← Most Valuable Agent with Matt Hannaford
Most Valuable Agent with Matt Hannaford
Why Most Pro Athletes Go Broke - Avoid This Wealth Management Mistake
01:16:37
Loading summary
Transcript182 lines
- [00:12]
A
All right, welcome back to another episode of the Most Valuable Agent podcast. I am joined today by a friend, someone who I've come to know for almost 20. I was gonna say it's been a long time.
- [00:24]
B
Almost 20.
- [00:24]
A
Yeah. So I want to give a shout out first. We're in Orlando, Florida. We were at the winter meetings. So both of us are here, obviously, business, from my perspective, just to give everybody a sense of what I'm doing. So meeting with various major league organizations, various scouting directors, also meeting with wealth advisors, and then different professionals throughout the industry. You are here not only, you know, gracing us with your presence on the podcast, but you're also doing business as well here, too. So this conversation is going to be kind of all things money related. And as I think most parents, when they first hear money or hear, you know, financial advisors, wealth advisors, I think the first reaction, if I had to assume, is they oftentimes think about, you know, whether it's the stories on ESPN, the 30 for 30, like, oh, I want to make sure that my son, if he's blessed enough to become a professional or even go to college and secure a pretty good nil package, that he has somebody in his corner that he can trust, that he can rely on, who's ultimately going to have his best interest at heart. So we're going to talk a lot about, from the player's standpoint, what are the things that they need to be mindful of, be aware of whether it's selecting a wealth advisor, but also, like, what are the. What are the responsibilities and duties of that individual? But I think it's only appropriate that we first start because a lot of this is devoted to the parents.
- [01:47]
B
Right.
- [01:49]
A
Unfortunately, I feel like as parents, what we need to be doing is. Is really asking ourselves, as we're spending money on travel, baseball and youth sports, are we doing it with this unattended, unintentional, rather expectation that they are going to provide a return for the investment rather than doing it just to support their son. And so as I kind of pose this to you, I mean, you're somebody who. And I do want to kind of talk about your background also, which we'll get into. You've been around the game for a very long time. Right before you were a wealth advisor, you worked at Maruchi Back company, really, from the ground up. Were you employee number one? I feel like you were.
- [02:30]
B
No, there was a couple guys that were there prior to me. So saying I was employee number one would be alive.
- [02:36]
A
Disingenuous. Yeah.
- [02:38]
B
Yeah. But, man, 18 years old. I mean, in my life, you know, it's really the only job I had prior to this. And so from the backyard to, you know, taking it to where, where it almost is now, I mean it's, it was a hell of a journey and I, I couldn't have asked for a better opportunity being so young.
- [02:54]
A
So talk a little bit about your role there because I do think it, it kind of blends perfectly into why you're so successful doing what you're doing today. So starting at the ground floor with Maruchi, I mean, you're really in charge of, you know, interacting with the major league players on a daily basis, you know, handling their bad orders, negotiating their contracts. So from like a marketing perspective, you worked for a company really securing those deals, you know, with these players. Talk about that experience and more importantly, like, what did that education provide to you with what you're doing today?
- [03:27]
B
I mean, I could go for hours, but if I were to, to really try to like get more specific for you. It was a small business that started in the backyard that ended up, has been sold twice. So that journey just from a business standpoint of like the small business growing pains to the highs, the lows, the evaluation from, from different groups that want to come in and purchase the company and trying to understand how you navigate those waters. I mean, from the pure business standpoint, like, I'm not sure like a, you know, a four year degree would have, would have given me the experience that I got there, but more specific to my role there, it was really is centered around their equipment. And you know, the goal, the objective of sports marketing is to get the logo seen on TV to influence the younger kids that want to go buy those products. And so you're, you know, I watch sports a little bit differently than most people. Some people watching the game, I'm counting logos, whether it be outfield fence signs or the logo and batting gloves. But you know, you're working with some of the best in the world and that equipment to them is so deeper psychologically to them than it is. There's a performance based, don't get me wrong, but that's where I had the connection to the athletes and so the guys, especially the bats, more than probably other products, like it is such a incredible tool to their success. And you have all these different types of superstitions. Some guys want to change all the time, some guys never change, but that, that tool in their hand is so important to their success that they actually invest a lot of time and they wanted to have A relationship with that person that they knew could deliver, you know, in a timely manner or rush something that needed to be rushed, but more importantly, the consistency in that product. And so it just happened by chance, you know, and we get this guy, would tell this guy, and next thing you know, he shares my number and, you know, we start building a relationship through there. And sometimes it was late at nights or early mornings. There's no real Monday to Friday schedule. These guys play Saturday, Sunday, travel days, you name it. So just being there and being available and really kind of getting inside the mind almost psychologically with those guys to see what that product actually meant to them, I took it upon myself to, like, to understand and whether they were right or wrong and what they were asking for, it didn't matter. Right. Trying to get within the four inches between their ears to, like, get them comfortable and make them perform. And so there's that. And then just being that close to such great performance, you know, working with some of the best players to. To have ever played the game, the hall of Famers. Yeah. See how they prepare and see how, you know, everything mattered to them. And the thing. The lengths that they would go to to just get that extra 1% is. Was very captivating to sit back and watch.
- [06:05]
A
Well, and, you know, because we've known each other for so long, I've obviously been down to the bat factory. I've been down and I've seen kind of the inner workings behind the scenes of, like, what it takes when you make a piece of wood to get it from, like, you know, the point where it's being cut to now in their hands. I wasn't expecting to go into this, but I feel like for the. The viewer who probably has no idea what that looks like, they think, you know, I want to order a dozen of these bats. Like, I'll have them tomorrow. Can you talk a little bit about, like, what that process is like? Because I do. When you talk about, again, trying to be valuable to people, I do think it would benefit them, just truly understanding, like, what goes into that, because it would give them such a different appreciation for those individuals behind the scenes and, like, how much heavy lifting that requires so much.
- [06:51]
B
And. And, you know, I was fortunate to be, like, the front end to deal with the athlete, but it took an army of people, you know, behind me to. To pull it off. But, I mean, whether, like, 15 sets of hands touched each. Every bat. Each and every bat that went there, I think, you know, I don't want to speak specifically to the numbers because they may have changed, but you know, such a very small percentage actually made it to, of the raw material, made it to a major league baseball field. So there in therein lies like that discipline and, and, and the things that you believe in and what makes a quality product. Like we're not Superman, we don't have x ray vision to look at a piece of wood and kind of see what's inside of it. So. But there's things that we evolved over time that we would look for to say what's good versus bad. And it was a very, very small percentage of the raw material that made it to the best players in the game. And so just being disciplined with that and sometimes it took longer lead times and sometimes it led to some difficult conversations, but we had a core principles that we believed in and we stuck to it. And so you're building that trust with the player. That's why they want the product, the brand, the service, all those things. But from a raw piece of material, it's got to be selected, graded, spun into the shape that they want. I mean, I think by the time I had left there was 1500 models. Maybe even, maybe even way more than that. They're constantly tweaking and making adjustments to their profile. Then they're hand sanded, hand painted, engraved decals. Then back out to the shop to be, you know, hit, hit weight and finish the ends and the dry time and the, and the right chemicals that go into making the hardest finish. And you know, always testing to try to get better and then you vacuum sealing them up and shipping them. So it was a multiple day process which sometimes would lead to, you know, you're trying to get something out to a guy that's in a slump, that wants to make a change. Like sometimes that would, you know, create some strains, but you always did it and you always communicated because you knew how important that that tool. But to your point of that, you came down and saw it. Anytime we could get a guy on campus to see that, it was like a light bulb went off, right? It was, it was, we all, we, we automatically connected on a deeper level. They had a better understanding of what it took and then allowed more opportunity to be more honest with them. And like, hey, this is what it's going to take to, to get it done.
- [08:59]
A
So it's, it's funny man. Like we're all consumers right in the world. And I think the thought that comes to me is like, it's not different than like as we eat food, right? We go to a restaurant, we Have a piece of steak. And we think like, yeah, like it's just everywhere. It's like, no, no, no. That actually came from something. Yeah. And like the process of getting it here to the table wasn't overnight. Right. There's all this lead time. But you know, the, the thought that comes to mind is like, level of care. So at Maruchi, you certainly, and I could speak to this, you had a level of care where you, you truly were invested in. When I deliver a product to you, I want to make sure that it is up to your standard. It is up to your liking. And so naturally, for you to do that, you have to have a very, very high standard for yourself. Right. Applying that now to what you're doing, I feel like it was a perfect segue for you. Because when you talk about, and I'll speak from my own experience, when you are responsible, because I use that word, I don't take it lightly. But when you're responsible for your work product. Right. When a player of any magnitude gives you an opportunity to work on their behalf, it is a big responsibility. Right. That player who's uneducated as far as bat making goes, as far as managing money goes, as far as negotiating contracts goes, or guiding a player's career, they're completely uneducated. They don't know what it entails. And so based on your advice and your expertise, they're making decisions.
