This is Buying Sandlot — the only newsletter that focuses solely on the business of youth sports.
Let’s get to it.
In the email today:
⛹️♀️ What Can Be Done To Grow Girls’ Participation?
Today is National Girls and Women in Sports Day.
And while it arrives amid a period of significant growth and rising popularity, participation and retention disparities between girls and boys in youth sports remain a top industry focus:
Girls make up 49% of U.S. youth population
Only 35% of youth sports participants are girls
Girls are 2x more likely to drop out of sports by age 14
Over 1M more boys play HS sports than girls
Two participation-focused initiatives, paired with in-depth survey reports, have launched in recent days.
The National Recreation and Park Association is partnering with Nike on the Get Her in the Game campaign.
And i9 Sports’ Gains are for the Girls initiative aims to have 500K girls participating annually across the platform by 2030.
A few of the big-picture takeaways after digging deep in the reports:
Friends matter: The i9 survey of over 1.5K families found 89% of girls are most apprehensive about not knowing anyone when they start a sport.
Families can now request to be paired with specific coach and past teammate as a result, i9 VP of Marketing Madison Gates told Buying Sandlot. Franchise locations are also offering preseason clinics where families can meet each other, coaches and staff members before registering for the season. Gates said i9 is also focusing on broader retention efforts with the goal of getting big groups of families — and even full teams — to return over multiple seasons.
Coaching factors: A lack of female coaches is often cited as one of the main barriers to girls participation — women represent 51% of the U.S. adult population, but only 25% of youth sports coaches. The NRPA survey identified this gap as the No. 1 issue. 71% of orgs said lack of female coaches is the main participation barrier. About 40% of orgs are actively recruiting female coaches. 59% lack specific training for coaching girls.
But even more interesting: Families who responded to the i9 survey were less concerned with the presence of female coaches:
80% said positive, encouraging coaches was a top priority
Only 10% said female role models were a top priority
30% did say that is a top priority as girls age
“I don’t think it’s a dealbreaker,” said Gates, who played soccer at Michigan. “We know that positive, encouraging coaches and role models are just table stakes, whether it be a female or a male.
“But when I think about it in my experience, as you get older in middle school, junior high, high school there are just life things that a female coach will connect better with you than a male.”
Gates said i9 is striving to have a "greater sense of representation with coaches and referees.” It also works with Positive Coaching Alliance and partners with Coaching HER for educational resources.
Coed sports: The NRPA survey identified discontinuing competitive coed teams and establishing more girls-only teams as a strategy to increase participation.
This was another area where i9’s survey provided a contrast.
95% of i9 programs are coed
5% are girls-only
38% of families ID’d girls-only sports as a priority
i9 does plan to launch more girls-only programming and new sports like softball
Other notable data:
57% of Americans believe it is “highly important” to encourage middle and high school girls to participate in sports, according to NRPA
44% of NRPA-surveyed orgs have never led or participated in an initiative to increase girls participation
Having fun is the top priority of i9 parents (31%)
Getting better at a sport is most important to i9 athletes (39%)
The i9 survey is particularly notable to me because it skews younger — HS sports parents are likely not as preoccupied with having fun — and it strikes at a great unknown when discussing the participation and retention gap.
Almost all of these studies and surveys rely on “public” data, for want of a better term — federal statistics and state and local figures with an emphasis on community and high school sports.
But i9 is one of the first examples of “private” data being made available (spoiler: more is on the way)— and it is already challenging the conventional wisdom that a lack of women coaches is a massive participation barrier. So what more might we learn if able to look behind the curtain of club and travel sports?
Example: A recent AP story examined how girls basketball participation in Iowa has plummeted despite Caitlin Clark’s emergence. The reporter was rebuffed more than once trying to get access to AAU figures that could have painted a more accurate picture.
Also: It is possible participation numbers are being undercounted because the standard methods miss physical activities that do not fit the criteria of a traditional sport — Zumba, for example — but are popular with girls? A survey produced by the Women’s Sports Foundation and Ralph C. Wilson Jr. Foundation last year made this point.
🤾♂️ The Easy Button For Youth Sports Operation*
That’s how Focus On The Field Founder and CEO Tyler Kreitz described his company to me when I (Kyle) met him at NextUp in October. The easy button for youth sports operators.
