Karina Martinez & Jennifer Yepez-Blundell Talk Latina Representation in Sports

The sports world can often feel like a men-only industry, and it’s can often feel unwelcoming especially for Latinas and women of color in general. As fans, we may have our favorite sports teams like The Lakers, The Dodgers, or The Mets, but many of us have been conditioned not to talk about or show that passion in public for fear of being unmasked as a “fake fan” by a man. As athletes, Latinas are not always supported or respected in such a male-dominated field, often not receiving the same marketing, sponsorships, or attendance support that male sports do. And Latinas are often not invited enough into the corporate sector of the industry as board members, team owners, or coaches, which would allow women to reclaim the narrative of what it means to be a Latina in sports.This divide is apparent in schools too, not just in professional sports. In 2019, a study found that while 54.6 percent of high school girls played on at least one sports team, only 48.4 percent of their Latina peers did the same. They also found that coaches were more likely to be biased against girls, believing that Latinas came from families who failed to see the value of sports and that girls in general were physically weaker than boys. It’s led to a sports culture that systematically gatekeeps so that BIPOC women are often not even considered for positions of power are acknowledged for their contributions to sports in the same way as men.

That’s where former athletes and entrepreneurs Karina Martinez and Jennifer Yepez-Blundell come in. Since 2023, they have been the co-founders of DRAFTED, the first Latina-owned media company that centers Latina sports fans and celebrates the intersection between the Latinx community and the sports world. They are passionate about seeing Latinas on and off the field in every aspect of the industry, so that we might be able to reclaim our power on the field.

“I love sports because there aren’t a lot of things that bring people together,” Martinez tells HipLatina. “But there’s an unbiased thing that happens when you’re gathered around the screen. Not only are we all watching our favorite sport, but we’re also seeing an embodiment of our culture, a representation of who we are in the world, and a positive narrative about our people and our stories. There’s something really beautiful about that.”

“I love the team aspect and what you can learn about not only yourself but how to work with others,” Yepez-Blundell adds. “Sports help develop leadership skills and self-confidence, but it’s not until now being older and reflecting back that I can actually see and pinpoint pieces in my life where, because of sports, I learned valuable lessons and trusting myself, making space for others, and never giving up on myself.”

Both women cultivated a love for sports from a young age and from their respective corners of the world. Born in Asuncion, Paraguay, Martinez was later adopted by Cuban immigrants and raised in Southern California where she took on her dad’s love of soccer and even played a few sports of her own. While she didn’t get to the level of a professional, playing sports saved her as a young queer kid who came out when she was 16. It was not only good for her physically; mentally, the sports world became her safe haven.

“Years ago, coming out wasn’t as widely accepted as it is now, so being on a sports team gave me the opportunity to be like everybody else for an hour and made me forget about this internal battle I was facing,” she explains.

Yepez-Blundell, meanwhile, started playing softball when she was seven years old and ended up getting recruited by a Division II school. As a kid, going to games was a family affair, with her dad often serving the role of coach or assistant coach and her mom always bringing the snacks for the team. But just a few weeks after sophomore year, she found that her joy for the game had faded, mostly because of the toxic environment she found herself in, and decide to retire from softball entirely.

But for both women, their love for sports never dissipated. In fact, what they decided to do next led them to the next chapter of their lives and to DRAFTED.

In 2019, Martinez founded her own public relations agency called The Avana House, where she blended together her love of storytelling and cultural representation in media. In the five years that she ran the start-up, she was able to directly impact the messaging of a market that doesn’t value or reflect the Latinx community as consumers. Through her work, she has supported other Latinx entrepreneurs in their product vision and focused on storytelling as a marketing tool. This was incredibly important to her as someone who has personally seen many Latinx-focused campaigns fail.

“We have seen time and time again how big companies innovate a new product or service or offering for our people and how it immediately misses the mark because you can tell right off the bat that it was not a person of Latinx identity sitting in that room when it came to fruition. Or that there was a lack of research and understanding of our cultural nuances. That becomes more harmful than helpful because it only aids stereotypes.”

Meanwhile, for many years, Yepez-Blundell worked in film and TV production as a producer, analyst, and marketing researcher, then shifting to roles in cultural strategy and consulting for multiple companies. This included many organizations in corporate America, all focusing on reaching and expanding the power of Latinx audiences in the consumer market.

