You learn something new every day on this beat.
A recent lesson: Very few middle schools nationally have a baseball team for myriad reasons — budget cuts, single-use field hurdles, local differences in how grades 7-12 are structured, etc. And the schools that do have a team tend to play very short seasons.
This is where Daniel Himel started thinking a little over a decade ago. The Dallas-area entrepreneur wondered how his son and middle school classmates would fare against the next town over. So he got jerseys made up in the schools’ colors and started marketing a tournament that has grown into Middle School Matchup, a franchise platform for specialized youth baseball weekend tournaments carrying the hashtag #HappyBaseball.
About 50K participants
Over 300 cities
2 tournaments a year in most markets
Players of all ability levels
Teams assembled based on middle schools
$30K franchise fee, plus standard royalty
Average fee for family is about $150
“It has grown into something I never would have believed,” Himel told Buying Sandlot. “You don’t leave your baseball team; it’s just a quick break to have a lot of fun. It’s very sandlot baseball. Kids are playing with kids they grew up with, the moms are in the stands hanging out with the ladies from their neighborhood. It’s this crazy, new experience that was discovered by accident, but is definitely working.”
Himel said the tournaments have become so popular that club and travel programs will arrange schedules so coaches and players can participate in MSM events.
MSM has some non-baseball sports in select markets, but they have not gained the traction baseball has. There are also some tournaments for incoming high school freshmen teams.
Typical franchisees have pre-existing local youth sports connections and relationships, Himel said — it is not the type of franchise where an owner is deciding whether to buy a MSM event or a Subway.
Player recruitment and tournament operation is the major component of the business, but MSM also has an apparel component since it produces uniforms for participants — Himel said they distribute about 70K pieces of gear each year. Expenses are low (i.e. hiring umpires for tournaments).
Himel said the biggest MSM franchise, based in Houston, is operated by the owner alone and has about 6K kids play each year.
Some new franchises will run multiple events initially to gain a foothold before condensing to the biannual format. Himel said parents often ask if MSM could launch a formal league, but that is not planned.
"The players that are more on the recreational side, they would love that,” Himel said. “But if you’re trying to elevate your game, you need to go on a select team. It wouldn’t make sense for the higher level kids. And there is just something really cool about reserving two weekends a year to put all the politics, all the pressure aside and just go do it.”
Further proof that:
1) There is a substantial market for the organized pickup sports we discussed during our 2026 predictions podcast.
2) While youth sports has become professionalized, there is still a desire to enjoy no-frills, traditional play when done right.
3) Turning a strong profit — do the math on the Houston franchise! — is not a bad thing in youth sports. More often than not it allows a platform to provide a high-quality experience that a low-cost rec league cannot achieve.
I could see there being a major opportunity at the other end of the spectrum — summer tournaments for HS seniors that allow the kids who chose lacrosse over baseball, the kids who went to a Catholic school, etc. to all come together one last time.
I’ve been considering a variation of this idea. My kids aren’t middle school age yet, and for various reasons, we are not ready to make the travel baseball commitment as it significantly cuts into beach and vacation time.
But as my kids enter travel age, they want the experience of playing in tournaments. Something beyond rec, but not something with 36 games and a season starting in November and ending in August, with fall ball filling the gap! So I’ve considered casting a net over the Philly suburbs and seeing if we could find other dads and families in the same boat, or who would otherwise like their kid to play on, call it, Sandlot Select 10U that plays in 2-3 tournaments, like a local one and then a Ripken or PG event. Surely we could get it sponsored and use some connections to elevate the experience… perhaps be the model for a sponsor-driven opportunity.
Anyway, no surprise this idea is taking off in baseball what with the drop-off in participation approaching teen years and the demands of travel, especially during the summer. Yet another sign that experiential-driven opportunities to fill the gap between rec and travel exist, perhaps in a big way.
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