Wall Street: Sports Never Sleep.

Welcome back to the Bill Bradley Collective, where this week we are coming to you from the intersection of Lambeau Field and the Fortune 500: an examination of the corporatization of sports. As consumers of sport we are exposed to it on a nightly basis: pre/post-show brought to you by “x,” halftime/intermission brought to you by “y,” telecast presented by “z.” Every athlete, franchise, broadcast and league are all to leveraged degrees beholden to corporate interests. The questions we seek to answer this week are fairly straightforward. Has the inundation of corporate advertising across each of the live and televised sports experiences hijacked enjoyment of the contests themselves? Does the athlete have corporatization to thank as the root for greater salary, social presence and Madison Avenue opportunity? Has corporate influence somehow “well-actually’d” their way into the good graces of the socially conscious fan in affecting some degree of real progress? All of that and more, but what’s a Tuesday commute without a fresh batch of rants to set the table? First, with unabashed joy, Zak looks forward to the post-basketball career of a retired prep-to-pro eccentric with a look at his attempted foray into collegiate golf; with unabashed disdain Ed unloads on the overdue exit of Andrew Cuomo, the immoral return of Deshaun Watson, and the grim labels we accord to women in power versus women in peril; finally Andrew assesses baseball’s wannabe second mid-summer classic, with a bit of love for the aesthetic but mostly shade for the game’s namesake and messaging on racial equality throughout the sport’s history.