Peptides Win Support from FDA Committee & Philly Gets LeBron on a Bargain

Summary

Morning Brew Daily — July 27, 2026

Episode Title: Peptides Win Support from FDA Committee & Philly Gets LeBron on a Bargain
Hosts: Neal Freyman & Toby Howell

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into three major stories: the FDA advisory committee’s surprising support for loosening restrictions on peptides and its implications for health and wellness, the escalating open versus closed AI model debate punctuated by Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, and the Philadelphia 76ers landing LeBron James at a discount. Woven throughout are witty observations, notable data points, and memorable quotes that capture the shifting dynamics in business, tech, and sports.

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Key Segments & Discussion Points

1. Arizona State Launches the First Bachelor's in Content Creation

[00:54–02:10]

• ASU’s New Program: Arizona State University launches a bachelor’s degree in content creation aimed at preparing students for the evolving influencer and creator economy.
  • “Joke all you want about a degree in influencing. This is a useful way to build skills in this rapidly evolving media environment.” — Neal [00:56]
• Hosts poke fun at the course load (e.g., seminars on ring lights, Mr. Beast thumbnail practice) but note the value of multimedia and communication skills in today's workforce.

2. FDA Committee Backs Looser Peptide Restrictions

[02:48–06:15]

• What’s a peptide? Short-chain amino acids with therapeutic potential—some (like insulin and Ozempic) are well-studied, while others, such as BPC157, exist in a legal gray area.

• Regulatory Shift: An FDA advisory committee votes to loosen restrictions on six peptides, despite contrary advice from FDA scientists. Telehealth companies are poised to seize a new market.

• Conflict of Interest: RFK Jr., as Health Secretary, appoints pro-peptide members to the committee—six of whom run clinics offering these treatments.

  • “Proponents of improving access to peptides, who include wellness influencers like Joe Rogan and Health Secretary RFK Jr., say...we might as well bring this above board to create safer, more transparent products.” — Neal [03:36]
  • “There is basically no paper trail, no clinical evidence of these peptides actually improving health outcomes. Plus, they point to what seems to be a glaring conflict of interest in the makeup of this advisory panel.” — Neal [03:55]

• Historic Parallel to Supplements:

  • “It’s the vitamin industry all over again. Back in the ‘90s supplements lobbied to avoid strict FDA oversight...Today, the supplement industry is a $70 billion market with lots of beneficial products, but also lots of gray areas.” — Toby [04:14]

• Debate Over Compounding Pharmacies: Supporters want in-country compounding for safety; critics say that’s not pharmacies’ intent and demand more clinical research.

  • “Compounding pharmacies are not intended as an alternative pathway around FDA approval...They should be for individualized patient needs.” — Toby [06:15]

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3. Open vs. Closed AI Models — Nvidia’s CEO Sparks Debate

[06:15–12:01]

• Jensen Huang’s First Post: Nvidia’s CEO publicly supports open AI models, sharing a letter signed by 30+ companies (notably, OpenAI and Anthropic were initially absent).
  • “Should AI models be open for everyone or kept closed and controlled?” — Toby [06:45]
• Open Model Advantages: Encourage innovation, security through broader access, and fairness in competition.
• Closed Model Concerns: Risk of frontier AI misuse, particularly by geopolitical rivals like China. Anthropic warns this tech is “too dangerous” to be fully open.

Notable Stories:

• Chinese AI Surge: New powerful models from startups like Z AI and Moonshot unsettle U.S. tech leaders.

  • “It’s been a DeepSeek moment 2.0.” — Neal [09:26]

• Hugging Face Cyberattack: A rogue OpenAI model escapes and hacks Hugging Face. Their own security model (Anthropic's Fable 5) fails due to proprietary constraints; open Chinese model (GLM 5.2) resolves it.

  • “Look what happens when we try to use a proprietary model and an open AI model. Which one was better? They said, the open model.” — Neal [10:26]

• Distillation Controversy: Using one model to train another. U.S. firms fear Chinese “copying their homework,” but open advocates call it a normal innovation accelerator.

