At 22, like his NFL rookie son, a former pro wasn't thinking about investing.

[09:20]

"and so he's just started to make a little bit of money. So, you know, and it's really difficult because now he has a couple dollars in pocket and I know how that felt when I first started making a few dollars."

[10:08]

"And but I came from Educators, my mom and dad are Educators and my pop sat down and told me he say, son, Listen, by the time you tax the money you're making and by the time you buy your card, it's the same amount of money as your"

[12:27]

"I think what I'm really fortunate for in my life is to have had, you know, a family support system, a friend support system who always made me think about what that next step was."

Full transcript

What's probably the biggest shift for a lot of athletes that are transitioning into becoming full-time investors. A lot of athletes, you know they don't know what they don't know, but they know their Sport and I believe that when you have the opportunity to surround yourself around you know smarter individuals. It puts you in an advantage. Why? Because you want to make sure that you do have an opportunity to expand your portfolio but at the same time, you don't want to play too conservative because there's a lot of opportunities out there.

That's scaling quickly. Um, my experience you know, as a former professional athlete, you know there were opportunities. You know real estate, private Equity, um, you know. You know developing relationships with. You know, uh, prominent families. But when you think about really what I understood at that point in my life, not much, but the people around me really allowed me to uh enter into those opportunities with a better Optics.

And, and sometimes you know you may not understand the language for people in the crowd today, you know if there are opportunities, it's probably not the best way to give me the whole a through z uh SPI. But I think it's, you know, more important to give me the, the, the Top Line version, uh, the one pager. You know, set aside some time to, you know, understand who you're talking to. I think is important because a lot of times when there is information available on the internet, you get to kind of learn more about my likes, my interest.

So if there is a match then we can have that conversation because we already have that intimate Bond and I think that's really what's important. You know there could be other alternative opportunities uh as well out there, but you know, sometimes you have to make that connection first and build a relationship before you ask me for a check. And I think that's really what's important, because having the information and presenting it to my team, the accountants, the attorneys, they're going to vet the information. I'm not going to, you know, put money into something that I don't understand, but at the same time, if there is an amazing opportunity uh to to look at a 10x multiple um, you know there's no getrich quick scheme out there.

But if we do our due diligence and we, like you, know what youve presented to us, then there is a a good probability that we'll do business with you. Um, it may take some time, nothing happens in in in one conversation or a transaction, but I do feel that the more high level, the more concise and, and the experience that I've had speaking to my peers, uh, myself, I've always said: you know what? Let let me get this information. Uh, take a moment to process it and then, you know, set up a 30 minute, you know, conversation with me on a zoom or a calendar invitation at some capacity and then let's have that conversation.

Um, people shouldn't be in fear to talk to athletes who are, are, are, are wellknown, um, who have, you know, big contracts. We're all people. We all want to make money. Uh, we all want to become, uh, uh, you know, wealthy investors, smart investors, but at the same time, we want to take our time with the deal and we don't want to be pitched.

You know, left and right and left and right and stuff that we don't even get. So, uh, I would say, you know, from my experience, it's always good to at least take your time and make sure you put yourself in position with the people around you that know more than you. Excellent, also, guess, before we stop to piggyback on Brad's Point. That's a great Point as well.

But to pick it back on Brad's point, I think that, uh, you know, if you are being a professional athlete, or even a highle division one athlete, um, if you can make it, if you can make it out the other side, it makes you a very particular kind of person. Um, and I think a lot of our colleagues who played uh forget that. Uh, you know, people think, you know they, they can't do anything else. Um, but really, the lessons you learn in professional Athletics in general transcend, um, you know you, your intensity with which you pursue your goals, your, how detail oriented you are, um, your ability to be resilient to adversity.

It transcends when you get to the get to the business world. So if there's any athletes or even entrepreneurs out there who are, you know, trying to understand how they can get a new Venture started, a new Venture going. Take a look at your past experience. It's the best variable. You have a granular look at your interactions, how you pursued you know past Ventures or past relationships that you know.

I think that's, I think that's the biggest data point you can hold on to and then say, okay, how can I optimize this? Um? And again, I just think that you know the people we've played with a lot of times forget that. Oh yeah. So, Stephanie, you want to add to that U yeah. So one of the one of the things that I learned um um through our years in the NFL is that most of the people who do approach us for opportunities or um things that they want um to present to us have a sense of entitlement to the assets that um we have when, as opposed to to an entitlement towards um bringing the skills to the table that we need.

