Stanford Financial signs disappearing at Heat, tennis
Since R. Allen Stanford was charged with fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission in February, his Stanford Financial Group’s numerous sponsorships with local sports venues have begun to disappear.
Stanford’s name was blacked out – well, greened over – at Crandon Park Tennis Center in Key Biscayne prior to the start of the Sony Ericsson Open last month. Those with sharp eyes could see where the company’s name had been on the stadium court walls.
And thanks to my colleague, Heat beat writer Ira Winderman, for noticing the VIP lobby at AmericanAirlines Arena no longer bears the company’s signage. The lobby has been stripped of the Stanford logos, which have been replaced with just generic Heat logos. Heat President of Business Operations Eric Woolworth told Ira a missed payment led to cancellation of the deal, which he said had an additional year to run.
CRAIG DAVIS In more than 33 years at the Sun Sentinel, Craig Davis has written about a wide variety of sports topics from baseball to yachting, fishing to triathlons, and also worked as a copy editor and page designer. Recently he reported on local sports, including running, swimming, cycling, equestrian and beach volleyball. He enjoys sports as a participant as well as a spectator, is active in the South Florida running scene plays in the curling club at Saveology Iceplex. This blog offers a glimpse at the business side of sports in the interest of enhancing enjoyment of the games and sporting options as a spectator as well as a participant.
