From the first time the pads hit the turf, CFK has stood for more than highlights. We forge student-athletes into community icons — champions in the classroom, on the gridiron, and beyond.
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Camps & Clinics
Invite-only CFK Invitational combines where Certified Kings lead drills, share film IQ, and open real doors for the next generation.
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Branded Gear
Custom CFK care packages on your doorstep — wristbands, tees, and more, tailored to your school colors. Rep the brand everywhere.
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Community First
We give back to the city that built us. Free youth programs, drives, and mentorship — because access shouldn't cost a family their last dollar.
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Classroom to Gridiron
CFK athletes are community icons — champions in the classroom first, then on the field. Grades and game-film go hand in hand.
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Digital Influence
Build your brand online. CFK equips athletes with the tools and knowledge to grow their presence and tell their story.
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The Brotherhood
100+ certified athletes across Chicago. One standard. One community. When you're CFK, you move with kings.
The Brotherhood
100+ Kings. One City.
Every athlete in the CFK brotherhood carries the same standard — certified on the field, certified in life. Chicago built this. We're taking it everywhere.
Chicago's own. Morgan Park legend. Linebacker. Community king. The man behind Certified Football Kings.
Current School
Ball State University
Cardinals · MAC Conference · SNIPER LB
Transfer From
Washington State
Enrolled Jan. 2025 · Spring practice
Position
Linebacker
5'11" · 195 lbs · 4 years eligibility remaining
Hometown
Chicago, Illinois
Morgan Park High School
247Sports
3-Star Prospect
#33 Safety · #15 Illinois · Class of 2025
On3 Ranking
#602 Nationally
#32 Athlete · #18 in Illinois
Total Offers
Nearly 20
Power programs to MAC schools
Instagram
@cfk_jojo1 ✓
Verified · 5,985+ Followers
Scout's Report
"He's a violent and instinctive football player. Born and raised to be a football player. Chicago toughness is on the way."
High School Career — Morgan Park
Four-year varsity starter under Coach Chris James. Senior year: led Morgan Park to a 10-2 record and Illinois State 5A quarterfinal with 92 tackles, 13 TFL, 6 sacks, and 2 INTs. Named to the News-Gazette All-State First Team and Chicago Public League All-Public League First Team. As a sophomore posted 111 tackles, 12 TFL, and 5 sacks, reaching the state quarterfinals for the third straight year.
Scholarship Offers
Held nearly 20 scholarship offers from programs across the country. Top 8 at one point included Georgia, Maryland, Missouri, Georgia Tech, Louisville, Boston College, Kansas, and Syracuse.
GeorgiaMarylandMissouriGeorgia TechLouisvilleBoston CollegeKansasSyracuseWisconsinUNLVToledoUConnMiami (OH)Western MichiganBall State
College Path
Signed with Washington State as one of their highest-rated pledges in the 2025 class. Enrolled early January 2025, participated in spring practice. Following a coaching staff change at WSU, entered the transfer portal and committed to Ball State on January 6, 2026 — bringing four full years of eligibility, projected to play the hybrid SNIPER linebacker position.
100+ certified athletes across Chicago. Click any king to visit their Instagram.
CFK · Internal Access
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For JoJo & Pops
Chicago to the World
This is the full plan — written plainly so you both understand exactly what we're building, how we're building it, and where it can go. CFK isn't an agency. It's a movement. And movements are built the same way Nike and Apple built theirs: start with the community, earn their trust, keep it real, and let the culture spread itself.
01
Phase 1
Lock the Foundation
⏱ Months 1–3
Before anything gets promoted, the business structure has to be solid. This phase is about getting the house in order so everything CFK does looks and feels legitimate.
JoJo — you already have the brand, the credibility, and the community. What we're doing here is packaging it so the world takes it seriously. Pops — this phase is behind the scenes, but it's what makes everything after it possible.
Set Up the Business Properly
1Register CFK as an LLC in Illinois. This protects both of you personally and is required before any sponsor will write a check. Cost is roughly $150–$200 one time.
