Jeremy Bloom, about 40 days into his new gig as the head of the X Games, is at his desk. Behind him are his 2002 and 2006 Team USA Olympic parkas from the Winter Games in Salt Lake City and Turin.
The Loveland-raised Olympic mogul skier, pro football player, entrepreneur and philanthropist has taken the reins at the X Games as the 30-year-old action sports franchise launches a new chapter. By the middle of next year, the new X Games League will feature sponsored teams with drafted, salaried athletes.
“It’s a fun vision we are executing,” he says.
The Winter X Games returns to Aspen’s Buttermilk ski area for its 24th year on Jan. 23, with a three-night contest featuring men and women skiers and snowboarders competing in halfpipe, slopestyle, big air, knuckle huck and street style contests, all under the lights. The new owner of the X Games, MSP Sports Capital — which owns a Formula One racing team and four European soccer clubs — has sold out 5,000 tickets for each night.
Next year’s 25th running of the Winter X Games in Aspen will mark the end of era, with the event’s future in Aspen uncertain as the new owners map expansion plans with hosting bids from 35 of “the best cities in the world,” Bloom said.
The Aspen X Games have evolved over the years. The free-for-all festival once drew tens of thousands to Buttermilk with dozens of overlapping contests featuring flipping snowmobiles and motorcycles next to high-flying snowboarders and skiers. Now it’s a ticketed event with big-name concerts and Olympic-caliber competitions.
Next year, after the Milano Cortino Winter Olympics in Italy, the X Games League will launch with four winter teams and four summer teams, each owned by a private company. Those teams will host an athlete draft by the end of this year, with each team’s five men and five women earning salaries with paid travel and benefits, marking a first-ever pay model for action sports athletes. In addition to the 40 drafted athletes, there will be 60 free-agent athletes competing in the league. When the model is proven and thriving, there will be 10 winter teams and 10 summer teams, Bloom said.
The league will roam to eight locations every year, hosting four winter and four summer X Games at cities in Europe, Asia and North America.
The Sun caught up with Bloom before the X Games landed in Aspen. The conversation was edited for brevity and clarity.
The Colorado Sun: Will we see any signs of the new league model at Buttermilk this weekend? And next year will be the last version of the traditional model of the X Games?
Bloom: Not yet. There will be some format changes. We want to create a more compelling finals … we want to increase the anxiety a little bit, you know, so maybe not three chances to win, maybe two. Some people maybe won’t notice it. And, yes, next year will be the final hurrah of the old model. But I will say, even in the league model, we will be awarding individual gold medals. So like if you win Superpipe, you are still going to be an X Games champion.
Sun: What are you hearing from athletes? This is a unique opportunity for them. Action sports athletes largely struggle to make ends meet, aside from a lucky few. A lot of your Winter X superstars lament the cost of a five-night stay in Aspen.
Bloom: The vast, vast majority of our athletes work two jobs and they knock on doors (looking for sponsors). I get that. I was in those shoes. I knocked on those doors. So it’s a big goal and objective for us to bring more commercial opportunities to them. That means more events, because more events make more money. That means better media. You know, bigger media partners and distribution deals. (The X Games recently announced a deal with Roku to stream contests for 90 million worldwide subscribers.)
I remember when I was drafted into the NFL (in 2006). I got that first paperwork and I’m like, “What, you’re going to pay me a salary? Let’s go!” It’s not going to be at the NFL level, as you can imagine, but it’s something to aspire to.
Sun: You know a bit about that, right? You got crosswise with the NCAA as a CU Buff when you wanted to recruit sponsors to help you train for your Olympic skiing journey. As someone who fought for better support for college athletes, what do you think of new-school college athletes being able to tap into their name, image and likeness?
Bloom: I’m just happy for the athletes. These men and women who have worked their entire lives to get these opportunities. And if somebody wants to endorse them because they’re marketable, they should have the right to do that. It’s just sponsorship, you know, as we call it at the Olympic or the X Games level, they get sponsored. The more commercial partners that we can bring into the league, they will not only support the league, they’ll support the athletes. And so we think that’s the tide that lifts all boats. We’re having those conversations with the big brands, not just the endemics, the big brands to bet on our league for the next five, 10 years.
Sun: You’ve got chops on the athletic and business side, having worked in both worlds. What do you bring to the X Games from those backgrounds as you work with both the athletes and these new sponsors?
