A Virginia Cavaliers midfielder walks out of the tunnel for warmups against the Yale Bulldogs in the men’s NCAA lacrosse national championship game in Philadelphia, May 27, 2019. Bill Streicher-USA TODAY Sports
A startup niche professional sports league isn’t an obvious winner. Yet New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft and Alibaba co-founder Joe Tsai have ponied up for the U.S. Premier Lacrosse League’s latest funding round. Despite failed past attempts, the PLL has a shot at success.
Star player Paul Rabil and his brother created the league in 2018. Options and health insurance got players onside. Costs are low, as there are few teams and no home cities. The appeal is instead based around online personas. It’s a way to attract a small, dedicated audience via social media.
It seems to be working. The PLL absorbed an older rival league in December. It won’t give figures, but says this funding round came at an increased valuation. Moreover, demographics are at its back. High schoolers playing lacrosse rose by a third between 2010 and 2019. Sure, only about a quarter as many kids participate in lacrosse as play basketball but traditional school sports aren’t growing. Perhaps most important financially, the sport’s preppy base is also well represented on Wall Street. (By Robert Cyran)
On Twitter http://twitter.com/breakingviews
Capital Calls – More concise insights on global finance:
AMC makes its own meme movie read more
Orsted investors fear it’s flying close to the sun read more
Gulf buyout shop calls time on public markets read more
SEC leans towards investors read more
Harry Potter casts lasting spell over Bloomsbury read more
Reuters Breakingviews is the world’s leading source of agenda-setting financial insight. As the Reuters brand for financial commentary, we dissect the big business and economic stories as they break around the world every day. A global team of about 30 correspondents in New York, London, Hong Kong and other major cities provides expert analysis in real time.
Sign up for a free trial of our full service at https://www.breakingviews.com/trial and follow us on Twitter @Breakingviews and at www.breakingviews.com. All opinions expressed are those of the authors.
/cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com/reuters/KZUD5XRYSNMUTOO7O4ZIKUEFLE.jpg&description=Professional+lacrosse+gets+a+financial+boost){kind=link}