🥎 Capacity Sports Group Takes Over LakePoint Sports

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A new big dog keeps barking.

Capacity Sports Group has added the entirety of LakePoint Sports to its portfolio, taking control of multi-sport operations at the Atlanta-area mega-complex.

CSG's Prep Baseball vertical has been running LakePoint's eight-diamond Baseball Village since 2019; This deal brings the Champions Center Indoor Pavilion and multi-purpose Publix Fields under CSG's umbrella as well.

"We felt with the evolution of Capacity Sports Group, it was very important for us to not only secure the long-term likelihood of [Prep Baseball] staying at LakePoint, but to also get involved in all the other sports," CEO Ken Kocher said during a wide-ranging appearance on the Buying Sandlot podcast. "We're excited to add the entire LakePoint team to our company. It's a good hub for us."

The deal is representative of CSG's growth "smorgasbord" approach, as Kocher called it.

CSG bought the land under the diamonds and three multi-purpose fields and secured a long-term lease on the 170K-square-foot indoor venue from Bartow County. CSG also acquired LakePoint-based basketball tournament platform RYZE Hoops as part of the indoor takeover; the facility holds 12 basketball courts and 24 volleyball courts.

"We want to be asset light," Kocher said. "We're not out in the market looking to buy complexes. But in this case it's a little bit different."

CSG launched in January when Prep Baseball merged with Bullpen Tournaments. It has over a dozen venues in its portfolio, including Grand Park Sports Campus outside of Indianapolis, United Sports in the Philadelphia area and Homefield Baseball Complex in Kansas City. It has also acquired a slew of tournament operators and leagues.

CSG is most focused on what Kocher called the “Power Six” sports — baseball, softball, flag football, lacrosse, soccer and volleyball. It also has basketball, field hockey and futsal programming under its umbrella.

Kocher previously told Buying Sandlot that CSG expected to run over 300 tournaments across over at least 150 fields nationwide by the end of this year, drawing 20M in attendance to its events. He believes CSG’s advantage is harnessing all aspects of the youth sports experience through its facilities, with LakePoint serving as the perfect example.

"Our ambitions are quite high with what we think we can do to some of the other sports in particular,” he said. “We think we can take what we've learned over the last 15, 20 years in baseball, which starts with the athlete and ends up at a tournament. They all kind of go together through the media, the social and all that. We think we could do that taking it to all sports."

Listen to our full, wide-ranging interview with Ken on Capacity’s ambitions:

The same team that safeguarded a showdown between the world's best rugby sides can do the same for your event or organization.

Go4 has expanded to provide vertically-connected safety solutions from medical governance to sideline coverage with Go4 Medical, putting medical oversight, policy, sideline staffing and injury documentation on one platform.

The expansion is helmed by Go4 Medical Director Dr. Mark Sakr, the University of Arizona’s Sports Medicine Director and the medical director for both USA Rugby and the CrossFit Games. It adds over 100 physicians to Go4's network of over 26K athletic trainers and 12K youth sports organizations, schools, clubs, colleges, facilities and operators across all 50 states, including last month’s New Zealand-South Africa test match in Baltimore.

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The world’s biggest youth soccer organization has landed a multi-year extension to retain the car e-commerce platform as its front-of-kit sponsor for all jerseys in its U.S. network.

Carvana and Rush will also launch a $200K youth soccer scholarship fund in 2027 as part of the deal.

The deal comes a few months after Rush secured a global partnership with Nike, which also begin next year.

Rush has over 60K athletes across 125 clubs in 50 countries.

Real American Freestyle will host a RAF Next Gen tournament in the United Arab Emirates next month.

The two-day event will run Nov. 14-15 in Abu Dhabi alongside RAF’s professional card with "international and regional wrestling federations" participating.

RAF is partnering with the UAE Wrestling Federation on the event; the promotion also has a five-year deal with Abu Dhabi's Department of Culture and Tourism.

The platform meshes Olympic-style wrestling with presentation similar to UFC and the WWE. It has a streaming deal with Fox Nation and launched the RAF Next Gen youth series earlier this year, as well as a wrestling clubs network.

Quick Take: We have talked a lot about experiences recently — subscribe to Buying Sideline! — and youth wrestling is a space that affords itself to some really cool possibilities. And it’s not just pairing competition with premium vacations; there are opportunities for genuine cultural exchanges and even sports diplomacy. RAF held a card in Russia earlier this year and wrestling is huge in Cuba and Iran, as well as India and Japan.

Oregon is the 25th state (plus Washington D.C.) to sanction girls flag as a high school varsity sport.

Nike will provide home and away jerseys to all teams next season, plus to any schools who launch programs in the next three years, according to KATU-TV. The OSAA said 1.4K athletes participated across 57 teams last spring.’

So who's next? The next scheduled sanctioning vote will be Indiana sometime next year. Missouri is likely the closest state to sanctioning after that. You can keep tabs by bookmarking our girls flag sanctioning tracker.

The Sports Facilities Companies will open and operate the Lakeview Park baseball and softball complex in Frankfort, Kentucky.

The venue will open in spring 2027 and will have seven youth diamonds and expanded concessions. The surrounding park includes a driving range and other offerings; the Franklin County Sports Tourism Commission is hoping to attract regional and national tournaments up to 12U

Also: Two SFC facilities — Illinois' Wintrust Sports Complex at Bedford Park and Florida's Wiregrass Ranch Sports Campus -- have agreed to multi-year deals with sportswear company Capelli Sports. The partnerships "will bring apparel, teamwear, retail merchandise and on-site activations to athletes, clubs and families."

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