Weekly News Roundup: The Biggest Headlines in the World of Youth Sports
Anwar Stetson
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🎥 NBC To Debut Doc On Youth Sports Officials
The youth sports officiating crisis is going under a notable lens. Whistle Blowers, a 30-minute documentary by NBC Local, will debut later this week in the Dallas-Fort Worth area before a national rollout.
The film tells four unique stories:
- A Mississippi softball umpire who was attacked by a parent in a parking lot
- The experiences of a veteran Texas high school basketball referee
- A developmental event for hoops officials in St. Louis
- A Minnesota high school elective class encouraging students to become officials
The documentary will air on NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth at 8 and 10 p.m. ET on Saturday and Sunday as part of the station’s special back-to-school coverage.
A national launch is Monday, Sept. 1 at 10:30 p.m. ET on NBC News Now, and the documentary will be available on Peacock after that airing.
⚾️ Batbox Lands Licensing Deal in Utah
A TopGolf-like batting cage simulator, Batbox Suite will open at Virtual Dugout in Lehi, Utah, near Salt Lake City.
The company touts that “Batbox Suite combines proprietary baseball simulators with adaptive gameplay, interactive kiosks, and continuous software updates that keep the experience fresh and social.”
Players are connected to “Batbox’s global ecosystem, giving them access to local, national, and international competitions, leaderboards, and evolving game modes.”
Batbox is opening another location in the Dallas area this year; it already has several locations in Mexico.
🏈 Football Drives The Bus In Ohio
WKYC 3 in Cleveland recently reported on the financials of fall high school sports in Ohio.
The stats were not terribly surprising, but still notable.
- OHSAA made $1.78M in profits on football last year
- All other fall sports ran a combined $210K shortfall
- Football drew 540K fans last year, over 100K more than all other fall sports combined
- Football is the state’s top sport for participation
⚽️ Op-Ed Sounds Alarm On American Soccer Pipelines
Cal men’s soccer coach Leonard Griffin and former U.S. Women’s National Team member Lindsey Huie called out the sport’s pay-to-play model in an opinion piece for Sports Business Journal.
“Without intervention, the U.S. soccer industry risks losing generational powerhouses, not because they lack talent, but because they lack the financial resources to be seen,” Huie wrote.
The column comes weeks after an academic report came to similar conclusions about Canada’s national soccer infrastructure.