Bloom: I spent most of my business career — the last 13 years — raising capital from venture capitalists who are used to, accustomed to, seeing 90% of their investments going to zero. What you learn as a startup founder is that you are only as good as your capital structure. Meaning if you can’t make payroll next week, I don’t care how good your idea is. We want to build a very valuable league and that starts with a good capital structure and building growth. The sports side, that comes naturally for me. I grew up in this world, I know the challenges. I know what athletes want and I know how we can work to get that. It’s paramount for us as staff to never lose sight of the reason we are here: It’s for the athletes. That is our North Star.
Sun: Back to Aspen real quick. ESPN, the previous majority owner of the X Games, has shopped the Winter X Games around to different potential venues over the years but they always came back to Aspen, where Aspen Skiing Co. pretty much hands over the keys to an entire ski area for a month or so. As you guys court new hosts, where does Aspen fit into this new chapter for the X Games?
Bloom: I hope it fits in. I can tell you there’s work to do if it’s going to fit in. Look, change is hard. I get that. But there’s a new model for the X Games and we’re never going back to the old one. We have 35 real bids across the world right now for winter and summer, a lot from the best cities in the world. They aren’t just inviting us to bring the X Games to their town. They’re paying for it. I mean big deals, right. So our new model is where we are not going to underwrite the entire cost of our event. We are going to find strategic partnerships. I really hope we can find a deal with Aspen because I love it. There is no Winter X Games without Aspen. When people really understand our vision, where we’re going, our capital providers, our new owners, the private equity structure, the new sponsors, the new league, our founder athletes … when people hear the whole story of where we’re going and understand and wrap their head around it, it’s not hard to sell this, and it’s not hard to find really good partners.
Sidenote: A spokesman for Bloom a few days after this interview said “there is genuine interest in keeping Aspen in the family.” Aspen Skiing Co.’s John Rigney said the operator and the X Games will soon “sit down together to discuss a way forward to build on our 24 years of partnership.”
“We appreciate initiatives that shine a brighter spotlight on snowsports. As a community, we are trailblazers when it comes to events,” said Rigney in an emailed statement, with a nod to his company’s hosting of World Cup ski races and, later this season, the debut of snowboarding legend Shaun White’s Snow League. “We know what we bring to the table — it’s hard to imagine a richer cultural landscape than what Aspen has to offer. Celebrating athletic achievement is a priority for us, built on the dedication, innovation and commitment of our team members, a group widely recognized around the world as best-in-class.” Now back to the Q&A.
Sun: What are “founder athletes?”
Bloom: After Aspen, we are going to announce our eight founder athletes, all of them tied into equity. These are the biggest action sports athletes in the world.
Sun: When MSP Sports Capital acquired majority control of the X Games in December 2022, company executives spoke about improving accessibility, maybe with X Games events in cities and downtowns. Are some of those 35 bids from metro areas that could host something akin to what we saw in the Beijing Winter Games, with the big air contest next to those industrial smokestacks? Like could we have an X Games in downtown Denver?
Bloom: 100% yes. But we don’t want to be in a convention center. We want to be outside. Part of our bid process is looking for amazing backdrops. Bali, for example, we want the Ubud Forest in the background with amazing temples. That is part of our strategy. It won’t happen overnight because we need to find the right partners and cities that will block off streets and all that. And for these host cities, we are not doing one-year deals. At a minimum they are three and in some cases they are 10 years. We want to go really deep into these communities. We want to partner with schools and partner with cities to build skateboard parks and BMX trails and motocross courses. We want kids to see our incredible athletes and then tell their parents, “I want to do that.” And then they’ll have a place to train and be the next generation of X Games champions. We see it as a responsibility at the X Games to make sure we’re spending our time, energy and resources to make sure it’s not only inspiring, but giving the next generation of athletes the places to craft their skills.
Sun: So one last question. When can we expect to see moguls in the X Games?
Bloom: Stay tuned. As you can imagine, that is on my radar. You know at the Winter Olympics in Italy, we’ll see the debut of dual moguls. Those guys are this close together … there’s a lot we could play with. We’re obviously exploring that among other sports to expand into. Imagine building a moguls course and there’s only two lanes, not four, so you’re real close. And all these athletes can do doubles (twice-inverted tricks) but doubles are banned at FIS (sanctioned events). But they can do doubles at the X Games.