From Athletic Management
Analysis by Matt Nasca in SRM 435 (section 1)
This article focuses on the head baseball coach at Mississippi State University, Coach John Cohen. Coach Cohen has coached five seasons at Mississippi State, leading his team to the 2012 Southeastern Conference Tournament Championship and appeared in the NCAA tournament in both the 2012 and 2013 seasons and finished second place last year in the College World Series. So this coach is known for leading a successful Mississippi State baseball team, but he is also very well known for getting large attendance turnouts at the games. Coach Cohen has already set four of the program’s top six all time season ticket sales in just five seasons of coaching at Mississippi. In a game this past April against Auburn University more than 14,500 fans showed up, which was the second largest on campus crowd in NCAA history.
The coach said he gets successful turnouts like that by having his players go out into the community and interact and hand out tickets, instead of having a sales person going door-to-door trying to sell season tickets. He says his players receive life lessons while doing this, so it works to their advantage. He also has his players go around campus and hand out tickets to students or tell students to show up to the games, which greatly helps the high attendance numbers.
In my opinion I think this is a great way to market and get your team’s name out there. I personally would be way more inclined as a student to go to a game if an actual player came up to me, had a conversation and told me to come to a game. If I lived in a community and I saw the players going around talking to people, helping out and giving out tickets, than I would 100% go to the game to show my support since they are taking the time to come out and interact with other people. I would say that this is a risky way for a coach to market because if I were a college level coach, I would have my team practicing all the time to get better and to be able to win. But since this team is showing that it can play successfully, I think the way Coach Cohen is getting people to show up is a very good idea.
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Analysis by Charles Higby in SRM 435 (section 1)
The Athletic Management Magazine website recently published an article about head coach John Cohen’s Mississippi State baseball success on the field, but focused on his role in maintaining the teams reputation as a leader in college attendance. There was also a mini-interview with the Mississippi State University baseball coach talking about his role in the attendance rates and the successful promotional tools he has instilled to do so. In five seasons Cohen has led the team to the 2012 Southeastern Conference Tournament championship, appearances in the 2012 and 2013 NCAA tournaments, including a second place finish in the 2013 College World Series. Attendance wise, in an April game against Auburn over 14,500 fans packed into Polk-Dement Stadium at Dudy Noble Playing Field, marking the second largest on campus crowd in NCAA history. Also four of the teams top six all time season ticket sales occurred during Cohen’s time as coach. This in part is due to his hand with promoting the team and the promotional strategies he has created. One of these techniques was having season tickets hand delivered by his players that used the team’s recognition factor as a thrilling way for the community to interact with the team. Another technique was a free program called “the dudes” where MSU students are rewarded with incentives for attending home games. These have allowed Coach Cohen to keep the Mississippi State reputation as a leader in attendance.
From a sport marketing and promotion standpoint, I believe these techniques are a great idea to implement. The coach’s tactics are tools that can build the Mississippi State baseball brand reputation and effectively get fans into the stadium. Having the players deliver tickets builds a lot more support in the community and gives the players experience interacting with their fans. The “dudes” club at MSU is similar to student clubs I have seen before, but the rewards they offer are personal and worthwhile drawing a huge student following to games. Coach Cohen has found a way to promote his team boosting attendance and season ticket sales through promotional strategies that at the same time builds community support, teaches players important lessons about interacting with fans, and turns students into lifetime fans.This article is very relevant to our sport marketing and sales course. To be a successful organization teams need to find innovative ways to attract fans that will buy tickets and fill up the stadium. This was an interesting story about how a coach used his knowledge and experience to create effective marketing/promotional programs that boosted attendance and built upon the team’s reputation. He already had a great marketing staff, but he found ways to use the player’s recognition to make more thrilling ways to attract fans. This is a great example of marketing your brand in the sports industry to improve the organization.
Bryce Cocke ('13) recently accepted a position with the Orlando Magic as a Ticket Sales Representative. He most recently completed an internship with the Washington Redskins.
Jess Jarrett ('10) accepted the position of Athletic Facilities Coordinator of Bridgeforth Stadium at James Madison University.
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Please send any alumni life/career updates to SRM@jmu.edu.