- [10:30]
B
Correct?
- [10:30]
A
Right.
- [10:30]
B
Important decisions.
- [10:31]
A
Right. There's part of what we both have to do is you have to also manage expectations because, you know, there's, there's many people. And the analogy or the example I always use with people when I, when I talk about kind of agents is there's various agents that, that could tell you what your value is. Right. You're worth X number of dollars. It is a totally different thing to then go out and be able to get whatever that value is that I just told you you're worth. Right. That's a different, It's a different strategy. It's. It entails a lot of different stuff. So when you have now transitioned over to the wealth advisor side, how was the education that you received not only just at Maruchi, but just more about like the daily interaction with really, really high end professional athletes? How is that kind of crafted your experience, but also your strategy with what you need to deliver? Not only what you need to deliver, but like what these players deserve?
- [11:36]
B
Yeah, that's, that's a great way to put it. Like what they deserve because they, they truly do live different lives than the average Americans walking the street, right? So, you know, know, my, my past career brought me inside the inner circle of a lot of hall of Fame type of players and to see how they function, how they tick, who else is inside that inner circle, why are they in that inner circle and more importantly, how, how many times they're, they're approached from outside the circle. And there's a lot of bad actors out there. So proximity for me was, was really big just to kind of see and learn and be face to face with some, with some serious situations. And that even led to, you know, investments inside of the company that was at before. So, you know, being in that inner circle, seeing how these guys live, function, the, the different sets of problems that they have that, you know, like walking the streets with a buddy to go eat lunch and like how many times they get approached by fans and stuff like that. And, and so many people want to be famous. But there's a downside to that, right? There's, there's, you know, you're at a restaurant, you're constantly being bothered, like who doesn't want to be a famous athlete in the city? But there is a side of that that like most people don't see. And so I was given access to, to a lot of those situations and see, you know, kind of maybe the downside of it. And so, but to go back more specifically of like what really transitioned is like the discipline, right, and investing. We, we really believe in a disciplined approach and having a plan and sticking to the plan. And you know, all these guys that are, that are, you know, the 1 percenters and the best travel ball players, soon to be college players and professional players, like, you're disciplined, right? We always tell them that we early educate them is like, it takes discipline, but you're already a disciplined person because, because you're eating right, you're getting up early, you're working out, you're taking extra swings with dad at night, right? So you already have this DNA that you need to be successful in investing. And the game of baseball really teaches that, right? How to be humble, how to be disciplined, how to work hard, you know, how to evaluate yourself versus other people. How do you find that value, right? So these guys that we eventually get to and where we're at and the type of clients that you and I both work with, they already have like that, that essence and that DNA of the discipline approach. And so we really try to double down on that and then spin it into the education of things, right? Because education is important. If I can educate you on what we're doing, like, then I'm not selling you on it. I'm. I'm here to help you. I'm a fiduciary. I'm on the same side of the table as you. Let me educate you and tell you what's going on. Because money can be intimidating, and there's so many different ways to go about this, and there's so many different options and plans, and a lot of them are great. There's some bad ones, but, you know, we don't even need to go into that. It's just from an education standpoint, if you know what you look, you're looking for, it's so much easier for me to show you the value that we provide to our clients.
- [14:11]
A
Yeah. So you talk about education. I think what's interesting is, and we talked about this before, you know, we all go to school, right. And our education either delivers or it doesn't. And there are ways that it does. Yes. But I feel like the. The school system today, on a really high level, from a standpoint of like, you know, general business knowledge, has failed us. Yes, Right. It's. It's more important that you understand how to do a certain, you know, math equation that you'll never use for the rest of your life instead of truly understanding how to, like, manage a checkbook as an example. Right. Even though a lot of people don't even have checkbooks anymore. Right. But so if. If. And you actually brought up one other thing too, like the discipline. I feel like the. The game of baseball, it prepares these players so well with a lot of different things, but a natural byproduct of kind of being trained to think about things a certain way. When it comes to money with professional athletes, there's actually a flip side to it, right?
- [15:12]
B
Yes.
- [15:13]
A
And what I mean specifically is you have these professional athletes that are very, very competitive. Right. They know that with discipline, determination, work ethic, all these things, I'm going to climb the mountain and I'm going to accomplish the thing. And the best of the best, the ones that we work with, they've actually done that exact thing multiple times throughout their career. Whether that was in travel, baseball, the draft, minor league baseball, the big leagues, they just continue to do it. And so these guys get to the big leagues, or maybe they sign for a really good bonus out of the draft, and they are now kind of like created, right? They're. They're. They're. Yeah, I guess created is a perfect word. Created to think about things a certain way. And now they have all this money and there's a problem that happens. And let's just say somebody approaches them and says, I have the greatest business deal in the world. Right? You know, if you loan me a hundred thousand dollars, I'm gonna give you back the money in three months with, you know, this much of a return and whatever. And to the athlete, yeah, of course I can do that. Right. It's, it's not based on the facts in that moment. It's more based on their emotions saying, I've overcome things before, this sounds like a challenge. With my involvement, we can overcome this together. But now they're entering a world that they're completely uneducated in. Right. And again, this is why it is so important to be educated, to be guided, but also to have people in your corner that you know are looking out for you. Because if, if somebody approaches you with a business opportunity, you're not just saying, oh, it sounds like a great idea. Right. I can't remember what the podcast was recently, but somebody said like, oh, funny enough, it was a clip from Steve Jobs. He goes, he was talking about when he left Apple, why it eventually failed before he came back. And one of the things he said is 99% of companies that fail didn't fail because it was a bad idea. Right. The idea was brilliant, but the execution was terrible. And so the idea oftentimes is the thing that the player wants to hang his hat on. It's a great idea. It's a billion dollar idea. Nothing becomes a billion dollar company based on an idea alone. Right. It's all about the execution. So how, as a wealth advisor, are you managing that with them? Because you got to tread lightly a little bit, right?
- [17:33]
B
Oh, 100%. And they're, they're, I don't say they're targeted. It's like, like this nefarious thing, but like their salaries are posted on social media and on the Internet.
- [17:43]
A
That's common knowledge, right?
- [17:44]
B
I mean, it's so one, you know, I, I always try to use an example with like a, you know, a two year, 20 million dollar deal. And it's like, how much money does this guy have? $20 million is what it says in the caption of the Instagram post. No, it's, let's back out taxes. Let's kind of go through here. Here's much as I actually guaranteed. If he throws in the out, you know, there's, there's all these different things, but like to really, truly understand. So from there, you know, you, you got an idea what you're working with, what things do they want to buy with, with, you know, big expenses are coming down the pipeline and then from there you some retirement you start looking at. You know, a lot of times the public markets are going to offer a lot more transparency and liquidity, which are very, very important to the odd lives that these guys live and when they need their cash flow needs. But they do get approached a lot from a private sector and an ideas and they float around the clubhouse and there's oftentimes peer pressure from teammates, like, hey, my buddy's getting in on this. Like, I don't want to be late to the party, right? Here's my chance to get in. And for the most part, some of the worst business ideas I've seen have come from a player inside the clubhouse. But when you build that trust, we don't want them to hide behind us, but we do offer this kind of like, buffer to where, like, if there is a situation where you're getting pitched a business idea, and I'm not here to shut down every single one, but there is a level of due diligence that has to happen to where if we're going to allocate your money and take it out of the public markets into this private company. And there's upside there, but you're also potentially tying money up for long periods of time. And you know, 90 of private businesses go or fail within the first couple of years. And so there's risk involved in anything from finance. But just to sit there and talk to a buddy about an idea or a teammate about an idea and feel that peer pressure, maybe from a veteran that wants to, you know, try to influence a guy to get more involved, like there's a level of due diligence that has to happen before you make an idea into your actual money. And speaking more to the private side, like, look at, look at the TV rights deals in professional sports right now. It's really the only thing that's getting people to live TVs. You know, the TV rights deals are going up and up and up. The salaries are going up and up. I know there's a big one coming in baseball next offseason of what that looks like moving forward. But like, they're not only are their salaries going up so they have money to invest in businesses, but they also have star power that allows them to get in on the private side of things. That creates opportunity, but it also adds liability. Private companies that say, hey, we want to get Matt Hannaford invested in our business, so we can put in the press release that Matt Hannaford's an investor in our business. He may have only $5,000 in it, but it's a name that they can put in the press release. Well, Matt now has liability to where if the CEO goes and does something nefarious and it, you know, becomes a bad article, bad news media out there. Well, like, well, Matt's invested in this, too. And so there's opportunities there to get these guys in on opportunities that the average Americans walking the street don't get. But there's also some extra liability there. So we play a lot in that space, too, because there's great opportunity, not all bad, not all these ideas are bad. Execution is really kind of where we dive into, like, the due diligence side of things. It's like, man, what is this company really going to be if it's tying your money up? 5 years, 10 years, whatever the fund or opportunity looks like. And then here's what we'll think it'll do in, like, the boring stuff in the public market that, like, is not as sexy, but, like, is kind of proven that has a very long track record way past the Great Depression, right? So that's where the education comes in, right? And that kind of, like, was the lead in the question. And, like, I like to really focus on the education, and I'm a big believer in what the. And not to take this conversation too far about, like, the school system, right? But, like, the school system is, like, it's, it's. It's training you to learn to, like, evaluate you of, like, kind of how smart you are, right? They really teaching you the things that you need to be successful. And personal wealth management is something that's just missed, right? And then now you're taking these kids that are getting nil. They're getting real money really fast with tax consequences and all these different things that go into, you know, that can really impact their future. It's an unbelievable head start for most kids their age, but it can be mismanaged very, very easily. And a lot of times you see, like, they don't really know how far that money can go. They don't know what they can really buy with it. That brings in the credit conversation of, like, yeah, guy gets a very nice nil deal. He wants to go buy a car, but he's got no credit. He's got a ton of cash, but, like, he goes to buy it and you look at the loan and it's like, this is terrible, bro. I can't let you do this, like, let's. Let's hold tight, let's build a little bit of credit, and, like, let's save some money. Like, a car is never going to be, like, a good investment that you flip and make money on. Maybe there's a few situations, but, like, yeah, you deserve a car. Right. You deserve to drive something nice. But, like, let's buy it on some really good terms and let's maybe wait a couple of months to, like, get you in a better position to where you're not just kind of lighting money on fire at times because you want to drive the sexiest car. And so those are important conversations. They're also difficult conversations because you are talking to them in this moment of, like, they're the best player and they're getting heavily recruited and they're, you know, their agents leverage them in IO deals at all these different opportunities. And so, you know, it's not like facing their mortality, but it's like facing, like, what if something. What if something goes wrong? What if you don't end up becoming this guy? So, like, let's try to curb some of those habits and those expenses, and that's really where the education comes from. It's like trying to get them to understand what that money can become from an investing standpoint. Will hopefully, you know, tailor some of the spending habits and then really get them to focus, like on a budget and. And have a plan, because that's kind of what you do when you train. You have, like, your. Your workout, how many hours you're going to spend in the cage and the drills that you work on. Like, let's have the same type of plan with our finances, and then from there we can have some fun.