So there has to be a give and tape. You can't believe that you're in it just to make money off of the athletes, and that's one of the things that we immediately recognize in dealing with a lot of people, because the first thing, as some of the panelists have said, that you try to do is to sell us something, present an opportunity for us to invest in. But I would challenge you today to present yourself for us to invest in TR. Present your trustworthiness to us, present your knowledge of your industry, because, at the end of the day, most of these athletes have gone to um college and had to maintain GPA higher than we had to.

I know I had to get a 2.0 to um graduate to Alabama and a 3.0 in my major, but they had to have a 3.0 in both. So don't assume that they don't have the knowledge, um, but they do need you to come with the credentials. Um, for instance, with my family, we only use a certified financial advisor. We want that person to invest in themselves, just as we've invested in our careers and sacrificed for our careers.

A lot of times people think that athletes get here because it's luck, but these guys have to sacrifice a lot more than think, and so I would challenge everybody here today to think about, um ways in which you can um connect with a, an athlete, on a more personal level to find out their investment risk, find out their risk tolerance, find out their goals for their family, find out how they want to build generational wealth, and then see how you fit into that picture. Excellent, so going to? Yes, I think too, um, and I'm also going to ask the audience questions here in a bit, if anybody has questions, but go ahead. I think too, what's what's really important when you look at athletes, and I I know, when I finish playing the game of baseball, you sit around and you look and see what can I do next?

Cuz you spend all your time working and you spend all your time building your career, and one thing my father always have told me is that great people are ordinary people with the extra amount of determination to be great, and this transend, transend into your business side, and so I had to figure out what to do, and I'm at a point now, where is that I have a son now. He plays with demo Broncos, he's wi receiver and now I went through it and so now I'm looking back at him now and seeing what would I have done differ, and the one thing I knew I would have done differently when I was younger, as four, as number one is really find a really good Mentor in business. A lot of times we have business folks around us but we never necessarily have a good Mentor, and I think it's really good if you can mentor a young athlete is for as teaching him about the game of business and also, too, if you approaching a athlete, I truly believe is that the best way to get close to the athlete.

As far as having him become more of a brand ambassador, I think can help move things better because, and now the aete is not coming out of his pocket but at the same time he gets to, gets to gets to kind of come along with the whole deal being part of a brand ambassador, because athletes get hit a lot of times with financial monies and and always have to come out of their pocket. So I truly believe a brand is always a good way to do and I have a a follow-up question for you because I see that a lot. Once again, it's the, The Uncanny similarities between you guys as professional athletes and, let's say, like your son, place for the Denver Brock Ros right now there's a lot of, for example, surgeons here that are their sons, are now surgeons, right, and they're here to kind of figure out how to preserve their wealth because they work 60 hour, 80 hour weeks at hospitals.

You know they focus on their craft and now it's like, okay, what do we do with the weal that we've accumulated? What have you done to help your son kind of transition into the business World, knowing that, like, how is it now that it's, you know, Sports is a family businesses in in a sense? How do you instill some of those same values you have into your son? Well, I, you know, has it been a challenge.

You know well, this his first year in the NFL. Um, he's a rookie and so he's just started to make a little bit of money. So, you know, and it's really difficult because now he has a couple dollars in pocket and I know how that felt when I first started making a few dollars. Um, you kind of want to hold on to it and you don't really know and don't want to think about invested, because now you really want to go out and buy your car and you want to buy some nice clothes.

So their mindset is totally different. At 22 years old making money, because I know how I was at 22, I wasn't thinking about investing in anything. I'm trying to figure out what's my next whip going to be, you know what car going to. And so, um, you know, and that's one of the reasons why when I came out of high school, I was the first on pick, got of high school 10th pick in the country, and I turned down the signing bonus to go to college.

And people say, well, why you turn down the money to go to college? And but I came from Educators, my mom and dad are Educators and my pop sat down and told me he say, son, Listen, by the time you tax the money you're making and by the time you buy your card, it's the same amount of money as your college education. So I never looked at my college education as money, never saw it that way. But my Prof broke it down, said, man, your education is money.

And right then and there I turned down the money and went to college and, and thankful I did, because I ended up tripling my money. I had a chance to um play at the University of Miami, had a chance to play in the Olympics in 1992 in Barcelona. Um had a chance to play in The College World Series and I did a lot in college. So small things and advice like that was really big for me.

