🔊 Former NBA Executive Launches $1.2B Sports Fund

📰 TOP STORY
Longtime Sports Exec Dave Checketts Launches $1.2B Sports Fund With The Eccles Family

Dave Checketts, a long-time sports executive and owner, and The Cynosure Group, a diversified private investment firm founded by the Eccles family, announced the formation of Cynosure Sports Fund Partnership, a new strategic collaboration dedicated to investing in high-potential sports opportunities. The fund will focus on various opportunities, including investing in professional and collegiate teams, leagues, governing bodies, stadiums and arenas, sports technology, media rights, and broadcasting ventures.

Why Does This Matter?

You’ve likely never heard of Dave Checketts, but most people haven’t. Nonetheless, he’s one of the most influential people in all of sports and has years of experience leading and building sports organizations. He is a competent operator who isn’t new to this game. Here’s a quick rundown of his accomplishments:

• Helped found the WNBA’s New York Liberty

• Helped found the MLS's Real Salt Lake

• Former President and CEO of the New York Knicks and Utah Jazz (youngest in history)

• Part-owner of Burnley Football Club

• Previous owner of the NHL’s St.Louis Blues

In the world of investing, this is called strategic capital. Capital is everywhere. Smart capital isn’t. Checketts said this about the partnership: “By joining forces with The Cynosure Group, we are creating a powerhouse entity with assets that will make us competitive on a global scale and will give us great opportunities to help shape the future of the industry right away.” There are a lot of wealthy individuals coming into sports, but when you combine it with great direction and leadership, it makes a world of difference for the future of the industry.

💰 MERGERS & MONEY MOVES 
Multi-Million Dollar Esports Brand Expands Reach With New Acquisitions

• PlayVS Acquires Generation Esports & Playfly College Esports. PlayVS, a leading amateur esports platform, announced its acquisitions of Generation Esports and Playfly College Esports, ushering in a new era for competitive gaming. These strategic moves unite the full spectrum of scholastic and collegiate esports, connecting elementary, middle, high school, and college programs into a single, student-centered ecosystem for players, coaches, and educators (more here).

• Respondology Raises Additional $5M. Respondology, a leader in social media comment moderation and intelligence, announced the successful closure of its $5M Series A-1 funding round. This round builds on the $11M Series A funding secured in 2023 from the same investor group. The company now serves over 450 brands across sports, entertainment, consumer goods, and marketing agencies, collectively protecting over two billion followers by moderating over 365M comments globally. (more here).

• ALT Sports Data Raises $5M. ALT Sports Data, a sports data and analytics firm, closed a $5M funding round co-led by Relay Ventures and Eberg Capital, existing company backers. ALT Sports Data stated the round was “significantly oversubscribed due to overwhelming investor interest.” The round also featured Motley Fool Ventures, Scrum Ventures, and other strategic investors. The company will use the fresh investment to “accelerate its broader vision to redefine how fans engage, wager, and consume sports content – powering the convergence of data, media, and gaming” (more here).

• Puresport Raises £3.6M. Puresport, a London, UK-based performance supplement and hydration brand, raised £3.6M in funding this past week. Investors included Redrice Ventures, Five Seasons Ventures, Ben Earl, and Finn Russell. The company intends to use the funds to accelerate global expansion, launch new science-led supplements, and grow its community-led wellness ecosystem (more here).

IN PARTNERSHIP WITH BUYING SANDLOT
☄️ Youth Sports Are About To Explode

The youth sports market is set to grow from its current level of around $40 billion to over $70 billion by 2030.

Investments in facilities, equipment, training, and yes, tech, are pouring in as PE money helps to consolidate a highly fragmented space.

Youth and amateur sports tourism alone may account for upwards of $50 billion in annual spending, according to some estimates.

The problem is that general interest sports business publications, like Front Office Sports and Sportico, only scratch the surface with their coverage.

Much like Vetted Sports covers the intersection of sports, tech, and business, Buying Sandlot covers everything you need to know about the business of youth sports.

Subscribe to their free newsletter and get:

✓ Insights on deals, investments, and market trends

✓ Opportunities in youth sports facilities, tech, and events

✓ Exclusive access to data and analysis

 🤝 PARTNERSHIPS
NFL Announces Partnership Focused On Fan-Generated Content

• NFL and Adobe Form Partnership. The NFL has expanded its global partnership with creative software company Adobe to enhance fan experiences. Adobe will provide its proprietary Adobe Experience software platform and its applications, including Adobe Express and Adobe Firefly, to the NFL to aid in producing fan-focused content. The NFL Technology Innovation Hub, a project launched by the league in 2024, will also benefit. Through the Technology Innovation Hub, Adobe will collaborate with the NFL to enhance the fan experience by facilitating live fan engagement activations via the NFL OnePass ticketing app to deliver personalized content (more here).

