Madden and Pizza Hut enter first-ever virtual stadium deal in esports EA SPORTSThe Madden NFL 20 Championship series will be taking place at the newly unveiled Pizza Hut Stadium. A move intended to further blur the lines between traditional sports and esports. Pizza Hut Stadium is the first-ever virtual stadium rights deal in history and all MCS live tournaments will be taking place at the new stadium. \u201cPizza and sports go hand in hand, and esports is no exception. Pizza Hut has always been a trailblazer in the gaming space, from the days of tabletop Pac-Man in our restaurants, to now, becoming the first-ever brand to have an official virtual stadium rights deal in esports,\u201d Pizza Hut CMO Marianne Radley said. He continued: \u201cThe goal of all our partnerships is to create 360 fan engagement and we are thrilled to join forces with EA Sports to create memorable experiences that connect fans to their favorite sports like never before.\u201d While the stadium is plastered with the Pizza Hut branding, that doesn\u2019t mean jerseys will be. Alex Nu\u00f1ez, the esports Sponsorship Lead at EA Sports told Dexerto: \u201cThe idea behind virtual stadium rights is to develop an opportunity that\u2019s in the image and in the essence of what you would see in the actual NFL. So we wouldn\u2019t want to stray from a traditional NFL experience. \u201cWe wanted to mirror what you had experienced if you were to go to an actual NFL stadium where the concept of stadium rights already exists and you\u2019re used to seeing brands within the stadium. We\u2019re trying to create an extension of that in our world.\u201d Dexerto asked Vida Mylson, the Sr. Director of Global Brand Partnerships at EA Sports if there are plans for any other virtual stadiums. \u201cI think there\u2019s always a possibility, I think from a bigger picture perspective and overall for esports,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m not going to say yes, I\u2019m not going to say no, but obviously we\u2019re definitely thinking a little bit bigger as far as how we can innovate these offerings and really lean into creating an experience for these brands within the sports environment.\u201d Mylson added that the partnership \u201cvalidates the future of the Madden Championship Series as an NFL partner and property. \u201cI think from a Pizza Hut perspective, as well as ours, it kind of goes back to the idea of blurring the lines between the real world and then the world of gaming and really creating that mirrored sponsorship opportunity that they\u2019re getting in the world of the NFL into a whole new area of gaming.\u201d Nu\u00f1ez added: \u201cThis is such a great example of how a sponsor program can bring value to the Madden competitive community, especially at the professional tier. \u201cNow our professional players are playing in a virtual stadium rights deal, Pizza Hut stadium. This was created for them and then a belief in them that they are stars and eventually we become superstars of this sport. And that\u2019s just how we try to approach our sponsorship business is not only bringing value to the brand but to the Madden community as well.\u201d The MCS kickoff and debut of Pizza Hut Stadium is August 30 at the Madden NFL 20 Classic. The tournament is taking place at North America\u2019s largest esports facility \u2013 Esports Stadium Arlington. $190,000 is on the line along with first and second place earning a spot in the Madden NFL 20 Bowl.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Madden and Pizza Hut enter first-ever virtual stadium deal in esports EA SPORTSThe Madden NFL 20 Championship series will be taking place at the newly unveiled Pizza Hut Stadium. A move intended to further blur the lines between traditional sports and esports. Pizza Hut Stadium is the first-ever virtual stadium rights deal in history and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66751\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}