García-del-Barrio, P., Becerra, N., & Schröder, J. (2019). Rivalries in sports competitions and in the global media showcase. Journal of Sports Economics & Management, 9(3), 185-201. RIVALRIES IN SPORTS COMPETITIONS AND IN THE GLOBAL MEDIA SHOWCASE Rivalidades en las competiciones deportivas y en el escaparate mediático mundial Pedro Garcia-del-Barrio, Nicolás Becerra Flores, Jef Schröder Aubert Universitat Internacional del Catalunya, Spain ABSTRACT: This paper examines how players compete in the global media showcase as well as in the sporting field. Special attention is paid to the role that players’ rivalries might have to raise the interest on particular sport disciplines worldwide. The paper initially compares the individuals’ media status, as a way to measure of the degree of attention they draw from supporters and the public around the world. To selected the group of superstar players, we first identify the Top-10 athletes with the greatest levels of visibility in the media. The appraisals, based on “Google Trends”, are computed based on the intensity of searches made by Google users that are related to each individual. Cristiano Ronaldo emerges as the player with greatest number of searches, thereby taking the reference value 100. Then, adopting a complementary approach, the paper examines the Top-10 most popular soccer players worldwide. In this case, our calculations are based on MERIT approach (methodology for the evaluation and rating of intangible talent), which evaluates the level of talent by counting the news articles that each superstar generates in the media. We actually calculate the individual index of media value as the factor by which the number of news articles associated to each player multiplies the corresponding figure of the representative (average) player in our data base. KEY WORDS: Sport stars; sport rivalries; media visibility RESUMEN: Este artículo examina cómo compiten las estrellas del deporte por estar presentes en el escaparate mediático global, además de competir en el terreno de juego. El análisis concede especial atención al papel que las rivalidades entre jugadores pudieran jugar de cara a aumentar el interés de ciertos deportes en todo el mundo. La comparación del estatus mediático se efectúa evaluando el grado de atención mundial que los jugadores reciben de parte de los aficionados y del público en general. Primero, identificamos el Top-10 de estrellas del deporte, de cualquier disciplina, que disfrutan de mayores niveles de visibilidad mediática. Nuestras valoraciones inicialmente se basan en “Google Trends”, que proporciona datos de la intensidad con que los usuarios de Google buscan información de cada protagonista. Cristiano Ronaldo resulta ser el jugador con más número de búsquedas en los últimos años, por lo que se le asigna el valor de referencia 100. En segundo lugar, adoptando un enfoque complementario, se analiza el Top-10 de los futbolistas más populares del mundo. En este caso los cálculos se elaboran mediante el enfoque MERIT (metodología para la evaluación y calificación del talento intangible), que elabora índices para medir el talento a través del número de noticias generadas en los medios por las estrellas deportivas. Concretamente, el índice individual del valor mediático se calcula como el factor por el que el número de noticias asociadas a un jugador multiplica a las noticias correspondientes al jugador representativo (medio) de nuestra base de datos. PALABRAS CLAVE: Estrellas del deporte; rivalidad deportiva; visibilidad mediática Received/recibido: 12-10-2019 Accepted/aceptado: 10-12-2019 Contact information: Corresponding author Pedro Garcia-del-Barrio Nicolás Becerra Flores Jef Schröder Aubert [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] c/Immaculada 22, 08017 c/Immaculada 22, 08017 c/Immaculada 22, 08017 Barcelona, Spain Barcelona, Spain Barcelona, Spain 2340-7425 © 2019 The Authors. This is an open access article under the CC BY license 185 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0) García-del-Barrio, P., Becerra, N., & Schröder, J. (2019). Rivalries in sports competitions and in the global media showcase. Journal of Sports Economics & Management, 9(3), 185-201. “Their matches [between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal] were definitely great, but there were big rivalries like Boris Becker and Stefan Edberg, Andre Agassi and Pete Sampras, me [John McEnroe] and Bjorn or me [John McEnroe] and Jimmy (Connors). But the level reached by Roger, Rafa and Novak is historically unique.” John McEnroe, 2019)1 1. Introduction This paper studies how sportspersons compete in the global media showcase as well as in the sporting field. The scope of the paper includes examining the role that players’ rivalries might have concerning their