• Gainbridge & USL Form Partnership. The USL Super League has announced a long-term title sponsorship deal with Indiana-based insurance technology firm Gainbridge. The women’s soccer league will be renamed the ‘Gainbridge Super League’ starting from the 2025-26 campaign. The Gainbridge logo will be featured on kits, in stadiums, and across social, digital, and broadcast channels. Gainbridge also becomes the league’s exclusive financial services partner and will serve as the official annuity partner of USL’s other leagues and its USL Super League teams (more here).

• SportsEngine Play & NXTPRO Form Partnership. SportsEngine Play, the streaming arm of NBC’s SportsEngine youth sports business, has agreed to a five-year extension with elite basketball showcase circuits NXTPRO Sports’ Puma NXT and Puma Pro16 to boost coverage. Under the deal, SportsEngine Play will carry live coverage of more than 10,000 elite youth-level games in 2025. Peacock will also stream ten fully produced games this year (more here).

🔊 ATHLETES & OTHER NEWS
TCG Introduces A New Pro Curling League

• The Curling Group Announces Rock League. The Curling Group, a strategic business group focused on growing and investing in curling, recently announced the launch of Rock League, the world’s first professional curling league featuring six elite mixed-gendered global franchises. Rock League will begin in April 2026, with a mission to deliver world-class competition, drive innovation within the sport, and connect curling fans across continents (more here).

• Notable Athletes Invest In Health Tech Startup. Logan Paul and NBA star Giannis Antetokounmpo are among the several investors in health tech startup Superhuman, which recently raised a $30M Series A round. The company, which is on a mission to revolutionize health, features a personal healthcare “super app” that offers users biannual lab blood tests to give a snapshot of a person’s health in real time (more here).

• Meet The Trio Of Tech Startups Bringing Live Sports To Blind Fans. Most viral videos have a very short half-life, but occasionally they have a much greater impact than you might imagine. The founders of OneCourt, Field of Vision, and Touch2See weren’t all inspired by the same viral clip. Still, the videos they did see were all variations on the same basic theme: a blind person having their hands guided by a companion across a facsimile of a soccer pitch to understand better what was happening in a live game. These three companies have developed tactile devices that help visually impaired spectators follow the live action on the field. (more here).

• From TGL To Travel Sports: Fastbreak AI Is A Scheduling Power Play. Fastbreak.AI is quickly becoming a pro sports scheduling goliath, and Founder and CEO John Stewart, who sold MapAnything for $250M, is leading the charge. The company has been on an acquisition spree of late, bringing four companies into the fold in the past six months, an effort that has substantially expanded its footprint, with its software now scheduling 55 professional sports leagues (more here).

• How Artificial Intelligence Could Shape The Future Of Youth Sports. Professional athletes study game footage to improve their performance on the field. But now, thanks to artificial intelligence, amateur athletes, including young kids, can also study their performance on the field. NBC News' Sam Brock has a closer look (more here).

• TitletownTech Picks Winners Of Startup Draft. TitletownTech, a joint venture capital firm formed through a partnership between the Packers and Microsoft, selected two winners of the “Startup Draft” pitch competition hosted during the 2025 NFL Draft in Green Bay. The two winners, from a pool of nearly 1,000 applicants, are Ateios Systems, a clean battery electrode manufacturer, and Ubicept, a computer vision company. Each will receive a $1M investment from TitletownTech and $350K in Microsoft Azure credits (more here).

🎙️ PODCAST INTERVIEWS
The Future Of Women's Sports With Lorine Pendleton

This week’s guest on the Vetted Sports podcast is Lorine Pendleton.

Lorine Pendleton is the Managing Partner of 125 Ventures, a venture fund at the intersection of sports, media & entertainment with technology.

As a former entertainment attorney, she has represented legendary artists such as Prince and Stevie Wonder. She has also held key roles at top law firms and agencies and has a rich background in tech, media, entertainment, and sports.

In this episode, we discuss:

‣ Why she decided to start 125 Ventures and the thesis behind the firm
‣ How she got started in angel investing and some of her best deals
‣ The growth and long-term potential of women's sports

Check out the full episode here: Apple | Spotify | YouTube