Welcome to The Hype Report where we break down the latest news, stories & insights at the intersection of sports, artificial intelligence & web3.

Here's What You Need To Know This Week 📝

• NBA All-Star Baron Davis Invests in Fan-Owned SailGP Racing Team ⛵

• PGA Tour Launches VR FedExCup Playoffs in Partnership with Golf+ 🏌️

• Pelicans Star Zion Williamson & Family Sued for $1.8 Million by Ankr 🏀

• Quick Hype 🎯

• Boardroom x CNBC Game Plan Photo Recap 📸

Let's Dive Into It 🤿

NBA All-Star Baron Davis Invests in Fan-Owned SailGP Racing Team ⛵

Two-time NBA All-Star and entrepreneur Baron Davis spent the weekend celebrating his investment into Fan Owned SailGP Team, a new professional sailing team of the global SailGP league.

At an intimate rooftop cocktail reception at Sant'olina in Beverly Hills Davis announced his stake in the team as an investor and the team's first owner.

Having missed out on raising the required capital necessary to take part in Season 4 of Sail GP, the Bernoulli Locke team is now attempting to raise sufficient funds for the start line of next season.

The new SailGP Team aims to allow fans to both invest in a team and participate as owners (up to 1,950 investors).

Using blockchain technology, team governance is managed through a DAO structure.

This allows voting on key proposals, from the name of the team to electing the sporting manager.

To become a shareholder, you must be an accredited investor and can commit from $5,000 to $200,000.

The investment is also tokenized on the NEAR Protocol to allow for potential liquidity and authentication of ownership.

Here’s what Bernoulli Locke founder David Palmer has to say about having Davis on board:

Davis has been an advocate for the Web3 space since retiring from playing.

His company, Baron Davis Enterprises, has launched businesses including:

• The Black Santa Company

• Business Inside the Game (BIG)

• More Than Us

His latest venture, SLiC Images, is a photo and video rights management platform that aims to empower athletes-turned-creators through foundational Web3 tools for community engagement.

Why Does This Matter?

The power of fans being able to invest in teams is an interesting concept.

Ideally with DAO structures fans can fund their favorite teams and be able to receive benefits such as:

• Potential monetary upside

• Exclusive perks and access

• Governance and voting rights

Offering ownership to fans aligns incentives and creates a path for super fans to participate in the upside of the organization.

I think all teams should be thinking about ways to implement this model in some way to drive deeper fandom and engagement with their community.

PGA Tour Launches VR FedExCup Playoffs in Partnership with Golf+ 🏌️

The PGA Tour is partnering with Golf+ to offer fans the opportunity to play on the same courses and in the same conditions as competitors in the season-ending FedEx Cup Playoffs through a VR contest.

A series of qualifying events will see the top 500 players progress to virtual versions of the final three tournaments of the season:

• The FedEx St Jude Championship

• The BMW Championship

• The Tour Championship

Each course has been digitally recreated in the game, using the same tee and pin locations as each real-world contest, along with identical wind speed and direction.

Prizes up for grabs include a VIP experience at a PGA Tour event next season.

Golf+ originally launched as an AR experience in 2018 before moving into VR on the Meta Quest 2 headset.

Full course play was added in late 2021 and the current Golf+ VR experience is designed to be a new pathway into the sport.

It lets beginners learn, play and practice without the need to visit an actual golf course.

Investors include PGA Tour:

• Rory McIlroy

• Jordan Spieth

• Stephen Curry

• Tom Brady

Pelicans Star Zion Williamson & Family Sued for $1.8 Million by Web3 Company Ankr 🏀

New Orleans Pelicans star Zion Williamson has been in the news for a lot of the wrong reasons throughout the past few weeks.

This week is more of the same.

Zion, his stepfather, and his mother have allegedly failed to pay back $1.8 million of a $2 million loan from a Web3 company Ankr.

