1. Ahead of its season-opening Daytona 500 on Feb.21, NASCAR has implemented an all-new charter system, guaranteeing owners starting spots in the grid and higher income. Under the new charter rules, Sprint Cup fields will be reduced from 43 cars to 40 cars – 36 of which will be chartered. NASCAR will bestow charters on cars that have run full-time since 2013, and each owner will be able to secure three or four charters. A charter guarantees entry into the field of every Sprint Cup Series points race, but qualifying speeds will still determine the lineup. The system will temporarily leave newer Sprint Cup entries for Stewart-Haas Racing, Joe Gibbs Racing, and Team Penske/Wood Brothers Racing without charters. Owners have discussed charter sales for months; a charter is likely to be sold for $1-10 million. The charter system deal will last for five years with a four-year option, allowing it to run through the duration of NASCAR’s current TV-rights deal, set to end in 2024. With payments significantly lower for non-chartered teams, getting a charter will now be serious business for NASCAR owners.

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2. Multiple countries are rumoured to be discouraging their athletes from attending the Rio Olympics due to the Zika virus. A mosquito-borne illness, Zika is suspected of affecting babies in utero, giving them brain damage and abnormally small heads. The virus was declared an international health emergency on February 1 by the World Health Organization. While Kenya is the most recent country threatening to pull out of Rio, the USOC is busy refuting a report saying that its athletes “might consider skipping” the Games. USOC officials said it is “100 per cent inaccurate” they suggested American athletes do not attend the Rio Games because of fears about the Zika virus, according to the L.A. Times. USOC chief external affairs officer Patrick Sandusky said, “Team USA looks forward to the Games and we did not, would not and will not prevent athletes from competing for their country should they qualify.”

3. While the NFL recently signed a deal with CBS and NBC for the rights to broadcast Thursday Night Football (TNF) for the next few years, the league is still searching for a streaming rights partner for its TNF package. The NFL has discussed the digital package with Apple, Amazon, Yahoo, Facebook, Verizon, and AT&T, according to Bloomberg News. Despite some companies being scared away by the streaming rights’ high price tag, AT&T, Yahoo, and Verizon are all expected to bid. Sources confirmed that the NFL isn’t looking for a long-term relationship; the league wants to use the next few years to experiment with different kinds of media, distribution models and technologies. The NFL’s first trial with live steaming went well this past season, when Yahoo live-streamed the Jaguars-Bills game from London. Capitalizing on a growth market for “TV everywhere” access, expect streaming rights to grow rapidly in coming years.

4. Futsal, a five-per-side indoor soccer game, may not be popular with the average soccer fan, but that could be about to change. The upstart 16-team Pro Futsal League, set to debut in the U.S. in 2017, is attracting big-time names to ownership stakes. According to the Dallas Morning News, Brooklyn Nets Owner Mikhail Prokhorov and the Buss family, owners of the Los Angeles Lakers, have each committed to owning a PFL franchise. Additionally, La Liga clubs FC Barcelona and Atletico Madrid, along with Argentinian club Boca Juniors and Brazilian club Corinthians, are among the “world-power soccer clubs that have committed to full or partial franchise stakes.” Futsal is currently played in 198 of 207 FIFA member associations, and owners are expecting top talent to flock to the U.S. Details concerning roster sizes and salary cap will be covered in upcoming meetings between prospective owners and futsal officials. Cities pegged to host franchises include Boston, Chicago, Dallas, L.A., Miami, N.Y. and Seattle/Vancouver.

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5. Amid mounting legal costs, DraftKings requested an early exit from an exclusive advertising deal it signed with ESPN in June. ESPN agreed to let the daily fantasy sports concern off the hook, according to Yahoo Finance. The exclusive ad relationship gave DraftKings deep placement within several ESPN shows, and vaulted DraftKings among ESPN’s top 10 advertisers. The deal was revolutionary in that it marked the first-ever, large scale integration between a DFS operator (DraftKings) and a season-long fantasy operator (ESPN). DraftKings and the DFS industry as a whole took major blows in New York and Illinois when those Attorneys General ruled the games illegal for state residents. Now, the industry is reportedly under investigation by the FBI and a Florida grand jury. News of the Draft Kings-ESPN split came on the same day that Fox Sports reported its $160 million DraftKings investment, including an estimated 11 per cent equity stake, has declined in value by about 60 per cent, to $65 million.