• Sports-themed events are great fundraisers.softball,sports image by Neil Denize from Fotolia.com
  
  Sports-themed fundraising raffles can be a great way to raise money for your school, club or sports team. Sports fans are legion throughout the United States, and catering to their interests can have your organization raking in the cash by selling raffle tickets. One of the advantages of a sports-themed raffle is the sheer number of ways you can approach the idea.
  
  

Baskets

• Raffling off a sports-themed basket appeals to a broad range of sports fans. In the basket you can put equipment, cards, novelties and other inexpensive sports-themed items. The basket has the advantage of allowing you to put many small items together to make a worthwhile prize as a whole. You can represent common sports like baseball and basketball alongside less popular sports like lacrosse, action sports like skateboarding and more exotic fare like jai alai.
  
  

Memorabilia

• Sports memorabilia offers an opportunity to give away something unique. Autographed items such as baseballs and sports trading cards are just two options for sports memorabilia raffle items. A number of companies on the Internet specialize in selling sports memorabilia. No matter what sport you choose to focus on, there is almost certainly something on the market that will make an attractive prize at your organization's sports-themed raffle.
  
  

Equipment

• Top quality equipment is worth considering if your budget can handle it. A set of top-of-the-line golf clubs appeals to any golfer when he can purchase a chance to own it for a mere dollar (or five). Other sports equipment that will catch the eye of ticket buyers includes top-end tennis rackets and bicycles. Less expensive but equally impressive equipment such as bike helmets or a year's supply of golf balls can round out the raffle as secondary prizes.
  
  

Outings

• Raffling off outings appeals to those whose interest in sports is doing, not watching. Your sporty raffle can offer prizes such as a day of golf at a swank country club, a membership to a gym or rock-climbing facility, a gift certificate to a batting cage or any number of other prizes that get the winner involved in her favorite sport.
  
  

Tickets

• For those who live in markets with sports teams, tickets to sporting events will move raffle tickets for your organization. You don't necessarily have to raffle off tickets to a big-time sporting event sponsored by the NFL or Major League Baseball. Sports fans loyal to their hometown teams will throw down the cost of a raffle ticket for the chance to take their families out for a night of minor league baseball or college sports.