In a civil lawsuit filed this week in U.S. District Court in New Orleans, Ankr stated that it made the loan in September 2021 to Williamson and family members while in the midst of trying to establish a marketing relationship with the Pelicans' power forward.

The company — which enables easy access to Web3 and increases efficiency in blockchain infrastructures — states in the lawsuit that it hoped Williamson could serve as an Ankr spokesperson.

The lawsuit also states that Zion’s stepfather Lee Anderson, who represented Zion as his business manager, required up-front payment of $150,000 to negotiate a potential business relationship with his stepson.

It also states that Ankr has helped Williamson with perks such as:

• Community events

• Identifying a physical trainer

• Identifying a personal chef

Williamson's mother, Sharonda Sampson, is named as a defendant, in part because Ankr wired money into her account after Anderson supposedly told the company his family urgently needed a “bridge loan” to cover investment obligations.

Ankr goes on to say that it agreed to make the loan on condition it is paid back by August 21st, 2022, but that Anderson requested a series of extensions, and when Ankr finally received a check for $25,000, it bounced.

Last April, Ankr and Anderson entered into a forbearance agreement in which the company agreed not to sue if it received repayment of $500,000 by April 25th and the remainder by July 6th, according to the lawsuit.

The company received $500,000 on time, but about $300,000 of that covered interest, and the remaining $1.8 million has not been repaid.

The 6-foot-6, 285-pound Williamson, who starred in college at Duke, was the first overall pick in the 2019 NBA draft.

Despite a series of injuries, he has been named an All-Star twice.

Knee, foot, and hamstring injuries have limited him to 114 games in his first four seasons, meaning he's missed 194 regular season games and all nine of his team's postseason contests since 2022.

Williamson and his stepfather also have faced multiple lawsuits by a marketing agent in Florida who has sought $100 million from Williamson.

Agent Gina Ford claims Williamson improperly broke an agreement she had to represent him in endorsement deals.

But a federal judge in North Carolina ruled that any agreement Ford had to represent Williamson was void.

The judge found that Ford was not a licensed agent in North Carolina at the time she met with Williamson and that their contract did not comply with key requirements outlined by the state’s sports agent law, the Uniform Athlete Agents Act.

Quick Hype 🎯 

3 Ways Artificial Intelligence is Impacting Sports Betting.

Game Plan 2023 Highlights: Sports stars, owners, investors, agents, and media power brokers on the big deals of the future.

FanDuel Hires Alison Kutler to Lead Responsible Gaming.

LaLiga Transforms Fan Experience with AI.

Veteran Horse Racing Gaming Exec Joins Game of Silks as President and Chief Operating Officer.

Bybit and Oracle Red Bull Racing Introduce 'Velocity Series,' a Groundbreaking Digital Art Collaboration.

ScorePlay Raises $5 Million in Seed Funding.

Ticketmaster Offers Sports Teams Tools to Build Custom Ticketing Apps.

TitletownTech Hits $95 Million in Investments Towards Midwest Startups.

FIBA Introduces New LED Interactive Basketball Court.

Boardroom x CNBC Game Plan Event Photo Recap

I had the privilege of attending The Game Plan Sports Business event hosted by Boardroom x CNBC this past Tuesday in LA.

I’m slightly biased, but it was by far one of the best sports business events I’ve ever been to.

Incredible speakers.

Top-notch knowledge and insights.

Tons of relationship-building and amazing conversations.

Shoutout to everyone who helped put it together and bring so many amazing people into the same room.

Here are a few photos from the day:

Thanks for reading today.

Talk to you again next Sunday.

Malcolm

This newsletter is for informational purposes only and is not financial or business advice in any capacity.

The information shared is my thoughts & opinions and does not represent the opinions of any other person, business, entity, or sponsor.

The contents of this newsletter also should not be used in any public or private domain without the author's express permission.

The contents of this newsletter should not be used for any commercial activity, for example, research report, consultancy activity, or paywalled article, without the author's express permission