Jen Rottenberg (MBA 1996), CMO at Fan Controlled Football League
(photo courtesy of Jen Rottenberg)

Jen Rottenberg (MBA 1996), CMO at Fan Controlled Football League
(photo courtesy of Jen Rottenberg)

There’s an old sports cliché that says if you listen to the fans, you’ll wind up sitting with them. But what if a generation of fans has been brought up to game plan like coaches and build rosters like general managers, with skills honed by playing video games and fantasy sports? What if they can actually manage games and teams just as well, if not better?

“Every fan of sports—going all the way back to the Roman Colosseum—has thought that they know best what the outcome should be,” says Jen Rottenberg, CMO of the Fan Controlled Football League (FCFL), which is set to debut in November. “There’s always going to be a decision that your team’s coach or manager makes that you don’t agree with, and you start screaming, ‘Why did they call a pass when they should have called a run?’ ” Fans call the shots in the FCFL—from play calling to roster moves, all the way to choosing logos, color schemes, and team branding. “This is the dream of every fan,” Rottenberg says. The more they interact with the league, the more Fan IQ points they rack up, thus unlocking greater voting privileges. It’s a video game come to life.

After debuting a team in the Indoor Football League in 2017 to prove the concept could work, the FCFL is set to kick off its inaugural season with eight teams that will play hour-long, 7-on-7 arena-style football games broadcasted on Twitch, a live-streaming platform used mainly by gamers. Play calling can be executed live during the game on either an app or through the broadcast itself by using an interface that looks just like a video game screen. Votes are tabulated and then relayed through an offensive coordinator. “What Twitch offers is a level of interactivity in the stream that doesn’t really exist anywhere else,” Rottenberg says. “You can stream to a computer monitor and TV and have a two-screen experience with the app. Or you can have a single-screen experience on a touchpad.” All the teams’ games will be played in a Las Vegas production studio with stands and a 50-yard arena field, eliminating numerous startup costs—from travel logistics and arena fees to traditional front-office setups like ticket sales. Also out are geographic affiliations. Instead, each team will be represented by a celebrity captain. NFL stars Richard Sherman and Marshawn Lynch are on board, as is pop star Prince Royce, who the league hopes will bring his 55 million social media followers with him.

If all goes well, the FCFL will look to expand the concept to other sports. Baseball and cricket are naturals, with organic stoppages that allow fans to call pitches and set strategies. Free-flowing sports like soccer and basketball would be harder to duplicate, Rottenberg says, but if you can play it in a video game, there’s a good chance you’d be able to replicate the experience in real life, too. What a dream.

Next: Chris Marinak (MBA 2008) — Advanced statistics are the new foam fingers »

Return to Level Up main page «

Post a Comment