How Gary Peyton II seeks to uplift the skateboarding community

Even if he can’t hit the ollie or the kickflip right, Gary Payton II has always had an affinity for skateboarding. Whether it was spending hours on his video game console grinding out the Tony Hawk Pro Skater, or riding to the skate park with his high school buddies, skateboarding always called out to the NBA champion.

“Not everyone gets along in the world of basketball and football. The skate community, they’re together,” Payton told ClutchPoints.

“They don’t care where you’re from. It’s not a court thing. It’s not a city thing. If you skate, they’ll always welcome you and want you to come skate… The skateboarding culture is just different. It’s really a community, a unit. They don’t care about anything, but each other’s skating and landing tricks.”

It’s the same spirit of uplifting those in the skate community that has fueled it Golden State Warriors veteran venture into sports business and entertainment.

Peyton is the co-founder of the Skateboarding Association (SBA), a new equal pay professional skateboarding league based in Big Bear, California, with the intention of providing careers for skaters and compensating them for their talents. A venture several years in the making, it’s the next step in Peyton’s journey as he looks to use his platform to support causes he cares about.

“I’m growing as a person, a businessman and an athlete – just to combine both and be able to do things this good – and to be a part of dope stuff that you know is going to change the face of the sport is unique. I’m very grateful to be a part of it.”

Peyton’s motivation behind the SBA

Peyton’s motivation behind starting a league like the SBA is simple. A sentiment rooted in his own journey and experience as a professional athlete.

“The feeling of being an athlete in demand,” Peyton told ClutchPoints. “You work so hard at your craft, you want to be appreciated.”

Payton, an NBA journeyman who was on the fringes of the league before finding his way to the Warriors, understands the trials and tribulations of being an underrated professional athlete.

Before he became a key piece in the Dubs’ 2022 title racePayton oscillated back and forth between non-guaranteed contracts and the NBA G-League, suiting up for five different franchises and their developmental affiliates from 2016 to 2021. Those years made Payton feel underrated and underappreciated, which helps him empathize with these pros.

“Most of all these skaters came out of the mud from their trip,” Peyton said. “They’ve had falls, they’ve had broken bones or whatnot. And just, the persistence and just continuing to do what they love – that’s one of those things that I can definitely relate to.”

Unlike skate competitions that pay athletes based on how they finish, the SBA plans to pay skaters who have signed a league contract with salaries in the five- to six-figure range. Athletes will be entitled to bonuses and will receive a share of the revenue from merchandise sales.

“I think building this platform and creating a league is going to help a lot of skaters come out and get their own space and just let them grow as people. I think if you do that naturally, they’ll grow as a skater. And traveling from wherever they are is going to mean a lot more.”

How the SBA will work

With his business partners and co-founders, Royce Campbell and Sheldon Lewis, Peyton and the SBA aim to address the lack of support for elite athletes in the sport by expanding the platform. They seek to do this by reconfiguring the business models of major skateboarding sports leagues.

“We want people to be able to experience the SBA the same way they experience an NBA game or an NFL game, even down to the length,” Campbell told ClutchPoints. “From that, it’s also going to enable some of the bigger brands that are spending more of their marketing dollars within the space, which will then just elevate the space as a whole.”

And like in the major leagues, competition in the SBA will be team-based in a season-long format.

The The SBA will have six teams with six skaters each— three women and three men – plus coaches and reserves, will compete over 10 weeks in the summer of 2026. The SBA has 80% of the 46 total skaters signed for the inaugural season. And the the league has skateboarding icons Manny Santiago, Robert Neal, Samaria Brevard, Pamela Rosa and Jamie Reyes are part of the lineup that will serve as owners of each of these teams along with Peyton in the league’s inaugural season.

“It’s going to be a mix of your top pros and pros who are extremely talented but haven’t gotten the opportunity to be featured the way some of their contemporaries have,” Lewis told ClutchPoints.

“We’re going to grab a handful of young skaters to come in and make a name for themselves, and we’re going to do it at a level where when the lights come on, you feel like you’re watching the NBA draft or the NFL draft.”

Payton’s vision for the SBA

The SBA hopes that the structure of the league and the skateboarding pros they have attracted will convince brands and sponsors to get involved and support the platform they are trying to build.

The SBA plans to broadcast its inaugural season on YouTube. But Campbell also shared with ClutchPoints that SBA is talking to multiple streaming platforms to accommodate SBA.

“We’re really betting on ourselves through this first model in the first season to then package that to position us for a long-term, bigger vision with the network.”

The SBA will conduct its six-team draft in the spring of 2026, with the season expected to begin soon after the summer. According to Sportico, the venture is funded for two full seasons but continues to seek more brands, sponsors and investors to contribute to the league. The alternative sports league business is a difficult one to navigate, as other startup leagues that have attempted similar ventures to the SBA have not always succeeded.

Regardless of the potential challenges, the trio of co-founders have faith in themselves and each other to shape the league into whatever they envision.

“When you’re able to be in business with people you consider family, it just makes it so much better for everybody. Top to bottom,” Lewis said. “That love and energy we have, bonded between the three of us, translates into what we’re building with SBA.”

For Peyton, the SBA’s vision at the end of the day is to create a league that showcases the athletes who ride skate culture.

“To me personally, more than anything, it just means that they have a platform to see themselves and show their talent that they have worked for all their lives.