2Open a business bank account under the LLC. Every dollar in and out of CFK runs through this account — camps, merch, donations, sponsorships, everything.
3Get the website live on a real domain (cfkcollective.com or similar). GitHub Pages makes hosting free. This becomes the official home base — the place that proves CFK is real.
Activate the Brotherhood
1Reach out to every CFK member — the 100+ athletes who already put CFK in their Instagram handles — and let them know the brand is going official. Get their buy-in. Their combined reach across Chicago is the brand's biggest asset.
2Create a group chat or Discord for the brotherhood. Keep everyone connected, informed, and moving together. A community that communicates is a community that grows.
3Start posting consistently on @official.cfk — at least 3 times per week. Highlight the athletes, the culture, the city. The content is free. The visibility it builds is not.
Build the Sponsor Approach
1Create a simple one-page document showing what CFK is: how many athletes, what events you run, what you do for the community. This is what you hand or email to any local business that shows interest.
2Three tiers: Title Sponsor ($5K–$10K/year, their logo on everything), Event Sponsor ($500–$2K per event), Community Partner (in-kind donations — food, supplies, gear). Start with the businesses you already know.
3The money sponsors bring in does not go into personal pockets — it funds the youth programs. That's the whole model. Sponsors want to be associated with a community that's doing real work, not one that's just asking for a check.
Cost This Phase
~$300–$500
LLC registration + domain name + basic tools. That's it.
Goal By End
CFK is official
LLC filed, site live, brotherhood activated, 2–3 sponsors in conversations
02
Phase 2
Build the Youth Pipeline
⏱ Months 4–8
This is the heart of CFK. Youth football from 6U to 17U. Affordable. Accessible. Run by real athletes who came from the same neighborhoods. This is what makes CFK different from every other camp out there.
Pops — you're the logistics engine here. JoJo — you're the face that makes these kids show up. When a high school linebacker with 20 scholarship offers coaches a 7-year-old, that kid remembers it for the rest of his life. That's the product. That's the movement.
Youth Football Camps — 6U to 17U Structure
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6U–8U
Little Kings
Fun, fundamentals, and love for the game. No pressure. Build the foundation.
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9U–11U
Rising Kings
Skill development, teamwork, and character building. Football meets life lessons.
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12U–14U
Next Kings
Position training, film sessions, and competitive development. Getting serious.
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15U–17U
Certified Kings
High school prep, recruiting education, and direct mentorship from CFK athletes.
1Keep camp fees affordable on purpose: $25–$50 for younger age groups (6U–11U), $50–$75 for older (12U–17U). A family with two kids should be able to send both without financial stress. This is not negotiable — it's the whole point.
2Use Chicago Park District fields. Most are free or nearly free for community programs. Book 8 weeks out. Start with one location and one weekend camp before scaling up.
3CFK athletes coach their age-appropriate groups. A 17-year-old CFK member coaching 12U. A college player like JoJo coaching the 15U–17U group. This mentorship chain is the most valuable thing CFK offers — and it costs nothing to build.
4Sponsors cover the gap between what families pay and what the camp costs to run. A local business putting up $1,000 to sponsor a camp for 40 kids at $25 each is a story that markets itself.
Free Community Programs
1Run a free flag football league for kids in the 6U–10U range. Completely free. Sponsored by local businesses who get their logo on the jerseys. This is your foundation — parents tell other parents, and the community grows organically.
2Annual back-to-school drive in late July or August. CFK athletes show up, give out backpacks and supplies, and spend time with the kids. Film it. Post it. This is what builds trust in the community — not ads, not promotions. Presence.
3Holiday drives (Thanksgiving, Christmas). Connect with local churches, schools, and community centers. CFK shows up every time. The community starts to see CFK as a permanent fixture in Chicago — not just a football camp that comes and goes.
