Mellody Hobson is not sweating the $110 million expansion fee that the new Denver NWSL franchise paid to get into the league. And she’s not worried about the millions she and the ownership group will pony up to build a new stadium, either.
In fact, Hobson, whose sports ownership portfolio includes the Broncos, White Sox, WNBA and League One Volleyball, believes the team’s commitment to making the largest investment in women’s sports history will look like a deal in due time.
“Math has no opinion,” said Hobson, the co-CEO and president of Ariel Investments. “And what does the math tell us? The math is astounding. (NWSL) viewership is up, the fandom is up, the sponsorships are up. The media rights are up.
“Yes, the (the NWSL entry price) by the standards of what we’ve seen recently is a lot more. However, it’s (a fraction) of the most valuable men’s team in sports in America. That says a lot about the value that can still be created. And we are convinced that in a decade, two decades from now, we are going to look back and say, ‘We are so glad we own this team.’ And this will seem like the best bargain price that you could imagine.”
Hobson was one of several key stakeholders who took center stage on Thursday afternoon at a packed Number 38 in RiNo, where it was officially announced that Denver is getting the NWSL’s 16th franchise. The team is set to begin play in 2026 and has plans to build a women’s soccer-specific stadium somewhere in Denver.
The formal announcement at 2:22 p.m. by NWSL commissioner Jessica Berman was met with deafening cheers by hundreds of club supporters in attendance as Berman passed a ceremonial ball to controlling owner Robert Cohen, who held it in the air above his head and pumped it towards the ceiling a couple of times.
As of Thursday afternoon, the franchise already had over 2,000 fans signed up for season tickets for the inaugural 2026 season, which the team will play at a temporary venue to be announced in the next couple of months.
As the alternate governor of the franchise and one of its primary investors along with Cohen, Hobson declared the moment as further evidence that “women’s sports are at a generational shift.”
“We are watching it in real time and we have a front-row seat to what is happening,” Hobson said. “And we want to be a part of elevating women to their rightful place in the pantheon of sports.”
Hobson’s newly formed Project Level, a subsidiary of Ariel Investments, is dedicated to leveling the opportunities in women’s sports through investment and ownership. The firm aims to capitalize on “the under-appreciated growth and value embedded in women’s sports.” The Denver NWSL franchise is the private investment firm’s first team.
For the supporters in attendance, the cash put up by Cohen and Project Level — in addition to other owners FirstTracks Sports Ventures LLC, Neelima Joshi, Dhiren Jhaveri, and Molly Coors — indicates the current stability of the NWSL as well as the long-term viability of the team.
Colorado’s previous women’s professional team, the Colorado Xplosion in the American Basketball Association, lasted three seasons in the late 1990s.
“The launch of this team is sentimental and emotional, and it’s meaningful to support women and young girls,” said Abby Waner Bartolotta, a former Colorado prep basketball great who attended the event and plans on being a season-ticket holder. “But these owners are not here if it’s not a great business opportunity as well.”
For the homegrown soccer players in attendance on Thursday, the launch marked a new era. Denver is no longer the largest American city without a professional women’s sports franchise.
Waner Bartolotta’s 7-year-old daughter, Real Colorado player Ella Bartolotta, wore a soccer sweatshirt as she witnessed history.
For the NWSL alumni at the event, the afternoon underscored how far the league has come since launching in 2013. That included emcee Jordan Angeli — a Green Mountain alum who was part of the For Denver FC grassroots campaign — as well Arapahoe and CU alum Amy Barczuk, who was the 14th overall pick in the league’s inaugural draft.
Barczuk recalled her $5,000 salary in that first NWSL season and living in a small house with two teammates. Fast forward 12 years, and the NWSL is in the second season of a historic $240 million TV rights deal, the minimum salary is $48,500 and Berman says there are “10 to 15 cities” vying for the league’s next expansion bid, which could come as early as 2027.
“At that time (in 2013), it wasn’t sustainable for many of the women, especially who weren’t on the national team level, to stay in the league and play for a long time because the pay was just really hard to live off of,” Barczuk said.
With a team in hand in a thriving league, Cohen and his fellow owners now turn their attention to building a stadium in the coming years.
Berman said that with the league’s average attendance around 11,000 last year — nearly double what it was a couple of seasons prior — the NWSL will consult the ownership group on how big the building should be. “You want to strike the balance between creating demand, and having space to accommodate the community that’s going to be there to support the team,” she said.
“I’ve already instructed our team at (Denver Department of Transportation and Infrastructure) to reserve downtown for championship parades in 2027 and ’28,” Denver Mayor Michael Johnston joked.
Aspirations for winning aside, Johnston believes Thursday is the beginning of a long-term opportunity for Colorado girls like Ella Bartolotta to “not just see themselves just at the top of this game, but at the top of any game.”
“(A women’s professional sports team) is what inspires our girls to believe this town is theirs, this city is theirs and this country is theirs, and it’s all open for them to dream and to achieve,” Johnston said.
“That’s what we start today in Denver.”
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