By Derrin Woodhouse
For most of my career, the job worked one way: a brand would select a particular person, pay for the placement, and then rent the audience. My role was to put a company’s name alongside the right face at the right moment, and I am good at it.
The model is starting to break, with the US Open being the first place where this happens.
There comes a point at which the uniform ceases to be a uniform and turns into an expression of identity; this is something you can observe all over Flushing Meadows this week. Naomi Osaka makes her appearance like a fashion show, moving beyond a tennis match, and becoming must-see TV (a tribute to Allen Iverson). Frances Tiafoe treats lululemon like a studio. Carlos Alcaraz leaves the court in the Ice Blue colorway of the unreleased Cactus Jack x Nike Air Force 1 Low. Townsend incorporates New York into all that she wears.
The focus has shifted from who would win to who gets to determine what a tennis player is nowadays.
The Athlete Became Media
Previously, attention was rare and audiences easy to identify; you could buy a logo placement and count the impressions. But nowadays, culture has broken up. People now follow personalities, taste, and access. They watch the event before the match starts and keep an eye on the designer and the collaboration
The athlete is more valuable than a ranking; they are the medium. The previous question was about how many people saw our logo; the better one is what this person enables our brand to represent.
Naomi answers it directly; she does not rent attention; instead, she builds a world. Géranium at the French Open; a kimono-inspired look presented by Hana Yagi at Wimbledon; Robert Wun in Melbourne; in New York, a sheer orange dress was photographed inside the empty Arthur Ashe Stadium before she hit a ball. The dress is the evidence. Identity is the subject.
Townsend does it through the city. She built her own label, TT, after Nike let her go and nobody replaced them. Her kits tell stories. A phoenix for resilience. An orca for her competitive streak. For this Open, she designed a red varsity dress with fringe, made with designer Anthony Lattimore and styled by J. Bolin. She called it Taylor Made. This year New York runs on Knicks energy, and she speaks that language because she lives in it.
Frances achieves this through the product; he helped develop and test lululemon’s ShowZero fabric, designed to conceal sweat under pressure. He is not merely wearing the product; he is also responsible for its existence.
Each one is a rung on the same ladder. Wear the brand. Shape the brand. Own the brand. Watch how far the ladder now goes.
Endorsement Is Turning Into Ownership
Previously, I stated that the endorsement agreement was coming to an end. Here is what is taking its place.
Carlos has chosen one path. Nike has given him its signature logo, the one it previously reserved for Rodger Federer and Rafael Nadal, with the launch of the line scheduled for later this year. He was also appointed a house ambassador by Louis Vuitton and added to Rolex’s roster at 19. He didn’t just enter into agreements; he went into the brands and had his name put on the products.
This week Nike went past that. It built a Cactus Jack collection with him, Travis Scott’s label, and brought it to the Open as a one-day pop-up at the Billy Jean King USTA National Tennis Center, before the opening of the Cactus Court Pro Shop on the Lower East Side, and online. Travis narrates his Nike campaign. A streetwear world set up shop inside tennis.
Alcaraz is no longer the face of the collaboration. He is the bridge one culture crosses to reach another, and the platform it ships through. Attention is rented. Worlds are built. And this one showed up where the fans already were, and created desirability.
Roger has shown that he can go it alone. After Nike attempted to reduce his salary in 2018, he left after twenty-four years, signed a reported $300 million deal with Uniqlo for apparel, and then did something very few athletes ever do. He took equity in On, a small Swiss shoe company, and co-designed a range under his own name, The Roger. On became a publicly traded company in 2021. The value of his stake has now reached nearly $500 million, more than all the prize money he has earned during his career. He stopped having a brand sponsor him. Instead, he became one.
Ben Shelton is the answer to that question. In 2023, On signed him as its first active men’s player, before he had become a star, from head to toe. He has now reached top-five status, and that contract will expire at the end of 2026. The industry is keeping a close eye on where he goes, since his next contract is not simply about a logo; it is about whether the next generation will receive a stake in the manner of Federer, a fashion house, or something no one has ever offered a tennis player before.
That is the shift in one arc: from wearing the logo to shaping the product to ownership in the company.
The Brands That Get It Are Not Only Apparel
The same logic runs through the grounds. Ralph Lauren has outfitted the Open since 2005 and has become part of its identity, not a banner on it. IBM has run the tournament’s technology for over thirty years, and this year its Match Chat answers fan questions across all 254 singles matches (genius). Grey Goose turned one cocktail into a ritual fans repeat and post for free. None of them rented attention. Each one joined something and added to it.
The New Currency Is Permission
A logo provides visibility, a sponsorship grants access, and an influencer gives you reach, but none of them entitles you to a place in the culture. That right has to be earned within a particular environment through a community after a long commitment has been made before anyone is looking.
For a marketer, the order is different. It’s not brand, then athlete, then campaign. It’s athlete, then cultural tension, then brand opportunity. You should start with the individual. What do they stand for? Who will be interested in them? What kind of world have they already created? After that, work out where your brand fits in.
There is a limit worth naming. When every player has a stylist, and every arrival is content, culture starts to look like advertising. The creator economy already ran that play and flattened it. Naomi, Taylor, Frances, Carlos, and Federer work because the identity came first and the deal formed around it. The audience can always tell.
Break Point
In tennis, a break point can be the turning point in a match. The sports marketing industry is all its own. The previous model was based on sponsorship, visibility, and reach. The new model is based on identity, participation, and ownership.
The athlete is not merely the one who wears the brand; in fact, the athlete is the reason the brand enters the conversation, and at times even its owner.
New York is the ideal setting since it has always dismissed clean categories: Wall Street and streetwear, luxury and basketball, music and fashion, art and commerce. The Open is now operating on the same principle; it’s not about bringing tennis to New York; it’s about altering the appearance of tennis itself.
The break point is not between the lines of the court. It is between the categories.
Woody is a culture strategist and entertainment executive turned brand builder. Founder of Masterpiece Sports Club. He writes about the cultural moments shaping entertainment, golf, fashion, music, and lifestyle.