- [23:29]
A
Yeah. So another thing that I think, athletes, a natural byproduct of being really good at sports is you're always in the know, in the mix, successful. And now you're in a world when you make money, you have this money as a professional athlete or you have this money as a drafted player. Right. And you've never had access to it before, and it's very overwhelming. And you think as a human being, you don't ever want to be vulnerable, however you want to act. Like, I understand how this works. And so I would imagine from your perspective, you're talking to players who have come into a lot of money and they don't ever want to admit to you. They don't understand intimidation. Right.
- [24:13]
B
It's very intimidating.
- [24:14]
A
So they.
- [24:14]
B
That's okay.
- [24:15]
A
It is okay. And that's my point. And this is why I want to make sure that this conversation, and the reason why I was excited to have it with you is we want to give them tools. And the first tool I think that we can give them is the acknowledgment that you're not supposed to be an expert in this.
- [24:29]
B
Exactly, exactly. And that's, you know, that's what I tell them, you know, back to the high school deal. Not to go too long winded on that. But like I went to a blue ribbon high school, like they didn't teach me this stuff whenever I was your age. So like, you shouldn't know all this, right? So it's okay to admit and like, let your guard down. I'm here to help you. I have a fiduciary responsibility to help you. Like, let me first educate you and like, let's let our guard down. And like, I'm inside the circle, man. Like, I'm here to protect your money. I'm here to help you. Right? So let me educate you on how this works. And it is very intimidating. And you are talking to, you know, guys that make more money than me, you know what I mean? At like a really, really young age. And so there is like this level of like, I don't say bulletproof to it, but like, there's this level of confidence that comes with it. But it's okay to like just take 15, 20, 30 minutes just to like have a real conversation with like, here's what we, here's what the contract says, here's what the cash flows look like. Here's things that we want to buy, here's what investment opportunities can look like. Here's what we need to save for in case things go wrong. Here's what we need to save for, you know, three month expenses and things like that, what our cash need, like, there's, it's, it's very complex, it's very intimidating. But if, again, going back to what I said earlier, like, if you give me the time to let me educate you on how this works, like we won't have to have these all the time because you'll have a better understanding. These meetings will move a lot quicker. And if, if, if you know what I'm doing for you, then I feel very, very confident in what I'm doing. And we're going to stay in touch and making sure we're staying to the plan. But it's okay to admit, you know, and using the car example, it's like, dude, I'm not like that much. I'm not smarter than you. I'm not here to be the smartest guy in the room. I've just bought more cars than you've bought. You know, I've bought more homes than you've bought. I've been through the financing options and things like that. So, like, let me just help you. And then along the way, let me just use this as like a purchase like this to like, educate you on being on the wrong side of this, this, you know, this interest. Right. I mean, like, so again, back to the credit. Like, you want to buy a car, you know, and you may have ton of cash, but like, you know, every thousand dollars you put down is going to affect your payment. Like 20 bucks a month. Like, let's hold on to the cash, right? What is really credit is what's more important, credit versus cash. And so, you know, you see guys go out and buy things because they have cash, but they're getting a horrible lease option or horrible, you know, finance and option on it. And it's like, let's get on the other side of that and have the money that you have at an age that most kids your age do not have.
- [26:49]
A
Right.
- [26:49]
B
And if you get that money working for you now, you're on the opposite side of this, you know, side of the coin and dealing with compounding interest and all these other, you know, terms that you, you kind of, you know, we can get into deeper. But it's really trying to get them to understand what that money really is, how that money really works. And if you just hop in and you have this influx of cash and you're like, I'm gonna buy the sickest car out there, like, more than likely you're not going to get a good, you know, if you go in by yourself in the dealership and you don't consult with somebody like they're, they're, they're waiting for you to walk in.
- [27:19]
A
Well, when players don't consult with someone, most of the time it's because I don't want to look stupid, so it's easier. Let me just go in. Let me just do the deal. And then no one's going to tell me that I don't know what I'm doing. Right. Because the dealership is certainly not telling you. Yeah.
- [27:30]
B
And I'm driving a sick car.
- [27:31]
A
Right.
- [27:31]
B
Like, you deserve the car.
- [27:32]
A
Right.
- [27:33]
B
I'm not here to tell you, drive a hooptie, go buy a, you know, a used car.
- [27:37]
A
Yeah.
- [27:37]
B
You know, I'm not here to be so pragmatic and save every single dollar but there are smart ways to buy things well.
- [27:42]
A
So, you know, everybody hears these stories. Like, you know, Antoine Walker is an example, and. And not to get into specifics, but, you know, he didn't make one decision that lost him, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars. Right. It was a slow bleed, death by many cuts. That's right. So that's why when we talk about budgeting, like, that's one of the tools that. That everybody kind of needs to be educated on. And from a wealth advisor perspective, that undoubtedly needs to be something that is a focus. Now, here's what I was saying.
- [28:09]
B
Let me stop you right there.
- [28:10]
A
Sure.
- [28:11]
B
I'm a wealth advisor. I have to have somebody do my budget for me. Right, Right. Like, because it takes this, like, outside level of, like, discipline to, like, you know, if you just look at your account and you're just operating off of, like, what you see, like, you don't really have a plan. Like, well, then you're a lot more, you know, you're going to swipe that card a lot more. So, like, you need, like, that outside advice to, like, kind of try to hold you to it. And it's not like, hey, man, like, you went over budget, like, what's the deal? It's like, no, it just. It's just more, like, psychological to know in your brain. It'll over time, like, it'll add up.
- [28:41]
A
Well. And I want to give, really, these parents an understanding and hopefully eventually their sons. Examples of kind of different Personas that players have when dealing with financial advisors. Right. And then I want to get to what. What we believe to be kind of like the most ideal Persona. So when I say Persona, here's what I mean. So one Persona. And these are specific examples, without naming names, of, like, Personas that I've seen with athletes and wealth advisors. One Persona is the athlete who says, all right, I want somebody to have full control over my stuff. I want you to put me on such a stringent budget that I have to call you on the phone and say, can you put a hundred dollars in my account so I can buy a pair of shoes?
- [29:25]
B
Y.
- [29:26]
A
Like, the most extreme, like, you have no access to your money. I am putting it away because I am not going to spend this money. If I sign for $1,000, I'm going to have a decent amount of that thousand dollars after taxes, obviously, left, and I'm not touching it for the most part. That's like, one extreme. Right. The other extreme is essentially the opposite. Nothing. Right. They may have people that they're Talking to. They don't listen to them. Right. They may have a wealth advisor, and it's like, it's my money. I'm doing with it what I want. You can tell me I should or shouldn't do it. I appreciate your insight, but it's not going to affect what I ultimately do.
- [30:01]
B
Yeah.
