SYRACUSE, N.Y. (NCC News) – When Syracuse Athletic Director Bryan Blair came over from Toledo, he knew that building a winning athletic powerhouse was the goal.
However, with NIL and branding becoming the topics of conversation in college sports, mastering those areas has never been more important.
That is where the creator economy comes in.
When speaking on a panel at Creator Con alongside Game 7’s Megan Hueter and women’s soccer player Julia Arbelaez this past week, Blair mentioned the importance of weaponizing social media and the creator economy when it comes to athletics and that he views it as something athletes can tap into.
“I think as this market continues to develop, this creator economy continues to develop…there’s a new expertise where I think our athletes have a platform and have a jumping-off point to maybe take that a little bit further,” Blair said.
Blair also said that having that content brand will lead to more recruiting wins, which in turn will lead to more success.
While building a brand through content sounds great, the question then becomes for student-athletes how will they be able to juggle that, while maintaining elite performances, and being good students?
“It’s really what you make of it. You have to enjoy doing it. I try to keep the content that I make fun, so I never look at it as another thing I have to do,” Arbelaez said.
Arbelaez has been able to build quite the following on social media, with over 5,000 followers across Instagram and TikTok and 99,000 total TikTok likes as well. All of that has led to her not only increasing her own NIL and deals, but fans asking for more content of her and her team.
“[Sports and student-athlete content] is the last sort of live, real, authentic thing left, especially in this age of AI,” Hueter said. “People are just going to love it.”
However if you ask Blair, he feels that the department overall is not doing a good job of creating these personalities for athletes. Telling stories and tugging at people’s emotions are things that he wants athletics to do in order to continue building the brand.
He says yes that the student-athletes are a huge part of that, but the students of the university are just as important.
“We have the best media school [Newhouse] in the country. So that means we should be the best department in the country when it comes to telling these stories,” Blair said.
Blair actually repeated that sentiment multiple times throughout the panel. He wants to give students that access to athletics so that these stories can be told. He has even gone as far as telling his coaches that they need to be prepared to open up that access to students, so that the Block S brand can be built even further through the creator economy.
He also mentioned SU alum Sean Dorcellus, who was a digital reporter and host for SU Athletics, as being a big part of the storytelling push of SU athletics. Dorcellus is now in a similar role with the Minnesota Timberwolves and while Blair does want to replace him, how he does that is unknown.
“Do we just use one person? Do we have multiple students fill that role? I am open to ideas,” Blair said.
There is zero doubt that the creator economy and sports can help each other. However, what that looks like in the future for SU Athletics is the question. With so many ideas and ways to do it, it can be overwhelming, but it looks like Blair and student athletes are committed to finding a way.