The NFL and mobile games developer Skillz have announced four finalists for their inaugural Game Developer Challenge. Up to three of the four finalists will be chosen to launch their NFL mobile esports game during the 2022 season.
Vancouver-based Session Games, Illinois-based Play Mechanix, California-based Brainstorm Games and Illinois-based igamebank were the four finalists selected to move onto the next development phase using the Skillz software development kit (SDK). As many as three selected winners will get a three-year sublicense to use the NFL and all 32 teams’ logos in their game and be promoted on NFL channels. Skillz will award $50,000 for each winner to spend on user acquisition.
“We look forward to providing football fans around the world with a fresh, competitive mobile gaming experience that allows players to interact with the NFL brand right at their fingertips,” George Petro, president of Play Mechanix, a subsidiary of arcade game company Raw Thrills, said in a statement.
The NFL originally invested in Skillz in 2019, then announced a multi-year gaming partnership with the company in Feb. 2021. Skillz and the NFL’s developer challenge is only open to skill-based games and gameplay must not include 11-on-11 simulation, as those rights are covered by EA’s Madden NFL series.
MLB’s automated ball-strike system will be used to challenge the human home plate umpire’s calls during select Low-A Southeast games this upcoming season. Teams will be limited to three appeals per game, MLB announced Monday.
The new challenge system is part of several experimental rules MLB will test in the minors this season. Hawk-Eye’s AI cameras were used to call balls and strikes during Low-A Southeast games last year and will return this season. However, in select Low-A “Challenge Games,” human home plate umpires will call the strike zone while the pitcher, catcher and batter can challenge a given ball or strike call through appealing to ABS.
If the ABS rules the home plate umpire’s call was correct, the team will lose a challenge, according to Baseball America. Overturned calls will result in a team keeping their challenge.
MLB will also implement its ABS system to call balls and strikes for all Triple-A West games starting May 17. Human home plate umps will call the strike zone in Triple-A West games through May 15. In Triple-A East, all Charlotte Knights home games this season will see balls and strikes called by ABS.
At the big-league level, MLBPA’s recent labor proposal to MLB did not give MLB the right to implement robot umpires in the majors through the 2023 season. Other experimental rules being tested in the minors this season include pitch clocks and the size of bases increasing from 15 to 18 inches. Shift restrictions at Double-A, High-A and Low-A will require a minimum of four defensive players on the infield, with at least two infielders positioned on either side of second base.
NIL marketplace MOGL won the Social & Culture category during the 14th annual SXSW Pitch Event held this week in Austin, Texas. Winners from all nine of the contest’s categories will each receive $4,000 and increased exposure to potential investors in attendance at SXSW.
MOGL is a platform that helps pair athletes with businesses, brands and community initiatives for partnerships—both pro athletes and especially college athletes who can now take advantage of name, image and likeness deals. The company emphasizes not just the highest-demand athletes and top earners, but also lower-profile athletes who can connect with local brands.
Earlier this month, MOGL began a collaboration with sports apparel maker Vintage Brand to help athletes create their own apparel and merchandise. MOGL was founded by former Notre Dame quarterback Brandon Wimbush and his classmate Ayden Syal; Vintage Brand was co-founded by former Notre Dame baseball player Chad Hartvigson.
Former Disney chairman and CEO Bob Iger has invested in Genies, a digital avatar company that has licensing deals with the MLBPA, NBPA and NFLPA. Iger will join the company’s board of directors; financial terms of his investment were not disclosed.
Genies announced partnerships in 2019 with the MLBPA and NFLPA and with the NBPA in 2020 to create digital avatars of players in each league. Dapper Labs also partnered with Genies last year to launch a “wearable NFT marketplace” that lets athletes and celebrities sell NFTs of digital goods and clothing. Fans can buy the digital goods to customize outfits of their avatars, which appear in apps such as iMessage, Instagram, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp.
“I’ve always been drawn to the intersection between technology and art, and Genies provides unique and compelling opportunities to harness the power of that combination to enable new forms of creativity, expression and communication,” Iger said in a statement.
Genies also makes avatars and NFTs of music artists through its deals with Warner Music Group and Universal Music Group. Investors in Genies include sports talent agency CAA and NFL star Ndamukong Suh. A startup pitch competition hosted by the NFLPA in 2019 included Genies as a presenter.
The Players Championship trophy came to life this week during NBC’s broadcast of the PGA Tour event. The Tour and NBC partnered with The Famous Group to animate the trophy, which marked the first mixed reality segment to appear on a golf broadcast.
Throughout the week, the golden golfer dismounted from his trophy stand and took swings on the iconic 17th hole at TPC Sawgrass. On Saturday, the trophy mimicked the mannerisms of Tiger Woods’ during his famous “Better than most” putt at on the 17th hole at the 2001 Players Championship. After the trophy sunk that putt, it delivered Tiger’s iconic fist pump.
How ‘bout that, huh? ? pic.twitter.com/IVhDPqm0DX
“Mixing this type of technology into the broadcast is huge for us to attract a new demo, and a demo outside of golf who may just be more interested in the XR space [extended reality],” says Anne Detlefsen, the PGA Tour’s senior director of digital content. “It’s hopefully a very shareable moment outside of our broadcasts across all of our Tour platforms and with our partners.”
The PGA Tour used last week’s event as a trial before possibly adding mixed reality activations for this year’s FedEx Cup Playoffs and the Presidents Cup. The Famous Group has previously created mixed reality activations for the Baltimore Ravens, Carolina Panthers and for Nickelodeon’s NFL wild card broadcasts.
MLS club Inter Miami has added four Heineken-branded reverse vending machines at its DRK PNK Stadium. The machines were built by Cycle, a technology startup whose app rewards users for recycling empty bottles.
