SVG Sit-Down: Team Whistle's Joe Caporoso on Building World Cup Content Around Fans, Culture, IRL Experiences

DAZN-owned digital-media company launches three fan-first series leaning into creators, lifestyle storytelling, the energy surrounding soccer across North America

As the FIFA World Cup begins in Canada, Mexico, and the U.S., content creation surrounding the tournament is set to reach a fever pitch. Among digital-first brands built around access, creators, and fan culture, few are better positioned to capitalize on the moment than Team Whistle.

The DAZN-owned media company has unveiled a three-series slate of World Cup content designed to tap into the culture, community, personalities, and fan experiences surrounding the tournament. The rollout includes Boots Across America, an eight-episode travel series hosted by soccer creator OussiFooty, presented in partnership with JD Sports; Supporters Section, a fan-driven vodcast built around the conversations and viral moments shaping the tournament in real time, presented in partnership with Lowe's and Snickers; and Homegrown: Investing in Family, an all-access series presented by Robinhood, following soccer player DeAndre Yedlin and his family as he experiences the World Cup as a fan.

All three series will be distributed across Team Whistle's YouTube channel and social platforms, as well as the DAZN app. For Team Whistle, the slate reflects a broader strategic push: pairing original social-first content with creator activations, brand partnerships, and in-person fan experiences at sports tentpole events.

SVG sat down with Team Whistle President Joe Caporoso to discuss the company's World Cup plans, how it approaches creator and athlete-led programming, why IRL experiences have become a growing part of its business, and how DAZN's global scale has helped shape its next chapter.

What is Team Whistle's approach to the World Cup this summer?

We have a pretty ambitious summer upcoming, between a mix of original content and another event. We're doing a very concentrated focus on World Cup over the summer. We've anticipated this for a while. It's obviously a unique opportunity with it in the U.S., and it plays very well to the style of content that we make. And there are some more opportunities that we have now that we're part of DAZN.

We're launching a community-driven sports-storytelling g ecosystem with a slate of original content throughout the summer, in-person experiences, and doing broader creator initiatives aimed at the evolving fan and keeping them engaged.

Boots Across America is hosted by OussiFooty, who's a soccer influencer we've worked with a lot. He'll be going to eight different cities that are hosting games and showing what's going on in those cities around the games -focused not just on the field action but more on celebrity-like soccer fans and what's going on in the different neighborhoods and culturally. We're doing that in partnership with JD Sports.

Supporters Section is hosted by a few different influencers we've worked with, including Duda and Adi. We worked with them a lot around Club World Cup. That's more of a straightforward in-studio podcast that will talk about some of the different storylines - a little more on-the-nose soccer analysis compared to the other one, which is more lifestyle analysis. We're partnering with Lowe's and Snickers on that one.

Last but not least, we're working with DeAndre Yedlin and his family. It's his first World Cup experience it as a fan versus being a player in the action. We document what he's up to, what his lifestyle is like now that he isn't a full-time player anymore, and how he's going to go about consuming this tournament.

Team Whistle's Joe Caporoso: This rollout is designed to meet fans where they are, highlighting the culture surrounding the tournament in an authentic and accessible way. Why does this tournament fit Team Whistle's content style?

You get only so many at-bats where the World Cup is in your backyard. For us, as a predominantly U.S.-based company, we wanted to build on that and take advantage of it.

It's so much more than a tournament. It's about the people, the energy, and the shared experiences that bring fans together. This rollout is designed to meet fans where they are, highlighting the culture surrounding the tournament in an authentic and accessible way.

Team Whistle works with creators, current athletes, former athletes, and athlete families. How different are those relationships?

They are all a bit unique. If someone's coming at this and they think of themselves as a creator first and they've been a creator their whole life, they're a little more savvy about the overall space and know more what to ask for. They're much more prescriptive in terms of how you're going to work with them.

Athletes evolving into this place and, in some ways, doing it as a side hustle is a little more unique because you might be a very famous athlete but, for your creator or influencer work, your career is just starting out.

None are harder or easier to work with. They just come with different expectations. Sometimes, athletes need almost a little more coaching in terms of what you're looking for: Hey, you're going to be doing a content capture. We're going to need this, this, and this or You're going to host or appear in this show for us. We're going to need you to do this, this, and this.

More broadly, for the agency work that we do, if you're working with an athlete or a team or a league or a federation, it's about ensuring that, in spite of all the games and the action going on, they're going to stick to the consistency they need as a creator in terms of content output and marketing the work they're doing on social overall.

With so much behind-the-scenes sports content in the market, how

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