👎 Why Does Sports Content Suddenly Suck?

Happy Wednesday,

Everyone’s talking about AI content, but no one’s talking about the most important question:

Who actually owns it?

That’s what makes Michael Gursha’s company so interesting. As the co-founder of Rookie Road and now CEO of Point Curve, he’s building a network of digital brands powered by original, human-created content—while everyone else rushes to spin up AI sludge.

But this isn’t just some “media nostalgia” play.

Instead, Mike and his team have quietly built 13 web properties from scratch, layered in custom-built content management systems and SEO tools, and are now exploring how to license that infrastructure to others. And in a world where content is only getting cheaper to produce, he’s betting that original content will become more and more valuable.

This week, Jake and I sat down with Mike to talk about the future of SEO, why niche content can still beat scale, and what creators today can learn from the history of digital media.

🎧 [Listen to our full episode with Michael Gursha]

5 Takeaways From Our Conversation With Michael Gursha

1. Rookie Road didn’t win by being first; it won by being better.

When Mike and his brother launched the site in 2017, the internet was already full of sports explainers. However, most of it was:

• Generic

• Low quality

• Hard to read

So they focused on building high-quality, beginner-friendly guides across 150+ sports—starting with football, then quickly expanding to everything from cricket to curling.

“There’s always been a lot of information on the internet,” Mike said, “but there was a gap in quality.”

2. AI is disrupting content, but it still needs something to feed on.

The irony of GenAI is that it relies on original, well-structured source material to stay useful. Michael pointed out that generative tools can’t create anything meaningful without first ingesting human-made content—which is why his team is doubling down on quality.

The big issue? There’s no compensation model yet. As he put it, “We’re in the Napster phase right now.” Long-term, he believes a licensing model will emerge, just as it did with music.

3. Owning the infrastructure is the real moat.

Rookie Road didn’t just produce content—they built custom tech to create, manage, and optimize it at scale. That includes their own:

• Content Management System (CMS)

• SEO Tooling

• Website Architecture

Now operating as Point Curve, they’ve used that same system to launch 12 more brands, all of which are zero-to-one builds. And with the success of niche sites like Skimboarding.com, they’re proving that infrastructure + insight can beat size alone.

4. Search is shifting, but original content still wins.

With GenAI-powered search results and tools like ChatGPT distilling answers without attribution, many publishers are panicking.

But Mike sees opportunity.

He’s focused on turning original content into multi-channel flywheels from a single source:

• Feeding SEO

• Social

• Newsletters

• Product reviews

• Commerce

“We’ve always believed in building a core base,” he said, “and distributing outward from there.”

5. The next evolution is tech licensing + content commerce

Point Curve has three growth lanes:

1. Digital media

2. Original content

3. Commercializing their infrastructure

While advertising and affiliate links still drive revenue, Mike is increasingly bullish on two fronts: building marketplaces inside niche content sites and licensing their platform to other companies.

“Everyone needs content. Everyone needs websites. Everyone wants to grow an audience,” he told us. “We’ve just been doing it longer.”

Why It Matters

In a world where content is getting cheaper, original work is becoming more valuable—not because of traffic, but because of what it powers. Just like music streaming didn’t kill musicians (it just forced them to find new models), generative content won’t kill creators—it’ll raise the stakes on quality and ownership.

Point Curve’s playbook is a preview of what comes next:

• Infrastructure that lets media scale without sacrificing quality

• Multi-brand portfolios focused on niche audiences

• Tech that turns content into a competitive advantage

If they’re right, content won't just be king—it'll be a platform.

🎧 [Listen to our full episode with Michael Gursha]

📩 And don’t forget: Bottom of the Ninth is back this Friday with the top three stories in sports and business from the week.

See you then,
Tyler & Jake