The 2023 YMA Charity Ball Brawl was back with a vengeance this year – with 16 registered teams, for a total of 128 participants, and over 150 in attendance from various animation studios across the Greater Toronto Area coming together to dodge it out for ultimate glory… and yummy snacks!

The annual Ball Brawl event, which has tournaments in both Toronto and Montreal, brings local studios together to raise funds for the Youth Media Alliance (YMA), a Canadian organization that seeks to enrich the lives of Canadian children and teens by helping improve the quality of the content created for them on all screen-based media.

This year's Toronto tournament was held on September 6th at Toronto Metropolitan University (Formerly Ryerson) Kerr Hall.

Our Brown Bag Films studio showed up in full force and ready to play with TWO blazing teams: The Brown Bag Films Brutes and The Brown Bag Films Ballers. 

The event kicked off with a thrilling opening ceremony, complete with a procession of bespoke team flags and chants. By the end of the tournament, our competing crews had both won and lost some intense matches, but it was our Brutes who made it through to the finals after some very epic and dodgy battles! After an incredibly close competition during an overtime elimination 2 minutes sprint, our Brutes came in second place, with the tournament win going to Spinmaster's Wrecking Brawlers. 

Though our dodgeball teams may have been defeated on the court, their spirits remained high knowing that true victory lies in the camaraderie of the game and the memories created while dodging and dashing! 

However, our teams were successful in snagging the first place win in the inaugural Flag Competiton – thanks to the craftmanship and creativity of our players. They were awarded with passes to the Escape Manor escape room. Check out their winning design below.

A huge thank you to the event organizers, the YMA, sponsors Sinking Ship Entertainment, and to the crew from Dodgeball Ontario and Dodgeball Toronto for hosting an awesome night of sport and entertainment. And shout out to the evening's sponsors Pizza Pizza, Creemore Brewer, Six Pints and Escape Manor. 

“A LOT of fun was had. Many laughs and high fives shared. And much Pizza and beverages were purchased for charity.” - Adrian Hansen

The annual YMA Ball Brawl is something our studio looks forward to every September. We love having the opportunity to participate in such a unique and thrilling teambuilding event, which brings our industry partners together to enjoy some fun competition while benefitting a great cause.

“People of the industry really took this seriously while being friendly with fellow colleagues of other companies. It is an epic dodgeball tournament featuring the best of the Canadian youth media industry battling for the 2023 title of YMA Dodgeball Champion. People made this a successful event while networking. A friendly competition mostly to have fun! The teams took on the challenge of the best Team Flag and Cheer as they were very creative and gave outstanding performances throughout the evening” says France A. Martin, Executive Director joined by J.J. Johnson, the YMA Co-President.

For more pics and info about the event check out the YMA website.