SLG Sports Services
We focus on the day to day, so our athletes can focus on their performance, using our resources and knowledge to achieve their goals both during and after their playing careers. In addition to the services we offer in-house, our team utilizes an extensive network of corporate partnerships in the areas of training, business development, contract negotiations, wealth management, legal services, community impact, and public relations.
Football
Contract Negotiations
Negotiating employment and endorsement contracts for our clients is all about creating value. Our organized and methodical approach to negotiating the most friendly terms for our clients is an exciting time, and quite simply, what we do best. From annual salary, to performance incentives, to the various negotiable bonuses which can be incorporated into a professional sports contract, our team employs a NFLPA Certified Contract Advisor to negotiate these contracts on behalf of our clients. Creating value takes persistence, careful strategy, and the belief in our clients’ playing ability that will translate into more dollars in their pockets. When done right, a negotiated contract can mean the difference between the length of the contract, the total amount of guaranteed compensation, and ultimately the stability our clients need for their families and futures.
NFL Combine, Pro Day, and Offseason Training
The NFL Draft, as well as the Free Agency period, can both be extremely hectic and complicated times in a player’s life. At SLG Sports & Entertainment, we make certain our clients understand every last detail of the processes. From draft preparation, interview and media preparation, to an eventual relocation, our goal is to ensure that our clients are put in the best possible position to master their craft. In doing so, SLG Sports & Entertainment provides access to some of the most reputable personal trainers, doctors, dietitians, therapists and state-of-the-art facilities in the world. Some of our corporate partners include: Bommarito Performance, Applied Science and Performance Institute, Golden Feet Global, FSQ Training, EFT Sports Performance and Exos.
Business Development and Marketing
SLG Sports & Entertainment focuses on creating the brand and developing business opportunities for the unique personalities that each of our clients possess. We take the time to learn about our clients and to understand their values, beliefs, hobbies, life goals, and how each of them is individually marketable in their own identity and space. Through our many individual and corporate relationships, and our constant efforts in creating new relationships, our marketing team creates personalized campaign strategies for our clients, putting them in the best possible position to generate multiple streams of revenue. Our goal is to ensure our clients can maintain residual income while away from their workplace. We achieve this by securing product or service endorsements in local and global markets, as well as monitor all social media platforms to protect and promote the player’s image.
Wealth Management
We have repeatedly seen the same story of young, professional athletes and entertainers losing the money game. Wealth management is vital to our clients’ long-term financial security, once their playing and performing days are over. Understanding that big paychecks likely equal big bills, we have built a professional relationship with elite financial advisors at firms all across the country. For all our clients, whether in professional football or the entertainment industry in general, we have built genuine relationships with NFLPA Registered Player Financial Advisors, as well as with Merrill Lynch, to create customized budgets, advise on stock market and investment opportunities, prepare for college tuition and retirement, and form a tax plan tailored to our clients’ personal income levels and market strategies.
Legal Services
SLG Sports & Entertainment, LLC, is a subsidiary company owned by the Sommer Law Group, P.C., a general practice law firm located in downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. We offer a full slate of legal services for our clients, which may be necessary during and after their careers. Our team of attorneys practice in the areas of the law including: real estate, criminal defense, family, business, personal injury, workers compensation, medical malpractice, bankruptcy, intellectual property, immigration, tax, and estate planning.
Community Impact
Charity
We highly recommended that our clients get some skin in the game. Getting involved and staying connected with the people and communities where our clients live is a rewarding experience for our clients and for the cities and people affected by their contributions. SLG Sports & Entertainment has affiliations with several dozen nonprofit organizations and charities throughout the country, including the Kid Nation Foundation, the American Heart Association, the American Cancer Society, The Salvation Army, St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital, Teach for America, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, and many more.
Youth Football
In conjunction with local high school and pee-wee football coaches, SLG Sports & Entertainment hosts various events, speaking engagements and skills workshops for youth football teams in the Pittsburgh area. Our agency is a corporate sponsor for the Northside Steelers, helping the boys' purchase equipment and concessions for game day.
Public Relations
Public Image
Our team monitors all social media platforms with the focus to promote and protect our client’s image. With the abundance of controversy surrounding professional athletes and entertainers today, and with every move and word examined and spun by the media, keeping a healthy and inviting outward image is vital to the way teams, companies, sponsors and fans perceive our clients. Devising a social media strategy to maintain the image our clients work so hard to create is vital to a stress-free lifestyle. Whether on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or in the press, we hear what they say and strategize for the most appropriate response, or we determine that none is necessary, all while keeping a favorable public eye on our clients.
Fashion
A good suit makes for a good man. In a day and age where the public responds more and more to the way an individual looks, keeping a reputable fashion designer around, could be the final piece of the puzzle to creating a well-perceived and put-together person. SLG Sports & Entertainment works with the extremely talented David Alan Clothing Company, who has designed suits for WWE’s John Cena, ESPN’s Jonathan Coachman, and JuJu Smith-Schuster of the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Boxing
Licensed Promoter
At SLG Sports & Entertainment, we employ a boxing promoter licensed by the Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission. Our promoter sets up everything involved in a boxing match, from the legal requirements to securing the alcohol license, to making the matches, to fronting the costs to obtain the fighters, to selling tickets for the fights. In a boxing metropolis as big as Pittsburgh, the success of a fight, and the success of the fighters, greatly depends on the involvement and interest of the promoter.
Boxer Management
Through our previously held events, we have been able to build a network of many, reputable boxing managers, who we have access to make fights happen. The manager finds trainers and camps for fighters, develops marketing campaigns, and secures sponsorships and TV deals for the fights.
International Matchmaking
The matchmaker works for the promoter. Matchmaking is not as simple as just choosing someone else to fight, at a specified time and place, and inviting other people to pay for it and watch. There are significant and sometimes insurmountable obstacles that come with making a boxing match safe, entertaining and profitable for the fans, the fighters, the managers, and the employees that make the match possible. From drug tests to the weigh-in, to securing passports and visas, to international currency exchanges, to varying weight classes and rankings, making a match happen is a skill that can only be delivered by a seasoned matchmaker. At SLG Sports & Entertainment, we employ an international matchmaker with connections in over a dozen countries to secure fights and generate interest on a global level.