The main things I learned doing this…
- There are a lot of pro sports leagues in the United States alone
- The deeper I went, the more I found, and the more excited I got about the opportunity the sports industry is offering
Here is the US Sports League market map:
*Notes:
- I only included leagues that are active or have raised significant capital to launch within the next 12 months
- I’m likely missing some…please shoot me an email so I can add it in
- Didn’t include minor leagues/off-shoots of the main entities — examples: Korn Ferry Tour (PGA), G-League (NBA), and NXT (Major League Paintball).
Business Models of Leagues
Structuring a league is incredibly hard.
The key challenge?
Aligning incentives between investors, team owners, and athletes.
Most traditional leagues (NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, Premier League, etc.) follow the association model, where the league operates as a non-profit governing body for the owners.
That structure creates constant negotiation between teams and players over things like:
- Who pays for travel, equipment, and facilities?
- Who owns what revenue? (Media rights, sponsorships, etc.)
- Who makes the final decisions?
But here’s the twist…
Association models aren’t built to raise outside capital. There’s no enterprise value to invest in.
*Note: Some leagues like France’s Ligue 1 and Spain’s La Liga have created separate entities to sell stakes in their rights packages. But even in those cases, the league’s goal was to find a strategic partner to grow revenues and deliver them back to the teams.
In order to raise capital, emerging leagues have moved away from the association model and chosen one of two models, each with different benefits:
- Tour models centralize all operations and finances within one league entity. The advantage is the simplicity of operations: One executive team manages the league’s operations, commercial rights, and player relations.
- Franchise-based models balance the league’s operations and finances across a league and its teams, which both hold enterprise value. The advantage is that franchise-based models can drive growth through team sales.
Both tour and franchise-based models are more complicated than the association model because they introduce an additional stakeholder: investors.
VC and PE investors will expect fast growth and a path to an exit within their fund lifecycles. As fiduciaries, league executives must operate on behalf of their investors (not just the players and owners).
The Lucrative Sports League Flywheel
The sports industry follows the “3 C’s”:
Content, commerce, and community.
As stakeholders throughout the consumer economy compete for market share, they all need to “pay rent” to the major teams and leagues for access to their IP (and the fandoms that come with it).
For example, look at the NFL:
- traditional media – $113B deal
- trading cards – Fanatics exclusive
- sports betting – $1B deal w/ sportsbooks
- gaming & esports – $1.5B deal w/ EA Sports
- e-commerce – Fanatics exclusive merchandiser
- data and technology – $120M/season with Genius Sports
- tickets and live events – LiveNation / TicketMaster exclusive
- AI, web3, and VR/AR are up next
The values and varieties of revenue streams for leagues and teams that follow the tides of the modern consumer economy continue to rise.
All new leagues are looking to get this flywheel spinning…because when it works, it works.
Leagues Are Transforming
Fans/leagues are different than they were before:
- They favor streaming over traditional TV
- They shorten games for modern attention spans
- They empower athletes as founders, not just players
- And they treat sport as content-first, competition-second
The rise of new sports leagues is more than a fad, it’s a strategic response to shifting consumer behaviors.
These innovative formats provide exactly that: live sports “snackable” enough for social media, yet compelling enough for stadium crowds.
Media companies, in turn, crave live content that can still draw real-time viewership in the streaming era.
Not every new alternative league will survive (many will face growing pains in monetization and player recruitment), but collectively they are pushing the sports industry toward a more open, creative, and fan-centric future.
Established leagues are already borrowing ideas (whether it’s the NBA adding a midseason tournament or tennis exploring mixed-gender team events) validating the impact of this trend.
For sports business professionals…
These upstart leagues offer a glimpse into tomorrow’s playbook, where the only true out-of-bounds is sticking too rigidly to the past.
Investment Framework
When assessing new leagues, investors often ask:
- Is the sport compelling? (Distinctive, scalable, culturally resonant)
- Founders and participants: Do they have credibility, networks, and the ability to execute?
- Path to monetization: Can they build media, sponsorship, ticketing, fan engagement, etc?
There’s a historic boom in venture-backed sports leagues.
While the potential payoff is tremendous, the path is steep and uncertain.
Recommendations for Tech Startups
Challenges to be aware of when dealing with newer leagues:
- Limited budgets compared to major leagues
- Volatile markets and inconsistent fan engagement
- Fragmented administration across regions or teams
- Immature data systems (performance and fan data are often underdeveloped)
Not every start-up is destined to become the next Google or Nvidia, just as not every league will rival the NFL or UFC…
But think about this: 50 years ago, if you had the chance to own an NFL team, who wouldn’t have seized that opportunity?
That’s the kind of foresight fueling today’s investment in emerging sports leagues.
Exciting times are ahead!
