Top of the morning to you on this Friday, August 14th. This is the Morning Buzzcast, and I'm your host for today, Joe Lemire. It was great to see Major League Baseball back in Dyersville, Iowa last night for the third Field of Dreams game, and first since 2022. Very cool that 26 Hall of Famers emerged from the Cornstalks in a moment very reminiscent of the movie itself. This was the first game with a new built-to-last stadium. The first two were contested with modular seats that were then taken down. The new venue opened in June and had a high school All-American game and a minor league game earlier this week, before the Phillies and Twins played last night.
Iowa taxpayers footed the bill for most of the construction costs, which includes about 3,000 or so fixed seats in a capacity of about 8,000 with temporary bleachers. As our Mike Mazzio detailed on sportsbusinessjournal.com, there are now MLB regulation clubhouses, bullpens, and a video board in left field. Populous, Brightview, and BAM collaborated to enhance the fan and retail experience. And MLB shared last night that it plans to return here in 2027 for another game. Netflix broadcast the game, one of the big events it prioritized in its limited rights deal of baseball, along with opening night and the Home Run Derby.
The coverage was full of live conversations. The booth of Matt Vaskirgen, Hunter Pence, and CeCe Sabathia were speaking with Phillies left fielder Brandon Marsh when he ranged back and appeared to have a chance at robbing a home run, which would have been a first, I believe, in baseball history to have a live mic'd up player rob a home run. Unfortunately, he couldn't quite do it. Later, Roger Clemens joined the booth while his son Cody Clemens was mic'd on the field at the same time. It was fun to watch a couple innings with my son, who, as I realized last night, is now at a great age to watch the Field of Dreams movie itself.
The NBA teased the release of its regular season schedule earlier this week with a few select games, including opening day, and it used to be opening night, but as Abe noted on the Buzzcast previously, it now includes a 3 p.m. matinee. Well, the rest of the schedule was shared yesterday, and for the second year of this new media deal, another focus in the messaging around the schedule is the regular cadence of availability, the fans' ability to discover national games when they want to watch. The tap-to-watch feature in the app remains a big part of that, as is the predictability of when the games are. Every day of the week.
has a different network. Monday is for Peacock and NBC Sports Network. Tuesday is for NBC and Peacock with its coast-to-coast, a doubleheader, starting with an Eastern or Central time zone game, followed by one in the Mountain or Pacific time. Wednesday is for ESPN Properties. Thursday is for Amazon's Prime Video. And then the weekends, we'll have dual homes, at least in certain parts of the season. Friday is for Prime and ESPN. Saturday for ABC and ESPN, along with Prime. Sunday is for NBC Peacock and ABC ESPN.
More games will be on broadcast TV this year, 14% more in fact, as ABC and NBC will carry 90 games this year compared to 79 last year. Including cable and streaming, we're again at 247 national games, which matches last year's total, but remains a huge jump from the 172 two years ago before this new media deal kicked in. At this point, the only games not yet scheduled are those dependent on the results of the Emirates NBA Cup. Holidays will also be a big focus of NBA programming. The Disney-owned channels will again share five games on Christmas Day. That includes a 12 new Nick Spurs match.
That's not only a rematch of last year's NBA Finals, but it is also the third straight noon game at MSG, and what's become a bit of a tradition. The previous two included the ESPN and Disney annual Dunk the Halls animated altcast with Mickey Mouse and Friends taking part. The first of those also pitted the Spurs as the visitor. So there's a strong chance we may see that for a third straight year. That's just speculation. After all, it could reduce the animation burden as the majority of the athletes have already been rendered that way.
Later on Christmas, the 76ers play at the Lakers as LeBron James returns to Los Angeles for the first time since leaving in the offseason. While on the topic of homecomings, both Jalen Brown's return to Boston and Giannis' return to Milwaukee will take place in January. Christmas, of course, has long been a day full of NBA games, even if the NFL has tried to encroach a little bit late, but that week will now have seven NBC games across four nights that week. NBC and Peacock will also carry a Martin Luther King Jr. quadrupleheader, as well as another four-game slate on President's Day. The one holiday the NBA is very intentionally vacating again is Election Day, when the league will support Get Out the Vote efforts. All 30 teams, however, will play the night before.
