Yahoo Sports has an interesting presence at Super Bowl LIX’s Radio Row, and it’s part of a larger shift in strategy.
Over the last year, they’ve launched 11 new video shows/podcasts across a variety of sports, and they have three NFL shows (Inside Coverage, McCoy and Van Noy, and Football 301) taping from the Toyota Land Cruiser set at Radio Row this week. Yahoo Sports head of content Sam Farber recently spoke to Awful Announcing on their strategy with the show launches and said these kinds of shows are content pillars for them.
“The engagement’s been awesome. Our show consumption, on average, is up 160% year over year, so that’s certainly working out for us. We’re up over 360% on social media, really headlined by our clips and content that come out of those shows. The way we’ve oriented our content operation is that everything is built around the talent and the show slate that we’ve put together and launched in 2024.”
He said the overlapping idea across the new shows is providing intelligent and thoughtful coverage for fans.
“Each sport is covered a bit differently, and the way that fans of that respective sport want it covered and the types of things they want to hear varies. However, I would say overarching across all of our content, our mission is to make sports fans smarter. That’s our north star.”
Farber said launching shows that fit with that central mission has been key for him at Yahoo.
“When I got here 18 months ago, that was the very first thing that we did together, thinking about what is it that Yahoo Sports is going to stand for and what role do we want to play in the sports ecosystem. And we felt like creating smart sports content to both tell people what’s happening, deliver the news, all the important utilities that everyone has come to expect from us and other sports media properties, but also going a step deeper and helping them understand the news and go deeper on all the biggest stories and storylines and trends that we’re seeing across every sport, is really the place that we’re going to focus on.
“And that’s been the throughline. So even though the talent might be a bit different and the way that they speak might be a bit different based on the sport, you’ll see the same sort of types of people that are hosting each of our shows across sports.”
He said the three football shows they have at Radio Row show off that diverse approach but shared mission.
“I think the NFL is actually the perfect example of it. [We have] Football 301, which is hosted by Nate Tice. Nate played the game, he’s the son of a coach, and he’s by far one of the sharpest analytical minds I’ve ever seen. He spends a lot of time watching film, really breaking stuff down, the way that a former player and coach and son of a coach would break down film. He’s really like teaching a master class via his show in understanding what you’re seeing on the field.
“To compliment him, we have McCoy and Van Noy, where we have multi-time Pro Bowler and All-Pro Gerald McCoy, Pro Bowler Kyle Van Noy, who’s still playing, who are breaking the game down, but through a different perspective. They both know the X’s and O’s, obviously, and in the case of Kyle, he’s part of a really great Ravens’ defense, but they’re talking about the game through the lens of, of people who actually played it recently.
“So they’re giving you the player perspective, and Kyle Van Noy is telling you what’s happening on Sundays from somebody who actually played on Sunday that week. It gives a really unique perspective, it really tries to create that sort of added texture to how you understand what’s going on in football.
“And then Inside Coverage, it’s hosted by Jason Fitz, and it’s really a place for all of our insiders and our analysts to talk about what’s going on in the league, so the rumors and what they’re hearing and sort of what’s happening behind the scenes in front offices. We have Jori Epstein, we have Charles Robinson, we have Frank Schwab, folks who are really tapped into what’s going on in the league and addressing things from that perspective.”
Farber said the combined shows and their different approaches offer fans a wider perspective on the league.
“I actually think it creates a really interesting 360 view of what’s happening in the league from a coach angle, a player angle, and then an analyst/front-office angle.”
Farber said one key reason Radio Row is worth visiting is the guest opportunities.
“Radio Row is an awesome opportunity to have guests on these shows. And Radio Row is a place where the entirety of the NFL universe descends on a convention center, or wherever it is in a respective year, for a week. So it allows for them to pick the brains of other voices and talk to other voices and sort of insert new voices and angles to the way that they are talking about the Super Bowl. But also, I think it’s important for them to give fans all the breakdown that they seek for the game that is obviously most anticipated this year.
He said that this also works out as part of a wider partnership with Toyota, which plays a key role on Yahoo’s Radio Row set.
“Finally, I would say, we have a really great partnership with Toyota, and Toyota has been a really amazing partner across our NFL coverage; they sponsored our NFL coverage this year and they sponsored our fantasy football coverage this year. So I think in part this opportunity is great because of them, because of their ambassadors and what they’re bringing to the table and because of the incredible-looking set and environment that they’re setting up for our shows.”
A notable element for many video shows in 2025 is balancing viewership through short clips that spread on social media with the viewership of the whole show. Farber said everyone takes different approaches to this, but Yahoo’s approach is focused on appealing to fans across a variety of platforms, so they emphasize clips a lot.
“It’s a good question, and I’m sure there are different opinions about this. But I’m somebody who was raised in digital and social media early in my career, and the way that I have always found fans to work is they want to consume content on the platforms that they spend their time on. And so our approach at Yahoo Sports is to meet fans where they are, full stop.
“For me, I’m delighted if they want to watch a short-form clip on a social platform, because that is where they’re spending time. And it allows for us to have that connection point with that fan. If I chose to withhold that clip from them on that platform, I think I would be presumptuous to assume that they would go and seek it out somewhere else, because that’s just not how people work nowadays. That spot would get filled by another piece of content on that social feed, right?”
“So I want to make sure that we are everywhere that fans are. Obviously, I want people to listen to and watch our full-length shows. And we have that happening on audio platforms, we have that happening on YouTube, we have that happening on our website. But if people want to just interact with us on social, I want to give them that opportunity. And I think I would be doing them and us a disservice if I didn’t distribute everything on all the platforms that fans care about.”
Speaking of those different platforms, Farber said that also informs who they hire for shows; their goal is often to get people who can contribute written content to Yahoo as well and be active on social media.
“We don’t have a linear network, so we’re digital-only. This really for us is our biggest priority from a content perspective. But we also are really focused on talent that are multiplatform, meaning most of our talent that you see in our shows or listen to in our shows are also writing editorial for us and are also active on social media for us. So we’re really trying to go with a comprehensive approach when we bring these voices to fans.
“And so oftentimes what you’ll see is companion piece written by one of our show hosts like Nate Tice, where he’ll go deeper on something. For example, Nate is a draft expert, as is Kevin O’Connor on the NBA side. And with the NFL draft upcoming, we’ve started to publish our mock drafts.
“So Nate may talk about risers and followers in the draft in his show, but he will publish an entire multi-round mock draft on our site and go really deep on the prospects and who he likes and who he doesn’t, et cetera. We tend to find these things work in tandem with one another, and work collaboratively, and create a whole picture together.”
