# The Annual College Football Business Update with Matt Brown

An episode of [The Solid Verbal College Football Show](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/270037732), 31 Mar 2026, 1 h 00 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/21437ee1-47d9-4b16-8696-b30d011a2c26/237244a3-3641-426a-898c-b41d00dfef3f/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=51c7e0eb-425c-4d93-b5a8-b30d011a2c46

It's time for our annual college football business update, and we couldn't think of anyone better than our friend Matt Brown from Extra Points (ExtraPointsMB.com) to walk us through everything happening behind the scenes. From the revenue arms race to jersey patches to the SCORE Act, Matt breaks down the big-picture forces shaping every athletic department in the country. We talk about whether spending more money is actually worth it, what Congress can realistically do about college sports reform, which revenue streams matter more than fans think, and why the stadium experience still has a long way to go. Plus, a seedy video game pitch, a rining endorsement for Milwaukee, and Dan discovers Summerfest 2026. Support the show!: https://www.patreon.com/solidverbal See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:02] Speaker 1: Welcome to the solid verbal ull.
[0:05] Speaker 2: For me, I'm a man, I'm forty.
[0:08] Speaker 1: I've heard so many players say, well, I want to
[0:10] Speaker 1: be happy.
[0:10] Speaker 2: You want to be happy for a day?
[0:12] Speaker 1: Edo State is that?
[0:13] Speaker 3: Whoa? Whoa?
[0:14] Speaker 2: And Dan and Tie Dan Robinstein, welcome back to the show,
[0:22] Speaker 2: my good friend. As people are listening to this, yeah,
[0:27] Speaker 2: to give too much away, you are actually not here.
[0:33] Speaker 2: Whoa time shift? You are not here. We're recording this
[0:37] Speaker 2: a few days in advance. You are spending some time
[0:40] Speaker 2: away from the home studio this week. Yeah, so this
[0:44] Speaker 2: episode and next episode I've been pre recorded according these
[0:50] Speaker 2: on the Friday before. Hopefully that doesn't give too much away,
[0:53] Speaker 2: doesn't ruin any of the mystique. We've got two great
[0:56] Speaker 2: episodes planned this week. On today's episode, or do in
[1:00] Speaker 2: our annual college football business update with our great friend
[1:03] Speaker 2: Matt Brown from Extra Points MB dot com. Never is
[1:08] Speaker 2: there a dull moment in the world of college football business.
[1:12] Speaker 2: I know it is not the preferred topic, certainly not
[1:15] Speaker 2: between you and I and definitely not out there in
[1:17] Speaker 2: the verballer hood. But if we are trying to paint
[1:20] Speaker 2: a waite episode time a complete picture for what is
[1:24] Speaker 2: going on, we'd be remiss to at least not bring
[1:27] Speaker 2: this up. So Matt's gonna be here momentarily. We're going
[1:30] Speaker 2: to talk through everything that's going on in and around
[1:32] Speaker 2: the world of college football business on today's show.
[1:36] Speaker 1: Oh I think, yeah, Look, everybody likes talking about football
[1:38] Speaker 1: nerd stuff, as you know, as often as humanly possible.
[1:41] Speaker 1: But no, I think this topic is fascinating. Obviously, with
[1:45] Speaker 1: the uncertainty surrounding literally every area of the business of
[1:49] Speaker 1: college sports, in college football, that to have somebody on
[1:53] Speaker 1: who does this day in and day out, I think
[1:55] Speaker 1: is prudent four dollar word. So I'm very excited for
[2:00] Speaker 1: this episode.
[2:01] Speaker 2: Yeah, and what I say, it's not our favorite subject.
[2:05] Speaker 1: Yeah, I know what you're saying.
[2:06] Speaker 2: That doesn't mean it's not interesting. I'm very interested in
[2:10] Speaker 2: this stuff. But you know this because you read the
[2:12] Speaker 2: emails too. It's a very fine line to walk between
[2:17] Speaker 2: presenting something that is actually interesting and that people actually
[2:21] Speaker 2: will care about, and you know, not making it feel
[2:25] Speaker 2: like we're just doom scrolling college football, right, you know,
[2:28] Speaker 2: because there's also another side of the coin that again
[2:33] Speaker 2: people feel programs are being left behind, like it's all
[2:38] Speaker 2: about money, like it's gone to a place that it
[2:41] Speaker 2: wasn't when we were much younger college football fans. So
[2:44] Speaker 2: that is the balance that we try to walk when
[2:46] Speaker 2: we talk about these subjects. I'm sure it is amplified
[2:49] Speaker 2: to a much greater degree with Matt in his beat
[2:52] Speaker 2: because of the types of things that he's talking through.
[2:54] Speaker 2: He just does a really good job of articulating these
[2:57] Speaker 2: things in a way that we can understand as too
[2:59] Speaker 2: dumb dumb. So that's why we bring it on every year,
[3:02] Speaker 2: not the least of which is he's one of our
[3:04] Speaker 2: best friends in the whole world. But he knows the
[3:07] Speaker 2: stuff inside out. So we're gonna have Matt Brown on
[3:09] Speaker 2: here momentarily. We appreciate everybody stopping on Buy Solidverbal at
[3:14] Speaker 2: gmail dot com if you have thoughts on what Matt
[3:17] Speaker 2: has to say or thoughts of your own over the
[3:21] Speaker 2: state of college football. I'd love to hear about that.
[3:24] Speaker 2: Hit follow, hit subscribe if you have yet to do so,
[3:26] Speaker 2: and of course, for ballers dot com is where you
[3:28] Speaker 2: can go to support what Dan and I do. Agree
[3:32] Speaker 2: all right, Dan joining us Now we do it once
[3:35] Speaker 2: a year, we have the annual College Football Business Update.
[3:38] Speaker 2: We would think of no one better to invite on
[3:41] Speaker 2: to engage in discussion around this very issue with us
[3:45] Speaker 2: than our good friend Matt Brown from Extra Points with
[3:48] Speaker 2: Matt Brown Extra Points MB dot com. I should add
[3:52] Speaker 2: that before we hit go on the recording here, the
[3:56] Speaker 2: two of you were involved in a rather deep discussion
[4:00] Speaker 2: singing the praises of Milwaukee, Wisconsin too Midwesterners talking shop.
[4:05] Speaker 2: I cannot relate at all. But if you guys just
[4:09] Speaker 2: want to take it in a Milwaukee direction, make this
[4:11] Speaker 2: in Milwaukee cast sure.
[4:13] Speaker 1: I it's just called It's cream City, tie, It's it's great.
[4:17] Speaker 1: Milwaukee is a hidden gem of the United States of America,
[4:21] Speaker 1: and anybody who has been there likely agrees. Unless you
[4:26] Speaker 1: are deeply lactose intolerance, you're probably going to have a
[4:29] Speaker 1: good time. There's there's something for everybody colin Milwaukee. I
[4:35] Speaker 1: like it.
[4:36] Speaker 3: I'm with you. There's there's very few like regional Midwestern
[4:40] Speaker 3: cities that I am am not willing to gas up
[4:43] Speaker 3: on the air here. But we're joking about this before this,
[4:47] Speaker 3: before the show, I did part of my honeymoon in Milwaukee,
[4:50] Speaker 3: and part of that was because when I got married,
[4:52] Speaker 3: I think I had seven hundred dollars on my checking account.
[4:54] Speaker 3: So it's not like Bermudo was really on the table.
[4:58] Speaker 3: But it's a great it's a great time if you
[5:00] Speaker 3: like encased meats, if you enjoy beverages adult or otherwise,
[5:05] Speaker 3: if you like I would like an old world, big
[5:08] Speaker 3: city experience. But also the opportunity to park my car
[5:11] Speaker 3: friends Milwaukee is right there. And then if you're in
[5:14] Speaker 3: Chicago and you're driving up to Milwaukee, you know what
[5:16] Speaker 3: you get on the way. The Mars Cheese Castle. Yep,
[5:19] Speaker 3: which is why I think one of America's most important
[5:21] Speaker 3: civic institution a cheese castle.
