Alumni in sport-related jobs discuss industry response to COVID-19’s blitz

COVID-19 called a time-out on everything – sports included.

Four alumni of the NIU Department of Kinesiology and Physical Education who work in the industry – a player, a coach and two front office professionals – talked during the April 14 Whiteboard Wednesday about their experiences during the pandemic.

Panelists brought perspectives from the NFL, the MLB and the NCAA:

  • Evans Adonis, M.S. ’10, director of membership sales for the Miami Marlins.
  • Michaela Franklin, M.S. ’20, head coach of women’s volleyball at Clemson University.
  • Malcolm Neely, M.S. ’18, marketing coordinator for the Chicago Bears.
  • Max Scharping, ’17, M.S.Ed. ’18, offensive lineman for the Houston Texans.

Moderator Steve Howell, associate professor of Sport Management and acting associate chair, led the speakers through a conversation that touched on playing in front of empty seats, keeping fans engaged, maintaining team chemistry, postponing and canceling games, moving seasons, using technology and more.

In Houston, Scharping said, preseason practices were delayed. Off the field, he added, a new agreement was needed between players, coaches, general managers and organizations to determine “how it was going to work.”

“One of the biggest things was, ‘How are you going to have all of these people in the building that you need to make even a practice or a meeting successful?’ ” he said. “That was one of the biggest things we had to try to figure out.”

Michaela Franklin
Michaela Franklin

Franklin’s volleyball players were allowed to meet virtually through the summer – something the NCAA typically prohibits, she said – while they watched and discussed “The Last Dance” documentary.

She made sure her team followed guidelines set by Clemson athletic trainers and the league, including frequent testing and the need for negative results from the swabs. Unable to meet in the locker room, players arrived at the court for practice with gym bags in tow.

When the season finally began, it was split between fall and spring, she added, with back-to-back doubleheaders Fridays and Saturdays. “That made it a grueling year for us,” Franklin said.

Adonis watched in Miami as furloughs and layoffs began last April – more than 100 regular season baseball games were canceled while the league lost millions of dollars – and as the entire team got COVID.

Yet the Marlins proved resilient, eventually making the playoffs and putting together a good run, and the behind-the-scenes staff worked with season ticket holders to offer no-questions-asked refunds or to credit their accounts toward 2021.

“Our thought process was that, ‘If we can give people money back, they can take care of what they need to take care of at home, and they’ll come back to us in the end,’ ” Adonis said. “And a lot of people did. Our strategy worked.”

For Neely, the arrival of COVID last March meant abruptly leaving his Halas Hall office Thursday, being told to stay home Friday and then receiving word that he could visit Monday only long enough to retrieve whatever he needed to work virtually.

“There were a lot of issues at first because no one knew how long this was going to last,” Neely said. “We were still planning as if we had a regular season.”

Malcolm Neely
Malcolm Neely

Yet much of the preparation for the 2020 season, including mini-camps and Game Day events, already was in place and eventually nixed: “You don’t think about wall the work that it takes to have a game,” he said. “A lot of those back-end things are being planned months in advance.”

Empty seats proved beneficial and detrimental for athletes.

Referees and line judges often comment to Franklin about the intensity of the Clemson gym – “It literally feels like the fans are breathing down our necks,” they tell her – that provides a “huge homecourt advantage for us.”

While that was missing during COVID-19, however, every team was in the same situation. The limitations on attendance also prevented Franklin’s recruits from sitting in the stands and feeling that energy.

NFL players, meanwhile, had to adjust to the eerie quiet – and will need to adapt again this fall when crowds inch toward normal.

“It was one of the weirdest experiences I think you can have in sports when you’re used to, especially in football, a packed stadium almost everywhere you go,” Scharping said. “We didn’t have to worry about a silent cadence, or worry about hearing what everyone was saying. We’re actually going to have to get used to that this year because I think most stadiums are going to open to capacity – if you have a vaccine.”

On the business side, the closed gates provided different challenges.

Marlins fans were invited to virtual events that included trivia games and a chance to talk with Manager Don Mattingly. Players were invited to meet online with season ticket holders.

Evans Adonis
Evans Adonis

“One impactful thing we did was a partnership with Budweiser – and this was Budweiser’s idea – to deliver Marlins-branded beer to our season ticket holders,” Adonis said. “We got in our cars, had six-packs and drove to people’s houses in Miami and Fort Lauderdale and delivered Buds before our playoff run.”

In Chicago, Neely and his colleagues had begun to worry about whether fans were experiencing Zoom fatigue last fall.

So, they tried other ideas that included free movie rentals from Redbox and, for some lucky and random members of the Kids Club, “movie night” gift packs with a Bears blanket, a Bears jersey, popcorn and gift cards from Jewel-Osco.

The Bears also harnessed social media to target college-age fans with new branding (designed in partnership with Lyrical Lemonade) that immediately turned profitable. Hoodies, T-shirts, jackets and even rugs sold out within 24 hours; the sweatpants were gone in four minutes.

“Eighty percent of people who purchased this gear had never engaged with us in another form,” Neely said.

Staff took note, realizing that marketing directly to the younger generation was worth the extra energy. New partners also have come forward to become involved.

“Because of COVID, it allowed us to move some of our efforts and our focus toward new ideas and trying new things,” Neely said.

“I definitely went out a limb pitching this idea – trying to get the org-exec on board, and I definitely got some pushback – but once we got the numbers back, and everything sold out – we saw it as a great idea,” he added. “We’re definitely trying to create more of this.”

Max Scharping
Max Scharping

What will remain after COVID subsides?

Creative and fun teambuilding activities. The flexibility to work from home. New thinking on how to manage the bodies of athletes during time-off and the frequency of practice. An appreciation for the game – and for the fans.

Meanwhile, Scharping said, no organization will get sacked by a blindside tackle again.

“Every major league will have a better plan in place in case something like this happens again,” he said, “for virtual meetings, for how many people will have access to the facilities, for when players and staff member can go in.”

Adonis agreed.

“We’re ready to bounce back,” Adonis said. “(COVID) taught us a lot about ourselves, and it taught us a lot about how we navigate through these waters; how we figure out how we take care of people while we also take care of the organization. It was tough, but we made it through.”

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