海外来风:美国青少年体育赛事直播产业市场价值已达百亿美元(下篇)
Fueled By Family Viewing and Recruiting Purposes, Youth Sports Streaming is Now a $10 Billion Business（Part 2）
受家庭观看和招募需求的推动，青少年体育赛事直播如今已发展成为一个价值100亿美元的产业（下篇）
原文转载自Sport Business Journal
There are a dozen youth sports streaming services, and nearly as many business plans. BallerTV’s goal is more straightforward: content for its own sake. Annual prices range from $95 to $239 depending on the tier and available features. BallerTV also created a product, BallerCam, that turns an iPhone into an AI camera.
目前市面上有十几个青少年体育赛事直播服务，商业模式也几乎一样多。BallerTV 的目标则更为直接：专注于内容本身。根据套餐等级和可用功能的不同，年费从 95 美元到 239 美元不等。BallerTV还开发了一款名为 BallerCam 的产品，可以将iPhone 变成一台 AI 相机。
“We never got in this to solve a recruiting problem,” Hingorani said. “We never got in this business to help coaches win games. We got in this business because of a connection that sports provided to our life, to our family, to our relationships. We like to say of our product road map, we’re in the happiness business.”
“我们进入这个行业并非为了解决招生问题，”Hingorani 说，“我们也并非为了帮助教练赢得比赛。我们进入这个行业是因为体育与我们的生活、家庭和人际关系紧密相连。我们喜欢用‘幸福事业’来形容我们的产品路线图。”
While BallerTV typically works with the event operators to provide a livestream, other services such as SidelineHD let parents use their own phones and share games to Facebook or YouTube for free. Its monetization comes in the form of premium features: unlocking HD resolution, automating highlights and receiving advanced stats. Acquired by Diamond Kinetics in 2024, SidelineHD is being integrated into the company’s player development platform for more advanced instruction.
虽然 BallerTV 通常与赛事主办方合作提供直播服务，但像 SidelineHD 这样的其他服务允许家长使用自己的手机，免费将比赛分享到Facebook 或 YouTube。SidelineHD 的盈利模式是提供高级功能：解锁高清分辨率、自动生成精彩集锦以及获取高级统计数据。 SidelineHD 于 2024 年被 Diamond Kinetics 收购，并被整合到该公司的球员发展平台中，以提供更高级的指导。
“SidelineHD fit really well for us because it’s very focused on the athlete, the family, the parents,” Diamond Kinetics CEO CJ Handron said. “It’s not an organization platform. We call them hero parents because we have parents who are outside the dugout who become the champion of that team, and they become the livestreamer.”
“SidelineHD 非常适合我们，因为它非常注重运动员、家庭和家长，”Diamond Kinetics 首席执行官 CJ Handron 表示。“它不是一个组织平台。我们称他们为‘英雄家长’，因为有些家长不在场边，却成为了球队的拥护者，他们成为了直播员。”
Rematch is primarily a short-form highlights tool in which users follow the action in the app but do not need to press record until after the play. That saves critical storage space and helps parents not miss a key moment. This flashback ability is its core IP that is generating interest from clubs not wanting to be left behind in a crowded youth sports market.
Rematch 主要是一款短视频集锦工具，用户可以在应用内观看比赛，无需在比赛结束后再进行录制。这节省了宝贵的存储空间，也帮助家长不错过任何精彩瞬间。这种回放功能是其核心知识产权，吸引了众多俱乐部的关注，他们不想在竞争激烈的青少年体育市场中落后。
Hanna Howard, Rematch U.S. CEO, said clubs are recognizing untapped value from content. “Even where we’re talking with club organizations who may not have a really strong social media identity yet, they know they need to in order to keep up,” she added. “You can’t be in this youth space and not be celebrating the content and your own community through the play that’s happening on the field.”