[5:24] Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a giant cheese emporium, but it's in a
[5:28] Speaker 1: castle shaped visage. I don't know what to call it,
[5:31] Speaker 1: but yes, you see it from the interstate and it's
[5:34] Speaker 1: called the Mars Cheese Castle.
[5:35] Speaker 2: I'm envisioning like medieval times, but for cheese.
[5:39] Speaker 3: It's not just medieval times. But for cheese you can
[5:41] Speaker 3: also get alcohol.
[5:43] Speaker 1: Yeah that's true.
[5:44] Speaker 2: Well you need the beer with the cheese.
[5:45] Speaker 3: Right sure, or or or moonshine or spirits if you will,
[5:50] Speaker 3: And then every bit of like tourist trap, you know,
[5:53] Speaker 3: just the amazing gas station kind of cuisine and stuff.
[5:58] Speaker 3: So like you know Dan and now we have we
[5:59] Speaker 3: have small children. If we're driving somewhere and then we
[6:02] Speaker 3: need to make a jelly bean stop, why not do
[6:05] Speaker 3: it at a place that looks like a castle.
[6:09] Speaker 1: And you also pass the the Haribo factory. I believe
[6:14] Speaker 1: on the tube. You don't take a tour. You can't
[6:17] Speaker 1: take a gummy tour. I don't believe. But you get
[6:20] Speaker 1: your kids get to see the giant Horibo gummy factory
[6:23] Speaker 1: that is like right on the border of Illinois and Wisconsin.
[6:26] Speaker 1: If you want to go somewhere, Tye, and I know
[6:27] Speaker 1: you were just talking about that and you just want
[6:29] Speaker 1: to talk about like Michael Red and Tim Thomas and
[6:33] Speaker 1: Robin Yunt. Milwaukee is the place, man, if you.
[6:37] Speaker 3: Want to It is a perfect place for guy remembering
[6:41] Speaker 3: sit back there with your with your eight hundred calorie
[6:45] Speaker 3: beer and just to remember Vin Baker and you can
[6:48] Speaker 3: do that.
[6:48] Speaker 1: And it's okay, Pat moletor yeah, any of these guys. Oh,
[6:55] Speaker 1: Paul Molitor, Yeah, yeah, I'm mixing up to Paul Molitor.
[6:58] Speaker 1: Great Blue Jay is well I want to say, yeah, yeah, okay,
[7:02] Speaker 1: well we talk college business or what. Yeah.
[7:04] Speaker 2: On that note, we bring back Matt Brown. Actually to
[7:08] Speaker 2: talk about college football business. We like to do this
[7:10] Speaker 2: once a year. As I said at the top, bigger picture, Matt,
[7:12] Speaker 2: if you were to zoom out, give us like the
[7:14] Speaker 2: thirty thousand foot view. I feel like we do this
[7:17] Speaker 2: every time we bring you on as well, like college
[7:21] Speaker 2: football as a business has evolved a great deal just
[7:25] Speaker 2: over the last five years relative to where it was,
[7:29] Speaker 2: let's say a year ago. What are the things that
[7:32] Speaker 2: you are tracking the most now outside of the video game,
[7:36] Speaker 2: which I know was a topic for you in the
[7:38] Speaker 2: not so distant past. But what are the things that
[7:42] Speaker 2: are most notable from your perspective that more people should
[7:46] Speaker 2: be paying attention to right now?
[7:48] Speaker 3: So I think in my neck of the woods, as
[7:50] Speaker 3: I'm trying to take a step away from writing the
[7:53] Speaker 3: same story about Congress or about anti trust bills that
[7:55] Speaker 3: I think I've been doing since twenty seventeen, I think
[8:00] Speaker 3: one of the more interesting developments to me is that
[8:02] Speaker 3: every athletic department, whether you're a fan of at Ohio State,
[8:06] Speaker 3: Penn State, Organs, some really big program, or an FCS
[8:10] Speaker 3: school or a Bowling Green or an acron and everybody
[8:14] Speaker 3: here is dramatically trying to find more revenue, and there's
[8:19] Speaker 3: a limit to how much more revenue anybody can really
[8:22] Speaker 3: generate from the traditional methods. If you're a big program,
[8:25] Speaker 3: you're probably already at ninety ninety five percent capacity, and
[8:29] Speaker 3: only one or two schools are really interested in building
[8:32] Speaker 3: more seats in their stadium. Almost everybody wants to go
[8:35] Speaker 3: the other direction. You can only raise the prices on
[8:39] Speaker 3: tickets and on beer, and I'm parking so many times
[8:41] Speaker 3: before people begin to push back, which is already happening.
[8:44] Speaker 3: So you're seeing, on one hand, a movement of schools
[8:47] Speaker 3: trying to sell and label everything that isn't nailed down.
[8:51] Speaker 3: That includes jersey patches, which maybe we could talk about
[8:54] Speaker 3: that that's beginning to happen here. We have about seven
[8:56] Speaker 3: or eight schools that have announced those I know of
[8:58] Speaker 3: another sixty that are that are looking for it. It's
[9:01] Speaker 3: field sponsorships, it's selling new stuff within the stadium, and
[9:05] Speaker 3: it's also about trying to come up with new things
[9:07] Speaker 3: to sell that you weren't selling before. And some of
[9:10] Speaker 3: those things I think are actually a net positive for
[9:13] Speaker 3: fans or consumers to kind of go back to Milwaukee
[9:15] Speaker 3: for a second. A lot of that has been with
[9:17] Speaker 3: beer with universities embracing officially licensed beverages, mostly alcohol but
[9:22] Speaker 3: some coffee and some other food stuffs and consumables. And
[9:27] Speaker 3: some of that is video game licensing and trying to
[9:29] Speaker 3: be more aggressive into getting into other video games and
[9:32] Speaker 3: evan front off of sports. I have storry about this
[9:34] Speaker 3: a couple of days ago. We have a few programs
[9:36] Speaker 3: that are basically trying to become television channels and do
[9:41] Speaker 3: different versions of the Longhort Network, where instead of trying
[9:44] Speaker 3: to put your Olympic sports coverage or one football game
[9:48] Speaker 3: a year, it's how can I put athlete podcasts or
[9:51] Speaker 3: documentaries or super nerd behind the scenes stuff to try
[9:55] Speaker 3: and make a little bit of extra money. So some
[9:57] Speaker 3: of this is successful, some of it isn't. But in
[9:59] Speaker 3: a world where everyone's trying to come up with twenty
[10:02] Speaker 3: one and a half million dollars to go pay players
[10:05] Speaker 3: and also pay for everything else that's become more expensive,
[10:08] Speaker 3: this is the driving question for almost every athletic director
[10:12] Speaker 3: and associated right now.
[10:14] Speaker 2: So one of the interesting things that I think I
[10:16] Speaker 2: saw over the last week or so, and forgive me
[10:19] Speaker 2: for not remembering who conducted who reported on the study,
[10:22] Speaker 2: there was something that came out about professional sports and
[10:26] Speaker 2: how in reality, though everyone claims to want to win,
[10:30] Speaker 2: in reality the profit is actually for the bad teams.
[10:34] Speaker 2: The teams that are the worst are the ones that
[10:35] Speaker 2: make the most money because they can sell off players
[10:38] Speaker 2: because it just like mathematically worked better to be bad
[10:42] Speaker 2: than good. And I say this because I know you
[10:45] Speaker 2: publish something just today. We're recording this on Friday that
[10:51] Speaker 2: a P four university president calls for dramatic reform. Okay,
[10:55] Speaker 2: and you've got a big picture of Virginia Tech. Now,
[10:56] Speaker 2: Virginia Tech has pledged two hundred and twenty nine million
[10:59] Speaker 2: dollars to infuse its athletic department, to renovate a whole
[11:03] Speaker 2: bunch of stuff, and to essentially bring themselves into the future.
