The Players’ Tribune gave athletes direct control of their stories and became a dominant voice in sports media.
ChallengeSports media is dominated by pundits and talking heads; athletes’ own voices are filtered or absent. A group of former ESPN veterans saw this gap for a platform where players could tell their stories directly, with editorial guidance but without the traditional media filter. To succeed, this startup needed a brand and digital experience that treated athletes as both authors and subjects, showcasing their voices, personalities, and stories with the same weight as their on-field careers.
ActionWorking with the founding team (including Derek Jeter, whose retirement essay launched the site), we built the Players’ Tribune brand and digital platform from scratch. The identity emphasized athlete ownership, with a typographic lockup that visually foregrounded “Tribune” while letting “Players” subtly overlay the content—symbolizing transparency and authorship. The editorial site design prioritized photography and story richness, with an endlessly scrollable front page and clear navigation by sport and story type (long-form essays, photo features, open letters). We created a fully responsive experience to highlight high-quality assets across devices and designed space for recurring editorial series like Letter to My Younger Self. The result was a system that elevated both the athlete’s voice and the editorial craft behind it.
ResultThe Players’ Tribune quickly became a go-to platform for athlete storytelling. Icons like Derek Jeter, Kobe Bryant, Tiger Woods, Deion Sanders, Ronaldinho, and many others have used it to connect directly with fans. Readership has grown steadily over the years, and nearly a decade later the platform remains a respected, influential voice in sports media. It proved that giving athletes control of their narratives could succeed editorially and commercially, filling a void that traditional sports outlets had overlooked.
