🏎 Las Vegas' F1 Nightmare

The question I get asked the most isn’t “What was the airless basketball like?” or “Why do you hate US Bank Stadium?”

Far and away it’s: “Are you hiring?” And today, the answer is “YES!” More on that at the end.

Today’s line-up:

🗞 The Big Story: Las Vegas Hates F1

📉 Biggest Loser: NBA joins the Metaverse

🏆 Winner’s Circle: The Creator Going to Every MNF Game

⬇️ Listen: A new baseball league took the internet by storm this week, and one of their teams drafted a 50-year-old Bartolo Colon in Round 1…

🗞 The Big Story

Formula 1 wanted to charge you $2,000 to look out a window.

And no, I’m not kidding.

Licensing Fees: To be more specific, F1 attempted to charge every hotel, club, and restaurant with a view of the 3.8-mile track that runs along the Las Vegas strip a $1,500 per person licensing fee for the day of the race (November 18).

This would have undoubtedly led those businesses, often with capacities of up to 2,000 people, to charge their patrons an estimated $2,000 cover charge to cover the $3M+ fee they would have been incurring.

Luckily, F1 backed off and is instead “just requesting” that each of these establishments pay $50,000 for the night.

Construction Hell: But the headache doesn’t end there, and as someone who spent some time in Vegas recently it’s nearly impossible to get around due to all the traffic caused by new construction.

Liberty Media (F1’s parent company) is spending $400M on the Las Vegas Grand Prix - nearly double its initial projections - in areas including:

• 300,000 sqft paddock building (garage for cars)

• Repaving the entire track (aka the Strip)

• Utility work

• Building of grandstands and luxury suites

Is it Worth It?: Most Las Vegas residents and recent tourists to the Strip might tell you ‘no.’

• The Bellagio fountain is currently blocked by construction

• Rooms during the event are going for $1,000 per night minimum

• The average cost for a three-day pass is $6,651

But it’s clear that this race is catering to F1’s richest American fans, with resorts like the Wynn offering $50,000 packages that include:

• Helicopter tour

• Transportation to the circuit

• A lap around the racetrack (cost extra $)

And as for the TV product? It’s going to be hard to beat the racing along the Vegas Strip.

📉 Biggest Loser

I took a trip to the Charlotte Hornets’ Fan Shop (in the Metaverse).

Here is my honest review, and how you can experience it for yourself:

Facial Scanning: While it’s not the core feature, the ability to customize your digital avatar in the Fan Shop is shockingly impressive for a free-to-use, desktop and mobile experience.

I was most impressed with how I could simply upload three pictures of my face through my phone and almost instantly get a fairly realistic version of myself in the Metaverse.

It was also fun to play around with all of the customization options, but one thing in particular seemed to be missing.

Merchandise Integration: You’re able to customize what your avatar wears from dozens of pre-selected outfits but nowhere in the entire Virtual Fan Shop can your avatar actually wear any team merchandise.

You can walk around and view it in its digital form, but all you’re able to do with it is click over to the team website to buy it.

You can’t try it on, and you can’t purchase a digital version.

What Does It Do Well: Team executives want you to believe that this will make the fan purchase process “easier” and “more convenient” but right now entering the Fan Shop in the Metaverse just seems like an extra step to an online purchase.

I believe its true purpose is to:

1. Attract a bit of positive press for the team and the NBA

2. Keep the NBA ahead of the curve on VR/AR/AI/Metaverse

Because one day, this will be a more widely adopted format for fans to engage with their favorite teams. And when that time comes, the NBA won’t be caught flat-footed.

You can visit the Hornets Virtual Fan Shop for free here.

🏆 Winner’s Circle

This creator is going to almost every Monday Night Football game this season, and he’s playing for it all out of his own pocket.

But why? And how much is it going to cost?

The Content: Kevin Walsh is an NFL content creator with over 800,000 followers on TikTok.

He’s worked with brands like Wilson and Bleacher Report and this season he’s been traveling to one prime-time NFL game per week and recording his experience.

The Cost Breakdown: Kevin invited me to last week’s 49ers-Vikings game in Minneapolis, where I got to see, first-hand, what he spends at every game:

• Flight: $258 round-trip from Columbus, OH

• Tickets: $172 for two

• Airbnb: $71 for one night

• Food: ~$20 before the game

• Transportation: $4 for a light rail ticket

Total: $525 for one game

Now, according to Kevin’s full financial breakdown from the season, that’s a little above average. Through the first seven games this year, he’s spent a total of $3,357, or about $480 per game.

That breaks down to:

• 38% - Tickets

• 28% - Flights

• 15% - Parking and Transportation

• 14% - Hotels

• 6% - Food

So across a full 18-week season, Kevin will likely spend close to $9,000 going to games.

But How: The not-so-glamorous secret is that it all comes out of his own pocket, and as for his ‘why?’

He described it to me as a way to let people experience an NFL game who might not otherwise be able to.

You can watch our experience at last week’s game here.

⏱ In Other News

• I’m a journalist now.

• When will the A’s Las Vegas stadium be done?

• The NBA is changing its ASG… again.

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🚨 HIRING UPDATE: My sports marketing agency, Uncle Charlie, is hiring a Project Manager:

• Full-Time, $45,000-$60,000/yr

• 401K and Medical Insurance

• Preferably located in Minneapolis/St. Paul

For the full job description and to apply click here.