[11:07] Speaker 2: But where I'm going with this, Matt, is, given what
[11:10] Speaker 2: we know about the economics here, and given what we
[11:13] Speaker 2: know about where college football seems to want to head
[11:15] Speaker 2: with all of this, I don't know, search for revenue
[11:19] Speaker 2: is the juice worth the squeeze? Like do we know
[11:21] Speaker 2: that actually spending more just to sort of keep up
[11:25] Speaker 2: with the Joneses is actually going to be beneficial in
[11:29] Speaker 2: any way, shape or form. And that includes on the field,
[11:32] Speaker 2: because spending money does not necessarily guarantee you're going to
[11:34] Speaker 2: have a championship. So is anyone talking about whether this
[11:37] Speaker 2: is actually worth it in the long run?
[11:40] Speaker 3: Tie, It's a really great question. And before I answer that,
[11:44] Speaker 3: I want to zoom out real quick for a second,
[11:46] Speaker 3: right because I think there's an important distinction that sometimes
[11:49] Speaker 3: gets lost in the weeds. And we're talking about professional
[11:52] Speaker 3: college sports. If you are the Cleveland Cavaliers, or if
[11:57] Speaker 3: you're the Red Sox or the Blue Jackets or anybody else.
[12:02] Speaker 3: To your point, the fundamental reason your organization exists isn't
[12:07] Speaker 3: to win championships. It's to make money. And you have
[12:10] Speaker 3: a salary cap, and you have the league television deal,
[12:13] Speaker 3: and you have limits to how much you can spend
[12:15] Speaker 3: on everything else. And then that the remainder goes to
[12:17] Speaker 3: the investors, goes to the people that own the team,
[12:20] Speaker 3: and they might even be okay taking a small loss
[12:22] Speaker 3: or a medium loss over a decade knowing that when
[12:25] Speaker 3: they sell the team they're going to make a gajillion dollars.
[12:27] Speaker 3: They have a liquidity event when you sell a team.
[12:30] Speaker 3: None of that happens in college. You can't right now
[12:34] Speaker 3: sell a team. You can't flip the University of Oregon
[12:37] Speaker 3: to the Saudi State or something to go make make
[12:40] Speaker 3: a financial return yet, and there's no profit. If a
[12:44] Speaker 3: school I, though provately generates more revenue and it spends,
[12:48] Speaker 3: nobody makes any extra money. The best case scenario gets
[12:51] Speaker 3: kicked into the university library system. More practically, it just
[12:55] Speaker 3: gets spent on other stuff. Which means that I remind
[12:59] Speaker 3: this because I think it's an important reminder that whether
[13:03] Speaker 3: it's worth it or whether you benefit is a question.
[13:06] Speaker 3: I think of values more than it is about dollars
[13:08] Speaker 3: and cents. If the only thing that you're trying to
[13:10] Speaker 3: do as a university administrator is generate revenue and excess
[13:14] Speaker 3: of expenses, you should get out of college sports completely.
[13:17] Speaker 3: You should go join Johns Hopkins and Case Western Reserve
[13:20] Speaker 3: and Reserve and n y U and TOFFS or whatever
[13:23] Speaker 3: and focus everything on medical research and patents and charging
[13:27] Speaker 3: too undergrand for tuition. That's not the world that people want.
[13:30] Speaker 3: That people want to be in in our in our
[13:32] Speaker 3: in our in our universe here for Division I schools.
[13:35] Speaker 3: So value might be winning on the field that you
[13:38] Speaker 3: in turn use for political favors. Winning I mean value
[13:41] Speaker 3: might be a marketing exposure that brings in different kinds
[13:46] Speaker 3: of students or or more students if you're if you're
[13:48] Speaker 3: hurting for that, or it could be something that's even
[13:50] Speaker 3: more difficult to define. And one of the challenges that
[13:53] Speaker 3: I see on my beat a lot talking with presidents
[13:56] Speaker 3: and athletic directors and and serious professional higher education reform people,
[14:02] Speaker 3: even members of Congress, is that they struggle to define
[14:05] Speaker 3: what success looks like or what they're trying to do
[14:08] Speaker 3: besides win. And if that's the only thing they're trying
[14:10] Speaker 3: to do, and you see somebody else in your conference
[14:12] Speaker 3: of spending money, by god, you feel like you have
[14:15] Speaker 3: to do it too. And we could go to these
[14:17] Speaker 3: kind of athletic administrator events, right the NACTA is the
[14:21] Speaker 3: big conference that that's over the summer. But there'll be
[14:23] Speaker 3: a lot of these people at the final four next
[14:25] Speaker 3: week too, and you don't have to get too many
[14:27] Speaker 3: cocktails in them before they'll admit to you, yeah, we're
[14:30] Speaker 3: spending money that we have no idea it will will
[14:33] Speaker 3: benefit any kind of KPI or anything, which is part
[14:36] Speaker 3: of why I joke a lot and extra points that
[14:38] Speaker 3: money isn't real. I can file foils and get charts
[14:42] Speaker 3: and write about money. Right, but it doesn't it doesn't
[14:45] Speaker 3: matter in the sense that it does to all three
[14:47] Speaker 3: of us. We're running our businesses or balancing our own
[14:49] Speaker 3: checking accounts. So yeah, it's a long story short here.
[14:53] Speaker 3: There are absolutely schools like Rutgers, but not exclusively Rutgers,
[14:57] Speaker 3: that are going to continue to shovel money at problems
[15:00] Speaker 3: without any real meaningful idea about whether that will help
[15:03] Speaker 3: them on the field or help them with any of
[15:05] Speaker 3: the big picture of university stuff that they want to
[15:07] Speaker 3: be doing.
[15:08] Speaker 1: One of the things that comes across my algorithm in
[15:12] Speaker 1: broader life is the idea of blue zones. Ti do
[15:16] Speaker 1: you know what a blue zone is?
[15:17] Speaker 2: I have no idea what that is.
[15:18] Speaker 1: Blue zone is there are five identified parts of the
[15:21] Speaker 1: world where people live to be like ninety eight oh yeah, yeah, yeah,
[15:25] Speaker 1: there's like scientists are like northern Italy and yeah, yes,
[15:29] Speaker 1: like Sardinia, what do.
[15:30] Speaker 3: They do and then Pennsylvania with all the Sardinians, they
[15:33] Speaker 3: went to Pennsylvania, right, yeah.
[15:35] Speaker 1: Exactly, And you know they go somewhere to a town
[15:38] Speaker 1: in Japan or a town in California, and they're like
[15:40] Speaker 1: they all walk and eat olive oil and fish and stuff.
[15:43] Speaker 1: I wonder, and this is putting you on the spot,
[15:45] Speaker 1: and it's okay to say I have no idea. I wonder.
[15:47] Speaker 1: Is there a school Are there a grouping of schools
[15:50] Speaker 1: that can be looked at as a model franchise, a
[15:54] Speaker 1: model program, a model university where people say, you know what,
[15:59] Speaker 1: they spend money, they make money, they don't lose a
[16:03] Speaker 1: ton of money, They're doing it efficiently. People seem to
[16:06] Speaker 1: be happy there, Coaches seem to stay there and they're
[16:09] Speaker 1: doing something right. At Texas State, at Montana, at or
[16:14] Speaker 1: wherever it is. Are there any of those blue zones
[16:18] Speaker 1: in college sports?
[16:20] Speaker 3: It's a great question. And if I'm just trying to
[16:22] Speaker 3: think here in my head about the people on my
[16:24] Speaker 3: phone as the ones I talk to the most, I
[16:26] Speaker 3: think the coaches in ads that are most likely to
[16:29] Speaker 3: say like, yeah, that's my life are going to be
[16:31] Speaker 3: in Division three where you're not trying to make a profit,
[16:35] Speaker 3: you're not trying to chase a television bag, and the
[16:39] Speaker 3: athletes and the vendors that you're working with are in
[16:42] Speaker 3: many ways insulated from many of the major problems or
[16:45] Speaker 3: issues that we talk about a lot with big time
[16:48] Speaker 3: college sports. I also here this more often than you
[16:54] Speaker 3: might expect from one Triple A institutions or in one
[16:58] Speaker 3: Triple A school is school that's Division one that doesn't
[17:01] Speaker 3: have football. And generally when you say that, we're not
[17:04] Speaker 3: talking about the Big East. We're not talking about Seaton
[17:07] Speaker 3: Hall necessarily. We're talking more about like you know, cal
[17:10] Speaker 3: State northrich or Manadors Sure or Aga in the Horizon
[17:15] Speaker 3: League or something right. And when you're in that world
[17:19] Speaker 3: and you're coaching, you're making good money. If you're not
[17:21] Speaker 3: making a crazy money, like they don't make that much
[17:24] Speaker 3: more than maybe the three of us do, or people
[17:27] Speaker 3: are listening here to. It's stressful, but you're not trying
[17:31] Speaker 3: to get you know, McDonald's all Americans necessarily, and you're
[17:35] Speaker 3: not going to get fired for going twenty one and nine.
