The return of SlamBall: Co-founder Mason Gordon discusses new season

SlamBall is back!

After a two-decade hiatus, thetrampoline-basketball league returned thanks to an outpouring ofsupport from fans. The new season of SlamBall is airing on ESPN,which has allowed the league to get a ton of attention – from olderfans who are nostalgic about the sport as well as younger fans whohave seen highlights on social media.

In recent weeks, legendaryrapper Snoop Dogg and Kansas City Chiefs star Patrick Mahomes wereamong the fans who have raved about SlamBall.

Snoop Dogg trying to get on Slamball 😂https://t.co/52WCdDsvQrpic.twitter.com/36jYAXGdoI

Man i missed slamball!! 🤣🤣

The trampoline-basketball leaguerecently celebrated the 21st anniversary of their first broadcast,and it has a ton of momentum moving forward. They have raised morethan $11 million from notable investors such as Blake Griffin,Michael Rubin and Gary Vaynerchuk. Also, Circa Sports is nowputting out SlamBall betting lines, which is a big step for theleague.

With the SlamBall playoffstipping off tonight on ESPN, I caught up with SlamBall’s co-founderand CEO Mason Gordon to discuss how he came up with the sport, thedecision to return now, the process of recruiting players, thereaction from fans this season and much more.

You just celebrated the 21st anniversary of the firstSlamBall broadcast, which is crazy because it doesn’t feel thatlong ago.

Mason Gordon:“Yeah, the time does seem to fly by and it is kind of wild, butthere’s just been this weird kind of intense focus on SlamBall –not just from me, but from everyone who’s been involved with it,from the coaches who used to be players, to the coaches who arestill coaching. I mean, imagine coaching a sport across 21 years;it’s unbelievable. That’s [Ken] Carter, Brendan Kirsch, HernandoPlanells and Kevin Stapleton. It’s pretty amazing tosee.”

What are some things you learned from the runningSlamBall the first time around that you’ve been able to applynow?

Gordon:“Things have changed overthe years, only in that the sport has become more sophisticated.And we have bigger, stronger, more-skilled athletes doing it. Imean, I love the old-school guys, the pioneers, who really putSlamBall on the map. But these new guys are really poised to takeit to another level, and we're seeing incredible stars like GageSmith and Tony Crosby II really being born in front of our eyes.And that's really heartening to see.”

I read that your inspiration for SlamBall was playingvideo games and wanting to combine multiple sports. Can you tellthe story of how SlamBall was initially created?

Gordon: “Growing up, I played basketball, I playedfootball and I played video games. That was kind of mythree-pronged focus in life. I loved the physicality of football,but I didn't love that you played for eight seconds and then youstood around for a minute. And in basketball, I loved how fluid andathletic it was, but when you get slapped on the wrist, you'relooking for a foul. So I always had this idea in the back of myhead, like, ‘Could you combine the best elements of these sports?’And then the other thing I did was play NBA Jam and NFL Blitz,which were these two over-the-top video games that Midway put outand were just kind of cultural phenomenons. The concept was thatthe sports action was cartoonish and big and huge, and the dunkswere gigantic and the hits were gigantic. And I was like, ‘Couldyou do this with real athletes in real life?’

"The idea all kind of coalescedwhen I was very young and I watched the very first UFC. What are weon, like, UFC 299 or something? I'm talking about UFC 1. And[watching] that blew my mind, because what I looked at was theywere taking all these different fighting styles and blending themtogether into something that young people loved. And I'm not amartial artist, I'm a team-sports guy, so I was like, ‘Could I takethe best elements of basketball, football, hockey, and blend themall together into something that really worked?’ I went into awarehouse, built a court out of spare parts, and somehow gotbasketball and football players to play the same sport together.And that was the hardest part of the whole thing. Once they bothbought in and started playing together, the magic really started tohappen.”

The early SlamBall teams were made up of streetballplayers and football players. How did you recruit these players andpersuade them to adopt a new sport?

Gordon:“I was a hooper, so peoplekind of knew who I was in the area. I would show up and they'd belike, ‘Oh, that's the dude who can jump a little bit and who hackseverybody.’ (laughs) So the idea was I had a little bit ofcredibility to go see some people. I recruited a lot of friendsthat had some crazy 40-inch verticals and stuff like that. Then, Irecruited football players. And the funny thing was, as we got themall on this court that was made out of spare parts, the hardestpart was the football players would hit the basketball players, andthe basketball players would just want to fight. So, we would bebreaking up fights every 60 seconds and we couldn't really learnthe sport. So what I did isI checked myself into the game and I pulled the football guy asideand I was like, ‘Hey, I want you to hit me harder than you've hitanybody in your life, and I want to make sure everybody sees it.Can you do that?’ And he looked me in the eyes and he was like,‘I've been wanting to hit you since you opened your stupid mouth.’So this guy came from about 30 feet away and absolutely pancaked meinto the glass. I ended up breaking three ribs and I was wheezing,but I got up and I kept playing. And so when the basketball playerssaw that, they were like, ‘Okay, well, if he's out here and he'sactually banging around with us, then we can suck it up and betough too.’ And then once we got past that and got the football andbasketball skills blending together on the court, that's where wereally started seeing the amazing progressions in thesport.”