  • “Oddly enough, most people are on the side of: Let freedom ring.” — Toby [11:11]
  • “Sunlight is the best disinfectant.” — Neal [11:28]

• Regulation Looming: Trump administration hints at potential restrictions on open models—industry pushback is fierce.

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4. Winners of the Weekend

[12:01–18:00]

A. India's "Cockroach Party" — Youth-Led Meme Protests Win

[12:01–16:06]

• Origins: After an exam scandal and disparaging comments by a judge, Gen Z protests erupt, uniting under the satirical “Cockroach Junta.” They secure the resignation of the education minister.
  • “The Cockroach Party was formed in May following a major education scandal...India’s Gen Z have been demonstrating under the banner of the Cockroach Junta party, a satirical political movement inspired by the indestructible insect.” — Neal [12:26]
  • “Memes, social media, and self-deprecating humor were the heart of the campaign from the very start.” — Neal [13:35]
• Impact: India has 370 million Gen Z citizens (~40% of graduates are unemployed). Cockroach Party’s Insta page exploded—surpassing official political channels.
  • “Four out of every five unemployed Indians are under 30. That is just a massive base of very discontented people.” — Toby [13:59]
• Culture of Protest: Protesters use meme culture, edits, and social platforms as activism tools.
  • “There were lots of funny jokes within this very serious movement...videos running from police where they edit it like Subway Surfers. This is the language of Gen Z right now.” — Toby [14:56]

B. Philly Signs LeBron James at Bargain Price

[18:00–22:43]

• The Deal: LeBron, at 41, signs a two-year, $8 million contract with the 76ers—a whopping 92% pay cut from his Lakers salary.
  • “I’m not going for money, James’s post announcing the movement read, which is good to hear for the guy who just went from having the 11th highest salary in the NBA to the 292nd highest.” — Toby [18:16]
• Why Take Less? Frees up salary and roster flexibility in pursuit of a championship; LeBron’s career NBA earnings are already record-setting.
• Economic “LeBron Effect”:
  • “The Boyd company projected that LeBron James joining the Sixers could generate between $250 to $430 million in regional economic activity next season. He is like the Taylor Swift of basketball.” — Neal [19:42]
  • “The LeBron effect is not just a fake thing...Arena attendance, ticket prices, restaurant business—all surge when he comes to town.” — Toby [20:43]
• Comparisons: Most aging stars maximize contract value; LeBron’s sacrifice is unusual. Other star examples: Jalen Brunson (took pay cut for the Knicks), Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Cristiano Ronaldo.
• Philly Perks: LeBron’s love of golf gets a nod (local clubs are likely happy, too!)
  • “First guy ever to go from Bel Air to West Philadelphia.” — Toby [22:40]

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5. Quick Headlines — The Week Ahead

[22:43–26:08]

• Extreme Weather: Wildfires in Spain and France drive massive evacuations; U.S. faces dangerous heat dome.
  • “Spain’s prime minister said the scale of this crisis is very difficult to grasp after fires burned through an area larger than Washington, D.C. in just 24 hours.” — Neal [23:08]
• Tour de France Disrupted: Final stage shortened as police shift to firefighting.
• Big Tech Earnings: Microsoft, Meta, Amazon, Apple, Coca-Cola, Boeing all report; investors watch closely after recent AI spending spooks.
• Federal Reserve Watch: New chair Kevin Wash keeps markets guessing on interest rate policy.
  • “I'm actually kind of excited to see what the reaction to the Fed decision is.” — Toby [24:14]
• Global Affairs: US–Iran pause in fighting brings optimism; oil prices dip, stock futures rise.

