The Fastest Growing Sport In the US Is Now On ESPN

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Hey Friends,

The Premier Lacrosse League (PLL) has announced a four-year media rights deal with ESPN. The network will exclusively broadcast all 47 PLL games, including the playoffs, across ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, and ESPN+ starting this season.

The PLL began in 2019 and had been operating on an exclusive media rights deal with NBC Sports. Their games were previously aired across the NBC family of networks, including their streaming service Peacock. But they will now move exclusively to ESPN, the world’s largest sports network.

“We’re thrilled to announce our new agreement with ESPN,” said PLL co-founder Paul Rabil in a statement. “It’s a testament to our gameday experience, the business teams at the PLL, growing interest level and engagement of a global lacrosse audience, as well as ESPN’s foresight and meaningful investment into a game that’s indigenous to North America—one of the fastest-growing in the US today.”

The financial details of the agreement haven’t been disclosed, but Deadline is reporting that the deal is worth “eight figures.” That’s significantly below the $2.5 billion that ESPN is paying for Monday Night Football each year, but it’s a solid deal for an upstart league going on just its fourth year.

“This new agreement will maximize exposure for the league and sport as a whole, with a number of events on linear television and all games being available direct to consumer,” said ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro. “Paul and Mike Rabil are incredible leaders and innovators in the sport, and we are all looking forward to continued growth for the PLL.”

The PLL’s fourth season is scheduled to begin in June 2022. They run a tour-based model, which includes 47 games across 13 US cities, and the season wraps up with Championship Weekend in September 2022.

We’ve talked about the Premier Lacrosse League a few times, and I even had co-founder and CEO Paul Rabil on the podcast. So I assume that most of you are familiar with the league by now, but for those who might have missed it, here’s a quick overview.

• Paul Rabil was the 1st overall selection of the 2008 Major League Lacrosse (MLL) draft. He is one of the best lacrosse players in history. But his rookie wage was only $6,000, and the average MLL annual wage was ~$10,000.

• Paul and his brother Mike tried to work with the MLL to maximize their opportunity, but after being rebuffed, they raised venture capital and launched a completely new league — the Premier Lacrosse League.

• The two leagues looked pretty different—the PLL removed wide-angled cameras, shortened the field of play, reduced the shot clock to speed up the pace of play, introduced yellow balls instead of white, and started interviewing players intra-game to add excitement—but the most significant difference came in player compensation.

• PLL players earn an average salary of $35,000, compared to $10,000 in MLL. In addition, all players and coaches receive health care coverage, and players are even offered equity in the league.

The TLDR is that the PLL quickly gained traction, and the world’s best players switched leagues. The PLL has seen a considerable increase in viewership each season, and the two leagues, Major League Lacrosse and Premier League Lacrosse, ended up merging last year to create one unified league.

The PLL then raised additional capital to fund growth. As a result, their cap table now includes Brooklyn Nets owner Joe Tsai, New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, The Raine Group, Creative Artists Agency (CAA), Arctos Sports Partners, Bolt Ventures, The Chernin Group, and Harris Blitzer Sports Entertainment (owners of the Philadelphia 76ers & NJ Devils.

The Growth Of The Premier Lacrosse League

• PLL ticket revenue in 2021 was up 56% from 2019.

• NBC Sports viewership was up 33% year-over-year.

• Last season’s PLL Championship on NBC registered 333,000 total viewers.

• The PLL recorded nearly 300 million impressions, 16 million engagements, and 17.5 million video views across Twitter & Instagram last season.

And now it’s off to the races. Lacrosse is the fastest-growing sport in the United States at both the youth and NCAA level. The game is fast-paced. It combines the athletic abilities required for multiple other sports into one, and kids love it because all you need is a stick and a ball to play.

Not to mention that new collegiate lacrosse programs are popping up every year, and a high school student is currently 2-3x more likely to play lacrosse at the collegiate level relative to every other major high school sport.

I’m a big fan of what Paul & Mike Rabil are building. Of course, it’s not easy to start a new professional sports league from scratch. But they seem to have an incredible team behind them (that thinks BIG), and their cap table is loaded with the exact people you want on your side — world-class entrepreneurs & operators that have done it themselves.

My guess is that this exclusive deal with ESPN is just the start. Sure, maybe most of the games end up on ESPN+, similar to what the network has done with their NHL package. But it doesn’t matter. The global sports landscape is quickly changing, and the PLL is positining itself to be a significant player in the future.

I hope everyone has a great day, and we’ll talk tomorrow.

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