Rematch 美国首席执行官Hanna Howard 表示，俱乐部正在意识到内容的巨大价值。“即使是那些社交媒体影响力尚不强大的俱乐部，他们也明白自己必须这样做才能跟上时代的步伐，”她补充道，“身处青少年体育领域，却不通过球场上的精彩瞬间来展现内容和社区精神，这是不可想象的。”
It’s not just a marketing tool. Howard said larger clubs, such as Lonestar SC in Texas, generated more than 1 million views related to its Rematch content in just six months. Armed with that data, clubs can sell sponsorships to local businesses.
它不仅仅是一个营销工具。Howard 表示，像德克萨斯州的 Lonestar SC 这样的大型俱乐部，在短短六个月内就通过 Rematch 获得了超过 100 万次的观看量。有了这些数据，俱乐部就可以向当地企业推销赞助。
Most streaming platforms equip the user with choices for monetization based on their comfort. That could be through subscriptions, sponsorships or other advertisements.
大多数流媒体平台都会根据用户的偏好提供多种盈利方式，例如订阅、赞助或其他广告。
When Hudl charges a subscription fee, Nelson said the schools receive 70% to 80% of the revenue. The company maintains a dedicated Hudl for Brands division that has produced collaborations with Gatorade, Nike, Chase and T-Mobile.
Nelson 表示，Hudl 收取订阅费时，学校可以获得 70% 到 80% 的收入。该公司还设有专门的 Hudl for Brands 部门，曾与佳得乐、耐克、摩根大通和 T-Mobile 等品牌合作推出联名产品。
One thorny issue gaining increasing scrutiny is the idea of broadcast rights for youth sports. If a media provider is streaming a tournament behind a paywall, for example, can parents also share live video of their children from where they sit in the stands? Generally, the stance has been similar to what you might find at a pro sports game — attendees are welcome to record as much of the game as they want for their personal use, but not for wider distribution. But getting folks to follow that policy is not an easy task.
青少年体育赛事转播权问题日益受到关注，这是一个棘手的问题。例如，如果媒体提供商对某项赛事进行付费直播，那么家长能否在看台上拍摄并分享自己孩子的比赛视频？通常情况下，这种做法与职业体育比赛类似——观众可以随意录制比赛视频供个人使用，但不得公开传播。然而，要让人们遵守这项规定并非易事。
“That comes with its own enforcement concerns, which has been in the media lately of, how do you monitor all of those facilities?” Nelson said. “How do you go tell a parent that they can’t take a video of their own kids?”
“这本身就存在执行方面的问题，最近媒体一直在讨论，如何监管所有这些场所？” 尼尔森说道，“你怎么告诉家长他们不能拍摄自己孩子的视频呢？”
Just capturing youth games on video used to be enough: plop a camera in place, click record and preserve the memories. But stationary, low-res videos lacking stats or even the score weren’t going to placate viewers forever. “Internally, I say, ‘No more security feeds,’” FloSports founder and CEO Mark Floreani said. “What used to be, ‘Hey, I don’t care what it looks like. I just want to see my kid or see this event’ has now evolved, and people do care about it.”
过去，仅仅用视频记录青少年比赛就足够了：架好摄像机，按下录制键，就能保存珍贵的回忆。但这种画面静止、分辨率低，且缺乏统计数据甚至比分的视频，终究无法永远满足观众的需求。“在公司内部，我说过，‘不再播放监控录像了’，”FloSports 的创始人兼首席执行官 Mark Floreani 说。“过去人们的想法是，‘嘿，我不在乎画面怎么样，我只想看到我的孩子或者这场比赛’，但现在情况已经发生了变化，人们开始在意画面了。”
FloSports has deep roots in wrestling, so for that sport — and, later, to expand to others — the company invested in developing its own AI algorithms to automate the production. The year-old product is called VPZ for virtual pan and zoom, as it tries to replicate natural broadcasting techniques. Of its 1 million total subscribers, about 100,000 receive FloWrestling, which carries a bounty of high school and college wrestling.