What does that mean?
Well, the professionalization of youth sports is leading to inefficiency, burnout, and turnover among youth sports organization. Part-time administrators, coaches and volunteers are loaded with full-time responsibilities. Current solutions only add to the administration glut.
That’s where Focus On The Field comes in.
They offer fully-outsourced, affordable, turn-key support for operators, including:
Administrative tasks
Registration
Communication
Website and tech stack management
Or, more fun:
This includes tasks like coach onboarding, schedule building, legal entity tasks, compliance, email communications, website maintenance, and tech integration, among many other things.
Most youth sports operators got involved because they love the game, not managing back-office tasks. FOTF quite literally wants you to keep your focus on the field and let them handle increasingly-complex administrative tasks.
Find out how Focus On The Field can help you right here.
*Sponsor
🏟️ First Full Round Of Buying Sandlot Summit Speakers Unveiled
Our first wave of Buying Sandlot Summit speakers has been unveiled, with more on the way! Panels and sessions will be unveiled in the coming weeks.
Get your tickets now:
Attendee: $649, includes food and evening networking event
VIP Attendee: $899, includes everything for attendees + VIP Lounge, VIP-only breakfast, and access to nearby hotel room blocks
🎥 AIM Sports Group Enhances Infrastructure
The volleyball-focused organization has followed up the launch of its AIM+ tech and media platform by installing over 20 automated fixed Spiideo cameras in the 115K-square-foot AIM Sportsplex in southern California.
This deployment leverages Spiideo’s automated production solutions to capture and produce thousands of elite volleyball and basketball games annually. The newly installed camera systems are designed to capture all the action taking place at the premier multi-sport facility and can be configured for a variety of events across 16 volleyball courts or 12 basketball courts.
By delivering seamless, professional-quality game footage without manual filming, this enhancement takes the user experience at the venue to the next level—empowering athletes with high-quality film and highlights accessible through the integrated AIM+ ecosystem, while providing parents, players, and patrons with an elevated youth sports environment that adds value to every tournament and event hosted at the Sportsplex.
🥇Q1 Birthdays = Olympics Medals?
An economics professor at San Diego State analyzed the birth dates of individual Olympic medalists (summer and winter) from 2000 to 2018.
Q1 birthdays were more likely to medal than Q4 birthdays
January-June birthdays more likely to win gold
Medalists in judged events tend to be 4.5 younger
Medalists in endurance events tend to be 2.5 years older
The professor’s coinciding theory is a novel twist on the eternal specialization/early talent ID/late bloomer/holding kids back discourse.
She suggests athletes who are older within their age group may stand out and therefore receive access to better coaching, teams, etc. — and for elite athletes that slight early edge could blossom into the margin of triumph on the international stage.
Somewhere, Malcolm Gladwell smiles.
☀️ Fiesta Bowl Joins Flag Football Craze
The Fiesta Sports Foundation has launched the Fiesta Bowl Flag Football Classic, which it is billing as the first national women’s flag tournament featuring D1 schools.
The two-day event is April 18-19 in Tempe, Arizona and will be 7-on-7. Oakley is the presenting sponsor.
Alabama State is the lone varsity program in the field; club teams from Arizona State, Charlotte, Florida, Georgia, Grand Canyon, UCF and USC will also participate.
🏒 Interesting Initiative In Canada
Five public elementary schools in Saskatchewan will have associated hockey academies this fall after partnering with a coaching platform.
Boys and girls in grades 6-8 are eligible to enroll; the annual cost is over $3K per family.
The academies are designed to provide ice time and training built around students’ educational schedules. Players of all skill levels are eligible, but the programming is geared toward those with aspirations to play at the junior, collegiate or professional levels.
🤦♂️ Parents Behaving Badly
Kentucky youth basketball just means more.
A dad is being held on $200K bond for allegedly threatening people with a gun last weekend in a school parking lot after confronting his son’s coach about playing time.
The man and the coach reportedly had a verbal altercation and “small scuffle” before the man retrieved a gun from his car and pointed it at a group of people and threatened to shoot.
There is no indication a taser was used.
🔗 Youth Sports Links
🤳 Follow Buying Sandlot on Social
We’re new— help us build up our social media accounts by following along:
Good game.