® WWW.SPORTSBUSINESSJOURNAL.COM MARCH 12-18, 2018 VOLUME 20 ISSUE 45 • $7.95 ESPN’s tricky NFL Instilling passion South Carolina’s Dawn Staley talks about problem her journey to coaching. Page 38 Pitaro’s to-do list: Repair relationship BY JOHN OURAND STAFF WRITER George Bodenheimer had only been on the job as ESPN’s acting chairman for a couple of weeks when he got word that Fox and the NFL would partner on the NFL draft, jointly producing a show that would directly compete against ESPN. ESPN executives were angry. ESPN created the NFL draft as a TV show Raising the game 38 years ago and popularized it to un- precedented heights over the years. It Recipe for success in women’s basketball: was one thing when the NFL Network Connect with community. starting covering it. But when the NFL Page 16 brought in a competitive broadcast net- CARTHY Better call Sal C work, it was seen as a slap in the face. Soon after, Bodenheimer heard rum- PATRICK E. M blings that the NFL was going to put Work ethic, perseverance, luck help turn See Pitaro Page 35 Sal Galatioto into a sports fi nance guru BY DANIEL KAPLAN STAFF WRITER openings for breathing. 2 groups vie Change overdue The creepy artifact is one of Gala- Madkour & Smith: Three LET’S MAKE A DEAL: few yards across from Sal tioto’s old radiation masks, evidence steps that would restore Charm, chutzpah, Galatioto’s desk inside his of the 33 excruciatingly painful treat- to establish intelligence deliver athletics’ credibility. A midtown New York offi ce is ments he endured during the last six Page 24 Galatioto free ride to a bookcase, on top of which stares years after a stage 4 cancer diagnosis esports PAs graduate school at Tufts, out a ghostly head-to-shoulder, white- in July 2012. Page 30 latticed-covered mask with small See Galatioto Page 28 BY LIZ MULLEN STAFF WRITER Two very different, but serious, ef- The free tickets are forts are underway to create players part of a series of Orioles’ bold bet offers youth free admission associations for professional esports youth-driven efforts. competitors in two of the most popular BY ERIC FISHER STAFF WRITER properties across sports wrestle games — “Overwatch” and “Counter- with how best to attract youth au- Strike: Global Offensive.” In a move believed to be un- diences. The issue has been particu- If successful, the efforts would mark precedented in major sports, the larly thorny in baseball, which has the fi rst real grassroots, player-driven Baltimore Orioles will offer free seen its average TV audience rise moves to form offi cial groups to repre- admission to Orioles Park at Cam- to 57 years old, according to data sent the interests of esports players. United bid leader den Yards to any child age nine and from research outfi t Magna Global, One effort, being led by “Overwatch” John Kristick plays younger all season, part of a larger and frequently is tagged as having player-turned-coach Thomas “Morte” multifaceted role in effort youth outreach program the club is a graying audience. Kerbusch and veteran sports labor at- to land 2026 World Cup. developing. But the Orioles, which have seen torney Ellen Zavian, could result in the Page 4 BALTIMORE ORIOLESBALTIMORE The effort arrives as teams and See Orioles Page 8 See Esports Page 8 SA AA Galatioto ■ Sicilian immigrant overcame personal, professional hurdles to become sports fi nance pioneer FROM PAGE 1 “I went from fi ne to you are dead,” the sports investment banking pioneer said. “I was stage 4, so there is no stage 5. Stage 5 is you go from the sports business to the fertilizer business. “I had it decontaminated,” he said of the mask. “Any time I am having a bad day, I look up at that and I think to myself, you know what, a bad day at work is better than a good day at Sloan [Kettering cancer cen- ter]. It just is.” During his treatments, he had to carry a letter from Sloan in case he set off the radiation detectors at Grand Central Sta- tion near his offi ce. Given the grim diagnosis, those closest to Galatioto believed he wouldn’t make it. “It was scary,” said Jerry Reinsdorf, owner of the Chicago White Sox and Bulls, who used Galatioto’s fi rm for franchise valu- ation and has a bobblehead of his friend in his own offi ce. “I really didn’t think he was going to survive. I remember one conversa- tion I asked him how he was doing and he replied, ‘They tell me I am doing great; I feel sorry for the SOB who is not doing great.’” But Galatioto, who refers to the radiation room as the torture chamber, did survive and is now free of