This Week’s Movers in Sports Media and Marketing

This week in the sports media and marketing ecosystem, Alex Coffey switches her beat at The Athletic, Jim Bell leaves NBC after nearly 30 years, and Neeta Sreekanth becomes INFLCR’s first COO.

For job openings and more on who’s moving where, check out the Hashtag Sports Weekly roundup.

Alex Coffey switches beats at The Athletic

Alex Coffey recently announced a change in her beat at The Athletic, moving on from her role as the Seattle Storm reporter to take over coverage of the Oakland A’s. The shift makes sense for Coffey, who worked in baseball prior to joining The Athletic in May 2019. After graduating from the College of William and Mary in 2016, Coffey was a communications specialist at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum before moving on to join the Seattle Mariners as a baseball information coordinator.

NBA Exec Amy Brooks to join Square’s Board of Directors

Amy Brooks, President of Team Marketing & Business Operations and Chief Innovation Officer at the NBA, will be joining the Board of Directors at Square, the company announced in a press release. An NBA corporate vet of 15 years, Brooks is currently in charge of growing NBA, WNBA, NBA G League, and NBA2K team profitability through strategic consulting on all aspects of business operations.

Twitter co-founder and CEO Jack Dorsey’s lesser-known brainchild, Square was founded in 2009 as a way to make credit card transactions more accessible with the Square Reader, a small device that enabled users to accept cards as payment with a card reader that connected to a smartphone. The company has since expanded its services to include mobile money-transfer service Cash App, and food delivery service Caviar.

NBC Sports Executive Producer and ‘Tonight Show’ Showrunner Jim Bell to leave NBC

Jim Bell is leaving NBC Universal after nearly 30 years with the network. Bell has been a producer for NBC Sports since his start at the company, working on every Olympics for the network since the 1992 Summer Games. He was Executive Producer for the ‘Today Show’ from 2005-2012 before moving to NBC Sports fulltime to lead the network’s Olympics coverage. After the Winter Olympics in South Korea, Bell agreed to take over as showrunner for the ‘Tonight Show’ in addition to running preparations for the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.

In announcing his departure from NBC, Bell said he wished to “delve into something new—to build on my experience in news, sports, and entertainment so I can broaden and deepen my leadership role in the content universe.” Gavin Purcell, a former writer and producer on the ‘Tonight Show,’ will take over showrunning duties on an interim basis. NBC has yet to make a decision as to who will take over the network’s Olympics coverage.

Sports and media exec David O’Connor joins Premier Lacrosse League Board of Directors

Premier Lacrosse League co-founder and CEO Mike Rabil announced the addition of industry bigwig David ‘Doc’ O’Connor, to the league’s Board of Directors. O’Connor was CEO of Madison Square Garden Company for two years, during which time he oversaw the company’s spin-off from its predecessor, Madison Square Garden Networks. Before his role at MSG, O’Connor spent 31 years as an agent and eventual managing partner at CAA Agencies.

INFLCR adds Neeta Sreekanth as first-ever COO

Social media content delivery platform INFLCR has added Neeta Sreekanth to the company’s newly-created Chief Operating Officer position, where she will head up the marketing, sales, client success, operations, and athlete engagement departments. Sreekanth, a social media and marketing whiz, comes to INFLCR from IGN Networks where she spent more than a year as Director of Social Content and Strategy. Prior to her time at IGN, Sreekanth spent 3 years at ESPN as a Social Media Manager.

Know someone with a new gig who should be featured? Submit a tip.