- [30:02]
A
There's obviously something in the middle that is the most ideal. Right. Somebody who acknowledges and recognizes this is all new to me. I do not know what I'm doing. But I have chosen you to be a guide for me. Right. And so help me understand if this was your money, knowing what you know, what should I be aware of? What should I be doing? And then let's have conversations about, do we want to invest a little bit more? Do we want to save a little bit more? Do we want to save a little bit less? Based on various things throughout my career. Because if you're talking to a kid who's 18 years old, who just signed for $10 million out of the draft, compared to, you're talking to a guy who's 35, who's played in the big leagues for the last 10 years, who's now on his last year. Those are two different conversations. Right. It's not cookie cutter. And so an analogy that I've always, like, appreciated, and it's not a perfect analogy, but the analogy that, that I was told at one point that I always visualize with athletes is when you're playing professional sports, right. And you're at the highest level. So you're in the big leagues, and now you're making the millions of dollars that every player dreams about. Visualize you're in a bathtub or like you're filling up a bathtub. The drain is closed and all of the water is filling up the bathtub. That is your playing career. You are making so much money, and you'll. You just feel like, I can't even spend this money. It's crazy. Right? And again, referencing the Antoine Walker thing, I think on some level he probably felt like, I'll never lose it because.
- [31:27]
B
It'S so much never going to stop coming.
- [31:29]
A
It doesn't matter if I'm, you know, flying privately every single flight. Even if it's a, you know, I could go to Southwest and get a hundred dollar ticket, or I could fly privately for 15 grand. I'm going to fly privately for 15 grand. What starts to happen, though, is that player's career ends. The water turns off. Now the drain opens, and now it's like, what are we doing with the water that's left in the, in the bathtub and is it being put to use?
- [31:53]
B
Right?
- [31:53]
A
And so you talked about earlier different things that, you know, athletes could ultimately do. The whole idea that these players need to kind of grasp and understand is you want to be able to understand how to put your money to work for you, because that's what you're doing. You're employing the capital capital for a specific reason. And it's not just to spend on enjoyment. That's a component. Right? And I know a lot of really good financial advisors. Part of the conversation is, look, we're going to have what you need for expenses. We're going to have what we need to invest.
- [32:29]
B
Right?
- [32:29]
A
We're going to have the savings component. And then it's like, okay, you guys want to go on vacation, let's allocate a certain amount of this for you to spend every single year on. Gifts for Christmas, flying for vacation.
- [32:41]
B
Earn that right. You deserve that, right? And it's good for your mental health too, right? Like, I'm not trying to get these guys to live in fear and play in fear of, like, when's my career gonna end? And, like, this is all I'm gonna have left. Like, there is something to spending that money on things that you enjoy and, and taking care of your family. And I love all the stories about guys paying off their parents mortgages and stuff like that. There, there is, there, there is the beauty in, in, in that. And that's what they really ultimately a lot of times strive for and that's what they want. So it's not here to say, like, dude, save all your money. You know, live in this level of fear, right? But like, there's a smart way to do, there's a right and wrong way to do a lot of those things. And let's just, let's just think about it and it's not just be so reactionary, not necessarily like, live in the now because you're right, Like a lot of these guys are making money that, like, it's, it coming in so fast, but it also shuts off faster than most people too, right? Like when you, when, when I, when I try to dive into some of the education with the kids and I show them how this is how, you know, the average NFL player earns or major league baseball player earns versus, like the average American, like those two curves, income versus age look way different, right? Like your spikes way higher than mine will, like, ever get. But, you know, I started making like, I think my started out Maruchi like 750 an hour, then moved up to nine bucks an hour and then I made 11 and then I got on salary and it was like, you know, 30 grand a year. And then, you know, but I learned how to live at like each and one of those stages, right? And like paying rent and used car, you know, and the life got better. And you know, you get married and all this stuff, right? But like, you know, they're just thrusting these kids in from like living with their parents house to like being millionaires. And it's like they have these spending habits because they just, they're, they're thrusted into like their, their highest earning years are just so much earlier in their life than most people. But it also shuts off too. So it's like, what do you want to do when you're done playing? Because like, look at, I mean like 35 years of age, you're done, right? And if so if you live that hard for that many years and you get to the end of that career and you have these mortgages and you have these, you know, bigger expenses because you were living like a rock star for so long, but then it shuts off like, and you didn't prepare to, to have that money reach, you know, 65, 70, 80 years of age. Like, well then what are you going to do next? You know, and so you got to go get income, you got to go coach and, and it's not to say like everyone should just save all their money and then just retire. Like not everyone wants to retire at 35 years of age. But you're also given this amazing opportunity that if you're smart with it, you get to make the decision what you want to do when you're done playing, right? Some guys want to retire on a ranch. Like that's awesome. Some guys want to take that money, invest in businesses, right? So if you have an opportunity, you have this cash and you're looking at the end of your career and you say, hey, I want to go do this next. It's way better to do it as like a part owner or have a stake in it as opposed to being an employee for a company. So let's start preparing and like not constantly having these conversations of post playing career. But that's a hard process for guys, right? And so I think it's just not getting caught up in like, you know, spending off of what the income is today. And like, let's focus on like what the income really looks like over the next five, ten years. Best case scenarios, worst case Scenarios and then just have a plan for there. Because is no baseball players playing at 55, you know, no football players playing at 40. There's a couple Brady, a couple other guys, but like, you still have half your life left.
- [36:09]
A
Right.
- [36:09]
B
You know what I mean? And you want to set up your family, you want to take care of people in your life. And so that takes planning. And so let's not just get lost in the glitz and glamour of the nice things that we buy, but let's also keep one eye on the future. And sometimes in that moment where you're, you know, you're bulletproof, you're on the COVID of magazines, you're, you know, you're the biggest name in a city, you get kind of lost in the bright lights a little bit. And. And there's a level of enjoyment, but use it to your advantage.
- [36:39]
A
Right.
- [36:39]
B
Like had this money make money for you. And when you get guys to really understand that whole compounding interest thing, and I mean, Albert Einstein calls it the eighth wonder of the world. Right.
- [36:48]
A
Those reason.
- [36:49]
B
Yeah. Like, those who don't understand it, pay it. Those that do, you know, profit off of it. So, you know, I think a lot of these guys have an entrepreneurial mind. Entrepreneurial mind, you know, so it's like just showing them options, you know, for like, in planning for like five years, 10 years down the road. Like, what do you want to do when you're done? A lot of time you talked about guys and they're like, when I'm done. That's actually closer than you think it is. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, and so they do earn very abnormally to most Americans, and it's an unbelievable head start. And so I guess for me, the hard part is like, seeing it being mismanaged. Right. And that's where my passion comes from of like, what gets me out of bed today is like, pretending this money is mine and what I would do with it. You don't have to listen to everything that I say, but like, let me just run some scenarios for you. Let me just hypothetically speaking, on. On a couple of things, whether it's like month to month, day to day, year to year, or planning for your. For your life after. After sports.
- [37:43]
A
Yeah. And a reason why I. There's various wealth advisors out there. Right. I think everybody probably knows somebody in the neighborhood who does it. And not that it's just like real estate agents, but I feel like there's so many real estate agents out there and there's a lot of wealth advisors too. And you know, because trust is such an important thing, I think sometimes when families have a son who gets drafted and is given some money because the trust maybe is with someone in the area who doesn't have experience in professional athletes, they say, I'd rather rely on the trust factor. I know I can trust this person, so let's have him manage it. And I'm not saying that that is 100% of the time a mistake. Right. However, knowing how professional athletes make money is drastically different than a business owner, a doctor, a lawyer, vastly different. The playing window is so small. The percentage likelihood that that player is going to eventually grow and become somebody who even gets the arbitration, let alone free agency, is so small that if you are unaware of how that process works, that financial advisor, wealth advisor may be recommending certain products or different things that would have been great for a doctor who's going to work until he's 75 years old, but maybe not so much for the professional athlete who his window of making money is going to be very small.
- [39:06]
B
Yeah, I mean, and the same thing kind of goes for, you know, Stephen, who you had in the podcast cpa. I mean like under, like there's a ton of great CPAs out there. Do they understand jock tax? Do they understand, you know, some of the things that different lifestyles these guys live? And it's kind of the same thing on the wealth advisory side is, is like, you know, we, we don't deal with, you know, doctors and lawyers and people that worked in the plants for many years and stacked all these stock options and they're, you know, planning that come to us at 50 years of age that you know, hey, what's my retirement situation look like? We deal with sudden net wealth individuals and we specialize in that because they are totally different and the cash flows are different. The, the, the, the, the, the investment opportunities. There's so many ways I could take it of how it's different, but it is totally different. And so using the guy that represents your mom and dad, it's not that he's not going to do a good job, but is that what's best for the, the 18 year old kid? Like what mom and dad's portfolio look like should not be what the 18 year old millionaire looks like.
- [40:03]
A
Well, and oftentimes that individual who you know and trust, and it's not that they're intentionally misleading you, but it's no different than an athlete. Like, do you think you can do this for us? Of course I can.