[17:38] Speaker 3: And if you like living where you're living, say Milwaukee,
[17:42] Speaker 3: if you're at UW Milwaukee for example, and you're okay
[17:45] Speaker 3: not chasing that brass ring, that can still be a
[17:47] Speaker 3: pretty good life. But that's again it goes into it
[17:52] Speaker 3: goes into values. If you're in the blue zone, you're
[17:55] Speaker 3: not working one hundred and ten hours a week and
[17:58] Speaker 3: that's not going to get you deal house stay, Is.
[18:00] Speaker 1: There a moment? And again, and this is arbitrary and
[18:04] Speaker 1: whatever your answer is, your answer is, is there a
[18:06] Speaker 1: moment that if you were to get one point five
[18:08] Speaker 1: drinks into a grouping of presidents, chancellor's ads, whoever where
[18:13] Speaker 1: they're like in retrospect, this moment really screwed all of us.
[18:19] Speaker 1: And if we had a time machine, we would approach
[18:23] Speaker 1: X or Y in a dramatically different way.
[18:26] Speaker 3: Yeah, I could. I mean I could think of two
[18:28] Speaker 3: right off the bat. One is we should have fired
[18:32] Speaker 3: Mark Emmert way sooner.
[18:34] Speaker 1: Okay, I don't think.
[18:36] Speaker 3: You could be. It's hard to get good ncaa leader.
[18:38] Speaker 3: But I really do think we will look back at
[18:42] Speaker 3: history and point to Emmert as an uncommonly bad one,
[18:45] Speaker 3: in part because, kind of like Larry Scott, even if
[18:50] Speaker 3: you have good ideas, but you are so profoundly alienating
[18:54] Speaker 3: to everybody that you work with, you're not going to
[18:57] Speaker 3: be able to execute any of those ideas. And if
[18:59] Speaker 3: you talk to coaches, most ads, members of Congress, members
[19:05] Speaker 3: of the legal community, people that are kind of in
[19:07] Speaker 3: charge of changing college sports now to a man and
[19:09] Speaker 3: to a woman, they almost. I'll say I hated that
[19:12] Speaker 3: guy and that matter right because they are also Yeah,
[19:16] Speaker 3: helped to drive the ncublea's legal strategy which led them
[19:20] Speaker 3: to Alston, which was an unmitigated disaster for the college
[19:24] Speaker 3: sports status quo. If you could go back to a
[19:26] Speaker 3: time machine, you know when we were all working together,
[19:29] Speaker 3: we go back a decade ago to the beginning of
[19:31] Speaker 3: the Northwestern unionization issues, the beginning of the of the
[19:35] Speaker 3: video game lawsuits, and had the NCAA and Power conferences
[19:40] Speaker 3: giving up some space rather than try to take this
[19:43] Speaker 3: to its hardline legal conclusion, I think you would be
[19:47] Speaker 3: missing a lot of the major issues that are happening
[19:49] Speaker 3: right now. There probably wouldn't be a transfer portal had
[19:53] Speaker 3: the suits in Indianapolis pursuing a different legal strategy in
[19:56] Speaker 3: twenty twelve.
[19:58] Speaker 1: I wonder, is there a world in which we get
[20:04] Speaker 1: I don't know you're talking about firing Mark Emmert. Is
[20:07] Speaker 1: there a world in which effective change can actually happen?
[20:12] Speaker 1: Is there a world in which people are deciding that like, okay,
[20:15] Speaker 1: these three people, this person is in charge, this person
[20:20] Speaker 1: has a thorough understanding of where the world is going
[20:24] Speaker 1: in five years, Or are there just too many people
[20:28] Speaker 1: at the table.
[20:30] Speaker 3: Now. I think there's too many people at the table,
[20:32] Speaker 3: and the biggest challenge for that is in like, it's
[20:36] Speaker 3: not too many people in the table a lah Greg sank.
[20:39] Speaker 3: Therefore we need to get rid of the NEC and
[20:41] Speaker 3: the OVC or something. Right, there's too many schools right now.
[20:44] Speaker 3: I think the challenge is that legally the schools presidents, ads,
[20:49] Speaker 3: people with dot edu email addresses, and then before commissioners
[20:54] Speaker 3: by extension are not functionally in charge. And they're not
[20:56] Speaker 3: functioning in charge because the law basically has now made
[20:59] Speaker 3: it clear that the regulations you want to enforce, whether
[21:04] Speaker 3: that's about athlete eligibility, whether that's about athlete compensation, whether
[21:08] Speaker 3: that's about almost any amount of athlete rule, it's illegal.
[21:13] Speaker 3: And it wasn't illegal in nineteen ninety seven, or at
[21:16] Speaker 3: least the judges hadn't decided it was illegal in nineteen
[21:19] Speaker 3: ninety seven, and that wasn't really the case in two
[21:21] Speaker 3: thousand and seven. So there were decades and decades when
[21:25] Speaker 3: the room were just college sports school people, and now
[21:28] Speaker 3: the room is a little bit of college sports school people,
[21:31] Speaker 3: but also judges and Congress and governors and attorneys general
[21:35] Speaker 3: and that becomes a very big room, especially because many
[21:38] Speaker 3: of those people know even less about how college sports
[21:41] Speaker 3: works than the ads and presidents and the three of
[21:44] Speaker 3: us and everybody in the Varballer's discord. And that's where
[21:46] Speaker 3: you run into I think, some big challenges because even
[21:49] Speaker 3: if you get all those people to agree on something
[21:52] Speaker 3: and then oh my god, we invade I ran well,
[21:54] Speaker 3: then suddenly we're not talking about college sports regulatory reform anymore,
[21:57] Speaker 3: and the room is big and not focused.
[22:00] Speaker 2: You know, I wake up every morning, Matt, and I
[22:04] Speaker 2: think the Higher power that we're not a politics podcast.
[22:07] Speaker 2: I'm really happy we're not playing in that sandbox. But unfortunately,
[22:11] Speaker 2: our world now in college sports has intersected with political
[22:16] Speaker 2: discourse in a way that it's hard to understand what
[22:20] Speaker 2: is actually real and what isn't you know, there was
[22:24] Speaker 2: this roundtable that happened a few weeks ago. I feel
[22:27] Speaker 2: every two weeks or so we hear new news on
[22:31] Speaker 2: the congressional front that somebody is now working up amendments
[22:36] Speaker 2: to a bill that may or may not apply here.
[22:39] Speaker 2: I have a real hard time, and this is my beat,
[22:41] Speaker 2: keeping track of what is even going on here. And
[22:44] Speaker 2: I think more specifically, if any of this can actually
[22:47] Speaker 2: impact change. I think we're all in agreement that a
[22:50] Speaker 2: lot's gone on over the last five years, that nobody's
[22:53] Speaker 2: running this. And to Dan's earlier question, what's the plan,
[22:58] Speaker 2: what's the vision? What is the right way to go
[23:00] Speaker 2: about this? There's a lot that probably needs to be
[23:03] Speaker 2: set in stone and run by somebody or something. But
[23:07] Speaker 2: I don't know if what I have read on like
[23:11] Speaker 2: the Politico website or wherever you get your news, is
[23:15] Speaker 2: anything that can actually influence it in a positive way.
