Philadelphia 76ers First Team Ever to Put Ad on Jerseys
The Philadelphia 76ers is the first team in the National Basketball Association to put a logo on game jerseys.
The team’s CEO, Scott O’Neil, explained why the Sixers decided to choose StubHub, a unit of eBay (NASDAQ:EBAY), as the first jersey advertisement, to the FOX Business Network’s Deirdre Bolton.
“StubHub has been a partner of ours for five years,” O’Neil said. “We were looking for someone who is in and around the game as opposed to a Toyota truck. We wanted someone that’s part of the fabric of the game. StubHub also believes a lot in what we believe in.”
O’Neil described how the league divvies up the money from the jersey advertisements.
“50% [of the revenue] goes to the league and that’s split between all 30 teams,” O’Neil said. “And the players then get 50% of the revenue.”
The 76ers have been struggling, owning a combined 47-199 record over the past three seasons. O’Neil discussed how the team is addressing its poor performance.
“We’re at ground zero now,” he said. “It’s been three years of very difficult performance on the court. But we’ve got the lottery night tomorrow, where we already have the 24th and 26th pick. We’ve got a shot to get the first overall [pick] and the fourth [pick]. We’ve got $50 million in [salary] cap space and free agents, hopefully, and a few trades out there. We’re going to build this relatively quickly.”