From Bleacher Report
Analysis by Alex Mosley in SRM 334 (section 1)
Jadeveon Clowney is one of the most gifted, explosive and most talked about players in college football history. He makes freakishly great plays that seem impossible for a person of his stature, seem like routine plays. Not in recent years has a player, that plays the same position, created such a huge star power about themselves. The article talks about the media frenzy about the player known as the freak, Jadeveon Clowney. Clowney has unique abilities and skillset that separates him from other defensive lineman. His size, strength, quickness and agility are all qualities that give him an advantage and gave him the identity of being known as the “freak”. A major quality that he has is being able to use both his left and right hands when getting into a stance. Coaches truly admire this as I allows him to play on both sides of the line which does not allow offenses to key on where he is going to be. That is a quality most guys in college do not have, as they are only comfortable with using their right hand. Wrapping all of these qualities into one and combining that with great technique has allowed him to be recognize as one of the best football players in the country. Coming into the year he was seen as a Heisman Trophy candidate and potential number one overall draft pick. The hype that surrounds him was accelerated throughout the summer in anticipation for another breakout yea. After a win against rival North Carolina, he faced major criticism. Clowney had only three tackles and was condemned to being “out of shape” as he seemed to have taken plays off. It was later discover he had a stomach virus the day before, but the criticism still followed. The media still ran with it as it seemed now that he was more human as he did not make the plays fans and reporters were accustomed to. What the article focuses on is that he is human and that though he has yet made any highlight plays, he still is “the freak” for a reason because of his major impact on the field.
It is ironic as to how media can create such hysteria on one person, build them up give them insane hero like abilities then break them down and overanalyze that same person. Jadeveon Clowney has been viewed as a freak of nature in the media, the hype surrounding him is unreal as it is said that he could play in the NFL right now. For a college football player, that is one major statement . Though is a great player, the media depiction of him makes one believe that he is somewhat of a superman and will make every single play. That is not the case as it was evident in his first couple of games this year. He has made plays but offenses realize his dominance and scout around him. If you listen to media reports though, you would think that he has made no plays and that he was over hyped. In my opinion, the media overanalyzes him, on one hand when he makes plays he’s the most dominant player in college football and on the other hand when he doesn’t make the highlight play, he is seen as being no as dominant.
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Analysis by Dana Allaband in SRM 334 (section 1)
Jadeveon Clowney, a defensive end for the University of South Carolina, was recognized for his sack against Michigan’s player Vincent Smith. This was Clowney’s rise to fame, just one hit and he immediately spread throughout social media. Since then Clowney has been scrutinized for his performance in his games thus far for the 2013 season.
In the article “South Carolina’s Star Player Jadeveon Clowney Hasn’t Lot His Swagger,” Brian Leigh explains how much the media has been extremely critical over Clowney’s performance on the field. Leigh states that the public has created the image that Clowney is a “God.” That due to one impressive highlight play, he will now be expected to perform at that level every game and if he does not the world will hear about it. For instance in the article, it states that Clowney was ranked first in a poll for the Heisman award after his highlight play. Now after only three games into this season he is left off the list completely. Also Leigh states that, “there was a time when Clowney was the bar-none favorite to go No. 1 in next April's NFL draft,” and this now has become questionable. The medias’ involvement in Clowney’s life has essentially altered it. In this instance Leigh is explaining how the media has become overly involved in Clowney’s life and he is defending him to a degree. Leigh states that the this issue with “impossibly high standards; they’re impossible.” Meaning that the media should not portray him as this unbelievable player. They should just state facts and statistics and let the public form an opinion about Clowney’s ability to play instead of being influenced by the media. For instance after South Carolina’s game against UNC the media stated that he was tired throughout the game, that he had to be pulled off, and that he will not win a Heisman with that performance. When in reality, if the public watched the game they would see that he performed extremely well against UNC. For most of the game he was double teamed, UNC placed two players to block him. Even with this in front of him Jadeveon managed to force UNC to rush their plays for a majority of the game. This exemplifies how the media can tweak a story so that the public will become interested and want to talk about it. Overall Jadeveon Clowney, an exceptional player, has become a name in the media and his performance this year will be scrutinized by the media because of this. The question left to ask is how will he react?
