Sports Business Innovation: How Anti-Monetisation Strategy Creates Premium Sponsorship Deals

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Welcome to The Sports Stack #18 and welcome to all the new subscribers! This week’s analysis will focus more on sports business, but we’ll also have our usual roundup of breaking sports tech news. We’ll cover:

• The Anti-Monetisation Paradox: When 'Free' Becomes the Ultimate Revenue Strategy

• 'Messi Cam' Returns: TikTok's Sports Broadcasting Experiment

• Golf's Innovation Lab: From Spider Cams to Rapid Rounds

• Other news and quick updates

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⚽️The Anti-Monetisation Paradox: When 'Free' Becomes the Ultimate Revenue Strategy

"We're leaving revenue on the street if that would mean it could up our audience even 1 per cent."

That's Felix Starck, CEO of Baller League, explaining to SportBusiness why his profitable sports property deliberately avoids monetising fans directly. The result? Millions in annual sponsorship deals, some of the best brands as sponsors, leading to 85-90% of revenue coming from brands eager to reach his young, engaged audience.

Starck has overturned traditional sports business logic: by keeping fans happy and ad-free, he's created something more valuable than subscription income, genuine access to the most challenging demographic to reach.

Thanks to SportBusiness for publishing this interview with Starck. It provides a thought-provoking insight into the future of challenger sports. I would recommend reading it once you’ve finished this week’s edition. You can also read one of the first Sports Stacks editions focused on challenger sports here.

What is Baller League?

A quick snapshot for anyone who hasn’t watched!

• Baller League is a fast-paced, six-a-side indoor football competition originally founded in Germany and now expanding to the UK and the US. 

• It’s centred around leading influencers, former professional footballers, and emerging talent, with a focus on engaging fans and attracting younger audiences. 

• Most revenue comes from major sponsors targeting a young, digital-native audience, with games streamed live on YouTube and social media, and some non-exclusive coverage on pay-TV like Sky Sports. 

The numbers behind the game:

You might wonder how a challenger sport in its early stages can afford not to ‘monetise’ the fan, but unlike other challenger sports, Baller League has a very strong portfolio of premium sponsors such as Nike, Pepsi, Footlocker, and others. Even without a YouTube ads model and their wish to avoid reliance on broadcast deals, Baller League can continue to operate and grow their business because of their robust sponsorship revenue.

According to SportsBusiness, this revenue accounts for 85%-90% of their total income. 

This is unusually high for a sports property (usually the figure is around 40% of total revenue). Having a highly weighted sponsorship revenue model puts the emphasis on a strong sales pipeline, excellent partnership management, and authentic storytelling. We will explore this further as we move through this chapter, but it’s crucial to recognise that this strong sponsor revenue is the reason why Baller League can focus on monetising the fan directly later in the roadmap.

Why can their model work?

• We’re seeing a real shift in consumption among Gen Z and the Baller League ideal customer profile, enabling them to leverage non-traditional channels. Their audience also has different needs when it comes to consuming advertisements, with user-generated content and ‘influencers’ being crucial for connecting with them. 

Gen Z controls $860 billion in US spending power but actively rejects traditional advertising, with 57% preferring social media ads over traditional formats compared to just 18% of Boomers. This creates a massive opportunity: brands will pay 10-50x premiums for authentic access to audiences that ignore their traditional channels. 

• With a large, engaged younger audience, Baller League can develop a strong pipeline of brands like Nike, Pepsi, etc and continue to generate revenue indirectly from their audience. 

• These engaged audiences can also help create leverage for media deals that Baller League still signs, even if they are non-exclusive. In the UK, Baller League has a non-exclusive deal with Sky Sports.

How are brands trying to integrate with Baller League?

Baller League is integrating its sponsorships into its product through a blend of visible branding, event partnerships, and exclusive fan engagement strategies. 

O2: O2 is the headline sponsor for the debut UK season, resulting in high-profile branding opportunities such as renaming the league to “Baller League UK, powered by O2.” O2 utilises this by offering its customers exclusive benefits like access to matches, VIP experiences, and rewards through the Priority app.

Nike: Nike is a main sponsor, supplying kits and apparel used by all participating teams, boosting their visibility through on-pitch exposure, official merchandise, marketing materials, and league events at major venues like the O2 Arena. 

Baller League is deliberate about working only with what it describes as “culturally relevant” brands. The league restricts sponsorship categories to avoid associations with betting and crypto firms and instead focuses on authentic, youth-oriented partners. Players and influencers involved in the league are also permitted to secure their own brand deals with official sponsors, creating additional opportunities for sponsor integration in personal content and fan engagement.

What are the challenges of a highly weighted sponsorship model?

Economic Uncertainty: With a high percentage of revenue coming from sponsorship income, they are vulnerable to external economic changes and other uncontrollable factors. Marketing budgets are usually the first to be cut during recessions, and challenger sports lack the "must-have" status that protects established properties.

Category exclusivity limitations: Premium sponsors demand category exclusivity, severely limiting revenue diversification. If Nike is your kit partner, you cannot add Adidas even if they offer a higher fee. This creates artificial revenue limits that subscription or media models do not encounter.