- [40:15]
B
Right.
- [40:15]
A
Like he and I, I believe that he believes that he can do it, but he doesn't yet quite know what he doesn't know.
- [40:22]
B
Yeah.
- [40:23]
A
Right. And so that's just, it's just something for families to be mindful of.
- [40:28]
B
Absolutely.
- [40:28]
A
More than anything.
- [40:29]
B
And look, I like interview multiple advisors. You know, I mean, I think trust is a very big part of it. You want to have a relationship, you want to know that, you know, you're dealing with, with good. Check people's resources, call around, make sure it's a good person. You know, let's hold on.
- [40:43]
A
I want to talk about this right now because this is a good. I want to give these people practical.
- [40:46]
B
Yeah.
- [40:47]
A
And like things that they can really put into practice after hearing this podcast. So if they interview wealth advisors, what are a handful of questions that you would recommend that they ask?
- [40:58]
B
How, how you organize your fees? You know, like, what's in it for you? Like anything.
- [41:02]
A
How do you charge me?
- [41:03]
B
Your motivation. And then, and then I'll, you know, go from there. Like, what motivates you? Why are you doing this? Right. So, I mean, you don't have to be that blunt and that forward with it. But like, where's, how are the fees? And, but then go deeper than that. Right. Like, because there's some, some, you know, putting the ping pong ball under the solo cup and moving around. Like, there's some firms that will kind of, you know, say, hey, like, our fees are way lower, but they're, they're getting commissioned off of like selling you products.
- [41:24]
A
Can you talk a little bit about, like specifically the various ways? Because I know for anybody listening, there are firms, and they've been around for a while who actually will charge a player a percentage of their playing contract, which is wild to think about, but there are, there are many firms that do that. Right. And so to help everybody understand, like the impact of that, you're paying obviously your agent a percentage of the contract that he's negotiating. Right. To add another percentage point or two for them to manage your money, but not based on what they're doing with your money, purely based on your playing contract doesn't mean you're giving them more money to use to invest. If they're paying five bills, let's say, and I'm generalizing here, but they're paying five bills and you're making a million dollars a year. Now you go make $30 million a year and they're still paying those five bills. Nothing's changed. Your fees just grew exponentially.
- [42:26]
B
Yeah. And, and when you look at fees over Time and again, this is a very important to like the age and the type of people that we're talking to now or the sons or, you know, of those, of the people listening is those fees over time, when you look at what they do like that, that half a percentage point over like, like 5 years, 10 years, 30 years, 40 years is like, could be millions of dollars. So just to sign up for a percentage of what you have is, you know, what you're earning is. That's, that's. I'm not even going to put a term on it because, like, I don't want to, you know, misstep. But like, yeah, it's, it's, it's so. It's, it's, it's bad.
- [43:06]
A
Well, so let's do this. Let's say we have. We're talking about a player out of the draft and this player doesn't know anything. They meet with various financial firms. They choose you. Right? What are some of the things that you're working on leading up to the draft? Like, what are you educating them on? What are you, what are you really focused on before they actually make any money to kind of get them to a place where when that happens, right, God willing, that they're, they're in a good spot?
- [43:36]
B
Yeah, well, I mean, you know, if somebody's going to go that high in the draft, they're more than likely receiving some sort of nil compensation. Right. So let's make sure that we're buttoned up and planned there. We're working with a good CPA that's helping you kind of organize some of those expenses. And where's the threshold on the llc and you know, do you pay yourself and you know, kind of. Are we in that same ballpark? What does that look like rolling forward when you get into pro ball, when the team now pays the individual. But back to the nil side. Let's make sure we're, we're organized, we're saving for our taxes as we lead up to the draft year. And let's kind of like financial quarterback this thing. Like, man, here's what we're thinking. You know, here's multiple different scenarios. Let's talk hypothetical. What do you, what are some of the things that you want to do? And there's, you know, baseball superstitious, right? So you don't want to get like too deep in the weeds and say, like, well, if this happens, if you're this pick or you get this slotted doa, you kind of stay away. You do speak in bigger yeah, Round numbers. You don't want to jinx it. Yeah.
- [44:30]
A
Generally say you have X number of dollars to play with.
- [44:32]
B
Let's have a plan because, you know, it's like, we talk with some of our guys, it's like, dude, so much goes into, like, training and traveling and focused and downtime and mental health and, you know, like, this is a big, cumbersome process that it can be intimidating. So, like, let's focus on it before your. Your season starts. So you're not something that you're thinking about consistently in season. But, like, now that we get through the college season and we're prepping for the draft and we have a better idea, you've already kind of started interviewing some teams and you got an idea of, you know, where you think you're going to go. Let's start running some scenarios. Let's start seeing with the, you know, backing out all the different expenses, fees, what city, you know, domiciling. You know, you're working with. With the CPA on that front there to kind of see, like, all right, where do we think we're going to be and what big. What do you want to do with it? You know? And again, I'd love guys to invest all their money, but that's not a realistic expectation. That's not what I'm here to do. It's not what I'm. I'm trying to extract out of them. Right. It's like, all right, so let's assume you're going to get this. What do you. Like, what do you do? What are your thoughts on money? Like, what do you want to buy with it? What do you know? And so let's just have, like, a real honest and open conversation, and I'll, you know, my job is to give you advice.
- [45:39]
A
Yeah. So it sounds like we've got a similar job. So one of the very first things that we do, it's like, we have to understand really who you are. Yeah, right.
- [45:46]
B
What are your motives?
- [45:47]
A
Yeah, let's figure this out. Because, you know, I talked about kind of like the three Personas, right. If we're dealing with the person, one who's all the way over here on the. Right. Right. Who's saying, like, I don't want any access to my money. You have full, not full control, but, like, you're the one who's telling me that I can spend $100 on a pair of shoes. It's good to know that because that player is gonna, you know, be much different than the guy on the other side, which is give me your opinion, but I'm gonna do whatever I want.
- [46:15]
B
Right? Right. I would say, why pay us?
- [46:19]
A
Right. You know, right. At that point, like, just.
- [46:21]
B
Yeah, just keep all your money in your checking account. And, you know, if that's. That's your philosophy on it, then there's. I'll save you some money.
- [46:27]
A
Right.
- [46:27]
B
Don't pay us. Right. So, yeah. But, yeah, you're right. There's somewhere in between. So sorry to cut you.
- [46:32]
A
Yeah. So with this player, right, You've now taken him up until the draft, now he's blessed, and he signs for a pretty good signing bonus. I know that there's many, many things based on who he is and what his goals are that he could be doing. How much is his salary as a baseball player now? Because again, you got your bonus, which is great.
- [46:58]
B
You got half your bonus, right?
- [47:00]
A
Yeah. There you go. After taxes, half. But now you're in pro ball, and these minor league guys don't make a lot of money.
- [47:06]
B
No.
- [47:07]
A
So, again, thinking about the standpoint of, like, what is your training going to look like in the offseason? Because that's going to cost money. Right. How are you kind of managing more the expectation? Because I think a lot of times when the guys sign for a lot of money out of the draft, oh, they think I'm getting to the big leagues in, like, two years. I'm going to make big league, minimum for a couple of years, then I'm going to get to arbitration, then free agency. And in their mind, they're six years down the road, and they're already making 10, $15 million a year. Right. How are you managing that with them to kind of get their sight set on? Like, well, let's slow down a minute. We've got to get there first. Like, we really need to focus on, like, how many years ahead are you thinking about?
- [47:44]
B
Usually three to five at a. @ a minimum. Right. And so what. What does kind of, like, get them to, like, check up a little bit and, like, humble them is like, here's going to be your minor league salary next.
- [47:55]
A
Year.
