What are the 10 best sports movies of the 21st century? (Plus: MoneyCall wants yours!)

Welcome back to MoneyCall, The Athletic s weekly sports business cheat sheet.

(Want to receive MoneyCall in your email every Wednesday? Easy sign-up here .) Name-dropped today: Brad Pitt, Michele Kang, George Costanza, Joey Chestnut, Jason Kirk, Caitlin Clark, Ndamukong Suh, Red Panda, Bobby Bonilla and more.

Lets go: Driving the Conversation The Top 10 Sports Movies of the 21st Century (and does F1: The Movie reach the 21st century sports movie pantheon?) F1: The Movie is a smash hit.

Advertisement It had the biggest opening weekend (~$146M) of any movie in Brad Pitts entire career, and it *just* missed knocking out Creed III as the highest-grossing U.S.

opening weekend for any sports movie ever.

Why? As with TVs Drive to Survive, F1 makes for the kind of glitzy visuals and hyper-aggressive soundscapes that prove popular in the summer, with a mega-marketing push from Apple.

(Even the cars tires are co-stars .) Two questions: 1) Will we see copycats, like we did with Drive to Survive? If anything, F1 is a bit derivative of modern sports movies.

Meanwhile, like DTS, F1s unique elements are hard to replicate with other sports.

Given that opening-weekend showing, it shouldnt surprise you to hear that a sequel is in development.

2) Is it one of the best sports movies of the 21st century? Our two F1 reporters wouldnt go that far (and neither will I), but that question nicely coincides with The New York Times buzzy Best Movies of the 21st Century list .

I picked mine just for sports movies , not listed in any particular order (and only features, not documentaries): (My hottest take of all: 2014s Whiplash is really a sports movie J.K.

Simmons Terence Fletcher is the scariest coach in movie history and if you watch it that way, it takes the film to a new level.) Lets have some mid-summer fun: Pick your own 10 favorite sports movies of the 21st century here , then drop any unlisted personal favorites (or gripes about my list above) in the comments section below.

Get Caught Up WNBA to reach 18 teams in 2030.

Plus: NCAA needs geography lessons Big talkers from the sports business industry: WNBA expansion mania : Adding Cleveland in 2028.

Detroit in 2029.

Philadelphia in 2030.

Thats on top of Golden State launching this season and Toronto and Portland launching next season.

Its a lot .

Heres the stat of the week: $50M : What Golden State and Toronto paid in expansion fees in 2023 and 2024, respectively.

Advertisement $75M : What Portland paid in 2024.

$250M : What the three ownership groups announced on Monday paid.

Thats 3X the fee from just a year ago! By the time those three new teams take the court, their team valuations could easily have doubled.

The Valkyries, for example, were just valued at $500M by Sportico.

(Related: How much of that jump from $75M to $250M can be attributed to the Caitlin Clark Effect? Anecdotally, I would say a lot.

But dont take my speculative word for it: Get an amazing just-published deep-dive here from my colleagues Ben Pickman and Sabreena Merchant on Clarks billion-dollar value to the league.) MLB, ESPN renew talks : ESPN was never going to keep paying MLB $550M for its rights package, but after the initial tensions cooled off, both sides clearly see the value of talking through a path forward MLB needs the additional national exposure, ESPN needs ...

the local game rights for its new streaming service? Club World Cup x weather : Zoom out the bigger issue with the heat (and myriad storm delays) is what this foreshadows for the World Cup next summer , across the U.S., Mexico and Canada.

Pac-12 adds Texas State : The conference needed an eighth football team to remain FBS-eligible, and even the ninth-best major college football team in Texas is still giving your inaccurately named league a footprint in TEXAS.

NHL, union sign new CBA : Expanding the regular season to 84 games got the headlines , but the end of the delightful ( if possibly overhyped ) emergency backup goalie (EBUG) system is the quirky detail Im lamenting.

Other current obsessions : Michele Kang taking over managing Lyon (and signing Lily Johannes to the womens side!) ...

Randy Moss returning to ESPN ...

Al Hilal toppling Man City at the Club World Cup ...

Cadillacs F1 startup ...

NBA Draft fashion reviews ...

the George Costanza bobblehead bubble ...

Joey Chestnut back at the Nathans Hot Dog Eating Contest on July 4th ...

get well soon , Red Panda ...

What Im Wondering How does an NFL legend think about business opportunties? The Athletic s newest podcast No Free Lunch, hosted by football legend Ndamukong Suh, launched yesterday ( check it out here ).

I had a few Qs for my new teammate Suh that he was nice enough to answer: What makes for a good podcast? Its about real, honest conversations no filters, just raw truth and transparency.

We want our guests stories to be relatable to everyone, showing the human side of success and struggle.

And most importantly, every episode should give you something valuable to learn for your own life.

Advertisement What is a recent/current sports business storyline you find fascinating? The dynamic around the NFLs management council and player compensation is fascinating.

Whether you call it collusion or strategic business, its a prime example of maximizing profit by minimizing costs.

Every business aims to widen that spread, and NFL owners are no different.

Ultimately, though, the responsibility falls to the NFL Players Association.

Its on them to be a strong, unified union and negotiate for better terms.

At the end of the day, its a business.

Watch the first episode here: Grab Bag Data Point: 1,293,526 Thats the number of WNBA All-Star votes Caitlin Clark got, the most any player has ever received (breaking her own record, set a year ago).

AND YET! Clark was only the ninth-highest vote-getter *just among guards* from WNBA players themselves , highlighting the not-concerning-at-all disconnect between Clarks frenzied fan following and her complicated status with her peers.

Ratings Watch: 534,000 Thats the number of fans who tuned in for the NHL Draft on Friday night, up 6 percent from last years Friday night draft, per SBJs ratings guru Austin Karp.

Brands of the Week Adidas, American Eagle, Battle Sports, Chipotle, DSW, Electronic Arts, Lululemon and Red Bull .

As my colleague Jason Kirk noted in his must-read Until Saturday college football newsletter: Just some of the companies in the Ohio State WR Jeremiah Smith business .

Bobby Bonilla Day tribute: $112,600,000 Thats what the Milwaukee Bucks will pay Damian Lillard over the next five years not to play for the team, the largest the largest waive-and-stretch deal in NBA history (and ironically announced ON Bobby Bonilla Day ).

Can you beat Dan in Connections: Sports Edition? Today: Puzzle #282 Dans time: 0:29 (Todays puzzle includes my favorite game of all time.) Worth Your Time Great business-adjacent reads for your downtime or commute: In a perfect postscript to last weeks MoneyCall lead item about Cooper Flagg and New Balance, dont miss this behind-the-scenes reporting on how that deal went down.

Two more: (1) The most fascinating case study in the business of college sports right now is ...

Sacramento State .

(Free idea for the Pac-12: Charge Sac St.

$10M a year to be in the league.) (2) Another smart column from my colleague Asli Pelit from her Down to Business series on womens soccer, globally: Players as media companies .

Back next Wednesday! Celebrate July 4th by texting this link to friends or colleagues asking for their 21st century sports movie recs.

And, as always, give a (free!) try to MoneyCall and all The Athletic s other newsletters .

(Photo: Gareth Cattermole / Getty Images for Warner Bros.

Pictures).

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