Audience ownership illusion: Despite a large viewership, Baller League doesn't actually own their audience relationship; YouTube and social platforms do. Algorithm changes, platform policy shifts, or content disputes could wipe out reach overnight, making sponsor promises harder to fulfil.

My view is that, even in small ways, it is important to begin establishing the foundations and funnels to monetise the fan base in genuine ways. 

Other thoughts:

• Baller League still needs to ensure it understands who its large, engaged audience is and collects first-party data; otherwise, it’s less valuable to sponsors, and it becomes harder to leverage these insights during negotiations. 

• They’ve raised capital from several investors; however, according to the SportBusiness article, their founder still remains the majority shareholder, meaning they face less scrutiny on their strategy and decision-making. However, that pressure could arise if they need to raise more capital; so time will tell how long they can maintain this strategy. 

• One of the biggest concerns for me, and I appreciated Starck’s honesty, was that he didn’t feel there was enough demand for King’s League (and other leagues) to operate in the same markets. That feels like a bit of a problem for a business model that is all about capturing the largest audience share possible. 

🤳'Messi Cam' Returns: TikTok's Sports Broadcasting Experiment

TikTok's Player Spotlight: Messi returns for four select matches this season, starting with Inter Miami CF vs. Necaxa on August 2nd. The dedicated Messi-focused livestream will be available globally on @MLS, @InterMiamiCF, and @AppleTV TikTok accounts.

• Previous success: The 2024 debut drew 6.4 million live views, setting the record for the largest live audience for a U.S. sports event on TikTok.

• Strategic timing: Launch coincides with the Leagues Cup, offering premium tournament content.

• Multi-platform approach: Simultaneous streaming across three official accounts maximises reach.

How The Technology Works

The experience centres on a dedicated camera following Messi throughout the match, creating an intimate vertical viewing perspective.

• Single-player focus: Continuous tracking of Messi's movements, reactions, and interactions.

• Mobile optimisation: Content designed specifically for vertical viewing and social sharing.

• Real-time engagement: Live comments and reactions create a community viewing experience.

Why This Matters

For MLS and Apple TV+, this creates a powerful funnel strategy allowing them to use TikTok's massive reach to drive subscribers to their premium MLS Season Pass service. With 46% of TikTok Live users aged 16-24, they're targeting exactly the demographic that traditional sports struggle to engage consistently (except for Baller League).

This approach feels increasingly critical given MLS's viewership challenges: while streaming numbers have improved 50% to 120,000 average viewers per match, the 2024 MLS Cup Final drew just 65,000 Apple TV viewers, and their Apple TV viewing numbers are lower than when games were on ESPN. A stark reminder that even with Messi's star power, reaching new audiences requires innovative distribution beyond traditional streaming models.

🏌️Golf's Innovation Lab: From Spider Cams to Rapid Rounds

Golf is truly in the spotlight recently; with the final men’s major concluded, a new star rising in the ladies' game, and Happy Gilmore 2 smashing Netflix records, it feels like it’s in a great place. Shout out to Lottie Woad by the way - winning the Irish Open as an amateur and then winning the Scottish Open on her professional debut.

This week, the PGA Tour announced the launch of ‘Rapid Rounds’, a new initiative developed from their 50,000-strong, fan-focused community. It will enable fans to watch shortened versions of select player rounds from Golf Channel, NBC, CBS telecasts, as well as PGA TOUR LIVE on ESPN+.

At this year’s Open Championship, we saw the debut of the ‘Spider Cam’.

• Spidercam made its debut in professional golf at the 153rd Open at Royal Portrush, using a four-point wire-cam system suspended above the 18th green to capture aerial views and unique angles of play.

• The system provided immersive coverage of approach shots around the green and captured the dramatic moments leading up to crowning the Champion Golfer, remaining in a resting position behind the 18th green during approach shots.

While we’re on the topic of The Open Championship, I’d love for you to read one of my favourite stories from the week. David’s a guy I know only through Twitter, so it was lovely to learn about his background and see him fulfil a dream at The Open.

🗞️Other news and quick updates

🏀 Did you see this? Will Ahmed (Founder + CEO @ Whoop) shared a tweet this week showing NBA 2K gameplay footage with AI overlaid, which almost looked real. Some of the player movements reveal it’s not real, but it’s quite unsettling how authentic it appears. Do you agree with his view that AI could disrupt live sport? (I’m not sure).

📺️ Interested in how DAZN managed to broadcast 63 matches across 200 markets during the FIFA World Club Cup? Read Dan Rayburn’s excellent technical deep dive here:

⛵️ SailGP's chief umpire makes split-second decisions using military-grade GPS accurate to 2.5 centimetres while sitting in a London studio, achieving 98% accuracy across 85+ real-time calls per weekend. Read more here. The sport continues to go from strength to strength! I found myself watching their UK event highlights on YouTube and enjoyed it.

🏃 What’s happened to Grand Slam Track? Numerous articles have been written, so I won't share my own analysis. Some of the best insights into what might have happened are below:

https://open.substack.com/pub/unofficialpartner/p/fat-vanity-and-athletics-lawyers

https://www.sportspro.com/news/grand-slam-track-michael-johnson-unpaid-atheltes-fees-investor-july-2025/ 

🏌️ L.A.B Golf majority share acquired by private equity for $200 million.