- [47:55]
B
Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, all right, here's the bonus. Great. You earned it. You deserved it. We'll put it over here. But, like, this is what you're gonna make next year. Right? Now, they've done a better job recently of, like, you know, housing stipends, and, you know, ultimately, like, a lot of the minor league guys, like, they don't make a lot of money, but, you know, it's, you know, the. The cycle that they're on. They don't really spend a lot of money, too. I mean, there is some downtime to go to the mall and some things like that, but, you know, they're all over and, you know, they're in hotels, they're in apartments in one city. They're not really, like, buying apartments. You know, they're not really buying real estate in the cities that they're in because they don't know where they're going. So their expenses are relatively low. But like, yeah, it's a little humbling to like, oh, I'm this millionaire because I got this bonus, but like, oh, my 20, you know, 27 salary is going to be, you know, under $30,000, you know, so that, that kind of like, is. Baseball has a way of. Of. Of kind of like checking guys and humbling them. It's just like the nature of the sport. Right? But it's, it's. It's really where you focus a lot on, like, what are those big expenses that you want to do? Like, let me show you. If you don't touch it, what do you do? Right. I realize that's not the case, but, like, if you have an understanding of, like, what the top scenario could be if you don't touch it and you just live off your minor league salary, like, here's what It'll do over five years, 10 years, you know, 30 years. But, you know, hey, I want to buy this house, I want to buy this real estate, I want to buy this car. Like, all right, let's start backing out some of those things. And like, all right, what are we left with? And so it just comes from trust and it comes from honest conversations and like, like you said, kind of getting into, you know, we, we like to use. We call it the mind map, you know, where we try to, like, get inside the mind and like, hey, like, what, what scares you about money? What excites you about money? Like, what do you think about money? What do you want to. If you had all the money in the world, what would you do? And all those, like, just kind of like philosophical, broad questions that have nothing to do with data and analytics and ETFs and all those, you know, like, you know, terms that you'll, that you'll learn in the financial world. Like, it's really good to understand what they want to do with it and what they want to buy. And so helping them buy that at the most efficient way possible and save as much as they can to invest. And then, you know, typically there's not a lot of married guys in the draft, but like, hey, man, like, you know, you're dating this girl, like, be riding a ring soon, like, you guys gonna get married? How much do you want to save for the wedding? And then, you know, a little later in their career, it's like, oh, we have a kid. It's like, all right, well then are we gonna, you know, what are those expenses look like moving forward? And then do we want to start establishing a trust to where we protecting some of those assets and how do they receive that money over time? Because I know you want to take care of them. And so the conversations just always evolve over their career. But yeah, man, in right out of the draft, back to it. I mean, it's, it's an influx of, of cash and, and you know, try to educate and instill some of that discipline. Show them all these different alternatives and different directions that we can go and then from there, listen to.
- [50:39]
A
Them. Yeah. All right, I want to get into. We've thrown around the term fiduciary a couple times. I know that a lot of families have heard it, some players may have heard it, but again, when you're talking about the financial piece, I think instead of making, you know, the assumption that everybody just knows, or the player or the parent says, oh, yeah, you know, I know what that is. When they really don't. Yeah, let's, let's talk about that. Like, can you describe what that.
- [51:04]
B
Is? It's such a loose term that's being thrown out there now. I think a lot of people are using the term that honestly shouldn't use it. But the way we view it at my practice is, you know, it's ethical and legal responsibility to put the client's interest above your own. Right. And so you could take that a couple of different ways, but that kind of fits back in and circles back to like the unusual life cycle these guys have of earning money. You know, when you. We are a fee only advisor, you pay us one fee to give you the advice that we do. And, you know, that'd be a different conversation for a different day of why we believe so wholeheartedly in that. But if you look at some of the other options that are out there and opportunities, a lot of them come referenced from family members that may be more suitable because you'll hear that term a lot too, for you know that this is who dad uses. Right. There's a lot of. You always kind of have to like, question like the motives and, and what people are trying to get out of it. And you know, the fiduciary side of things, something we take very serious. It's a legal responsibility. It's an ethical and legal responsibility to put the client's interest ahead of our own. So if we're helping a guy buy an insurance policy for his junior year of high school, leading up to his draft year, like we're gonna go find him three or four different options. We literally make nothing.
- [52:23]
A
Nothing. Right. You don't make any money off of.
- [52:24]
B
That.
- [52:24]
A
Right. Not every firm is the.
- [52:27]
B
Same. No, they're, you know, and you start mixing in like some of the banking institutions and like the banking products that they offer. It's like, oh well, we'll, you know, well, no one's going to get better finances on like on your housing loan for the first house that you want to buy. They try to loop a lot of this stuff in there. And then if you go a lot of times, look at some of these guys portfolios, you're like, they're just selling them products, like, oh yeah, we're charging less fees and it's like, yeah, but they're making commissions off of like, like these products that they're putting them in. It's not that they're all just like bad products, but like, does that fit? Is that the best product for a 19 year old kid that's got $800,000 invested?
- [53:00]
A
Like. Right. So I don't know. To make sure that everybody understands. So a firm says, you know, we want to sell you this product, we want to put you in this thing. They're making a fee off of it. Yes. Right. And.
- [53:12]
B
So. Or like a trip to Cabo if they sell X amount of them. You know what I.
- [53:16]
A
Mean? Right. So they're giving you.
- [53:17]
B
Advice. They're. Yeah. And they're incentivized differently than I'm.
- [53:20]
A
Incentivized. Right, right. They're incentivized. You know, I, I think this is a terrible analogy, but thought that comes to mind is like you go to a restaurant and behind the scenes they're like, hey, if you can sell 100 margaritas a day, like, yeah, yeah, you get a thousand bucks. And so when they show up, it's like, you know, our best drink is a margarita. You.
- [53:35]
B
Should.
- [53:35]
A
Yeah. And in reality maybe the worst drink, but they're incentivized to do it. So. Same.
- [53:39]
B
Same. So yeah, it's questioning like their motives. And again, it's like it's, it's, it's uncomfortable and it's, you know, interviewing process is important but like it's hard to just like put a microphone in somebody's face, be like, hey, what are your motives? I'm trying to get to my.
- [53:51]
A
Son. So what's funny is I, I think parents are great at that. I think part of the problem though is they don't know what they don't.
- [53:58]
B
Know.
- [53:58]
A
Yeah. So they ask a question, how do you charge? They give an answer and the family's like, okay, I think I understand. And then they meet with the next person and they may say something totally different. It may sound the same and they may say, oh, they charge the same. They just don't understand. And so naturally they may go with the guy that, oh, he's lives closer to us. Right. He's going to be here more. I liked his personality more, whatever it.
- [54:23]
B
Is. And so I worked with them in the past.
- [54:26]
A
Right. So the mistake is made not from not asking the question, not understanding. And this is why I wanted to kind of go more into the specifics as far as like, what do you mean when you say.
- [54:35]
B
Fiduciary? It's sitting on the same side of the table as you, right. It's, it's pretending like your money is my money. Simple as.
- [54:45]
A
That.
- [54:45]
B
Yeah. Like again, you're going to make the decision on it. My, my job is to give you advice on how I think you should buy this home or hey, we're getting drafted and we're going to live in this city and you know, all right, well here's what a eight hundred thousand dollar home, a million dollar home, a million five home. This is how it'll affect your portfolio. Let me kind of, you know, run scenarios for you. But ultimately my job is to like give you advice for, to make you make the best decision. I'm not going to make the decision for you. My job is to present you options and advice to help you make the best.
- [55:16]
A
Decision. Well, and the thing that you said, which I love, which I agree with, and you can look, read up about Charlie Munger, right. Warren Buffett's business partner who passed away, I think a year ago, but he talks often about, you know, you learn a lot about people when you understand the incentives, right? Absolutely. And so when a firm that is working or you believe to be working on your behalf is being incentivized to actually do things that may not be in your best interest, they're going to be motivated by that, their incentive. Right. And I talk about it on the agent side a lot. Right. When these really, really big agencies, and again, I've worked at a Couple of them. But when agencies in general, when, if, if they're only incentivized by going to get more clients, naturally they're going to continue getting more clients. Does that mean getting more clients is better for you? The player?
- [56:07]
B
No. Or the free agent side of things. Of, like, I've heard you use reference this example before, but like, a guy may not want to play in that.
- [56:15]
A
City.
- [56:15]
B
Yeah. But maybe there's like this, oh.
- [56:18]
A
They'Re offering the most.
- [56:19]
B
Money.
- [56:19]
A
So.
- [56:19]
B
Yeah. You know what I mean? So it's like, is that really what's in the best interest? Are you really having those deep conversations? Are you really sitting on the same side of the table? And so you always got to analyze people's.
- [56:30]
A
Motives. Well, and I think the reason we are both so outspoken and care so deeply about this is because we've seen that it's so common in this business that it doesn't happen quite like that. And so to a family out there, you know, I. The thought that comes to mind is like being taken advantage of. Right. Because to us, they may admit. Right. Because we understand the business. Oh, yeah, I just did this. And to that agent who's maybe doing something that isn't in your best interest, he says it so casually, as though it's not a big deal, but in reality, well, how come the family doesn't know? Because if the family knew it, they wouldn't be on board with.
- [57:10]
B
That.
- [57:10]
A
Correct. So it's obviously a bigger deal, but to you it's not a big deal because. Yeah, it's your pocketbook or.
- [57:16]
B
Whatever. Correct. And when you look at investing, you know, you guys operate in a window on their playing window, the most important window, because that's where the income's being generated. I'm looking at life after sports too. Right. So I'm looking at things like tax efficiency and fees and the other part of the financial industry that compounds over time, as you would assume the account would grow for various different reasons, but like the, the fees and all that stuff, you know, as it compounds the problems only become greater. Right. So that's where I think it's important to have like, those deeper conversations of like, what does this look like not only today, but what does it look like 10 years from now? Because you're. They're 18, 19 years old. Right. Like, you know, we would hope that somebody wants to be with us for 30, 40, 50.
- [58:03]
A
Years. Yeah. And I think a lot of times athletes, when they're choosing a wealth advisor, it is truly. Yeah, I want to choose one. I I'm gonna work with you for my whole.