That’s an amazing story. I remember watching SlamBallwhen I was in middle school, so there’s definitely a lot ofnostalgia when I’m watching now. What kind of reaction have yougotten from fans who used to watch and are now returning to thesport?

Gordon:“Snoop Dogg, PatrickMahomes, Pat McAfee, these are the people who are flipping outabout SlamBall, and in the best way possible. We're incrediblyheartened to see that kind of reaction from big-time influencers.But it's really the rank-and-file fan out there who broughtSlamBall back. About three years ago, a hashtag #BringBackSlamBallstarted going crazy on the internet. And 20-year-old highlightsfrom SlamBall were going viral every single week like clockwork. Itwas amazing because it was just people who checked out SlamBalllate at night on Spike TV all those years ago – millions and millions of people– and we pressed this button in their hearts andminds that never really got unpressed. So when they startedinteracting with this #BringBackSlamBall hashtag with videos andstuff, we looked at it and there were over 200 million views at thetime, and now it’s over half a billion. And we were like, ‘Youknow, I think the timing is really perfect to bring SlamBallback.’

"My partner and I kept tellingeach other that we weren’t going to do it until the timing wasabsolutely optimal. But alternative sports are red-hot. Youngpeople are looking out for sports to call their own the same waythat fight fans gravitated to MMA as opposed to boxing because thatfan base was kind of aging out. So, I think the opportunity for ateam sport like SlamBall that has this kind of mythical qualitythat has picked up over the years as a real sport, and as a hybridsport where basketball and football cultures collide. You don'thave to squint that much to see the opportunity for scalehere.”

SlamBall feels perfect for this day and age, withhighlights that can blow up on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, so Ithink younger fans will fall in love with thistoo.

Gordon: “Itdefinitely is. Our TikTok is about 90 days old and has well over100 million followers and millions and millions of likes on theaccount, so we're obviously doing really well with the youngdemographic. [I think it’s] because SlamBall generates theseunforgettable moments that seem to just be very shareable andpeople want to put it out and share it wider when they experienceit. And I think what's really interesting about SlamBall is thatpeople watch legacy sports now mostly through highlights and theyactually kind of lose something in the sports-viewing experience bywatching highlights because when somebody's taking a shot, you knowthey're going to hit it, right? When somebody's driving to thebasket, you know they're going to hit the shot. So you're actuallykind of missing the live experience of watching it.

"But SlamBall has half-hourgames. You get a whole game in a half-hour. We have this amazingformat where four teams play three games. One plays two, threeplays four, and then the two winners play in the main event. Sowatching Slamball on ESPN, it's kind of like watching Fight Nightand you've got this ability to follow the story with a beginning, amiddle and an end. So what we keep hearing from people is that whenthey come to SlamBall, they're not on their phones once. Or whenthey're watching SlamBall, they're not on their phones. That's thehighest compliment I think you can be paid in today'sculture.”

By the way, your social-media person does a great job. Ilove the captions, memes, etc.

Gordon: “That'sworking out really, really well. Shout out Bailey, he's absolutelythe best and we love working with him. Also, Harrison works with uson our social. We really, really love what's been done on that sideof things. And we think we get it. We don't take ourselves superseriously. But we're a real, legitimate sport with high-levelprofessional players. But the fun factor in SlamBall is dialed upto 11, and we're very proud of that.”

SlamBall used to be on Spike TV and Versus. Now, it’s onESPN. I’m not trying to bash Spike TV or Versus, but I’m sure beingon a big network like ESPN has its advantages.

Gordon:”I would never disparage Spike TVbecause they took a chance with us, giving us a national-televisiondeal when we were in a warehouse, still figuring out the rules.That move by Spike TV and Viacom was absolutely amazing, and I'llbe forever indebted to them for giving us a national platform for asport that got invented on a napkin. But the vision for SlamBallfrom the very beginning was for it to be live, bettable andengageable. And back in the day, people really responded toSlamBall as a real sport, which it was, and a real league, which itwasn't. We were a television show. We would get all the teamstogether, we would play all the games, and then we'd release thegames three months later. That's no way to build a sport. That's noway to build affinities. That's no way to build team loyalties orstars. It's really just a way to make canned Ninja-Warrior-typecontent. And Ninja Warrior is super successful, but it's differentthan what we want to do.

"We want SlamBall to be live,immediate, tuned-in programming, something that you create time inyour schedule to consume, so it's really important for us to belive, bettable and engageable. And I'm so happy to report that asof [last week], SlamBall is bettable in Nevada through CircaSportsbook and additional sportsbooks that are piling into SlamBallbecause they see this as a signature summer sport that spans thedifference between the end of the basketball season and thebeginning of the football season.”

You mentioned that the fans and their #BringBackSlamBallposts influenced you and your partner. But behind the scenes, whatwent into reviving the league? What were the conversations withpotential broadcast partners like?

