The iShowSpeed takeover continues.
If you somehow missed the massively popular YouTube streamer at the Super Bowl, or the Royal Rumble, or in a Dick’s Sporting Goods ad spot alongside Tom Brady and Kevin Durant throughout the spring, you couldn’t miss him this past weekend at the UEFA Champions League final. Between appearances on UEFA Champions League Today, streams from the UEFA Champions League final between Paris Saint-Germain and Inter Milan, and on-pitch access with the trophy and commentators, UEFA and Paramount tapped into Speed’s huge global audience by allowing him to embed around the biggest soccer event of the year.
For a significant online community of soccer fans, Speed was omnipresent in Munich during the UCL festivities. Easily identifiable in his signature red Cristiano Ronaldo jersey, Speed traipsed from the Paramount+ set to an interview with Jamie Carragher and then to the training grounds. The 20-year-old content creator farted in Paramount host Micah Richards’ face, challenged MMA fighter Khabib Nurmagomedov and PSG star Achraf Hakimi to athletic contests, and leapt into Ronaldo’s “SIU” celebration after a penalty kick at the UCL Festival. Every fifth video on CBS Sports Golazo’s Instagram account features Speed clowning around at the Allianz Arena.
On his YouTube channel, Speed took his streaming audience into the action. They watched him compete in a celebrity soccer match, joined him as he checked out a PSG training session, and followed him on the field after PSG’s win during the trophy presentation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRCxWOX9_08
The old-fashioned fans in the comment section of some CBS Sports videos might feel differently, but the appearances were executed perfectly. The UCL Today crew, from Richards to Carragher to Kate Scott, clearly love Speed. They play along with his shenanigans and understand the vibe of a stream well enough to meet Speed on his turf as well.
By going first, Paramount is capitalizing on Speed’s success. CBS Sports has a geographic crossover, broadcasting the UCL for American soccer fans with a studio show and a broadcast booth composed of Europeans. It also features an age crossover, with its Golazo property aiming to make the sport a little more fun and accessible, given that soccer’s audience in the U.S. is younger than that of other sports. Speed is the perfect character to bring into that world.
Because Speed has dropped into so many big events and drawn massive crowds for his traveling exploits around the globe, major sports figures know him now. Just a couple of years ago, Speed went viral for bombing into a sponsored interview between Jake Paul and an irritated Durant. Now, when he chops it up with Khabib or Hakimi, there is something much closer to a mutual respect. They have probably heard of him. They get his character.
And for Speed, it pays off. His two streams from Munich drew a combined 10.6 million viewers and counting as of Monday afternoon. Vlogs and clips from the weekend are already going viral on his channels.
The most fascinating layer of Speed going mainstream in soccer came before his trip to Germany. On May 23, FIFA president Gianni Infantino visited Speed at his home in Los Angeles during a stream. The most powerful man in soccer spent 30 minutes live on YouTube. It wasn’t quite an interview. The age disparity and concocted authenticity made it much closer to the Donald Trump-Adin Ross sitdown last year. Still, it got the job done.
Infantino brought the FIFA Club World Cup trophy along, promoting the expanded tournament going down this summer. Then, Infantino dropped some headphones over his bald dome and sat through Speed’s usual routine on his desktop, watching soccer highlights and fan edits. The unlikely pair discussed the beautiful game before Speed showed Infantino a backflip, and FIFA’s supreme leader went on his way.
Call it sports-washing and you wouldn’t be wrong. Infantino is openly courting Donald Trump and Middle East leaders this month ahead of the World Cups in North America and Saudi Arabia over the next decade. Days after his appearance on Speed’s stream, Yahoo Sports published a two-part investigative story detailing how Infantino leveraged corruption reform to consolidate power and become, as reporter Henry Bushnell described, “king of soccer.”
Clearly, people on each rung of the ladder of world soccer see Speed’s value. The dude is pathologically entertaining and has developed a real connection to sports. In the U.S., the NFL and WWE seized on him early and are hungry for more. But the rub of getting in with the powers that be in the world’s game is that, inevitably, you end up on-screen with some questionable characters.
Headed toward the North American World Cup next summer, Speed is becoming a fixture in soccer fans’ lives. That means, for a kid who started out playing games at his house in Cincinnati, means the phone will keep ringing with bigger asks and more strings attached.