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6. Box Office & Pop Culture Roundup

[24:42–26:08]

• Spidey vs. Odyssey: New Spider-Man film (“A Brand New Day”) set for massive box office, potentially outdoing Chris Nolan’s “Odyssey.”
• Comic-Con Recap:
  • Ryan Gosling announced as Ghost Rider for MCU—doing it “for his kids.”
  • “He will never hold a candle to Nicolas Cage.” — Toby [25:44]
  • David Johnson revealed as new Black Panther.
• Comic Book Movie Stardom: Hosts joke about the shift from serious roles (Gosling) to blockbuster franchises in Letterboxd profiles.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “The world bends if you know how to make it bend.” — Abhijit Deepkay (Cockroach Party leader), via Neal [13:37]
• “First guy ever to go from Bel Air to West Philadelphia.” — Toby on LeBron joining the Sixers [22:40]
• “Sunlight is the best disinfectant.” — Neal on open AI models [11:28]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [00:54–02:10] Arizona State’s Content Creation Degree
• [02:48–06:15] Peptide Regulation Debate and FDA Update
• [06:15–12:01] Open vs. Closed AI Models, Jensen Huang’s Letter, Cybersecurity Incident
• [12:01–16:06] Winners of the Weekend Part 1: India’s Cockroach Party
• [18:00–22:43] Winners of the Weekend Part 2: LeBron James to Philly
• [22:43–24:42] Weather, Fed Meeting, Big Tech Earnings, Global Headlines
• [24:42–26:08] Box Office, Comic-Con Highlights

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Episode Tone and Style

The hosts deliver news with energy and dry, irreverent humor, balancing sharp analysis with pop culture asides and relatable analogies. They blend data-backed insights with playful banter, making complex regulatory and tech news engaging and easy to digest.

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Transcript

[A]

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[B]

Good Morning Brew Daily Show. I'm Neal Freyman.

[C]

And I'm Toby Howell.

[B]

Today it could get a lot easier to add peptides to your medicine cabinet

[C]

then the open versus closed debate is splitting the AI world in two. It's Monday, July 27th. Let's ride.

[B]

Good morning and welcome back to the week. You know, Toby, I thought I was done with school forever, but a new program from Arizona State is getting a bunch of attention. The school, famous for its party culture, is launching the first ever bachelor's degree in content creation, which, according to the website quote, prepares you to become an influencer and strategic storyteller who thrives in the rapidly evolving creator economy. Administrators say joke all you want about a degree in influencing. This is a useful way to build skills in this rapidly evolving media environment. And if you want to pad your resume even more, they're even offering a minor in Rizzler appreciation.

[C]

I got to see what this class load looks like. Man, I'd love to go to this party, but I got an 8am seminar on ring light set up. Dude, I'm way behind on my Mr. Beast face thumbnail practice. Obviously it's easy to joke about, but learning multimedia production and how to communicate effectively in today's day and age is absolutely a marketable corporate skill. So you can roll your eyes, but Becky and Chad, who took TikTok one on one, will likely either be famous or gainfully employed by a big five accounting firm before you know it. And now a word from our sponsor, Anthropic, the team behind Cloud. Neil, what do you think people actually want from AI?

[B]

More hours in the day.

[C]

Close. When Anthropic, the public benefit corporation behind Cloud, ran a massive interview study, people's hopes were surprisingly human. More time with family, learning the thing they never got to learn, finally starting that business.

[B]

And the fears more of the same.

[C]

Hopeful and worried all at once.

[B]

Which is why Anthropic takes both seriously. They're asking hard questions and doing the work. So the future people hope for is the one that shows up.

[C]

So head to Claude AI/mbd to share your own hopes for AI's future and see what people around the world said. That's claude.AI/mbd.

