Posted in: Pop Culture, Sports | Tagged: Bryan Smiley, Erick Peyton, Hard Carry Media, stephen curry, Unanimous Media

Hard Carry Media & Unanimous Media Announce New Sports Venture

Hard Carry Media and Unanimous Media have come together to announce they're currently working on a brand-new sports content venture.

Hard Carry Media announced it has partnered with Stephen Curry and Erick Peyton's Unanimous Media to launch an all-new sports content venture. According to the announcement, this will focus on "the next generation of athlete-driven programming for young audiences," as they will develop and produce a creator-led platform designed to make original IPs that will be "centered around NIL athletes, sports culture, and personality-driven storytelling built for digital platforms." All with the goal of extending to streaming, television, and global distribution. Curry is said to play an active, creative role, as the yet-to-be-named venture will be led by former Hartbeat President & Chief Content Officer Bryan Smiley. We have more details and quotes from the announcement below.

While rooted in sports, the venture is designed differently from traditional sports media. Instead, the companies will co-develop, produce, and distribute creator-led content, recurring formats, and scalable original IP. The content is designed to travel natively across platforms such as  YouTube and TikTok by blending competition, personality, culture, and storytelling. Initial programming will center on the new generation of NIL athletes with basketball as the foundation, and formats built to scale across sports and culture over time.

Curry will make special appearances across select projects, while also taking an active role in shaping the venture's creative direction, talent relationships, and cultural lens. The partnership brings together Unanimous Media's strength in premium, athlete-driven storytelling with Hard Carry Media's expertise in building digital-native brands and formats that resonate with young audiences. The joint venture also creates a pipeline for premium IP, with successful formats positioned to extend beyond digital into television, streaming, and global distribution. The launch marks Hard Carry Media's official expansion into sports and adds to a growing portfolio of scalable, digital-first brands spanning the interests and life stages of Gen Z men across sports, entertainment, comedy, and lifestyle.

"In the NIL era, fans are forming connections with athletes earlier and far more personally than ever before," said Bryan Smiley, CEO of Hard Carry Media. "That shift is creating a new kind of fandom that requires a different kind of storytelling. We're building high-engagement formats that audiences already watch, share, and return to week after week. Sports and athletes are the entry point, but the real product is the format. That's how you turn athletes into stars and moments into franchises."

"We're excited to partner with Hard Carry Media to build something that reflects how the next generation engages and celebrates sports today," said Erick Peyton and Stephen Curry of Unanimous Media. "By focusing on format-driven storytelling and empowering athletes and creators to show up authentically, we hope to build a platform where new voices can break through and where sports culture can evolve in a more dynamic, inclusive way."

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