the dreaded disease. While cancer was obviously his biggest hurdle, Galatioto has cleared many in a life that’s taken him from a small olive farm in Sicily to helping create and then getting to CARTHY the top of sports investment banking in the c U.S. No challenge was too big, starting with making it to the U.S. in the fi rst place. Gala- PATRICK E. M tioto had no money for school. He’s worked Sal Galatioto helped establish the sports finance industry over the last 25 years, becoming a go-to voice for team sales and franchise loans. dozens of jobs. He’s been laid off. When he a few years earlier. Galatioto’s mother he went to business school. He called cus- been delivered for a second time. His only wanted to focus on sports his employer told sewed collars on shirts for 3 cents a col- tomers whose beds, sofas and other items problem: He hadn’t kept a record of his him not to. Big banks threatened his fi rm, lar in a Garment District sweatshop, and weren’t delivered. initial stories. Galatioto Sports Partners, with a $100 mil- his father secured a backbreaking job as a “I had the best job ever,” he said, con- “It was great,” he said. lion lawsuit just for keeping his word. longshoreman. vincingly. “I would make up a story when Galatioto is proud of his hard and con- Yet, through it all, thanks to hard work, “He couldn’t straighten up” when he it didn’t get there. The truck was hijacked. tinuous work. It’s a trait that has never left intelligence, chutzpah, some luck and his came home, Galatioto recalled. “I would … It was 1970s New York; it was perfectly him. When he fi rst returned to the offi ce trademark humor and sales skills, he’s have to take his big work boots off, untie plausible. The truck broke down, there after cancer treatment, he couldn’t eat. His cleared everything that life has littered in them, because he couldn’t bend down. And was an accident. You had to come up with nutrition came from a bag connected to his his path. he would work no matter how cold it was. He had a goal: He wanted to get a house, ■ ■ ■ ■ and we did it.” His 97-year-old mother still lives in that Galatioto’s par- tiny row house they ents, Giuseppe and eventually bought in Giovanna, were THE CHAMPIONS Maspeth, Queens. poor farmers who At 10, Galatioto started lived outside Castel- This is the third installment in shining shoes on Knick- lammare del Golfo, the series of prof les of the 2018 erbocker Avenue in Sicily, and applied class of The Champions: Pioneers Brooklyn so the family for visas to the U.S. & Innovators in Sports Business. could save up for their in 1948, four years This year’s honorees and the issues version of the American before Galatioto in which they will be featured are: Dream home. Polishing was even born (he shoes became the first has an older broth- DATE CHAMPION of scores of odd jobs he er, Rocco, nine years Feb. 26 Ben Sutton would hold in the years his senior). At the before he got his fi rst fi - March 5 Kay Koplovitz time, the U.S. had nance position. quotas from cer- March 12 Sal Galatioto “I liked that, that was tain countries and March 19 Howard Ganz fun,” Galatioto said of his only allowed 4,188 shoe-shining business. Italians to immi- March 26 John Wooten “I learned everything I DANIEL KAPLAN grate annually. The April 2 Paul Beeston know about marketing A radiation mask from his cancer treatments gives Galatioto perspective at the office. Galatiotos won the from that business. lottery in 1957. “I did,” he responded something, you couldn’t just say, ‘You know stomach. “My entry num- to the laughter brought what, the Teamsters, they decided they were “It was pretty ugly,” he said. “I had to plug ber was 2333,” Galatioto said smiling seated on by the comment. “I learned how to talk going to take a longer lunch break and they into this goop. That was my meal every day.” in his New York offi ce. “That was my lucky to people.” didn’t get to you.’” Tom Ricketts, the Chicago Cubs owner, number.” His favorite job? Bloomingdale’s furni- He got so good at the job that Blooming- recalled the laborious process he endured The family came to Brooklyn because a ture warehouse, which he worked in the dale’s promoted him to “Double Fails,” buying the club over three years because the man from their village had moved there evenings after a day job in the year before calling people whose furniture had not Cubs’ then owner, The Tribune Co., declared 28 ❘ MARCH 12-18, 2018 www.sportsbusinessjournal.com ❘ Street & Smith’s SportsBusiness JOURNAL SA AA and working part-time jobs.