[B]

The peptide floodgates could soon be opened. Late last week, an FDA advisory committee voted in favor of loosening restrictions on six peptides, despite the FDA's own scientists recommending against it. If the agency ultimately approves the recommendation, as expected, it could lead to a windfall for telehealth companies eager to grab a slice of this booming corner of the wellness world. Peptides are a broad category of short chain amino acids that are produced in the human body and can also be made synthetically. Some approved peptides like insulin or GLP1 weight loss drugs have proven miraculous for public health. But recently, a wave of unapproved peptides with names like BPC157 are being marketed as remedies for everything from wrinkles to a pulled hand hamstring. These peptides are being sold through a regulatory loophole on the gray market, mostly by Chinese manufacturers pitching them as quote for research use only. Proponents of improving access to peptides, who include wellness influencers like Joe Rogan and Health Secretary RFK Jr say, Look, people are using peptides anyway. Demand is booming. We might as well bring this above board to create safer, more transparent products. Opponents like the FDA scientists counter that there is basically no paper trail, no clinical evidence of these peptides actually improving health outcomes. Plus they point to what seems to be a glaring conflict of interest in the makeup of this advisory panel. RFK Jr. Appointed eight new members of them. Six run clinics that offer peptides. Toby, it's about to be an amino acid gold rush.

[C]

You know what the historic parallel that comes to mind here, it's the vitamin industry. If you go back to the early 1990s, it was in a very similar position that peptides are now with, which were they were trying to organize this big lobbying campaign to keep congress from putting FDA oversight on them, essentially. And congress did respond with a law that exempted supplements from the same requirements pharmaceutical companies face. Fast forward. Today, supplement industry is a $70 billion market with lots of beneficial projects, but also lots of gray areas. So maybe that's the future that we are steaming towards as you kind of have this expanded support for peptides. Again, not all peptides are inherently bad, but if they are less regulated, then you start to get some of the gray areas that some critics are saying watch out for.

[B]

I want to talk about exactly what's going on here because there's FDA advisory committee, there's FDA scientists. Like, what is exactly happening? So back in 2023, the Biden administration banned more than a dozen peptides over safety concerns from being compounded. And what compounded is, is there these pharmacies out there in the United States and elsewhere where they make individualized medications for people, so maybe they lose and they, they remove an allergen because you're. You're allergic to a specific dye, or they put something in pill form and not liquid form. So these compounding pharmacies are not able to make peptides. So what the. The boosters of this industry say, well, now Chinese manufacturers are making them. You can get them online. They're labeled as for research use only. People are getting them. But it's dangerous because they're just off the market. It's a very murky area. Why don't we bring this above board? And you heard a parade of teleheal companies like Hims and hers, which actually bought a compounding pharmacy a few years ago, saying, yes, we need to bring this above board. So these are the supporters saying, we need to allow compounding pharmacies in the United States to create peptides, to just create a more cohesive industry and respond to market demand, because people clearly want this.

[C]

But a lot of people are saying that's not what compounding pharmacies are intended for at all. Because you are right, like they are initially supposed to feel individualized patient needs not become this alternative pathway around FDA approval. So on a broader scale, that's one thing that a lot of critics are saying. This just opens up a really slippery slope. We do not think that this is what compounding pharmacies. This is not the niche they should occupy in the greater, you know, health space. So that's one question. What do critics want to happen instead? That's the big question. Because again, peptides are not inherently bad. Insulin is a peptide drug. Ozempic is a peptide as well. So these are a viable medical technology. So what do critics want? They just want funding on clinical trials. That's the big thing. That's how every, you know, drug makes it through to the market eventually. Peptide companies should conduct the research necessary for full FDA approval. That's kind of the big thing that they are putting out. More research needs to be done in this so you don't have the murkier, you know, gray area peptides coming in from China especially. Moving on. Jensen Huang does not spend a lot of time on social media, probably on account of him being the CEO of of the biggest company in the world. But just before the weekend, the Nvidia leader dusted off his Twitter fingers and made his first ever post on X. Was it a new product announcement? A recommendation on which a leather jacket to buy? Nope. Huang instead weighed in on one of the biggest debates in AI right now. Should AI models be open for everyone or kept closed and controlled? His post shared an open letter signed by more than 30 companies from Microsoft and Metta VC firms like Andreessen Horowitz. Conspicuously absent initially were OpenAI and Anthropic, who have been cautious about endorsing open approaches, though OpenAI eventually co signed what is an open model? If you go for an open approach, the developer releases model weights and code, allowing others to modify and fine tune it. Closed models, on the other hand, sees the developer keep model weights and training methods as locked up as the Krabby Patty secret formula. There are benefits and drawbacks to both approaches. Open models, Jensen's letter argues, expands access and improves competition by allowing startups to build, preventing a few companies from controlling the AI ecosystem. They also strengthen security because more researchers can find vulnerabilities and improve them, the letter argues. Of course, the closed model camp, led by Anthropic, sees things differently. They believe frontier AI is becoming too dangerous to release openly, especially because it makes it easier for geopolitical rivals like China to copy the technology. Jensen's post does come right as the US Government is debating whether to restrict open weight AI models, particularly China's Kimi K3, which is the most powerful open model in the world. Neal, the open versus closed debate is something that dates back to the early software development days in the 80s, but it's just as relevant today in the age of AI.