- [58:11]
B
Life. Well, then that brings into a conversation of, like, the intimidation of it. They may have somebody that they like. People inherently don't like to fire people assuming things aren't, you know, bad actions and things that, you know, there's some. Some things every now and then. Oh, that'll maybe shake the tree a little bit. But are they really, like, diving into their statement at the end of the year and seeing what's what, or is it just kind of like, I don't really know and I'm intimidated. I'm not going to really do it. Look, anyone can examine performance, right? So I'm not here to say, you know, that's the only thing that you need to be operating, but I think it is important for every couple years to just have somebody, like, look at your statement or have somebody just. Just hear a different opinion every now and then just to make sure it's not something you need to be constantly taking meetings on. It's not what I'm saying at all. Right. But it is, as you enter these different phases of your life, right, because they get to money a lot of times when they're young and single, well, then their life's different a couple years later when they're married, and then a couple years after that when they have kids. And then a couple years after that, they, you know, they're planning for life after sports. So there's. There's all these different, like, kind of leaps within that window that we operate in that I think is important to just kind of sit back and just double check, you know, just do your homework. Just maybe have somebody else look at.
- [59:24]
A
It.
- [59:24]
B
Yeah. You know what I mean? Just to make sure you're in the right thing. Dude, there's. I've had a lot of times where I've, you know, a guy would have me look at it and I was like, dude, I'm shooting you straight. Like, guy's taking care of you, doing a good job. Yeah. He's got you in the right stuff. Like, this isn't worth you, you know, it's not worth you making this move. You know what I.
- [59:39]
A
Mean? Well, and good for you for doing that, because oftentimes if you were just trying to sell him on something, if that guy is doing a good job and then he's coming over to you, it's like, if you're going to be doing the same thing that that guy was doing, you're creating a problem a lot of.
- [59:49]
B
Yourself. Like, dude, like, there's A, there's a. And I went through it. It's an intense, you know, certification process. Like people that are in the industry are smart people. Right. It's not that like, you know, you hear horror stories of like the 30 for 30, but that's more like bad actors that operate outside of like, sure. The window, you know, kind of the lane that I'm in. So it's not that. It's, it's like you got to look out for these crooks out there. They're going to steal your money. It's just like, is it in most optimal and is it in the best interest for you versus like what are some of the options out there that may be more in the best interest for you? And I think over time it's good to just re examine and just make sure you're on the right.
- [60:23]
A
Path. Well, it's almost more dangerous, I feel like, because sometimes the bad actors, I mean, you can like sniff them out plain sight, but the ones that you actually feel like, oh no, this guy's in my inner circle, I can trust them. And then his incentives again, are not in your best interest. It's like, oh, I don't even see that this person is not having my best interest at heart.
- [60:42]
B
Yeah. And, and you know, there's so many different ways you can take like the, not only the incentive side, but what, what, what's available to you, what products are out there. But I think I touched on a little bit earlier too. Like there is a big private sector option that these young millionaires, athletes who have millions of followers on social media have access to private investments. And I'll be completely honest with you, if a player of mine wants to take money out of the market to invest in something private, well, that's less money for me to manage. But I would do it if I believe that this is a good investment, that in the next three to five years he's going to be able to liquidate that investment and bring it back to.
- [61:20]
A
Me.
- [61:20]
B
Yeah. Right. And so it's like, it's really just not trying to keep, keep, keep, keep, keep everything that he has because, you know, it affects my pay. It's more of like, no, this, I want to be with this client for a long.
- [61:31]
A
Time.
- [61:32]
B
Right. And this company is cutting him in on a deal that most people can't get. And I think this is a good deal and I think you need to do it. And I'm banking on, I'm investing in it too. I mean, the dog food. Right. I, I think it's something that, like, you know, and there's, there's obviously some, some, some stuff you have to tiptoe around there. But it's, I'm believing in it even though it's less money for me to manage because I think it's going to come back to me. Yeah, right. And so that's where I think a lot of other advisors that are out there that are kind of more on like the institution side or the broker dealer side that are kind of selling products, they're a lot more leery to do to pass on that opportunities because it's less products that they sell and it's less that they have under management. And that's, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's very shortsighted approach because again the incentives. Right. And so that again comes back to the relationship side and the trust and like, dude, I'm not looking to just represent somebody for like two to three years. Like I'm here to do this for 20, 30, 40 years to, to. There's going to be good opportunities that this athlete's going to get that I can't get by.
- [62:24]
A
Myself.
- [62:25]
B
Right. And so yeah, let's pull this out, let's liquidate this, let's try this investment. It gets a little bit tougher because there's not the transparency that you have in the public markets and certainly not the, at times of liquidity, but you still have a good opportunity that you know, you want to, to leverage and use the athlete because they can impact the business more than. It's not just like everyone's money's green, you know what I mean? It's like I can get this guy invested in this business and he's going to impact the business that's going investment over time. And so there's unique opportunities there that you kind of have to be nimble from like that fiduciary approach and, and help guide those.
- [62:59]
A
Conversations. So the firm you work with, Lord, Lord, Lord Murray, you guys are very big in multiple sports.
- [63:06]
B
Right? Sports actors, entertainers, Sutton, net wealth individuals, YouTubers, Twitch streamers, you know, SpaceX, meta employees that have a ton of stock options. It's, it's sudden. Net wealth.
- [63:19]
A
Individuals. Yeah, I recognize that some of the listeners may be parents of football players, basketball players, etc. What is something that jumps out as far as like the difference in the, and maybe it's more of like the business side right now. Being somebody who's in baseball, I certainly understand the differences, but like, is there something that jumps out, like, you know, as an example, the first thing that comes to mind is, well, for a lot of these NBA guys or NFL guys, they're getting drafted, they're in the league. Yeah, right. Where baseball. They're making the minor league salary and it's going to take a while. What are some of those, I guess, initial.
- [63:55]
B
Differences. This the cash flows. Right. I think, you know, on the, on the football side, you know, there's, there's a 53 man roster. I forget how many, you know, guys practice squad. I'm going to get that number wrong. Average life cycle in a lot of positions, like 2.8 years. And it is a turnstile of employment. Like 35% of the guys get to a second contract. Right. So it's, you know, it is a lot more transactional. I mean the injury risk is way higher pivot to the NBA. Was there 13 guys on the bench? I mean, LeBron's 40, Steph's nearing 40. They're still playing like Kevin Durant, you know, like there's. So those spots don't come as readily available. Now you get a supermax guy, like that's a whole different ball game. Even inside of football position groups are different. Quarterbacks are different than linemen versus wide receivers and corners. And you know, their pay is totally different. Back to baseball, it's like a very big upfront draft bonus. And then there's this kind of waiting period, you know, that can go so many different directions. I do think the teams have gotten better with calling guys up sooner. They're not really manipulating like the, you know, some of the stuff that you've seen like with Chris Bryant and stuff like that. I mean, definitely incentive changing.
- [65:04]
A
Incentives. Yeah. Cba certainly. And a shout out to the union for. In the last cba, they did a very good job of getting some additional things put into the CBA that finally protected players in that regard who maybe you referenced Chris Bryant, you know, should have made the team. Didn't make the team really because they didn't want his clock to.
- [65:19]
B
Start. And, and the PR pool has been big. I mean, the greatest. I mean you get there and you perform like all right, there's, there's a way to get to it where they used to actually have that control over.
- [65:27]
A
You.
- [65:28]
B
Sure. Now we're gonna manipulate this and we're gonna get all six years out of you or try to buy out a couple of those years on the discount. And so, yeah, so there. It's a little bit faster Runway, but still baseball, dude. Yeah, you know, it's still. It's a very, very hard sport. It takes a lot mentally to withstand the treacherous route to the big leagues. Doesn't matter how talented you are. Like, if you're in professional baseball, you're.
- [65:50]
A
Talented.
- [65:50]
B
Yeah. But it is a mental grind, physical grind. The sport itself, you know, you always hear the, you know you fail 7% of the 70 of times you're a Hall of Famer. Right. So there's that element. But on top of that, the minor league's tough stuff. Right. And I've seen a lot of talented players, like just get ate up in.
- [66:08]
A
That. Oh.
- [66:08]
B
Yeah. In that world. And so that's where I think some financial security would.
- [66:14]
A
Help.
- [66:15]
B
Absolutely. Live life a little bit easier in this such unknown time because you're going in like this vortex of like, you don't know you're a prospect, the Rule 5 draft, or you're getting traded or like, what city am I going to be living in? You're in this like level of unknown. Then you're going back to the off season to see your buddies for like two or three months. But now you gotta like, get back on the training wagon. After you let you know, after you recharge your body into the next thing you know, you're right back in spring training. You're in a different city. You go to that spring training, you don't really know where they're gonna send you. You may have an idea, but then it just, it is a, a very chaotic and hectic, hectic time. And on top of that, you're trying to perform in probably the hardest sport that there is to play. So, you know, the baseball guys, it's, it's, it's unique to other sports. Yeah, they're all athletes. Yeah, they're celebrities. Yeah. Marketing deals can be similar, but they're earning cash flows are just totally different than a lot of the other.
