The Harlem Globetrotters wish to change into a real multi-platform media model as soon as extra.
The exhibition basketball crew continues to face off towards their arch-nemeses the Washington Generals in stay matches held around the globe, and now they’re as soon as once more turning into a staple of the Saturday morning children TV programming block, with season three of the sequence Harlem Globetrotters: Play it Ahead set to debut Oct. 5 on NBC. Kenny Smith, the NBA on TNT analyst, will host the brand new season of the present, The Hollywood Reporter has discovered.
However Keith Dawkins, the president of the Harlem Globetrotters, says that he’s simply starting the method to construct out the media presence for the crew, which is able to have fun its a centesimal anniversary in 2026.
“We’ve missed a number of generations of an viewers during the last 20-30 years by being this tour-only mindset, the one method wherein you would attain the Globetrotters is by touring some 250 tour stops round North America, one other 150 round the remainder of the world,” Dawkins tells THR. “Don’t get me flawed, it’s a robust a part of our model, but it surely has its limits. It has limits by way of client contact factors, not being in retail, not being on somebody’s content material platform or streaming platform, gaming, digital social media, the listing goes on.”
So Dawkins goes about altering that narrative, leaning into his expertise at Nickelodeon and Viacom to construct a flywheel that features a flurry of unique content material, together with lengthy and short-form documentary tasks, options, and “animated sequence with finest at school companions,” all of which may coexist alongside the NBC Saturday morning sequence. Dawkins says that the event slate is now 20-40 tasks deep.
“After we’re in a position to strike these offers and convey these properties out to {the marketplace} on totally different platforms, it’s simply going to assist to raise the model and likewise kickstart different components of the enterprise,” Dawkins says.
Streaming providers like Netflix, Peacock and Prime Video have all aggressively sought sports activities content material, not simply stay sport rights but additionally documentaries and sequence that sort out topics tied to sports activities. Dawkins argues that the Globetrotters match properly into that style.
“There’s documentaries on Elvis and Michael Jackson and Tina Turner and Wu Tang Clan and what have you ever, there needs to be stuff on the Globetrotters as nicely,” he provides, whereas saying of Play it Ahead “having the ability to attain 800,000 to 1,000,000 individuals every week between the present’s airings on NBC correct, Telemundo, Cozi, Peacock, YouTube, is simply phenomenal.”
The NBC morning present, which averages about 900,000 viewers, is a throwback to the heyday of the basketball model, when animated reveals that includes the celebrities have been a staple of Saturday morning TV. These days, it serves as a gateway to the Globetrotters for followers, and to let the on-court expertise shine off-court.
“It will get individuals to know our stars, who’re expertise is, what the Globetrotters have been as much as, the best way wherein we function as a enterprise builds model affinity and consciousness and creates conversion, the place there’s a proportion of these individuals be like, you understand what? the Globetrotters are again, I see them extra favorably. I’m extra doubtless to purchase a ticket proper to the tour to different issues which are necessary,” Dawkins says.
For a model turning 100 in two years, it’s pursuing its objectives in a method that feels nearer to that of a startup.
“I’m sufficiently old to recollect the Globetrotters on TV and after they have been related in that method, and I used to be a child, and the affect on me personally then, proper?” Dawkins says. “I believe to me, that’s the wonder, the chance of getting this nearly 100 12 months outdated model with a huge addressable viewers, is that there’s one thing in there for every of them that we needs to be telling tales to… We’ve this superior product, gigantic model consciousness, superior fairness, and it makes individuals really feel a sure method, proper, pleasure and happiness and prospects.”