Power Play – Talent vs Owners in Sports

Zoom Webinar

The global sports industry is an exploding multi-billion dollar business.  Annual player salaries, max contracts and salary caps are hitting and exceeding all-time records. NBA, MLB, and NFL players are making three to five times more now than thirty years ago. And the world's highest-paid athlete, a pro soccer player, earned a US$75,000,000 salary in 2021.

As we entered the 2022 off-season, power struggles between owners and players seemed more common than ever before.  While NBA star player Kevin Durant stared down Brooklyn Nets owner Joe Tsai when demanding a trade, the Premier League broke prior records with its summer signings, and the Major League Baseball owners imposed a lockout causing a two-week delay to the 2022 season.  Some believe, player-empowerment is at an all time high.

Where are sports salaries and the player-owner power dynamic headed?  Can owners and the leagues reverse the trend toward continued stratospheric pay during the height of player empowerment?  Who foots the bill at the end of the day?  Are fans being penalized with higher ticket and team gear prices? Are owners victims of their own making?  And what can the leagues do to contain the impact on fans or is it too late?

Join our expert panel as they discuss power dynamics and escalating pay scales in sports leading to labor disputes, and growing player empowerment and mobility while owners try earn even greater profits.

October 27, 2022
9:30 pm    Japan | South Korea
8:30 pm    Hong Kong | Beijing | Singapore
6:00 pm    Delhi
2:30 pm    Paris
1:30 pm     London
7:30 am    Chicago

Speakers

Professor Allen Sanderson
Senior Instructional Professor in Economics and the College
Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics
The University of Chicago

Dr Ben Shields
Senior Lecturer, Managerial Communication
MIT Sloan School of Management

Professor Robert Simmons
Professor, Department of Economics
Lancaster University

Moderator

Mark Barnekow (MBA’88)
Executive Director
The University of Chicago Francis and Rose Yuen Campus in Hong Kong

About Director’s Pick

From current news, STEM, to arts and history, The University of Chicago Hong Kong Campus Faculty Director and Executive Director share a broad range of interests. The Director’s Pick series catalogs an array of webinars covering various topics that our directors wish to share with our audience. Read More