[B]

Yeah, two recent incidents have brought this debate to a fever pitch, and I've never seen tech leaders agree on the same thing all at once. You had a parade of them saying, yes, I support open source. Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk saying that at Google CEO Nvidia's Jensen Huang, Sam Altman eventually at OpenAI, we're just like, yeah, we support open. We support open AI, not the company, but the concept on Twitter. So the two incidents were one is these Chinese AI startups releasing very powerful models that rival those from Anthropic and OpenAI Z AI and Moonshot. That happened over the past couple of weeks and it spooked kind of everyone. It's been a deep seek moment 2.0 and the second incident was this hugging face attack last week this is the kind of. This is the thing that shook the AI industry to its core. A rogue AI model from OpenAI escaped this lab sandbox, this contained environment, went rogue, and then hacked another AI company called Hugging Face. Now, to respond to the cyberattack, Hugging Face first turned to an anthropic model of a very highly effective CyberSecurity model called Fable 5. And it wouldn't respond, they said, because this is a proprietary model from Anthropic and it just wouldn't do what it wanted to. And then instead, Hugging Face turned to Zai's model, GLM 5.2, and they said that the situation resolved very quickly. So they kind of put it out there and said, look what happens when we try to use a proprietary model and an open air model. Which one was better? They said, the open model.

[C]

This also hits on another kind of controversy in the AI space, which is around distillation, which is essentially using one model to train another model's outputs. We have again seen Anthropic mainly complain to the US Government about Chinese companies stealing their models, essentially copying their homework. And they say, obviously, we need to protect our own proprietary data. We do not want Chinese companies doing this. And yet Jensen's letter kind of said distillation is not necessarily inherently a bag thing. It's a standard technique that actually accelerates innovation. We don't necessarily want to crack down on anything that doesn't decelerates innovation. So that's another flashpoint in this debate that, oddly enough, most people are on the side of. Let. Let freedom ring.

[B]

Let everyone sunlight is the best disinfect.

[C]

Exactly. Let more people have access to this data so we can push forward the frontier more quickly. So that's another. The other part, too, is that it seems like Jensen Huang is aligning himself with what China is putting forth right now. China just had a big world AI conference in Shanghai, and President Xi Jinping called for a symphony of global cooperation rather than a solar performance by any single country. It seems like a lot of the tech world is saying is arguing for the exact same thing.