[23:18] Speaker 2: What is your view on again, I hate to go
[23:21] Speaker 2: to the politics side of this, but we have to.
[23:24] Speaker 2: What is your view on how that side of this
[23:28] Speaker 2: conversation has evolved, let's say, over the last year.
[23:32] Speaker 3: I think it has changed meaningfully over the last year.
[23:36] Speaker 3: And part of the reason it's changed is because the
[23:39] Speaker 3: political coalition that's interested in kind of college sports reform
[23:44] Speaker 3: broadly is unique in that it's not completely partisan. There
[23:49] Speaker 3: are both Republicans and Democrats who look at the way
[23:52] Speaker 3: college sports is set up right now and think, boy,
[23:55] Speaker 3: this has some problems and we like to make some changes.
[23:58] Speaker 3: And they're actually several issues where there's don't say broad consensus,
[24:03] Speaker 3: but meaningful consensus. Right, there are a lot of lawmakers
[24:06] Speaker 3: in both parties, for example, that are deeply troubled about
[24:09] Speaker 3: the influence of prediction markets and new and widespread gambling,
[24:13] Speaker 3: on the welfare of college athletes, on the whether these
[24:19] Speaker 3: games are having points shaved or are being manipulated in
[24:22] Speaker 3: some way. I want to put that toothbaste back into tube.
[24:25] Speaker 3: That is a kind of bill that could potentially pass.
[24:29] Speaker 3: I'd also say that that with some exceptions, but there
[24:33] Speaker 3: is a narrow majority of people within both parties that
[24:37] Speaker 3: don't love unlimited transfers, that think that maybe some athlete
[24:42] Speaker 3: compensation stuff has gone too far, too quickly, and that
[24:45] Speaker 3: there's been some pushback on the beleaguered athletes. And I
[24:51] Speaker 3: want to say trope, but like, you know, kind of
[24:53] Speaker 3: framework that maybe was more popular before twenty twenty or
[24:57] Speaker 3: before the beginning of the ANIL here.
[24:58] Speaker 2: Right.
[25:00] Speaker 3: The challenge though, is one, you know, Republican control of
[25:04] Speaker 3: the US House is just a razor razor thin margin,
[25:07] Speaker 3: and there's enough Republicans that are going to disagree with
[25:10] Speaker 3: almost anything. That's very hard for literally any kind of
[25:13] Speaker 3: bill to get through the House under the best of circumstances,
[25:17] Speaker 3: and we are not in the best of circumstances right now.
[25:20] Speaker 3: You have an executive branch that you know, we'll just
[25:24] Speaker 3: be honest. Is uh one that is not constrained by
[25:29] Speaker 3: tradition or a healthy respect for the judiciary, Like there's
[25:35] Speaker 3: this is a white house. I was willing to do
[25:37] Speaker 3: its own thing aggressively and also can get distracted by stuff.
[25:41] Speaker 3: It can be unpredictable, you know, for love the guy
[25:44] Speaker 3: or hate the guy. It's probably a secret how I feel.
[25:46] Speaker 3: But if you know, regardless, Trump's a hard guy to predict.
[25:50] Speaker 3: And it's a lot of it is based on who's
[25:51] Speaker 3: talking to him at that exact moment. So he might
[25:53] Speaker 3: say one thing and Tiger Woods talks to him in
[25:55] Speaker 3: two weeks and then think things are different. Would you
[25:58] Speaker 3: have an issue that doesn't fit into an innat camp
[26:02] Speaker 3: and there's nobody really super in charge of kind of
[26:05] Speaker 3: directing it, It's very difficult to get anything over the
[26:08] Speaker 3: finish line. There's the Score Act, which is the bill
[26:12] Speaker 3: that we've talked about last time I was on here.
[26:14] Speaker 3: You might see in the news a lot more. That
[26:17] Speaker 3: is the bill that is most friendly towards the NCAA's interests.
[26:21] Speaker 3: It's not going to become a law. It might eventually
[26:25] Speaker 3: get through the House. It's mostly supported by Republicans, and
[26:28] Speaker 3: the Republican leadership would like it to get through, but
[26:31] Speaker 3: there's a reason, and it hasn't come up for a
[26:33] Speaker 3: formal vote because they don't have the votes yet, and
[26:36] Speaker 3: they definitely don't have the votes in the US Senate.
[26:39] Speaker 3: So this is a long way of saying, like, I
[26:42] Speaker 3: think there is a legitimate pathway for some laws to happen,
[26:46] Speaker 3: Laws about taxation of athlete and il, laws about sports gambling,
[26:52] Speaker 3: laws about about reporting lots, about potentially agents and their
[26:55] Speaker 3: certification and where they have to go. But for something
[26:59] Speaker 3: that's going to provide more meaningful structure about the portal,
[27:02] Speaker 3: about athlete contracts, about tampering of those kind of things,
[27:06] Speaker 3: it's hard to see it. And it's hard to see
[27:09] Speaker 3: it when we kind of seem to be lurching from
[27:10] Speaker 3: global calamity or global event every ten days.
[27:14] Speaker 1: Right, is there one issue that is the if somebody
[27:19] Speaker 1: were to run on this issue in college sports, is
[27:22] Speaker 1: the most universally agreed upon thing that every party agrees
[27:28] Speaker 1: is something that needs to be addressed, Right, whether it's
[27:31] Speaker 1: employment of players, whether it's you know, portal stuff, whether
[27:36] Speaker 1: it's nil stuff like when reaching across the aisle, you
[27:40] Speaker 1: are likely to get the most bodies and raised hands
[27:44] Speaker 1: in support of this stance. What is that stance? What
[27:49] Speaker 1: is that position?
[27:50] Speaker 3: I think I think that the two positions where you
[27:53] Speaker 3: can get to sixty votes in the Senate would be
[27:56] Speaker 3: about we need to better regulate college athletic agents. We
[28:01] Speaker 3: need whether then the question is does that come through
[28:04] Speaker 3: the FCC? Is it come through the FTC? Like you know,
[28:08] Speaker 3: reasonable people can debate and figure that out, but like
[28:10] Speaker 3: the there isn't in my understanding from talking to people
[28:14] Speaker 3: like that is a bipartisan concern, and there's a bi
[28:17] Speaker 3: there are bipartisan concerns about how do we protect college
[28:20] Speaker 3: athletes from harassment and from overreach from gambling. I don't
[28:25] Speaker 3: think you can get You're not going to get sixty
[28:26] Speaker 3: votes the band sports gambling. But could you if you
[28:29] Speaker 3: had a skinny bill that was just about prop bets
[28:32] Speaker 3: or about trying to increase the regulatory teeth to protect
[28:36] Speaker 3: people who get death threats from missing a free throw. Yeah,
[28:39] Speaker 3: I think I think you can do that even with
[28:41] Speaker 3: all of the money that the DraftKings of the world
[28:43] Speaker 3: are invested in Congress. But anything about employment status of athletes,
[28:48] Speaker 3: about collective bargaining, about health care and UH and about
[28:53] Speaker 3: anti trust exemptions, those are very difficult political questions because
[28:57] Speaker 3: there is where you'll get pretty intense lobbying from specific
[29:02] Speaker 3: interest to fight that.
[29:03] Speaker 2: Matt, I want to go back just a second, because
[29:06] Speaker 2: if you've watched TV, if you have read sites like yours,
[29:11] Speaker 2: if you have, as Dan pointed out earlier, just been
[29:14] Speaker 2: cruising through your algorithm, you may have seen something about
[29:17] Speaker 2: the Score Act. It has been on the tip of
[29:21] Speaker 2: the college football tongue. Now for gosh, it feels like
[29:24] Speaker 2: a couple of years running. Yeah, what is that? Can
[29:27] Speaker 2: you explain that to our audience so that they have
[29:29] Speaker 2: a better understanding for what exactly that entails.