Prime Video, meanwhile, will again lead the way with the NBA Cup, Global Games, and the play-in tournament. Those Global Games will take place in Paris at 2 p.m. Eastern and in Manchester, England at 10.30 a.m. Eastern. Those earlier start times are another real focus for the NBA, which scheduled a record 115 games that will be available live in primetime in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.
All markets already with a strong basketball interest, and it's a clear example of the lead further building the market for NBA Europe. There had been some reporting earlier in the week that the Bears might make a grand announcement about finalizing plans to move to Hammond, Indiana. That did not happen yesterday, but Bears CEO Kevin Warren did tell reporters that the team is, quote, focused on building a stadium in Hammond, end quote. But, but, the Bears are still evaluating exact locations and don't have a specific timeline. Warren acknowledged that the franchise has had only minimal conversation with reps from Illinois, and Warren concluded only that the Chicago Bears fans deserve a new environment. That, of course, leaves plenty of wiggle room as to what that means.
It could mean a stadium in Hammond, but also potentially in Arlington Heights or somewhere else, even if the Indiana location is the focus for now. A new Nielsen report shows a 71% increase in fans watching women's sports from 2022 to 2025, for a total of 46 billion minutes last year. Interest continues to climb. In the first half of 2026 alone, viewers watched 28.3 billion minutes, putting women's sports on another record-setting pace. That report indicated that 52% of the U.S. population is now interested in women's sports to some degree, while the number of people who declare no interest whatsoever has dropped nearly 20% over the last three years. The overall audience is also becoming increasingly female. Nielsen found that 56% of recent U.S. sports fans are women.
and women are among the fastest-growing audience for men's sports as well. One glaring example is that for the 2026 Men's College World Series, female viewership was up 107%. And for sponsors, the business case keeps getting stronger. More than 30% of NWSL fans, for example, say they purchased a product after seeing an in-game sponsorship, while 60% of all women's sports fans say they've switched brands because of a company's values. Not surprisingly, advertising investment in women's sports has risen 120% since 2022.
A story involving former LSU quarterback Jaden Daniels, who now plays for the Washington Commanders, is worth keeping an eye on. His attorney reportedly sent a cease and desist letter to his alma mater requesting the school no longer use his name, image, or likeness after the Tigers issued his former No. 5 jersey to quarterback DJ Pickett. No LSU player had worn No. 5 since Daniels left following the 2023 season, just as no LSU player has worn No. 9 since Joe Burrow wore it while winning the Heisman and a national championship in 2019.
Over to European soccer. Remember the heartbeat data graphic from the FIFA World Cup with the sensor coming from the ball and how it proved that it hit a player's hair and apparently did not register contact with the Skycam wire in that other match? Well, that same technology will be making its way to a domestic league for the first time starting tomorrow as Spain's La Liga has partnered with Puma and Conexon Sports to bring the censored ball tech to the top Spanish league this year with plans to expand to the second tier league next season. This tech was first deployed at the 2022 men's and 2023 women's World Cups by FIFA working in tandem with Conexon and Adidas. UEFA also began using it for its signature tournament, the men's and women's Euros.
Now, it'll be in a professional league for the first time. The primary use case will be to support officiating through VAR and semi-automated off-sides technology by working in concert with Sync Video, but it will also be used to provide new data-driven insights for clubs and fans. La Liga is even creating a whole new data feed to support those broadcasting digital media activations with info on shot speed, spin, trajectory, and more. A few final headlines to share. NASCAR has added a new credit card sponsor, Avant, which has made its first entry into the sport. And Love Volleyball has retained Inner Circle Sports to be its advisor for expansion and franchise sales.
Lastly, for those of you with a good memory, I shared on the Buzzcast a year ago a little about the annual Artists and Writers Charity Softball game out on Long Island. It's a fun event for a good cause, and tomorrow is the 78th anniversary game. I play for the writers, as you'd expect. And we prevailed 9-6 last year, showing that, once again, a word is worth a thousand pictures. Thanks for tuning in to the Morning Buzzcast. I'm Joe Lemire. Have a great summer weekend.