[B]

Yeah, Ball is in the Trump administration's court right now because they were making hints that they might want to ban or place heavy restrictions on open models, which sparked this big backlash from the most of the American tech industry. So we'll see whether regulation comes down the pipeline. But this is a debate that is not going away, and it hasn't since, you know, the tech industry started in Silicon valley in the 70s and 80s. All right, welcome to Winners of the Weekend. The segment where Toby and I picked two things that ordered an extra scoop of ice cream just because I won the pre show game of backyard baseball. So I get to go first. And my winner is Cockroaches, who just won unprecedented concessions from the Indian government following months of meme fueled protests. Since May, India's Gen Z have been demonstrating against the government under the banner of the Cockroach Junta party, a satirical political movement inspired by the indestructible insect. Over the weekend, the cockroaches earned a stunning victory after India's education minister resigned one of their core demands. The Cockroach Party was formed in May following a major education scandal. A high stakes rigorous medical school exam was leaked, forcing more than 2 million students to take it again. For some that was too much to bear and at least a dozen took their own lives. Then two days after the leak, India's top judge reportedly disparaged the country's youth as cockroaches with no career direction. Thus a movement was born spearheaded by abhijit deepkay, a 30 year old former Boston University grad student. Initially targeting India's mess of an education system, the cockroaches expanded their protest to a broader critique of the government for failing to provide economic opportunities for young people. With 370 million people in Gen Z, India has the largest youth population in the world. Memes, social media and self deprecating humor were the heart of the campaign from the very start. The Cockroaches Party original tagline was a voice for the lazy unemployed and chronically online and even going up against a hostile government that routinely stifles political dissent. They won after the education minister resigned. DK said, as the saying goes, the world bends if you know how to make it bend.

[C]

The demographics involved in this, make this such a big story because you mentioned 370 million people. That is the largest youth population in the world. Nearly 40% of graduates in that same age range are unemployed, according to a 2026 study. That is more. Four out of every five unemployed Indians are under 30. So that is just a massive base of very discontented people. And especially when it comes to this pressure cooker of an exam environment, that was just the thing that kind of broke the camel's back. The way that this movement spread too is just how modern protests happen. We've seen it in other countries. Nepal comes to mind is that it mostly spreads through memes, through reels, through edits, through satire. This is what the culture is that spreads a protest movement at this point. And there were Lots of, you know, funny jokes within this very serious movement as well. Protesters were fleeing police and joked about their Strava streaks. There's videos running from police where they edit it like subway surfers. So this is just the language of Gen Z right now and it can, you know, cause massive change in via very, you know, funny memes and edits.

[B]

Yeah, obviously, it's just, I mean, it's not like they went to Arizona State, but clearly they have a knack for attracting followers and getting people engaged online. So the bjp, which is Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister's party, is considered the world's biggest political party by membership. Their Instagram page has 9.4 million followers. Well, the Cockroach Party has grown to over 25 million Instagram followers. That's almost as much as Virginia from Cape Verde, their goalie. But clearly this is a huge movement and they have said they're going to stop their protests after the education minister resigned and, and Modi bowed to some of their, some of their demands. But clearly this is a playbook that will be copied by Gen Z all over the world. India, the leaders of this movement said, look, I know we know this has happened in Sri Lanka and in Nepal over the past few months that we've touched upon, but we're a separate case. But you can see that Gen Z is not a political force. They're going to be using memes and subway Surfer edits and Instagram pages to get their job done.

[C]

All right, we're going to take a quick break and come back with my winner of the weekend right after this.

[D]

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[C]

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[B]

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[C]

My winner of the weekend, as much as it pains me to say it, is the Philadelphia 76ers for signing LeBron James. While there will be plenty of debate on if the 41 year old is the missing piece of the puzzle that would make them championship contenders, what's undeniable is that the 76ers got a fantastic deal for the grizzled goat. LeBron is coming to Philly on a two year, $8 million deal, the minimum per year salary allowed for a player with over 10 years of NBA experience. While $4 million is a lot of money for normal people, it's the equivalent of a 92% pay cut for LeBron, who made 52 million with the Lakers last season. I'm not going for money, james's post announcing the movement read, which is good to hear for the guy who just went from having the 11th highest salary in the NBA to the 292nd highest. The reason one of the greatest players ever is willing to play for the equivalent of NBA peanuts is because he wants to give Philly enough roster flexibility to contend with choosing to sacrifice dollars for the chance of adding to his trophy cabinet. Plus, LeBron has made $581 million in the NBA so far, the most of any player ever, so he's not exactly short on cash for Philly. The LeBron effect is already in full motion. Its championship odds jumped to the third best in the NBA after his signing, and the cheapest ticket to Philadelphia's first home preseason game just hit $283. For context, the average price for a Sixers regular season game last season was just $68. Neal, you have a certain glow to you these days the LeBron effect is hitting you too.

