Social media has been the touring point and has been very important to strategic communication campaigns for sports organizations throughout the last decade. It gives fans the ability to be more engaged with their team in many ways such as giving people the ability to create and market specific highlights in athletic events for specific target audiences. It also allows team players and mascots to interact with their fans in ways that make fans feel more connected to the game. In the reading Sport, Public Relations and Social Media by Raymond Boyle and Richard Haynes, they discuss how the use of network media has created a more versatile way for fans to engage with sports. It also discusses how the use of social media influences branding for sports teams that can either lead to a positive or negative view of the team. People can be fast to put something positive out on a team but they can be even faster when it is something negative. When something negative is released, it then causes Public Relations teams to try to calm down the effects and backlash of the post. An example of this is the mascot of the Washington Capitals hockey team. The mascot is known as Slapshot and they have their own Twitter known as @Caps_Slapshot, The mascot’s Twitter feed is full of tweets and videos of Slapshot interacting with the fans and players during the game and in public. Using Slapshot to act as a strategic communications campaign is smart because it relates to fans of all ages in a fun and engaging way. This is done by pictures posted of Slapshot interacting with the fans, either from the official Slapshot Twitter or the fan’s personal Twitter accounts. An example of a tweet is when Slapshot posted a video going up to the channel 4 news reporter holding merchandise to buy and wearing a face mask to promote selling capitals merch and to be safe while in the arena at the first home game of the 2021 season. The mascot’s Twitter also promotes a positive outlook on the team and how much of a bond that their community has grown in this past decade using network media. This example relates to the reading described above because the mascot is the image that will showcase the team and having Slapshot use social media to create a strategic communications campaign that benefits the view of the Capitals as a whole.