Bleacher Report teams up with Notre Dame

NOTRE DAME, Ind. -

A unique partnership between Bleacher Report and Notre Dame football is changing the way you watch your favorite team.

"We can get something up in 10-15 minutes. Especially in a social media world, you have 15 minutes to get it up or you miss the moment," said Adam Donaldson, lead producer.

On a campus where time stops for Notre Dame football, this is the one office where the clock is always ticking.

"The world of social changes quickly. New algorithms, new platform exists, a new algorithm changes. It can really affect how you do business," said Joe Yanarella, Senior VP Content.

And that's why Bleacher Report decided to do business with the University of Notre Dame and their football team.

"The partnership started as an extension of our CEO and founder Dave Finnochio is a Notre Dame grad. So he's been able to maintain a relationship with Notre Dame AD Jack Swarbrick," said Yanarella. "Bleacher Report has exploded as the dominant social presence with a younger audience, thinking very social first, mobile first. It just felt like there was a natural opportunity here for us to embed a team of four people within the Notre Dame program and take a social first approach to creating content behind the scenes, off the field and take a look into the program like you've never seen before."

Bleacher report is competing for your attention.

The digital media company transplanted these four guys to South Bend for six months

"It's a hybrid thing that we all can do it all," said Donaldson.

To offer you a unique perspective into everything Notre Dame football.

"We're here to make them look good and that's what we've been trying to do in a unique way," Donaldson said.

Like the video of a pro-ultimate Frisbee player taking over campus.

"We found Brodie Smith on social media. He was an Ultimate Frisbee player, plays professional ultimate Frisbee, played for the University of Florida. And I called him up and I said 'Hey we're doing this project with Notre Dame, we have an idea where we'd love you to come out for a day and throw Frisbees to the guys all over campus.' And Brodie was awesome, Brodie was all about it," Donaldson said.

And so was the university.

Every story the group does has to be approved, but it's hard for even university officials to say no to Ultimate Frisbee.

"Apparently there were lines to participate in it, because most of them knew Brodie and thought he was the man," Donaldson said.

Head Coach Brian Kelly wasn't left out either.

Thanks to new technology, capturing these moments is a lot easier.

"It's interesting because Bleacher Report invested a lot of money in these new DJI Osmos cameras that have made our lives so much easier," said Donaldson.

The camera looks like a golf ball with a selfie stick attached to it.


But the cameras don't make the moments, the players do.

"The feature we did on Greg Bryant, I've done a lot of interviews and that was one of the hardest sets of interviews I've ever done," said Donaldson.

Bryant was shot and killed in Florida this past summer.

Bleacher Report captured Bryant's former teammates grieving his loss.

Capturing this life is beautiful. On the field or off.

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