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Sports Storytelling

Sports storytelling is the use of narrative to present athletes, teams, rivalries and events, so that audiences follow people and plots instead of only scores. Media, clubs, leagues and sponsors use it to build emotion and attachment around a sport. In sponsorship communication it is the art of telling stories that engage customers while distinguishing a brand in a competitive market [1].

Key points

  • Stories promote ideas and values based on emotions, not products directly, and emotion is central to sport [1].
  • Psychology describes the effect as transportation: absorption into a story, with imagery, affect and attentional focus [2].
  • In an experiment, digital video storytelling ads hooked viewers more effectively than argumentative ads [3].
  • Netflix’s Formula 1: Drive to Survive is a studied case of a story converting viewers into sport fans [4].
  • In a Play of Values fan survey, “better media storytelling” was named as a driver of the most popular sports by 28.6% of respondents.

Origin

No single person is credited with coining the term “sports storytelling”. It sits where two lines of research meet. In psychology, Green and Brock (2000) proposed transportation as the mechanism by which narratives affect beliefs. They showed that more transportation increased story-consistent beliefs and favourable evaluations of the protagonists, and that these effects were generally unaffected by labelling a story as fact or fiction [2]. In sport communication, Kończak (2018) described storytelling as a tool of sponsorship communication that uses stories to build a brand’s image [1]. Soble and Lowes (2024) later studied how narrative converts people into sport fans [4]. The idea is also older than the term: the history of media starts with oral storytelling.

How it works in sports media

A story needs characters, a plot and stakes, and sport supplies all three on its own. Storytelling turns results into arcs: the underdog, the comeback, the rivalry, the farewell. Research on narrative persuasion explains why this works. When viewers are absorbed in a story, it shapes what they believe and how they judge the people in it [2].

The effect is measurable in advertising. In a quasi-experiment with 273 undergraduate students, digital video storytelling ads hooked viewers more effectively than argumentative ads. Being hooked in turn raised intentions to view, share, promote and spread positive word of mouth [3]. The same logic is behind the storytelling trait in the Play of Values Ad-Meter, discussed in the article on good video ads.

Storytelling also works through sponsorship. Because sport is full of emotion, sponsors can use stories to communicate values rather than product features [1].

Examples

  • Formula 1: Drive to Survive (Netflix). A content analysis found that the series relied on the plot types adventure, ascension/descension, rivalry and sacrifice, and on the hero as its character type. These elements fostered fan conversion through information exchange, emotional connection and inter-fan relationships [4]. Play of Values covers it in What Drives the Most Popular Sports in the World?, where fans ranked “better media storytelling” behind a once-in-a-generation superstar.
  • Sponsor campaigns. Brands that tell a story about an athlete or a team’s values, instead of listing product features, follow the pattern Kończak describes [1].
  • Event marketing. Recurring tournaments with a legacy can build their story over years. See sports event marketing.

Common questions

What is the difference between sports storytelling and sports journalism?

Both can tell stories about sport. Sports journalism reports events independently, while storytelling is a technique that clubs, leagues, brands and media use to shape how an audience feels about them. A story is persuasive even when readers know it is a story: in Green and Brock’s studies, transportation effects were generally unaffected by a fact or fiction label [2].

Does storytelling really work better than facts?

In one study of digital video ads, storytelling hooked viewers more effectively than argumentative ads did. The sample was undergraduate students, so the finding applies to similar audiences [3].

Can a story replace the sport?

No evidence in the sources suggests it can. In Drive to Survive, the narrative worked on top of an existing sport and its rivalries [4]. Play of Values argues that storytelling amplifies authentic competition and fan passion but cannot replace them.

Related terms

Read more on Play of Values

Sources

  1. Kończak, J. (2018). Storytelling – sponsorship communication in sport. Quality in Sport, 3(4), 57–68. https://doi.org/10.12775/qs.2017.023
  2. Green, M. C., & Brock, T. C. (2000). The role of transportation in the persuasiveness of public narratives. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79(5), 701–721. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.79.5.701
  3. Coker, K. K., Flight, R. L., & Baima, D. M. (2021). Video storytelling ads vs argumentative ads: how hooking viewers enhances consumer engagement. Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing, 15(4), 607–622. https://doi.org/10.1108/jrim-05-2020-0115
  4. Soble, C., & Lowes, M. (2024). Narrative storytelling as a fan conversion tool in the Netflix docuseries Drive to Survive. Communication & Sport, 13(5), 904–922. https://doi.org/10.1177/21674795241238158

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