[29:32] Speaker 3: Sure, the Score Act, broadly speaking, would give the NCAA
[29:37] Speaker 3: an antitrust exemption to enforce its existing rules about athlete
[29:41] Speaker 3: comp So what that means is that, like you know,
[29:45] Speaker 3: outside of college sports, if you had, like all of
[29:49] Speaker 3: the restaurants in one city all get together at a
[29:53] Speaker 3: secret restaurant meeting and all decide that we're all going
[29:56] Speaker 3: to charge eleven dollars a slice for pizza. We're all
[30:00] Speaker 3: going to we're going to collude and set the price
[30:02] Speaker 3: on that. No one's we're going to create a pizza cartel,
[30:04] Speaker 3: and no one's going to sell pizza for under eleven
[30:06] Speaker 3: bucks of slices. That would be an anti trusting that
[30:09] Speaker 3: would be a violation of anti trust law. You are
[30:12] Speaker 3: you're colluding to break free market competition. And when the
[30:16] Speaker 3: NCUBA says right now, hey, you can't engage in a name,
[30:22] Speaker 3: image of likeness activity that exceeds how the CSC defines
[30:26] Speaker 3: fair market value, somebody will soe and say that's a
[30:30] Speaker 3: violation of the Sherman Anti Trust Act, and it is.
[30:33] Speaker 3: And in order for the NCUBA to still get together
[30:35] Speaker 3: a vote and say, yeah, but we have created a
[30:39] Speaker 3: salary cap, but now we need to enforce it. Unless
[30:41] Speaker 3: you're doing something legitimate, you need an exception from that
[30:45] Speaker 3: anti trust law. The reason that the pro sports are
[30:48] Speaker 3: able to do this with their salary caps is because
[30:50] Speaker 3: they've collectively bargained a CBA right And you can't do
[30:56] Speaker 3: that right now in college athletics because athletes are not
[30:58] Speaker 3: legally employees and there's no one to bargain with. There's
[31:01] Speaker 3: no players Association there's no union, so you don't get
[31:04] Speaker 3: a built in antitrust exemption that way. The Score Act says,
[31:08] Speaker 3: that's fine. Athletes can't be employees, regardless of whatever a
[31:12] Speaker 3: future NLRV judge might say. And we're going to let
[31:15] Speaker 3: the NCAA enforce the House Settlement and enforce some of
[31:20] Speaker 3: its existing rules. That's the most important general provision of it.
[31:26] Speaker 2: Is this why they hired Charlie Baker.
[31:29] Speaker 3: This is unquestionably one of the biggest reasons why I
[31:32] Speaker 3: hire Charlie Baker. Somebody who has experience in building relationships
[31:38] Speaker 3: with lawmakers in both parties, somebody who has a lot
[31:40] Speaker 3: of experience in professional associations and a complicated policy, and
[31:46] Speaker 3: someone that people enjoy being around a little bit more.
[31:49] Speaker 3: That was it, and it hasn't been successful so far,
[31:54] Speaker 3: even though the NCUBLEA and the SEC and the Big
[31:56] Speaker 3: ten have spent just gobs and gobs of money. But
[32:00] Speaker 3: the conversations with Baker are far far more receptive than
[32:04] Speaker 3: anything that Emmert was doing about antitrust.
[32:08] Speaker 2: All right, let me change gears a little bit here.
[32:10] Speaker 2: You mentioned the Jersey Patch thing earlier, so this is
[32:13] Speaker 2: something that the NCAA approved. We are going to start
[32:17] Speaker 2: seeing some jersey patch situations. You noted that there are
[32:22] Speaker 2: a couple, there are many more in the queue. Not
[32:26] Speaker 2: to replay my previous question about whether this is all
[32:29] Speaker 2: worth it, I know there's obviously some money there that
[32:31] Speaker 2: institutions can pull in and use for whatever they seem
[32:34] Speaker 2: to think is appropriate. But what is the mechanism there?
[32:38] Speaker 2: And among the athletic departments that you speak with, are
[32:42] Speaker 2: they viewing this as like an exciting thing in any way,
[32:45] Speaker 2: shape or form. Are they viewing this just as like
[32:48] Speaker 2: another line item that they can use to boost budgets.
[32:51] Speaker 2: How do people think about this? And how aggressively are
[32:53] Speaker 2: they going after trying to put a patch on the jersey?
[32:56] Speaker 3: It's really aggressive almost everywhere, really, because that is the
[33:00] Speaker 3: the thing with the jersey patch that's that's honestly different
[33:03] Speaker 3: from selling something on the field, or an ad under
[33:06] Speaker 3: the scoreboard, or naming rights for something within the stadium.
[33:10] Speaker 3: One is that the amount of money you can get
[33:12] Speaker 3: for a jersey patch is usually a lot more than
[33:14] Speaker 3: those things. I think you could very credibly argue it
[33:18] Speaker 3: is better for you as a brand to have real
[33:20] Speaker 3: estate on a jersey, but it is to have real
[33:22] Speaker 3: estate on the twenty five yard line or the forty
[33:24] Speaker 3: yard line. Every every broadcast home or away, your brand's
[33:28] Speaker 3: going to be on there. Every time someone buys a
[33:30] Speaker 3: jersey at the bookstore, where's it to a tailgate? You're
[33:33] Speaker 3: gonna have brand exposure every highlight like you're gonna be
[33:35] Speaker 3: on TV a lot more than your ad is on
[33:38] Speaker 3: the on the football field. So even like at the
[33:40] Speaker 3: bottom end of FBS, your low level sun Belt CUSA
[33:45] Speaker 3: mac teams, the numbers that I'm hearing are like that
[33:47] Speaker 3: conversation typically starts around a million bucks, and at the
[33:52] Speaker 3: very high end of the Ohio States and Alabama's of
[33:55] Speaker 3: the world, it should be in the five six million
[33:57] Speaker 3: dollars range. And if you want to just get out
[34:00] Speaker 3: on a basketball jersey and like a the NEC or
[34:03] Speaker 3: the A Sun or something like that, starts at six figures.
[34:05] Speaker 3: Because I initially thought, like, I wonder if Extra Points
[34:08] Speaker 3: could like sponsor Western Illinois. Yeah, yeah, I made a
[34:10] Speaker 3: couple of phone calls. I'm but no, we can't, not
[34:13] Speaker 3: not yet, although although that would be fun and it's interesting,
[34:17] Speaker 3: right because I empathize with some fans who look at
[34:20] Speaker 3: this and think it sucks. This is where we're throwing
[34:23] Speaker 3: away one hundred years of tradition uh and and commodifying everything.
[34:28] Speaker 3: It makes me less exciting. I also understand that we've
[34:30] Speaker 3: been doing this for soccer for god knows how long
[34:33] Speaker 3: it's been around. It's already it's already a thing in
[34:35] Speaker 3: the NBA. And and I don't know if I enjoyed
[34:38] Speaker 3: the NBA. I don't know if I've ever looked at
[34:39] Speaker 3: an NBA jersey and thought like, because I see a
[34:42] Speaker 3: Motoroa patch on the bulls, gooodle for him. I like
[34:44] Speaker 3: the bulls less. It's it's generally not particularly obtrusive. The
[34:48] Speaker 3: we're exciting may or maybe the wrong word, but like,
[34:51] Speaker 3: where the big conversation is happening now is can we
[34:54] Speaker 3: find a patch partner that is additive in some way
[34:59] Speaker 3: versus just purely transactional and like as an example here,
[35:03] Speaker 3: like New Mexico State is the program that most recently
[35:05] Speaker 3: signed a jersey patch deal with the Inn of the
[35:09] Speaker 3: Mountain Gods Resort and Casino, which is I believe relatively
[35:14] Speaker 3: close to Las Crusis. And if you are a part
[35:17] Speaker 3: of that living in that area of New Mexico, like
[35:20] Speaker 3: that this place where you've taken your kids, and that
[35:22] Speaker 3: is a very new Mexico oriented you know brand. And
[35:28] Speaker 3: I have not heard anybody on social media. I heard
[35:30] Speaker 3: anybody at the school look at this negatively unless you
[35:33] Speaker 3: just really hate casinos and into the Mountain Gods is
[35:35] Speaker 3: about much more than just a casino. I think if
[35:38] Speaker 3: you were Texas State, as an example, and you had
[35:40] Speaker 3: an AGV patch, I don't think a lot of people
[35:44] Speaker 3: would really complain. Or somebody in Texas got a Bucky's
[35:47] Speaker 3: patch and like, no, that's how very Texas thing. I'm
[35:50] Speaker 3: excited about that. If it was Nationwide Insurance, if it
[35:54] Speaker 3: was you know, Drone company XYZ, if it was planets Here,
[35:59] Speaker 3: if it was a crypto exchange, I think people might
[36:02] Speaker 3: might look at it differently. You know, I'm an Ohio
[36:04] Speaker 3: State fan, like I know this isn't gonna happen, but like,
[36:06] Speaker 3: would I be really upset if there was a Wendy's
[36:08] Speaker 3: baconator patch. I'm like an Ohio State uniform, like a
[36:12] Speaker 3: United Dairy Farmers like little thing like they it's a
[36:15] Speaker 3: Columbus institution. That makes me feel good. If it's if
[36:18] Speaker 3: it's a if it's if it's a defense contractor or
[36:23] Speaker 3: another bank, you know, you know what I mean. And
[36:26] Speaker 3: that's kind of the push and pool here, because these
[36:28] Speaker 3: things are so expensive that a lot of the beloved
[36:31] Speaker 3: regional chains that fans often promote for these kind of
[36:35] Speaker 3: things are just not going to be able to afford.
