Ballhalla is life
From The GIST (hi@thegistsports.com)
Leveling The Playing Field
Good morning!
And welcome to the WNBA, Dez and Dot. The Toronto Tempo unveiled the expansion franchise’s new mascots on Tuesday, a nonbinary snapping turtle and cotton candy–loving Arctic hare who pay homage to the team’s Canadian roots and its time-based branding. WNBA mascots are a big deal — can’t wait to see what Dez and Dot bring to the league.
WNBA
💜 Meet us at Ballhalla
The GIST: As you may have heard, the WNBA All-Star Game (ASG) is headed to the Bay in 2027 — a monumental dub for a team that will only have played since 2025. It’s the latest in a long string of achievements for the Golden State Valkyries, who can’t seem to stop winning on and off the court.
💸 The context: It’s hard to imagine the women’s sports scene without the Valks. Even though the team is only in its second season, it has the highest valuation of any women’s franchise in the world, breaking the $1B mark earlier this year. But how did they do it?
- The Valkyries play at Chase Center, a venue shared with the NBA’s Golden State Warriors that opened in 2019 and cost over $1.4B to build. While several other WNBA teams are roommates with men’s franchises, the most recent other shared venue (Barclays Center) opened in 2012.
- Debuting in one of the biggest sports markets in the country in a luxury arena brought interest, eyeballs, and most importantly, season ticket deposits of which the Valkyries have over 12K.
🏟️ The numbers: The Trade Desk report we covered earlier this week revealed that 92% of Valkyries season ticket holders are unique to the market, meaning they don’t also hold Warriors season tickets.
- It’s a common — and encouraging — trend: According to that same report, ticket buyers in cities with both men’s and women’s pro teams max out at 8% crossover, showing traditional sports advertisers exactly where to find fans that might be new to sports.
📖 The outreach: Outside of basketball, the Valkyries have been paying it forward to the community that embraced them so thoroughly. In honor of World Entrepreneurs’ Day tomorrow, it feels fitting to mention the team’s Violet Book of Business, a strategic collab with Chase that champions and accelerates the growth of women-owned businesses from jewelry to DIY tools to gelato. Meet us for a scoop?
⚾ Kwanza Jones becomes first Black woman to own an MLB majority stake
The record-breaking $3.9B San Diego Padres sale is officially official after MLB unanimously approved it Monday — and with it, history was made.
- The final sale price is truly mind-boggling, especially given the Padres — who boast one of the best attendance records in baseball — were valued at just $2B last year. For context, the $3.9B price tag is more than double what the Tampa Bay Rays sold for last year. Sheesh.
🏀 WNBPA president and LA Sparks icon Nneka Ogwumike to retire this season
The W will be without its fearless leader next season after the 36-year-old announced her impending retirement yesterday. Ogwumike helmed the players’ union for a decade, beginning her tenure just four years into her career. She led the WNBPA through two collective bargaining negotiations, with the most-recent CBA upping the average salary from $120K to $583K.
- That said, Ogwumike — widely considered one of the WNBA’s most impactful players on and off the court — still intends to suit up for Project B when the upstart international basketball league tips off next January, according to Front Office Sports.
💰 Publicis Sports, Travis Kelce’s 3 Arts Sports launch brand-centered NIL venture
Backed by the NFL superstar, Tekta is a first-of-its-kind NIL offering that will provide consulting and marketing assistance to brands attempting to navigate this new (and increasingly lucrative) era of college sports. The plan is that Publicis Sports’ exclusive access to data and analysis, alongside the reach of Kelce’s talent firm 3 Art Sports, will add much-needed structure to the NIL space.
- With a whopping $4.5B expected to be spent on NIL in 2026–27, Tekta aims to assist brands in identifying athletes and schools for potential partnerships, while providing explicit metrics and learnings from successful integrations. On the way up.
✂️ FIFA fired COO Kevin Lamour weeks after he publicly opposed president Gianni Infantino’s now-foiled plan to sell stakes in the organization’s tournaments to private investors.
🛑 Two members of Nicaragua’s Little League Baseball World Series team were denied entry to the U.S. due to visa issues, but the team does not have time to replace the affected players and will compete with a reduced roster. WTF.
🧑⚖️ Two notable NCAA lawsuits were filed this week: An SMU women’s basketball player sued the NCAA and the university to challenge the transfer portal window, and a former DePaul athletics employee filed for wrongful termination after being fired while on pregnancy-related medical leave.
🐺 Apple TV’s three-part docuseries The Dynasty: UConn Huskies premieres tomorrow, showcasing the program’s unmatched success during head coach Geno Auriemma’s 40-year reign.
🥎 Sports tech company Rule42 made a major investment in the AUSL as the league builds on the success of its inaugural season. Hitting it out of the park.
🏒 The PWHL officially clarified that owner Mark Walter’s splashy sports sales will not affect the league.
🌹 Nike is the presenting sponsor of today’s The Epicenter: Women’s Global Sports Summit in Portland, OR, once again thrusting the city into the women’s sports spotlight.
💉 Enhanced Games parent company Enhanced Group, Inc. reported $62M in Q2 losses. Call it just another letdown.
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