Building a Professional Sumo League From the Ground Up

I’ve been fortunate to lead and work with some incredible businesses and people throughout my career.

I’ve worked across television, sports, live entertainment, hospitality, and media. I’ve led teams at WWE, Cartoon Network, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey and more. Each experience came with its own challenges, opportunities, and responsibilities.

But building Sumo Championship League from the ground up feels different.

Sumo Championship League is a professional sumo league and live entertainment experience being built in the United States. The goal is to introduce more people and families to sumo in a way many have never experienced before: live, in person, and as part of a professional sports entertainment property.

This time, I’m not stepping into an existing business.

We are creating EVERYTHING, the business model, the league, and the live experience at the same time.

And there is a different kind of weight that comes with that.

Seeing the Opportunity in Sumo

I’ve been to sumo matches in Japan and have always been fascinated by the sport. But a few years ago, I had the opportunity to spend more time around sumo here in the U.S.

I went to amateur matches and exhibitions. I watched and talked to the wrestlers,. I watched the sport. But I also watched and talk to the audience.

That is where the opportunity started to become clear.

Most people already have an idea of what sumo is, even if they have never attended a match. Say “sumo wrestling” and people immediately have a picture in their mind.

But for many people, that is where their experience stops.

Then they see it live and realize there is much more to it. There is Athleticism. Strategy. Finesse. Honor. Respect. Fun. And there is a lot of energy in the room.

The more I watched, the more I kept coming back to one question:

Why isn’t there a professional sumo league built for this audience in the U.S.?

Eventually, that question became an opportunity.

What Does It Take to Build a Professional Sumo League?

Having the idea is the easy part. Building the business behind it is where the real work begins.

With the Sumo Championship League, we needed capital. We needed a team. We needed athletes. We needed arenas. We needed branding. We needed production. We needed to determine what the live event should look and feel like.

And all of those things had to start moving at once.

That is one of the realities of building a business that people do not always see from the outside.

A launch announcement can make something look finished. In reality, the announcement is often when a whole new phase of the work begins.

That is when execution becomes everything. A good idea can create excitement. Successful execution is what turns it into a business.

Experience Helps. It Does Not Remove the Pressure.

I’ve spent much of my career leading companies and teams where the stakes were high.

That experience matters.

I understand live entertainment. I understand television and production. I understand what it takes to build teams and operate businesses.

Most importantly, I’ve spent a career paying attention to audiences — what captures their attention, what creates energy, and most importantly, what makes them care.

Those experiences are a big part of why I believed I could help build Sumo Championship League.

But experience does not eliminate the pressure of building something new. If anything, I feel the responsibility even more.

I have a phrase I’ve used throughout my career: Success is the only option.

That phrase carries even more weight when you are building something from the ground up. 

There is no established roadmap to follow. You have to make decisions with the information you have, surround yourself with the right people, trust your instincts, and keep moving.

Building Something New While Respecting What Came Before

That responsibility is different from what I experienced when my friend and I purchased Beal’s Lobster Pier in Maine.

Beal’s was already more than 80 years old. Generations of families had eaten there. People had traditions tied to it. They had memories there.

Our responsibility was not to reinvent Beal’s. It was to be good stewards of what generations before us had built while finding ways to make it even better.

With the Sumo Championship League, the responsibility is different.

Sumo itself has a long, rich history. That is something we deeply respect.

What we are building is a new professional league and live entertainment experience in the United States around that sport.

One requires protecting and building upon an existing legacy. The other requires creating a new business model while honoring the history behind it.

Both carry responsibility. It is simply a different kind of weight.

Why Share the Process While Building?

That is part of why I want to share more of this process.

Not simply the announcements and milestones, but the thinking behind them.

Why did we make a particular decision? What did not go according to plan? What are we learning? What keeps me up at night? What happens when five things feel urgent at the same time?

I’ve spent decades building and leading businesses, and I’m still learning while doing it.

My hope is that by sharing some of that process while it is actually happening, other founders, leaders, and entrepreneurs can take something useful from it.

Because there is the business everyone eventually sees.

And then there is the work, pressure, decision-making, and learning it took to build it.