[36:38] Speaker 1: Fair enough is I mean? Look, everybody's searching for money.
[36:41] Speaker 1: We've talked about this. You're searching for money via the patch.
[36:45] Speaker 1: Are there efforts at schools to find revenue sports that
[36:50] Speaker 1: traditionally have not been revenue sports?
[36:53] Speaker 2: Right?
[36:53] Speaker 1: They have existing brands on campus, right that like Nebraska
[36:58] Speaker 1: and Wisconsin can fill what a football stadium playing volleyball.
[37:02] Speaker 1: That's who played in that game?
[37:03] Speaker 3: I believe no Nebraskt did, but Wisconsin can play at
[37:08] Speaker 3: the Buck Sabrina.
[37:09] Speaker 1: It's all that same we are, right, there's there's a
[37:11] Speaker 1: there's regional huge sports, right you have the frozen four
[37:14] Speaker 1: type teams. I know these places are making efforts to
[37:19] Speaker 1: market and build out these sports. Are there a lot
[37:22] Speaker 1: of schools that feel like maybe there's a sport that's
[37:25] Speaker 1: untapped that their efforts haven't you know, really gone in
[37:29] Speaker 1: the direction of take your pick lacrosse or tennis or soccer.
[37:35] Speaker 1: That these are ignored sports relative to football or basketball
[37:39] Speaker 1: or baseball. When you look at you know, the sec
[37:42] Speaker 1: are are there renewed efforts like you know what, this
[37:44] Speaker 1: is actually like a really cool product in this part
[37:47] Speaker 1: of the country. Let's put some muscle behind take your
[37:51] Speaker 1: picksport or do too many places just look at it
[37:55] Speaker 1: as like a dollars and cents and you know, human
[37:58] Speaker 1: power thing that they're they're not able to do it.
[38:01] Speaker 3: I love this, And what I can tell you is
[38:04] Speaker 3: that there are certainly schools that I can think of
[38:08] Speaker 3: that have reached that conclusion and think about this less
[38:11] Speaker 3: as if we put some gasoline on this fire, it's
[38:15] Speaker 3: going to be revenue positive for us. That doesn't happen
[38:18] Speaker 3: so often. But there are ones that think we can
[38:21] Speaker 3: fill it. We can sell out the stadium, and we
[38:23] Speaker 3: can be really competitive here and build and build a
[38:26] Speaker 3: great experience. And I think a good example for this
[38:28] Speaker 3: would be softball. Duke and Clemson didn't have softball teams
[38:32] Speaker 3: at all a day ago. They both started programs and
[38:35] Speaker 3: now they both compete for hosting regionals. And I've covered
[38:39] Speaker 3: a softball game of Clemson before, and they can sell
[38:42] Speaker 3: the park out. And there's two thousand people there, and
[38:44] Speaker 3: now is that a revenue sport for Clemson in so
[38:47] Speaker 3: far as like men's basketball might be or no, like
[38:50] Speaker 3: men's men's soccer at Clemson can win national titles and
[38:53] Speaker 3: they'll tell me we'll still lose four million dollars, Like
[38:56] Speaker 3: there's not really a functional way to make men's soccer
[39:00] Speaker 3: at Carolina, at UCLA, Indiana Clemson like cash positive. That's okay,
[39:06] Speaker 3: You're I think you're seeing kind of two different trends.
[39:08] Speaker 3: There's one, are there ways that we can better market
[39:12] Speaker 3: and better like monetize some of our Olympic sports, women's volleyball, softball,
[39:18] Speaker 3: to a lesser extent, lacrosse. Those conversations are definitely happening. Ten.
[39:22] Speaker 3: When I was first starting my career on this beat,
[39:25] Speaker 3: there were schools that wouldn't ticket for women's basketball or
[39:28] Speaker 3: that wouldn't ticket for women's volleyball. That's not a thing anymore,
[39:31] Speaker 3: and people are schools are certainly making the investments to
[39:34] Speaker 3: ticket those things more efficiently. But generally, if you're trying
[39:38] Speaker 3: to make an investment, it's more for competitive reasons. And
[39:41] Speaker 3: you know, to bring this full circle, I think one
[39:46] Speaker 3: interesting storyline that we're going to begin to see this
[39:49] Speaker 3: offseason and especially in the next year, is what kind
[39:52] Speaker 3: of approach schools decide to take with women's flag football.
[39:55] Speaker 3: In this approach, which is on track to be a
[39:59] Speaker 3: varsity sport and Division one quite soon, there's the club
[40:04] Speaker 3: adaptations already strong. Nebraska is starting a program, lots of
[40:08] Speaker 3: mid majors are starting programs, and the vast majority of
[40:11] Speaker 3: those schools are starting programs for enrollment purposes. Right, let's
[40:14] Speaker 3: go play on a field that has three hundred seats.
[40:17] Speaker 3: Let's go play two flag football games over a weekend.
[40:19] Speaker 3: Let's try to get thirty more women full on your
[40:22] Speaker 3: payingful tuition on campus. But could you sell tickets to this?
[40:27] Speaker 3: Could this be something that generates meaningful audiences on ESPN Plus?
[40:32] Speaker 3: Could the NFL continue to throw money at this? Could
[40:35] Speaker 3: this be something that's different? Yeah, I think I think
[40:38] Speaker 3: that's entirely possible. And it really only takes two or
[40:40] Speaker 3: three schools saying we're going to really go all out
[40:43] Speaker 3: here and make this a party and make this an
[40:47] Speaker 3: interesting home field advantage kind of situation that will make
[40:50] Speaker 3: other people want to follow along. It'll be interesting. Will
[40:52] Speaker 3: that be Nebraska? Will it be UNC Asheville, Will it
[40:55] Speaker 3: be up Carolina? Upstate?
[40:57] Speaker 1: Who knows on that sort of same token? Is there
[41:01] Speaker 1: a type of revenue stream that people don't realize is
[41:06] Speaker 1: incredible for schools? Oh yeah, I kind I kind of
[41:09] Speaker 1: don't think it's like apparel. Apparel seems sort of flat
[41:13] Speaker 1: and you're just like, yeah, you go to the bookstore,
[41:15] Speaker 1: you go online, and you are but like, is there
[41:17] Speaker 1: a type of is it parking, is it booze?
[41:20] Speaker 3: What? What?
[41:20] Speaker 1: What type of thing? Would people potentially be surprised? Like, yeah,
[41:24] Speaker 1: this thing if it went away, it would be so
[41:26] Speaker 1: much more of a disaster than anybody would think.