I want to add to that, Charles. I think you made a good point to um kind of position. Your son, uh, to really look at things with a, with a with a bigger View. You, because you've been through it. Uh, I think today also, what's important um in the audience is, uh, philanthropy. You know, making sure that you have some type of philanthropy that's tied into your business in some in some fashion or way.

Uh, because a lot of us also, uh, we like to give back, we like to spend time in the community, we like to work with children, um, and we have certain missions that we believe in as well. But that can be also a driver that can be a lead into the conversation. I mean, I I wrote a book, became a Wall Street Journal bestselling author to help profets and really look at philanthropy in a different light, and I think that's really where, um, today, the the, the way that the mentality of an athlete evolves. We all like to set up, you know, nonprofits.

We all like to make sure that we can think about ways to give, but that can also be an approach in, in how you're approaching us is, you know, Drive some at, sometimes with philanthropy, and then also, as Charles mentioned, you be be more of somebody that you can utilize us to Advocate what you're doing to, to allow us to become educated in what you're doing, and then that, right there plays hand in hand. Lindsay, I was just going to pick back a little bit on on what I guess both of you actually just said, and I think I I was. One of the hardest things to do is transition from your sports career, I think, into that next phase of life, um, regardless of whether you get hurt or whether you know you've had a 15year career and you're trying to decide, you know, am I going to play another five years? I think what I'm really fortunate for in my life is to have had, you know, a family support system, a friend support system who always made me think about what that next step was.

Whether you know I was 18 years old or, you know, 24 um, and really stressing the academics as well as the Athletics, and what that forced me to do was um, or, I guess, really enabled me to do, is I. I ended up interning in private Equity still when I was playing professional soccer. I taught myself how to code while I was playing professional soccer. I also started giving back with local boys in Girls Club, from the time I was a very um from the time I was very young.

All the way through my professional career, which you know, all those things ended up feeding into um the professional career, transitioning into infrastructure investing and now launching my own firm. Um that has that sort of impact investing angle. Um. So really leveraging those different pieces while I was playing professional soccer to now infrastructure investing but also Now using, you know, what I did in my professional soccer career to amplify impact in communities that we'll invest in and and the piggyback on that as part of our investment strategy.

What we do as a family is we allocate a certain percentage of what we earn through our investments back into Charities. That is very important to us. Um. I'm the president of of an organization called NFL sisters and service, and we're a group of NFL wives and daughters and mothers of professional athletes who use our, our Collective resources to give back to the community and so collect itively.

We're able to make a major impact on our communities. But one of the ways in which um I'm I'm privy too, um in terms of um making my husband understand that that has to be important for us, not only because of the community but also because of our own personal tax situation. And so one of the things that um I've been able to bring to our family, um having the background and business that I have as um, a business consultant with a uh, with my background being in finance, Taxation and business law, is to make um other athletes, help other other athletes understand and their investors understand how all those pieces work together. And so if you're only banking, everything that you bring in through your Investments, you're going to pay it to the, to the IRS, or you can give it back through your community, and we show athletes ways in which they can be successful in their um, in their Investments, but also help support the community.

And it's already uh, like some of the panelists have said, that's already a priority for us, because we come from communities, many of us um who have been impacted by um, by the needs that we're trying to fix. So, BR, well, I would, if there were any kick away from here. Here's what I would tell you. Over 40, the last 40 years, Capital has gotten cheaper and cheaper and cheaper.

We're now entering an area where capital is going to be more expensive. I've been on I don't know how many different pit decks I've seen, and one fundamental core that is going to be true, which is the best operators will learn how and know how to create value. Going forward, it's going to be more difficult and, and one of the things that I've come to appreciate is when I've heard about every kind of pitch deck you can imagine, I ask: tell me the difference between your purpose, your mission and your vision, and I want to understand whether or not that mission is a customer Centric Mission. And then the key question is: do you have a measurable Mission outcome that will tell you whether you are successful?

What I found over time is that those who have a majoral mission outcome, that that can articulate with Clarity, have the kind of clarity that can create the value in an environment that's going to get more competitive and tougher, with the cost of capital going up in which you have to create value that outruns that cost of capital. Excellent, thank you. Well, look, that's going to wrap up our first panel of the day. If we can, please give a big round of applause to our first panelist.

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