Night Light | The Athlete Era

August 29, 2024

Here Come The Athlete YouTube Channels…

Cristiano Ronaldo just shattered the record for most YouTube subscribers gained in a week, becoming the 64th most subscribed YouTube channel overall. While I’m not surprised that the most followed person on social media was able to break records, I was surprised to see how much content was available day one. Ronaldo was the second major athlete to launch a new channel lately—Tom Brady also joined YouTube.

1 Million subs in a day 🤯

It’s not just college athletes, now we’re seeing a clear trend where professional athletes are doubling down on YouTube.

Will every channel be successful?

Don’t expect every professional athlete to launch a YouTube channel—it’s not going to work for everyone. Even Tom Brady went from nearly a million views on his first video to just 300K on his second. One important thing to understand is how much time and effort YouTube requires. Your content still depends on factors like average watch time and a banger thumbnail/title. Athletes who don’t hone their craft and continually improve their videos won’t have successful channels.

A side by side of Ronaldo and Brady’s top performing video on their channel.

Why are we seeing this more now?

We’ve seen athlete YouTube channels before, but I think content creation on YouTube has become more mainstream because of creators like Kai Cenat, RDCWORLD, and IShowSpeed (Nowadays, it’s cool to be a YouTuber). Cristiano Ronaldo and Tom Brady are using production companies to make their videos, and it feels like there are more dedicated agencies than ever before that handle filming, editing, and uploading. Five years ago, these companies didn’t even exist.

What’s next for athletes?

I think that content actually depends heavily on the sport. I watch a lot of F1 content, and in my opinion Lando Norris and Charles Leclerc have done a great job finding content that works (BTS content, Race Week, explaining the industry). BTS is different in football because we have so many shows like Hard Knocks, so you have to think differently about what the content is.

Seems like Cristiano is really trying out a ton of content ideas in the week the channel has been live.

Some opportunities I see are in UFC, Sean O’Mally and Israel Adesanya have engaging commentary and lifestyle videos that I can see others experiment with. I’d be thinking about the top cricket stars, Connor McGregor (bring back the channel), and Lionel Messi. There’s also an opportunity for athletes to start podcasts (Kelce brothers just signed a $100M deal). I know I’d listen to an Aaron Rodgers podcast, I think that would go crazy.

The Big Takeaway:

A lot has changed since athletes were making YouTube videos 5 years ago. Obviously there’s a huge appetite for content from our favorite players, but it’s not as easy as setting up a camera and pressing record. Being a YouTuber has a much better connotation than it once did, and athletes recognize that. I wouldn’t be surprised if we see other big name athletes start channels or podcasts over the next few months.

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