Fans insert their empty bottles into Cycles’s reverse vending machines and then scan a QR code on the machine with their phone. Their phone will display their rewards for their recycled items, which can include Inter Miami merchandise, team jerseys, exclusive stadium promotions and Heineken’s 0.0 non-alcoholic beer. DRK PNK Stadium’s video boards and PA announcements will promote the recycling program throughout Inter Miami home games.
Cycle was co-founded by two University of Miami students and was a winner at the 2020 Miami Herald Startup Pitch Competition. The four reverse vending machines at Miami’s DRK PNK Stadium are placed near sections 120/121 and 103/104, with two machines next to the Heineken Bar. Cycle’s machines also contain sensors to automatically reject contaminated beverage containers.
David Beckham-owned Inter Miami named Heineken a founding sponsor in 2019. The club’s partnership with Cycle supports Heineken’s Brew a Better World sustainability program. “This initiative seeks to eliminate the barriers fans may face at sporting events by encouraging and making it easier to make the responsible choice to recycle,” Josephine Bertrams, SVP and chief corporate affairs officer at Heineken USA, said in a statement.
The Fox Sports-owned United States Football League will launch an NFT marketplace ahead of its inaugural season scheduled to start April 16. The platform will let USFL teams, players and coaches create tokens to sell to fans.
Blockchain Creative Labs, a Fox Entertainment division launched last year with a $100 million investment from Fox, will create the digital marketplace. According to Fox, players and coaches will receive a “majority” of the revenue from their NFT sales via individual digital wallets, making them the first players and coaches from any professional sports league to receive revenue at exact time of sale.
Fox’s Blockchain Creative Labs is serving as the blockchain sponsor of this week’s SXSW conference in Austin, Texas. BCL plans to promote NFTs from USFL players and coaches to fan communities on the messaging app Discord. Fan Controlled Football, another pro league kicking off in April, added new teams in January that are controlled by fans who own their affiliated NFTs.
Tom Brady’s digital collectibles company Autograph has partnered with live music and entertainment organizer AEG Presents to offer NFTs at concerts and festivals. The multi-year collaboration will begin March 25 at the AEG Presents-organized BUKU Music + Art Project in New Orleans.
According to Variety, Autograph will be on-site at BUKU to sell NFTs of works from eight graffiti artists. Attendees will also be able to mint their own NFT festival posters. Autograph will reportedly host similar NFT activations at AEG’s Electric Forest, Hangout Music Festival and Firefly events.
AEG Presents is a subsidiary of AEG, which owns properties such as Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, the NHL’s LA Kings, MLS club L.A. Galaxy and the Coachella music festival. Autograph, whose co-founders include Brady and Richard Rosenblatt, raised $170 million earlier this year with backing from venture capital firms Andreessen Horowitz and Kleiner Perkins. The company makes NFTs for DraftKings and stars such as Tiger Woods, Derek Jeter and Naomi Osaka.
Madrid-based startup accelerator SportBoost is partnering with innovation hub Wayra to invest in sports technology companies. Selected startups will receive up to $770,000 in joint funding from Wayra and SportBoost, which was founded by former Real Madrid goalkeeper Iker Casillas.
Wayra is the innovation arm of Spanish telecommunications firm Telefónica. SportBoost’s accelerator is looking to invest in companies related to the metaverse, smart stadiums, data analytics, esports, streaming, and home fitness. Wayra previously supported accelerators with the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre and the University of Edinburgh to invest in AI and blockchain startups.
Selected startups will work in Wayra’s hub space on Gran Vía street in Madrid and have access to sports industry mentors provided by SportBoost, which is also working with Spain’s La Liga soccer league. Telefónica’s various business units will support the startups with development of their products. The websites for SportBoost and Wayra will accept applications for the accelerator until April 20.
Purdue University’s baseball team is the first college program to implement Intel’s 3D Athlete Tracking system to improve its players’ running mechanics.
Intel originally developed 3DAT as a broadcast tool for the Tokyo Olympics; two-time gold medal-winning decathlete Ashton Eaton is a product development engineer on the team that created it. 3DAT has also been used by promising college football prospects who trained at Exos in advance of last year’s NFL Combine and pro days.
A story on Purdue’s website reported that several Boilermakers showed rapid improvement when training with 3DAT. The article indicated possible expansion of the tool beyond running mechanics to pitching and hitting analysis, as well as use in other sports such as men’s basketball.
NCAA March Madness Live, the second screen companion to the men’s college basketball tournament, is implementing advanced data visualizations to its whiparound Fast Break content. March Madness Live is managed by Turner Sports in partnership with the NCAA and CBS Sports.
Second Spectrum—the official analytics partner of the NBA, English Premier League and MLS—will provide its insights to the Fast Break presented by AT&T 5G and Nissan, a show offering highlights, studio analysis and social commentary to the games. The NCAA signed a 10-year deal with Genius Sports as its official data partner back in 2018. Genius acquired Second Spectrum last year, and they recently added the Mid-American Conference as their first college conference partner.
Also new this year is the Starting Lineup Challenge, in which fans select a budget-constrained batch of five teams they expect to advance far in the tournament. Users can make some modifications at the end of each round. This contest was developed in partnership with SharpLink Gaming.
The March Madness Live app previously rolled out a multi-game viewing feature for Apple TV in 2019. There had been plans to expand it to Amazon Fire TV and Google TV in 2020 before COVID scrapped the tournament. Those connected devices are now supported, along with Xbox One, for streaming an updated multi-game view this March. The multi-game viewing experience permits users to add a second game, without audio. Other existing features such as the Bracket Challenge, Game Center and Matchup Analysis all return.