First Merch Drop — Priced for the Community
1Use print-on-demand so there's no upfront inventory risk. Three items: hoodie ($40–$45), tee ($22–$25), hat ($25–$28). Priced so a Chicago parent can buy their kid a CFK hoodie without thinking twice about it. This is intentional — the gear should be everywhere, not just on people who can afford hype prices.
2Tie the drop to the Season Kickoff event. Every CFK member posts about it the same day. The combined reach of 100+ athletes posting simultaneously is more powerful than any paid ad campaign.
Camp Revenue (Year 1)
$8K–$25K
Low fees × high volume. Sponsors cover the rest. The mission is access, not margin.
Goal By End
CFK is trusted
Families know CFK, kids are coming back, community programs are running, merch is out
03
Phase 3
Own Chicago
⏱ Months 9–12
By now CFK has proof. Events ran. Camps ran. Kids came back. Families trust the brand. This is where you go bigger — and start building the infrastructure to take this beyond Chicago.
Think about what Nike was before it was Nike. It was a running community. A group of people who believed in something, who kept showing up, who built trust over time. CFK is at that same crossroads. The community is already there. Now we organize it into something that can outlast any one person.
CFK Awards Night — The Signature Event
1Rent a proper venue — a downtown Chicago ballroom or event space. Dress code: suits. This event should feel like the ESPYs for Chicago community athletes. The message it sends: CFK takes its people seriously.
2Award categories: Best Academic Athlete, Community Leader of the Year, Most Improved Player, Top Performer. Not just football awards — life awards. This reinforces that CFK is about more than the game.
3Table sales at $300–$500 each (seats 8–10). Keep it accessible. 20 tables = $6,000–$10,000. A Title Sponsor at $3,000–$5,000 covers the venue. Every dollar left over goes back into programs.
4Invite coaches, scouts, parents, and local media. Film it professionally. This footage becomes the single most powerful recruiting and sponsorship tool CFK has — it shows what the brand actually is.
Lock a Title Sponsor for Year 2
1By now you have data: how many kids attended camps, how many people came to events, social media numbers, press coverage. Put this into a 5-slide document. This is your pitch. Not a pitch for money — a pitch for partnership. There's a difference, and sponsors feel it.
2Target regional brands first: local car dealerships, hospitals, banks, insurance companies, and food brands all have community budgets. A $5,000–$10,000 Title Sponsor for a 100-athlete Chicago youth brand with proven events is completely reasonable.
3Pops — this is your lane. Email 15 companies. Have conversations with 5. Close 1 or 2. You only need one Title Sponsor to transform what CFK can do for kids in Year 2.
Build the Coaching Pipeline
1As kids who went through CFK camps get older, they become CFK coaches. A 10-year-old at your first 6U camp is a 16-year-old in 6 years — coaching the next 6U group. The pipeline feeds itself. This is exactly how Nike's running clubs worked in the early days.
2Create a CFK Coach Certification — a simple program that teaches the older athletes how to run drills, communicate with young kids, and represent the brand. This gives teenage CFK members a real credential and real responsibility.
3Pay them. Even $50–$100 per camp session. When young athletes get paid to give back to their community, they become ambassadors for life. That loyalty is worth more than any marketing budget.
Revenue This Phase
$25K–$60K
Awards Night + Title Sponsor + second merch drop + expanded camp schedule
Goal By End
CFK owns Chicago
Annual events locked, title sponsor secured, coaching pipeline started, national attention building
04
Phase 4
Chicago to the World
⏱ Year 2 & Beyond
Once Chicago is locked, the blueprint travels. The same model that works in Chicago works in any city with football culture, community pride, and young athletes looking for something real to be part of.
The Nike & Apple Lesson
Nike didn't start with a global brand. They started with runners in Oregon who believed in something. They gave those runners better shoes and better experiences than anyone else, kept the community tight, and let the word spread. Twenty years later, everyone wanted to be part of it.
Apple didn't start with the iPhone. They started with a computer in a garage for people who thought differently. They made products that felt personal, that felt like they belonged to you — not to a corporation.