Gordon:“Yeah, so when we saw#BringBackSlamBall going so crazy on the internet, these videoswere just going insane. I'm not talking about 200,000 views,I'm talking about 8.5 million views, 11 million views. These were,like, Justin Bieber video numbers (or at least for the first monthof Justin Bieber or whatever, I don't want to overdo it). But thenumbers were really, really huge! So we were trying to be kind oflow-key about it, like, ‘Yeah, maybe this will work out. Let's gotalk to some investors.’ And it's funny: everybody we talked to waslike, ‘Oh my God, this is unbelievable. This is brilliant.’ And wewere like, ‘Really? Because we're saying the same things we'vealways been saying.' But I think something changed, like the groundshifted under our feet. And I think it had a lot to do with thesetrampoline family fun centers like you've probably been to for a6-year-old’s birthday party. It’s crazy but I think that wasdriving a lot of interest because everybody's been on these tramps,and they can identify with the athletic experience and all thatkind of stuff.

"So we talked to investors, andeverybody wanted to be in. Everybody wanted to be in and it's avery challenging capital environment right now, but we wereoversubscribed in just a few months. So that was incredible to see.Then, we went out to broadcasters and we were like, ‘Look, man,SlamBall is pretty cool, somebody's gonna give this thing a shot.’But what we didn't expect is that every single sports network madeus an offer or signaled the strong intent to make an offer. Wecould pick our partner. For us to be able to say, ‘SlamBall is backand it's on ESPN,’ is a conversation-ender with respect to[questions like]: ‘Is this a real sport? Does this deserve to belive?’ All of those questions are in our rearview mirror and we canjust focus on putting the best possible sports product in front ofpeople and build for the future. We think we've got a shot to bethe UFC of team sports, and I'm gonna keep saying that until it'strue.”

I was going to ask about trampoline parks! Many of thesetrampoline parks have full-court basketball and it’s super popularamong kids and teenagers, so that makes a lot of sense. You startedSlamBall when you were 25 years old. What was it like to invent asport and have it nationally televised at 25? That had to besurreal. And does it still feel surreal now?

Gordon: “Itfelt surreal at the time. [Now], hopefully, I make measuredstatements and I don't like to overhype stuff. Hopefully, I'vegrown in my experience over the time because I think you would havehated 25-year-old me (laughs). I was literally just too dumb toknow any better. Like, ‘Yeah, yeah, we're gonna create a sport andit's gonna take over the world!’ And my partner, Mike Tollin, who'san absolute genius –he's the guy behind ‘The LastDance’ Michael Jordan series and ‘The Redeem Team’ [documentary],‘The Captain’ Derek Jeter series and allthis other stuff that you've seen. Mike Tollin is the guy thatreally had a vision for SlamBall. He was like, ‘Listen, building asport from scratch is insane and we're just a couple of guys. Butwhat we might be able to do is get this on television and, ifenough people love it, over time, we can back our way into a moretraditional league model.’ That's literally what he said to me,verbatim.

"I didn't think it would take 20years, but the fact is we got to where we wanted to be with theright partners, and we're growing this thing by leaps and bounds.And every single week, the sport is getting better and more peopleare finding it and loving it, and we think there's a real place inthe market for this. Basketball and football fans want action everysingle day and then they're not getting it [for months]. There'sthis giant desert in the middle of the calendar, and we thinkSlamBall just fits that to a T as a hybrid sport combining the bestelements of basketball and football players.”

You talked about finding streetball players and footballplayers to join the initial SlamBall league. How did you find newplayers for the current league on ESPN?

Gordon: “Maybethe thing I'm most proud about is that people are acceptingSlamBall as a highly authentic sport, and I think a big part ofthat is that the sport has an internal logic to it, right? Like, wedon't have some celebrities pretending to coach our SlamBall teamsjust to get more reach on social media. The best players who everplayed SlamBall are some of our head coaches now, and some of ourformer coaches are still coaching SlamBall, so it's amazing to havea bunch of people who were with me in that warehouse on a courtmade out of spare parts who are still part of SlamBall today. Alarge percentage of my organization are people who have been withus over the years, so that’s something I'm extremely proudof.

"In addition to that, we havethis great new generation of guys. We started reaching out to newplayers and we thought we'd have to make this whole pitch, ‘Hey,there was this thing and it was on cable TV 20 years ago and…’ Butliterally every single person was like, ‘Hey, hey, stop talking.I've been wanting to play SlamBall for the last five or six yearsbecause it's been in my social-media feed!' The opportunity to playthis has been, like, built into [their] psyche over many years.Everybody that we reached out to wanted to play SlamBall, so wemade the training camp invite-only. And since we announced the ESPNdeal, now the calls that we're getting are like, ‘I played footballat the University of Alabama and I have two national championships,and I want to play SlamBall!’ The pipeline of athletes forSlamBall, I think, is just gonna be absolutelyspectacular.”

That’s really exciting. Is there anything else you’dlike to add?

Gordon: “Yeah,we’re just very excited about the upcoming playoffs and SlamBall isavailable on ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN+. Our playoffs are Tuesday,August 15, and Thursday, August 17. We've got a lot of great thingsplanned for the playoffs. I think people are really gonna loveit.”