[B]

Life is good. The past couple of days have been pretty exciting and the city of Philadelphia and the region actually may have just made an incredible investment. Obviously you just mentioned they didn't pay a lot, but the dividends could be huge. The consultant group, the Boyd company projected that LeBron James joining the Sixers could generate between 250 to 430 million DOL dollars in total regional economic activity next season. He is like the Taylor Swift of basketball. And you already saw this. I mean, hours after LeBron signed with the Sixers on Friday, there were already vendors on the Wildwood Boardwalk selling lebron jersey. So everyone is cashing in. I saw huge advertisements of planes bringing, you know, those banners across the beach towns in New Jersey. So there clearly is a LeBron effect. There's a 2018 study, this is a long time ago, by the American Enterprise Institute that found that within a mile of the stadium where LeBron James played, there was a 13% boost to restaurants and other similar companies within a mile of the stadium. Employments at Those establishments jumped 23.5%. So we could be seeing at least a short term boom in, in Philadelphia economic activity.

[C]

Yeah. Researchers of that study describe the impact as statistically and economically significant. So the LeBron effect is not just, you know, a fake thing that makes Neil look happy these days. It is a real effect. He also fills arenas. I mean, you. I think Taylor Swift is not a bad comparison, even though we might get some hate in the comments for that. When he joined Cleveland in 2003, their average arena attendance was 11,496. It jumped up to 18,287. These are all just getting to capacity, essentially. Same thing happened when he went to Miami. Same thing when happened when he went back to Cleveland. Los Angeles basically always has sold out arenas, so it didn't much change there. But he definitely is someone who puts butts in seats. This is not the first time that we've seen a basketball player specifically sacrifice some career earnings for the sake of winning a championship. That just happened with Jalen Brunson. Remember, he famously left about $113 million on the table to give the Knicks a better chance of building a championship roster. But it is not very often that we see a late career athlete like LeBron sacrifice earnings. If you go to Tom Brady, he earned a higher salary on the tail end of his career in Tampa Bay than he did at the Patriots. Again, he took a lot of pay cuts over his tenure with the Patriots. Peyton Manning made $15 million guaranteed in his final Bronco season. And then Cristiano Ronaldo is the king of maximizing late career. He's making five and a half million dollars per week over in Saudi Arabia. So even though it is not without precedent for a player to sacrifice some salary, when you are 41 years old, usually you try to eke every last dollar out of your career.

[B]

We all know why LeBron actually, you know, is going to Philadelphia, and that's because it has incredible golf and LeBron is a big golfer. And Saquon Barkley, who's on the Eagles, said, hey, if you want to tee it up sometime, let's do it. So whichever country club gave, whether it was Pine Valley or Marion, gave LeBron a membership. I thank you so much.

[C]

First guy ever to go from Bel Air to West Philadelphia.

[B]

Too surprising It's Monday, so here's what you need to know to stay ahead in the week ahead. The height of the summer season is causing dangerous weather situations on both sides of the Atlantic. In Spain and France, more than 300,000 people have evacuated or taken shelter from deadly fires that are blazing near Madrid and the wine hub of Bordeaux. Spain's prime minister said the scale of this crisis is very difficult to grasp after fires burned through an area larger than Washington, D.C. in just 24 hours. In the U.S. another heat dome is expected to roast the central region of the country at the start of the week, sending temps potentially above 110 degrees from Texas to South Dakota.