Independently without knowing each other, they each found a passion and love for authentic Latinx representation in media but they wouldn’t meet until the pandemic hit. They met in an online community for entrepreneurs and hit it off after having a virtual coffee. But it wouldn’t be until 2023 that Yepez-Blundell finally received the phone call from Martinez asking if she wanted to help her launch a media company for Latina sports fans.

“I don’t even think she finished the sentence before I said yes!” Yepez-Blundell says. “The sports layer was a no-brainer with us being both former athletes and sports fans, as well as my sports marketing background. We knew that this was an area we wanted to reshape.”

What was most interesting during this period was both of them were looking for research to support their brainstorming process, including statistics and facts about Latina sports fans. But again and again, they came up empty because no research had been done in this area. That, in addition with the knowledge that there were so many Latina sports fans out there despite their lack of visibility in media, including themselves and their family members, only fueled them more.

“Think about when you watch a football commercial. What are the women doing? They’re bringing the chips. They’re serving the beer,” Martinez says. “And if you google Latina sports fan, it will likely autocorrect it to Latino and if you go to Google Images, you’re likely going to see half naked women. More power to you if that’s what you want to do at a game but that is a small percentage of who we are as fans. We’re moms, we’re sisters, we’re tias, we’re abuelas who show up and  have regular bodies and put on our favorite jerseys.”

Of course, the reality is there is no one person to blame for the misogyny and racism of the sports world. Everyone is complicit in playing a role, from the corporations to the coaches to the media and broadcasting network. The rise of DRAFTED fills that void when it comes to representation and counters the narrative that all women in sports are good for is following the rules that men have set out for them, as opposed to creating their own.

“Our world was intentionally built to exclude women, particularly women of color, and the sports ecosystem is not immune to this,” Yepez-Blundell explains. “We see it across the entire ecosystem: lower participation rates of young girls in sports, particularly black and brown girls who drop out of sports at a faster rate than any other cohort, which then affects the high school and collegiate pipelines. There’s the underfunding of women’s sports programming at all levels, as well as the lack of representation in decision-making offices and seats within commercial partners and sports governing bodies.”

Currently, DRAFTED lives primarily on Instagram where they post relevant content for the Latina community, highlighting Latinas in a variety of sports including soccer, gymnastics, wrestling, and more. They also cover important newsworthy moments from games all over the world, most recently the 2024 Paris Olympics where we saw a lot of new ground being broken by professional Latina athletes. They celebrate Latinas off the field too, including those who get positions of power, authority, and impact in the corporate sector of the sports industry. They highlight stories that would otherwise be – and are – ignored by the mainstream media solely because of who we are and what we look like. But because of their valuable work, Latinas in sports are finally being seen and heard.

Looking ahead, Martinez and Yepez-Blundell have plenty of developments and plans for DRAFTED in the works. Within the next few weeks, they will be releasing a research paper about Latina sports fandoms: how and what motivates Latina fans to buy team merchandise, their attendance numbers at sports games, how they prefer to consume sports-related content, and so much more. This study will be a groundbreaking look into Latinas as an untapped consumer market in the industry, providing a road map for changes that can be implemented in the marketing and foundational structure of sports.

“Data is going to be a key part of our business growth because if you’re going to change a narrative, you also have to understand what motivates them,” Martinez says. “We’re excited to be leaders in that space and being able to provide really valuable research and insights so that brands have a toolkit to understand what excites our audience and invest their dollars into us.”

They will also be launching a membership-style community platform that will provide users access to opportunities for jobs, fellowships, mentorships, and scholarships in the industry. Not only will they be able to have these resources regardless of whatever barriers have been set in front of them, but they will also be able to communicate and network with one another. As opposed to men who network on golf greens or exclusive clubs, DRAFTED’s platform will have the potential to connect a user with a junior marketer at ESPN or other companies. Even for those who don’t think of themselves as sports fans, the duo is doing the work of making sports more accessible to Latinas everywhere, even if means just going out to a park to watch a local soccer game.

As both women know, being able to watch an athlete who loves their sport can be life-changing and be surprisingly more exciting to watch than some might realize. Ultimately, the hope is that, much like the sports themselves, DRAFTED can be a safe place for Latinas, not only for the sports fans but also the athletes who play them and those who want to pursue a professional, behind-the-scenes career. Yepez-Blundell notes:

“For so long, so many of us have had to experience sports through the lens of the others, and it’s about damn time that changes. I hope that our community, who have often felt ignored, feel seen, and that we can bring a different, deeper connection with sports.”