- [67:07]
A
Sports. Last thing I have for you and I'll link this on the podcast or I'll figure out a way if you guys want to see this, to get it to you. There were two studies that were done and I want to say it was right around 2016 and I'll look and see if there's more of a up to date and recent study, but based on these two studies, essentially what these studies showed was in youth and travel sports. And primarily these studies were about baseball. Right. Or one, I should say one was about baseball. The reality is a lot of families, right, as they're paying for their son playing travel, baseball or sports, they're looking at the money that they're spending as an.
- [67:46]
B
Investment.
- [67:47]
A
Yeah. Right. And so then naturally, and I don't blame families for thinking this way, it's more of a byproduct of thinking this way. Naturally, as they're paying all of this money and looking at it as an investment, the sun is unnecessarily being affected by all of the pressure that comes with that, right? Well, because they're spending so much money on it, you know, and what the study addresses, one of them was families, a large percentage of them now are no longer putting forward towards their retirement plan because the money is now going to this investment. They're now putting a lot of money on their credit cards. Right. I mean, these things are expensive. And what, what families are doing, you know, knowingly is they're banking on, well, if school's gonna cost us 60 grand a year now, potentially, if my son gets a scholarship, well, if I'm not spending 60 grand a year, like it's still gonna be worth it. Right. And so they, they bank on that happening. But in reality, they're in their mind, it's like, you know, not that it's 100% chance this is going to happen, but let's say it's an 80% chance my son's getting it a full ride scholarship. Reality is, say it's closer to 25%. Right. And so they're making these decisions and naturally there's this byproduct which a lot of the time is the pressure being placed on the sun. And that's when you start having things like burnout. You know, the kid wants to quit, he doesn't enjoy the game anymore. It's becoming much more professionalized as far as the pressure goes in advance of the draft. And so more of a challenge to all these families. And I did a podcast recently about this. It's, you know, spend time and understand. Talk about budgeting like these families need to budget and figure out if we've got X number of dollars roughly to spend over the course of a year. And I know that it, it for any family, it may be we don't have any money to spend. We're doing it because we're hoping something's coming. But at least do it with all your eyes open, understand the risk and have a conversation with your son and just. You're not letting him know, look, you know, we can't afford this, but we're doing it anyways. It's more like, look, this is why we're doing it. We're choosing to support you not Invest in you. We're choosing to support you and your dream. And I feel like that conversation needs to happen a lot more, really, for two reasons. One, because I think it's going to alleviate a lot of stress and pressure on the sun. But also I think I'm hopeful it's going to alleviate a lot of stress and pressure on the parents. Because when you could just call out what the thing is that you're dealing with that right now is living in your head and you're just knowing you're doing it but not not wanting to pay attention to it. That's no different than a player, you know, giving somebody a bunch of money and, like, needing it back, but just, oh, man, I can't ask him for the money back. It's just. It's this unnecessary stress that kind of lives in the ether, and I feel like it just creates a lot more problems.
- [70:32]
B
Than. Well, the reason why the study was done in baseball and probably other sports is baseball's very.
- [70:38]
A
Expensive. Oh.
- [70:39]
B
Yeah. I mean, you go, I came from that world. You know, bats are close to 500. God forbid you have. Son's a catcher. You know, you have two sets of gear. It's a thousand. You know what I.
- [70:47]
A
Mean? And then your traveling fees.
- [70:50]
B
Travel. Yeah. I mean, private equity is in that space.
- [70:52]
A
Now. What does that tell.
- [70:53]
B
You? Exactly. Right. They're extracting cash out of you. So that's where I think there's something as simple as this podcast who, like, you know, Matt, you're. You're a very successful agent. You can't get to every kid that's out there and represent that many people. Right. But given this platform to be able to listen and just, like, have that advice, because I think it's, It's. It's very, like, gotta have perspective, which I understand is ahead of time. Like, right now, it's easy for me to say, like, come these parents need more perspective. Like, my son's 8 months old. Check in with me in 15 years. I might be totally different. Right, right. But. But I think it's kind of like understanding, like, what really do you think your kid's gonna be like? What colleges are actually talking to.
- [71:28]
A
You?
- [71:28]
B
You. Like, which one actually have nil opportunities? Which one are probably just like, scholarship opportunities. And it's hard for parents to kind of evaluate their own kids, like, through that, through that lens. And so not everyone is going to have an agent in their ear to help them, guide them through that process. So, again, I commend you for having this podcast because I think Cast a wider net. So many people that do need that advice, dude. Hearing people, like, are spending their retirement money on that stuff. That. That, as a. As a financial advisor is like, that's very. Like that. That. That. That kind of eats at me a little bit. I hate that it is the case. But there is this level of exposure that you do have to have, and you can't just sit back and just like, hey, I'm only gonna play two tournaments over the summer, right? So I think they've gotten better from, like, you know, hey, you can go face the. The best competition in, like, a. In a faster window at some of these bigger events, which I think are important. But, like, baseball, you got to see live pitching, right? You gotta. You gotta. You gotta get your reps in, right? You can't just, like, you know, fish all summer with your buddies and then hop in, go to, you know, go to, you know, Lake Point and go play a tournament against the best arm in the country.
- [72:29]
A
Right? Here's what I'll say it. I think it can. It connects to a lot of this conversation today, right, about employing capital, putting money to work. The same applies in baseball. Yeah, right. You know, we talk often on this podcast that, you know, development is more important than exposure. The reality is, is, like, you do need exposure, but exposure is a natural byproduct of doing all these other things really.
- [72:49]
B
Well. You're gonna have overexposure.
- [72:50]
A
Too. Well. And that's. And so we've talked about that on the podcast. But to your point with the whole. How it connects to money also, though, is just like, development leads to exposure. Education on the financial side leads to you being able to save money and make smart decisions. And so that's what I mean. It's like if. If a family, you know, thinks about youth sports and just gets so overwhelmed, it's no different than someone who just, you know, comes into a lot of money and is like, I don't know what to do with it. The answer isn't just go spend more. It's slow down, think about it strategically, and ask good questions. And that's where I'm hoping that the podcast is adding value to a lot of these families who otherwise wouldn't get this.
- [73:30]
B
Insight. And. And that brings you back to this nil conversation. And one of the things I think about often is like. And again, that's where a good agent comes in, is like, you know, everyone wants, like, this. These. These marketing deals. They want this Nils deal. And it's like, that's added pressure, right? I mean like, even if it's like the local burger joint that's paying you, you know, a thousand bucks for a couple social media posts, like there is in the back of these kids mind, they may not want to admit it that like they now have added pressure because like, you know, like, you know, the local burger joint may not post them if they have a rough weekend. Like, dude, it's, it's understanding where you really fit in this sector and who you want to be and what motivates you to not just get on the hamster wheel and try to keep up with some other kid or have the same path that some other kid, some kid may be very outgoing and he wants to do that kind of stuff. Some kids more, you know, like to lay low and just prepare. Just like so having real conversations or having access to be able to listen to people that have experience in the, in the, in the industry is probably a calming thing for a lot of these parents because I see like, dude, the, the, the, the, the crowds at these events are just the most like anxiety ridden sets of parents and grandma's there and then the agents looking over them to make sure no one else is talking to them and like they're sweating it in the stands, like every single at bat. And it's like this is youth summer.
- [74:44]
A
Baseball. I know it should be like.
- [74:46]
B
The funnest time of your life, like with your buddies. Like, don't lose sight of that. Like have fun. Play, play the game. But, but I just can feel this anxiety from mom and dad and the families in the stands and the agent looking over the shoulder and the scout that's there. I was never, look, I'm not an athlete. I never stood in that box. But I've talked to a lot of kids that talk about that window and like the pressure that they feel. Oh yeah. Staring down the, you know, the number seven arm in the class and like here we go. And it's like, it's good to get like best on best and like, yeah, I think guys should get that. But like, like there shouldn't be this added pressure. Right. If you would play better if you were looser, wouldn't you, Right. If you, if you didn't have.
- [75:26]
A
That.
- [75:26]
B
Absolutely. Wouldn't your brain focus a little bit faster? Wouldn't you have more bandwidth to analyze what this guy throws and what I think he's going to throw in this situation? Not looking over your shoulder to see like, man, if I don't get a hit off of this guy, like I might end up having to go to a juco route versus a D1 like dude that's just a horrible mind mindset to live. And so that's where back to the financial side of things with these parents is like it's, it's, it's, it's driven off of fear and then you have these private equity companies just ringing the towel, just getting all the juice out of that which is, which is stuff. So again having a podcast like this or an advisor or somebody that, a trusted ally that kind of knows the game that can really kind of shoot you straight or like where how you need to be thinking about this, what schools, what real opportunities are really out there in front of you is very, very important. I think that would alleviate a lot of the emotional stress but also financial stress too no question. I appreciate you. Thank you man. I appreciate it. I want to do this for a while man.