Since the NFL expanded the playoffs during the 2020 season, 10 of 30 Wild Card games have been decided by a single possession, and the average margin has been 13.5 points. Ten years prior, during the four-game Wild Card era, 21 of 40 Wild Card games were decided by a single possession, and the average margin of victory was 10.2 points.
Tom Brady’s agent tells SBJ his client intends to stay with Fox SportsGETTY IMAGES
Tom Brady has nine seasons left his contract with Fox Sportsand he’s not going anywhere, his agent exclusively told SBJ today. “Tom has had a great time working with Fox this year, and he is truly excited about the future with Fox and his growth as a part of their team,” said Don Yee. “And this year was the first year of a long relationship.”
I asked him directly: does this mean that he intends to complete the duration of his contract? Yeah: “Yes.”
Yee’s remarks come as commentary on Brady’s dual roles as a broadcaster and 5% limited partner of the Raiders, it peaks during the coaching carousel/playoff season. He serves on the team’s coaching search committee, which reportedly targeted Lions CO Ben Johnson as a top candidate and prepares to call the Lions-Commanders playoff game on Saturday.
Many comments have focused on the perceived conflict of interest, but speculation about Brady’s future at Fox is driven more by assumptions around the simple demands of time and interest. The Athletic’s Richard Deitsch predicted Brady would not participate in a second season in the broadcast booth, let alone all 10.
Yee’s comments are notable because Brady’s longtime agent has kept a low profile and has not spoken publicly about his client’s work at Fox until today.
Raiders owner Mark Davis said: “I want Tom to have a huge voice“, and that Brady will be “someone who can oversee the big picture.” But Davis also acknowledged in December that he “wouldn’t get in the way of Tom’s work.”
Brady is one of several members of the coaching search committee, and NFL policy prohibits him from becoming a Raiders employee. A new coach/general manager tandem would likely be expected to make their own decisions. So while the picture is painted in the desert, it’s fair to wonder how much time Brady will actually give to the Raiders in the long run, especially in light of Yee’s remarks.
The NFL’s search for new legal counsel is reaching its final stages, and owners hope to have an offer extended and accepted in time for the league’s meetings in March, sources tell me.
Most, if not all, of the serious candidates still in the running come from outside the sector. This isn’t really a surprise: The NFL increasingly sees itself as having no real counterpart in sports, and the toughest challenges facing its leaders are more akin to those found in multinational entertainment/events/enterprises. IP only to teams and leagues.
Jeff Pash, long-time GC and Roger Goodell’s top lieutenant announced his retirement — during the selection of a successor — last May.
The Packers are the latest NFL team to bolster their fandom with a feature film, another data point for strategists who believe TV/film production could be the next great frontier for NFL business growth. The team hosted the red carpet premiere of “Green and Gold” at the Lambeau Field atrium earlier this month and is helping promote the film ahead of its Jan. 31 national release.
The film tells the story of a struggling family dairy farm in Wisconsin during the Packers’ resurgence in the 1990s. The Buck family patriarch – played by Craig T. Nelson – literally bets the farm on the Packers during of the Super Bowl while her granddaughter fights against the forces that take her away from her roots. “This movie is going to be very popular,” Packers president Mark Murphy said. “It tugs at the heartstrings.”
The film was produced three years ago independently of the club and has only entered into a formal sponsorship deal with the team in the last six months, ensuring alignment on the use of intellectual property and promotional cooperation. But it functions as a community relations vehicle for the Packers nonprofit and a fan development tool, Murphy said. “We are a community-owned team, so for us, supporting and promoting the local community is a top priority,” he said.
In 2024, the The Chefs teamed up with Hallmark Channel to produce “Holiday Touchdown: A Chiefs Love Story,” but the team took an active role in every detail of production and promotion.
If other teams are looking for ways to promote their important role in fans’ lives through fiction without the same level of commitment, it might make sense to look for ways to emulate the Packers’ approach. “It really came from our sales and marketing division, and we thought it made a lot of sense,” Murphy said. “But it wasn’t a big task for us.”
The Packers have licensed their intellectual property for the upcoming feature film “Green and Gold.”
- Jack Easterby’s rapid and unconventional rise in the NFL world has undeniably fascinated league insiders and sparked questions about his experience, ambition and tactics. Two years after being fired by the Texans, Easterby’s biggest defenders, like Bill Belichick, still believe he is a brilliant executive, capable of quickly identifying and resolving organizational challenges in the workplace. I Easterby was featured in this week’s SBJ because he hopes for a second act in big sports.
- Beyond the NFL taking up a large portion of the top 100 TV shows of 2024, the league accounted for 126 spots (one being the first round of the draft) in the top 200, note Austin Karp from SBJ. That’s down from 137 spots in the NFL in 2023, in the middle of an Olympic and presidential election year.
- WME Football will be separated from WME but will retain its name, similar to how IMG Academy retained the IMG brand despite no longer being affiliated with the parent company, sources tell my colleague Chris Smith.
- The NFL and Bleacher Report have entered into a three-year content deal that gives TNT Sports’ digital property and its subsidiary House of Highlights access to NFL game footage, as well as access to the league’s marquee events. NFL like the Super Bowl, Draft and Combine. reports Mollie Cahillane of SBJ.
- NFL team sponsors are looking for playoff wins this weekend, with a variety of activations around the divisional round, writes SBJ’s Terry Lefton. One that stood out to me: Bud Light is sponsoring a Lions bus tour this week that covers most of Michigan and Windsor, Ontario.
- Ticketmaster signed on as the first founding sponsor of the Bills’ new Highmark Stadium, scheduled to open for the 2026 season, the team said.