CFK does the same thing with football. You give kids from Chicago a real experience — real coaches, real community, real care about who they are off the field — and those kids become CFK for life. They bring their younger siblings. They bring their friends. They move to Atlanta and start a CFK chapter. That's how a movement spreads.
How the City Expansion Works
1Find one athlete in another major city who has the same energy JoJo has — respected in their community, with a following, and who genuinely believes in what CFK stands for. They become the city's chapter leader. Not a franchise, not a business deal — a brotherhood extension.
2Give them the CFK playbook: how to recruit members, how to run camps, how to approach sponsors, how to run events. CFK HQ (JoJo and Pops) handles branding, national sponsor relationships, and merch. The chapter leader handles local execution. Same values everywhere.
3Each new city multiplies CFK's impact. More kids. More communities. More athletes who grow up with CFK values. The brand becomes more valuable — not because of deals or dollars, but because it's genuinely everywhere.
How JoJo's Career Amplifies Everything
1Every game JoJo plays at Ball State, every highlight posted, every interview done — it's CFK exposure. The better the career, the bigger the brand. They're not separate things. JoJo's athletic career is the brand's most powerful marketing tool, and it doesn't cost a dollar.
2A Division I athlete who runs a nonprofit youth football community is a story every local and national sports media outlet wants to tell. ESPN, The Athletic, Chicago Tribune, Sports Illustrated — they all cover this kind of story. You don't have to pitch them. Just keep doing the work and they'll find you.
3If JoJo goes on to play professionally, CFK has a pro athlete as its founder. That changes everything. National sponsors. Licensing conversations. A documentary. The groundwork you're laying today becomes worth exponentially more at that point.
Digital & Media — Telling the Story
1Launch a CFK YouTube channel. Document everything — camps, events, athlete profiles, community moments. Not polished corporate content. Real. Raw. Chicago. A series following multiple CFK athletes through their seasons builds an audience that no algorithm can take away from you.
2A CFK podcast with JoJo and Pops. Talk football, talk Chicago, talk life as a young athlete, talk what it means to be certified. Bring on CFK members. This builds direct connection with the audience — and sponsors pay to be on podcasts that people actually listen to.
3The documentary conversation. "100 athletes, one brand, one city" is exactly the kind of story ESPN+, Apple TV+, or Amazon Sports is buying right now. You don't need to be famous to pitch it. You need a great story and proof it's real. By Phase 4, you'll have both.
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Chicago
Home base · Year 1
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Atlanta
Chapter 2
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Houston
Chapter 3
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Los Angeles
Chapter 4
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Dallas
Chapter 5
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Global
The long game
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Nike
Started as a community of runners. Gave them something real. Let the culture build the brand. CFK does the same with football.
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Apple
Made products that felt personal, not corporate. Built loyalty by making people feel like they belonged to something. CFK's community-first model is exactly this.
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CFK
Starts with 100+ athletes in Chicago who already chose this brand. Scales by giving every kid who comes through a CFK camp a reason to stay for life.
The Bottom Line
What This Builds
JoJo and Pops — here's what CFK looks like if you stay the course, keep the community at the center, and execute the plan phase by phase.
Projected Scale — Year 3+
2,000+Youth Athletes Served
5–8Cities Active
$300K+Annual Revenue
∞Community Impact
A Note for JoJo & Pops — Read This
The most important thing to understand is this: the hardest part is already done. You have 100+ athletes who identified with CFK enough to put it in their Instagram handles. Nobody paid them to do that. Nobody made them do it. They did it because CFK means something to them. That kind of organic buy-in is what major companies spend millions trying to manufacture. You have it for free because it's real.
Every great movement — Nike, Apple, the Boys & Girls Club, Pop Warner football — started with someone who showed up consistently, kept it about the people, and refused to let money change the mission. The money follows the mission. Not the other way around.
This plan isn't about getting rich. It's about building something in Chicago that lasts — something kids grow up with, something parents trust, something the city is proud of. Do that right, and everything else follows. Phase 1 is simple. Start there. The rest will come.