capacity to expand the attention paid to different sports worldwide. Rival contenders in sports are tied by rules that are binding for every specific discipline that the athletes perform. On the contrary, the global media showcase offers to all kind of individuals – regardless of the sport they engaged at – the chance to compete under the same terms to pursue the same goal: trying to draw the interest of followers, journalist and the general public. To measure the degree of popularity and media visibility of the selected group of star players – who concentrate the attention of sport fans and the public – we adopt two approaches. The complementarity of these approaches is apropos for analyzing also the extent to which sport rivalries between certain players is related to the degree of media exposure and popularity. The paper’s objective is not to modeling or assuming statistical causality links, but rather to examining the involvement that sport rivalries may have concerning the superstar players’ visibility in the media. The enjoyment of consumers of sport entertainment depends on the level of excitement delivered by sport spectacles and competitions, which in turn depends on aspects like: empathy feelings, the presence of attractive icons or sport rivalries. Previous papers focused on how “Uncertainty of Outcome” (UO) affects the degree of interest of the followers of sport competitions2. The economic literature has also discussed, since long ago, several aspects related to the role of prominent superstars and the peculiar features occurring in the markets where they are present. The seminal paper by Rosen (1981) stressed the link between sport talent and the superstar status, while Adler (1981) also mentioned the externalities associated to the individuals’ popularity. Precisely, extensions of these ideas invite studying further the role of local and global rivalries in sports3. The literature (Cf. Brandes et al. (2008); or Franck and Nüesch 1 Retrieved on Sept. 2019 from: https://www.tennisworldusa.org/tennis/news/Roger_Federer/77248/mcenroe- shares-why-roger-federer-v-rafael-nadal-rivalry-is-not-the-greatest/ 2 The “Uncertainty of Output Hypothesis” (UOH) is a central aspect in economics of professional sports: Cf. Rottenberg (1954) and Neale (1964). There is however disagreement on the relevance of the UOH, given the contrasting evidence on how competitive balance affects fans’ interest in sports: Cf. Borland and Macdonald (2003); Garcia and Rodriguez (2002); Coates and Humphreys (2010); and Coates and Humphreys (2012). 3 Cf. Garcia-del-Barrio (2018), who identifies global sport icons in Soccer and Formula One and compares a 2340-7425 © 2019 The Authors. This is an open access article under the CC BY license 186 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0) García-del-Barrio, P., Becerra, N., & Schröder, J. (2019). Rivalries in sports competitions and in the global media showcase. Journal of Sports Economics & Management, 9(3), 185-201. (2012), among others) highlights the relationships between sport talent, popularity and superstar status. More recently, other researchers (Cf. Garcia-del-Barrio and Pujol (2016) and Korzynski and Paniagua (2016)) provide empirical evidence to support that visibility in the media works along with sport talent to explain the players’ actual market value. The interest on sport events depends on factors that explain its success in terms of both entertainment quality and economic returns. Important variables in this regard include: concentration of sport talent; identification with certain players, teams or leagues; sport brands predominance; team dynasties; excitement in betting; outcome uncertainty; superstars’ popularity; local and global rivalries, etc. This paper deals with the aforementioned factors, paying special attention to stardoms and rivalries. Sport rivalries, between individuals or teams, have always been an important source of excitement for attracting people to follow sport events and competitions. In recent times, thanks to the development of new technologies, we have witnessed some top- class global rivalries, involving contenders from the most popular sport disciplines worldwide: soccer, basketball and tennis. Precisely, John McEnroe referred to this issue when a journalist asked him about the current rivalry between Federer and Nadal. In his answer, the famous former tennis player mentioned other rivalries, like those held by: Boris Becker vs. Stefan Edberg, Andre Agassi vs. Pete Sampras, he [McEnroe] vs. Bjorn or he [McEnroe] vs. Jimmy Connors, while considering that: “the level reached by Roger, Rafa and Novak is historically unique.” In this paper we examine to what extent these exceptional sport rivalries go along with outstanding levels of media visibility and popularity.