Sports Law Professor Quoted By NBC News in Article About Mets’s Ambition to Compete with Yankees

Mark Conrad, who directs the sports business concentration and is a professor of law and ethics at Fordham University’s Gabelli School of Business, was quoted by NBC News in an article the media outlet wrote about the New York Mets ambition to compete with the New York Yankees.

The journalist suggested that “a region’s second-place franchise can emerge from shadows if an owner is willing to shell out cash, Fordham University professor Mark Conrad said, citing the NBA’s Steve Ballmer, who has remarkably made L.A. Clippers games fashionable events. ‘The focus of New York baseball could be shifting now,’ said Conrad, who teaches sports law at Fordham’s business school.”

Conrad went on to say that the “Mets were run like a minor league team for years under [former owner Fred] Wilpon. And now you have [Cohen] coming with a Steve Ballmer mentality: ‘This is my thing, and I will do what it takes. It’s a new incarnation of a George Steinbrenner.'”

Professor Conrad’s books and articles have appeared in academic, legal, and general-circulation publications. The third edition of his book The Business of Sports — Off the Field, In the Office, On the News was published by Routledge in 2017. Prior editions have been cited in leading journals as among the most comprehensive texts on the subject.

In addition to his full-time responsibilities at Fordham, Professor Conrad has lectured at leading sports business and law programs, including Columbia University’s sports management program and at St. John’s University’s LLM program in international sports practice. He has appeared on panels at Duke, Fordham, Cardozo, and the University of Virginia Law Schools. He was president of the Sport and Recreation Law Association from 2014 to 2015 and is serving as president of the Alliance for Sport Business from 2016 through 2018. He has been asked to advise international programs in sports and communications.

Professor Conrad has been quoted in The New York Times, Boston Globe, and Chicago Tribune and has appeared on CNN and Bloomberg TV. He holds a B.A. from City College of New York and a J.D. from New York Law School. He also received an M.S. from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. He resides in New York City.