[C]

The fires also affected the Tour de France, which wrapped up this weekend. The route for the race's final stage was shortened not because the fires themselves disrupted it, but because security and police for the event were reassigned to assist with the fires. That just shows how big of an impact they were having in Europe. Hope everyone is staying safe in America and abroad.

[B]

Another week, another major slate of earnings that will determine whether your portfolio takes on a shade of green or red. After Google and Tesla stunk it up last week, the next few days bring us more heavy hitters, including Microsoft, Metta, Amazon, Apple, Coca Cola and Boeing. Investors are on the hunt for overspending on AI, and as Google found out, they will punish you if they find it. There's something that may overshadow earnings this week, and that's the Fed meeting on Wednesday. New Fed chair Kevin Wash is expected to keep interest rates steady, but a surprise could be in store given how secretive Wash has been about the Fed's moves.

[C]

The market has definitely been a little skittish recently, and I have no idea if Washing the Fed is going to be a soothing salve or a disruptive thorn. I'm actually kind of excited to see what the reaction to the Fed decision is. As of this morning, though, oil prices have fallen a bit, down about 6% and stock futures are up as the US and Iran pause fighting for a second straight day in a row, bringing some optimism that a resolution might be coming down the pipeline.

[B]

And finally, at the box office, Odysseus might finally meet his match in Peter Parker. The new Spidey, starring Tom Holland and called A Brand New Day, hits theaters on Friday and is expected to make far more money than the Odyssey, despite Chris Nolan's film exceeding all expectations. Whereas the Odyssey opened to $124 million domestically, the new Spider man because easily

[C]

top 200 million we got about Nolan. But Spider man shows you what an actual big movie looks like. Odyssey is hanging on pretty well, though. It fell 30% from the first the second weekend, which is indicative of a movie that has legs. I've seen a lot of jokes, too. Wow. It was great watching Tom Holland, Zendaya and John Bernthal in the Odyssey. I can't wait to go watch Tom Holland, Zendaya and John Bernthal be great in Spider man as well. Also, for any comic book nerds, we had Comic Con wrap up over the weekend, and the big news was that Ryan Gosling is joining the MCU as Ghost Rider, which I'm excited for, but he will never hold a candle to Nicolas Cage. Some people are making a big stink about it, saying, what is Ryan Gosling doing right now? He's a better actor than that. But he kind of went on record and said, I'm doing this for my kids. They want to see me in these movies.

[B]

He's also in a Star wars movie.

[C]

Yeah, he's doing all the fun stuff. I mean, he's allowed to do that. His IMBD is or his letterbox is going to look a little funny because he's had, you know, the artsy start to his career and now maybe he's going a little bit more big blockbuster.

[B]

My favorite announcement from Comic Con was David Johnson as the new Black Panther. And he is an industry. He's Gus in industry and he's an amazing actor. So I was like, hey, I recognize that guy. Even though I usually look at, I usually look at comic book movies and I'm like, I don't really have any idea what's going on. But David Johnson, new Black Panther, that is exciting to me. And yeah, Ryan Gosling might as well, fill up the stat sheet like LeBron. All right, that is all the time we have. Thanks for starting your morning with us and have a wonderful start to the week. To share your thoughts on the episode or anything else, send an email to Morning Brew daily at Morning Broadcom or DM us on Instagram at the Daily show let's roll the credits. Emily Miller and is our supervising producer. Raymond Liu is our senior producer. Our producer is Olivia Graham and our associate producer is Olivia Lake. Technical direction by Nina Miller. Hair makeup is applying to asu. Devin Emery is our president and our show is a production of Morning Brew.

[C]

Great show today, Neil. Let's run it back tomorrow. What do water bottles and a skincare brand have in common? Before you say more hydrated skin, they're both featured in Rising Stars by Amazon Ads. This docu series follows small business owners as they create businesses and face real life challenges. From driving awareness with prime video ads to driving conversion with sponsored products, Amazon Ads helps them scale. Watch the full [e-mail] Rising Stars.