take a light and sarcastic look at the week’s posts and other sports and business news around the world. Other than my Vancouver Canucks who have won six in a row (and I suppose I have to give the San Fransciso Giants a little…
10 Tips to Help You Land Your First Sports Job
1. Network, Network, Network
Have you heard the adage “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know?” Well, in sports, it’s more like “who knows you” or “who is familiar with your work”. The key to getting your first job (or any job) is networking. You need to get out there in front of the decision makers who have the power to hire you, whether that’s the head of the sales department, box office or the general manager.
Attending networking functions is a great idea. Most teams and leagues either run their own career fair or attend sports related fairs every year. For example, job seekers interested in a career in Minor League Baseball should attend the annual PBEO Conference (the same “Winter Meetings” where players are traded and the Rule V draft are held ever year) and network with as many people as possible.
Networking with the Cleveland Indians
I was recently invited to speak at Tribe Social Forum hosted by Major League Baseball’s Cleveland Indians on September 16th, 2010. It is an event focused on the increasing trend of social media usage in our society and networking with some of the finest folks in sports today.
Back when we did the Sports Business Survey, participants voiced that they wanted more networking opportunities and I believe this is a great chance to network with experts in the business. Attendees will learn how social media is changing the way we communicate, especially in the sports world.
What We Can Learn About Branding from Stephen Strasburg’s Injury
Did we just witness the entirety of Stephen Strasburg’s professional baseball career in the span of mere months? I doubt it, given that the success rate of Tommy John’s surgery is over 90%, but it is a possibility.
Strasburg is one of the most hyped players in professional sports in recent memory and he was living up to the buzz in his first season. Not only was he delivering on the mound, with 98-100 MPH fastballs and dirty curveballs, but he was generating more television viewers, ballpark visitors, and straight cash for the game of baseball, a sport which is still struggling somewhat from the Steroids Era.
Many have called Strasburg’s injury a “sad day for baseball.” And it is. But let’s forget about the game for a moment and think about the individual. What a potentially awful day for Stephen Strasburg.
Considering that significant injuries happen all the time in sports (St. Louis Rams’ wide receiver Donny Avery tore his ACL last week, for example, and is out for the season), and that we live in a time where personal branding has become so important, is it foolish for any professional athlete, Stephen Strasburg or not, to not be focusing on building their brand off the field? [More…]
How to Become General Manager of a Major League Baseball Team
I connected with Mark Shapiro two years ago at the Princeton Sports Symposium, and had a great time getting to know more about his professional career in Major League Baseball. He came from humble upbringings, but through his hard work and perseverance, he worked his way up to become the Vice President and General Manager of the Cleveland Indians and was recently promoted to become team president for the club next season. Mark’s journey has been an inspiring one and his rags-to-riches story has something that we can all take away in our own journey to success in the sports world.
The Rise of Marucci Sports
In 2002, two former LSU athletes were rehabbing their recent injuries with Jack Marucci back in Baton Rouge the topic of conversation turned towards Marucci’s recent hobby. This hobby eventually led Eduardo Perez of the St. Louis Cardinals to do something no one else had done yet in Major League Baseball history. By taking a different approach to the business and providing a higher quality product to the market, Marucci helped create a whole new ballgame.
Jack Marucci, the Head Athletic Trainer at Louisiana State University first started perfecting the craft of hand-made wooden baseball bats as a hobby, originally making them for his son. As the two former LSU athletes, Kurt Ainsworth and Joe Lawrence, rehabbed, they spoke of what to do after their professional MLB careers. Marucci’s hand crafted bats became that future. By 2003, the focus on detail and quality craftsmanship to ensure every hand crafted bat was a ‘gamer’ brought them into ‘on deck’ circles and into the batter’s box.
Kurt Ainsworth was a former LSU All-American and 1st Round draft pick by the San Francisco Giants. He also played on the Gold Medal winning Olympic team in 2000. Joe Lawrence was a former USA Today high school All-American and played professionally for the Toronto Blue Jays. After 8 years in professional baseball Joe returned to LSU to play football.