FloSports 在摔跤领域有着深厚的根基，因此，为了更好地服务于这项运动——以及之后拓展到其他运动——该公司投资开发了自己的 AI 算法来实现视频制作的自动化。这款名为 VPZ（虚拟平移和缩放）的产品已经推出一年，旨在模拟自然的直播技术。在其 100 万订阅用户中，约有 10 万用户订阅了 FloWrestling，该频道提供丰富的高中和大学摔跤比赛内容。
Along with PlayOn, Pixellot introduced virtual yellow first down lines in high school football games. Pixellot, PlaySight and Spiideo are among the providers that have invested in multi-camera systems for several sports, in which the stream automatically cuts to the better angle based on the action.
除了PlayOn之外，Pixellot还在高中橄榄球比赛中引入了虚拟黄色首攻线。Pixellot、PlaySight和Spiideo等供应商都投资开发了用于多种体育项目的多摄像头系统，这些系统能够根据比赛情况自动切换到最佳视角。
“We’re in the midst of a tipping point when it comes to youth and amateur automatic production of sports,” Pixellot’s Gerstel said. “The technology very much allows doing it in the quality that is expected and, at the same time, the price of streaming is being dropped significantly.”
“在青少年和业余体育赛事自动制作方面，我们正处于一个转折点，”Pixellot 的 Gerstel 表示。“这项技术完全能够以人们期望的质量实现视频制作，同时，流媒体的成本也大幅下降。”
GameChanger recently partnered with youth sports organizer Unrivaled (related story, Page XX) to sync additional angles to its streams. Anyone at the field — starting with Rocker B Ranch in Texas — can scan a QR code and have his or her phone’s stream added to the full game production. AI incorporates the new viewpoints for a more comprehensive viewer experience. This follows an earlier GameChanger update in which new compression technology enables full 1080p HD resolution on all games.
GameChanger 近期与青少年体育组织 Unrivaled（相关报道见第 XX 页）合作，在其直播流中同步更多角度的画面。任何在场的人员——首先从德克萨斯州的 Rocker B Ranch 开始——都可以扫描二维码，将自己手机的直播流添加到完整的比赛直播中。人工智能会将这些新的视角整合起来，从而带来更全面的观看体验。此前，GameChanger 还进行了一次更新，新的压缩技术使所有比赛都能达到 1080p 全高清分辨率。
Executives with LiveBarn and Spiideo underscored the need for high-quality video because, with computer vision algorithms, it can be utilized for content, player development, scouting and a host of other use cases.
LiveBarn 和 Spiideo 的高管强调了高质量视频的重要性，因为借助计算机视觉算法，它可以用于内容创作、球员培养、球探工作以及其他众多应用场景。
“Video is the starting point of a lot of the experiences that people want to deliver,” Spiideo’s Bushman said.
“视频是人们想要呈现的许多体验的起点，”Spiideo公司的布什曼说道。
The consensus is that, as long as the original objective of celebrating and preserving memories remains the most important goal, the continued proliferation of video serves the industry well.
大家的共识是，只要庆祝和保存回忆这一最初目标仍然是最重要的，视频的持续普及对整个行业都大有裨益。
“At the end of the day, as the tech operator in the middle of this, the parent on the other side of it, I have been in the space for a long time — it’s such a net positive,” Diamond Kinetics’ Handron said. “That’s the thing that makes us feel the best about this, is you just get this overwhelming, consistent feedback from folks who are like, ‘Hey, if I couldn’t do this, we couldn’t watch the game. We wouldn’t have the memory.’”
“说到底，作为身处其中的技术运营者，同时也是另一端的家长，我在这个领域已经待了很久——这绝对是一件好事，”Diamond Kinetics公司的汉德隆说道。“最让我们感到欣慰的是，我们不断收到来自用户的反馈，他们会说：‘嘿，如果不能用视频，我们就没法看比赛了，也就没有这些回忆了。’”
—— 全文完 ——
清大智成体育智库致力于促进国内外体育产业发展与交流，在体育产业规划变革、消费营销、特色主题等研究领域，以及体育活动策划与明星经纪等方面具有丰富的经验与资源，同国内外体育产业领域知名专家学者及业内人士建立了广泛的合作关系，愿为客户提供多方位、全流程的高品质、个性化服务，力争为推动中国体育产业发展贡献智慧与力量。业务合作联系方式：bjqdzc@139.com或公号私信留言