--- title: Gabi Butler: TIME100 Most Influential People in Sports 2026 description: Find out why Gabi Butler was selected for TIME‘s 2026 list of the most influential people in sports. canonical: https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/gabi-butler/ article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2026-06-09T12:00:47.895Z article:modified_time: 2026-06-09T12:00:47.996Z article:section: Sports og:title: TIME100 Most Influential People in Sports 2026: Gabi Butler og:description: Find out why Gabi Butler is on the list og:url: https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/gabi-butler/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt38f295f39bd8cc3f/6a209d51d3d558432c568367/T100SPORTS-2026-Web-Gabi-Butler.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y24.82 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME100 Most Influential People in Sports 2026: Gabi Butler og:type: article twitter:card: summary twitter:title: TIME100 Most Influential People in Sports 2026: Gabi Butler twitter:description: Find out why Gabi Butler is on the list twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt38f295f39bd8cc3f/6a209d51d3d558432c568367/T100SPORTS-2026-Web-Gabi-Butler.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y24.82 --- Jun 09, 2026 # Gabi Butler by [Avery Stone](https://time.com/author/avery-stone/) ## Avery Stone Senior Editor  Varsity Spirit Gabi Butler is the face of American competitive cheerleading. Long a star within that world, she entered the broader cultural zeitgeist in 2020 as a breakout cast member of [_Cheer_](https://time.com/6138443/cheer-season-2-what-to-know/), Greg Whiteley’s Netflix docuseries following her north-central Texas junior-college team, Navarro College, on its road to the National Cheerleaders Association championship. Now 28, Butler—who won two national titles with Navarro—is investing in the sport’s future, competing in the Pro Cheer League (PCL), the country’s first professional cheerleading league, which debuted with four teams in January. Though Butler’s team, the Miami Metal, was defeated by the Dallas Drive on a tiebreaker in the PCL championship, her impact on the league is just beginning, particularly as it adds two more teams ahead of its second season. Varsity Spirit, the cheerleading giant and the PCL’s owner and operator, tapped Butler as its lead brand ambassador in February. With a slate of youth clinics on the books this summer and more than 6 million followers across TikTok and Instagram, the floor is hers. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/gabi-butler/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/gabi-butler/"},"headline":"Gabi Butler","datePublished":"2026-06-09T12:00:47.895Z","dateModified":"2026-06-09T12:00:47.996Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/gabi-butler/","keywords":["list","franchise"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt38f295f39bd8cc3f/6a209d51d3d558432c568367/T100SPORTS-2026-Web-Gabi-Butler.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y24.82&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Avery Stone","jobTitle":"Senior Editor","url":"https://time.com/author/avery-stone/"}],"creator":"Avery Stone","articleSection":"Sports","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt38f295f39bd8cc3f/6a209d51d3d558432c568367/T100SPORTS-2026-Web-Gabi-Butler.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y24.82&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/sports/","name":"Sports"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/gabi-butler/","name":"Gabi Butler"}}]}] ```