Brodie is building the NBA for everyday athletes — and just raised $3.6M to prove adults still want to play organized ball.
Brodie Rec League closed a $3.6 million seed round led by Lerer Hippeau and Golden Ventures. The money is funding expansion into four new U.S. markets — Atlanta, Long Island, New Jersey, and Seattle. Founded by Connor Renton in 2019 as a side project while he worked at a bank, Brodie now runs more than 600 games a week across 20 cities, serving over 50,000 players and another 50,000 fans.
A Brodie season runs 12 weeks across six skill divisions, from first-timers to former college and pro athletes. Games are officiated and filmed, giving players highlights and a career record instead of just a final score. An updated app layers in career stats, leaderboards, team chats, and performance tracking — an unusually detailed setup for a rec league, built for players whose organized basketball ended when school did.
"You show up on this day — it's the same every single week, and you can look forward to something. It's an anchor for people," founder and CEO Connor Renton said of the funding.
Golden Ventures partner Ameet Shah described the pitch as "2K in real life": a league where a player's stats and season history carry forward, built on top of social content Brodie says has pulled more than one billion views.
More than 8 million Americans play high school sports, and over 90% never compete again after graduation. Brodie is part of a wider rec-league build-out — alongside Volo Sports, Crosscourt, and Street FC — betting that adults don't want to stop playing, they just need the infrastructure to keep showing up. As Lerer Hippeau managing partner Ben Lerer put it: "Attracting users digitally is one thing, but hooking them offline is another thing entirely. Brodie's done both."
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