[41:29] Speaker 3: No, you're right, it is an apparel for most schools. Actually,
[41:33] Speaker 3: they don't make any money from apparel, right, Like you
[41:35] Speaker 3: see a headline this is like, oh, Nike signed this
[41:37] Speaker 3: two hundred million dollar new deal with UNLV and then
[41:41] Speaker 3: ifoy with a contract and look at it and it's like,
[41:43] Speaker 3: oh and there's no cash.
[41:45] Speaker 1: Is also a lot of apparel kind of sucks, like
[41:48] Speaker 1: it's kind of like stylistically pretty flat, creativity pretty flat,
[41:52] Speaker 1: Like there's you know, home Field, the types of brands
[41:54] Speaker 1: like that have tried and I think have done a
[41:56] Speaker 1: good thing, but like I don't know, apparel doesn't strike
[41:58] Speaker 1: me as a huge growth play.
[42:01] Speaker 3: It isn't and the profit margins are not great for
[42:04] Speaker 3: anybody there, right, Like no disrespect to our friends. Of course,
[42:07] Speaker 3: the homefield a pail would build a wonderful business, but
[42:09] Speaker 3: like you know, I can look at the licensing reports
[42:12] Speaker 3: and see that, like people, not that many schools are
[42:15] Speaker 3: getting rich off of home field licensing alone. Right, There's
[42:17] Speaker 3: always so many T shirts you could you could.
[42:19] Speaker 2: Sell the one.
[42:22] Speaker 3: The single biggest revenue item that I think people don't
[42:25] Speaker 3: think about that much is what's called MMR or multi
[42:28] Speaker 3: media rights. Oh you hear multimedia rights. I think most
[42:31] Speaker 3: people would think, oh, that's that's that's your your television checks.
[42:35] Speaker 3: But that isn't true. Those those are your broadcast rights.
[42:38] Speaker 3: And for a power forward program, that's your most important check.
[42:41] Speaker 3: But if if you're in a mid major, especially in
[42:43] Speaker 3: the FCS, you don't get very much money from from television.
[42:47] Speaker 3: If you're in the Big West, you make enough money
[42:49] Speaker 3: to pay for your production and and that's about it.
[42:52] Speaker 3: Like that, that's that's not a boon. So your MMR
[42:56] Speaker 3: are your radio rights, they're your corporate sponsorship, they are
[43:01] Speaker 3: the signage in and around the stadium, and it's basically
[43:04] Speaker 3: everything that's not part of game day experience that that
[43:08] Speaker 3: gets sold. And for U, you know, a mid major institution,
[43:12] Speaker 3: you might get a four hundred, five hundred thousand dollars
[43:14] Speaker 3: a year check from lear Field. That's bigger than any
[43:16] Speaker 3: check that you get from from anything else or from playfly.
[43:19] Speaker 3: And this is an area where, if it went away
[43:22] Speaker 3: like that might be the single biggest income source for
[43:24] Speaker 3: a lot of Division one. And it's also the place
[43:26] Speaker 3: where most schools are pointing and saying, that's the place
[43:28] Speaker 3: where we can grow the revenue the most. We can't
[43:31] Speaker 3: sell that many more tickets. We can't raise the ticket
[43:34] Speaker 3: price that much. We can only sell I mean, you
[43:37] Speaker 3: could you make a lot of money from beer, more
[43:40] Speaker 3: than you do from other concessions. But there's limitations of
[43:43] Speaker 3: what kind of spirits you can sell, not just from
[43:46] Speaker 3: the law, but like logistically, like you know, real quick,
[43:50] Speaker 3: I think you guys would appreciate. I remember when I
[43:52] Speaker 3: went to visit Camp Randall like summer and a half
[43:56] Speaker 3: ago Wisconsin. You know, it's right before they were selling
[43:59] Speaker 3: alcohol to the general Wisconsin fan base for the first time.
[44:03] Speaker 3: And I remember being floored by this because God blessed Wisconsin, Like,
[44:06] Speaker 3: this is a drug state. This is a state that
[44:08] Speaker 3: appreciates adult beverages. And the reason that they weren't selling
[44:11] Speaker 3: stuff and at the Badger Stadium before wasn't out of prudishness.
[44:16] Speaker 3: It was because the stadium is so fricking old. There's
[44:18] Speaker 3: no place to put taps, and there was no place
[44:21] Speaker 3: to put in more more bathrooms, and so the only
[44:23] Speaker 3: now the only stuff they can sell is in bottles. Right,
[44:25] Speaker 3: So you have a lot of these things to navigate.
[44:28] Speaker 3: And that's why sponsorships and corporate partnerships and and that
[44:33] Speaker 3: what we call this, like the incremental sponsorship revenue is
[44:36] Speaker 3: so so important, and that's what everybody is trying to
[44:39] Speaker 3: grow even more.
[44:41] Speaker 2: Is there?
[44:42] Speaker 1: I mean, I like the Camp randal illusion here it
[44:46] Speaker 1: took Ty thirty minutes to get back from the bathroom
[44:48] Speaker 1: to his seat at Penn State.
[44:50] Speaker 2: I don't want to talk about that.
[44:51] Speaker 1: The stadium experience at a lot of places is not great.
[44:57] Speaker 1: It costs money to fix this. It costs money to
[45:00] Speaker 1: evaluate efficiency and bringing in contractors from overseas who we're like,
[45:05] Speaker 1: these are your choke points, and this is why you
[45:07] Speaker 1: have people who are upset at X, Y and Z.
[45:11] Speaker 1: Are there so many things on an AD's plate that
[45:15] Speaker 1: fan convenience and experience at these stadiums is just so
[45:20] Speaker 1: far down the list that it's just not going to
[45:23] Speaker 1: get appreciably better unless Steve Bomber comes in and is, like,
[45:27] Speaker 1: we need ten thousand toilets like he did with his
[45:31] Speaker 1: new arena and built it from scratch to be an
[45:34] Speaker 1: incredible place to see a game. Allegedly, I haven't been,
[45:38] Speaker 1: or are we just sort of doomed to you know,
[45:42] Speaker 1: ades have too many problems on their plates, and we'll
[45:44] Speaker 1: get to when we get to it.
[45:46] Speaker 3: You know, I don't think we're doomed. And actually this
[45:49] Speaker 3: is kind of one of those those problems that you're
[45:51] Speaker 3: describing that I here discussed more and more. Right, Like,
[45:54] Speaker 3: an AD's job is not just hiring twelve coaches or whatever,
[45:57] Speaker 3: especially because probably for a different show, eighties do a
[46:01] Speaker 3: lot less than that than you might think, Like that's
[46:03] Speaker 3: way more presidential or search firm or booster driven. So
[46:07] Speaker 3: these kind of problems about we don't have enough bathrooms
[46:10] Speaker 3: or going to our game kind of sucks is a
[46:13] Speaker 3: major part of what ads talk about Danny White and
[46:15] Speaker 3: Tennessee talks about this all the time. This is something
[46:18] Speaker 3: I hear about in the eighties and in my phone
[46:20] Speaker 3: book all the time, and it was something that I
[46:22] Speaker 3: heard recently talking to folks at Saint Thomas in Minnesota
[46:27] Speaker 3: bring this up recently when they just built a beautiful
[46:30] Speaker 3: new basketball and hockey arena their Tully. Part of the
[46:32] Speaker 3: reason they did that is because, like, we're a pro
[46:34] Speaker 3: sports town, and so if people are used to one
[46:37] Speaker 3: level experience when they go see the Twins or the
[46:39] Speaker 3: Timberwolves and the Vikings, they will not accept a dramatically
[46:45] Speaker 3: worse experience for the Tommies, Like you don't want to
[46:48] Speaker 3: wait in line for forty five minutes to go get
[46:51] Speaker 3: eighteen dollars chicken wings. So that's something that you have
[46:54] Speaker 3: to fix. And when I talk to ads that I
[46:57] Speaker 3: would say are less traditional that came in from pro
[47:00] Speaker 3: sports or from private business or other places, and my
[47:04] Speaker 3: limited experience, I think those folks tend to be a
[47:06] Speaker 3: little bit more attuned to these issues. But this is
[47:09] Speaker 3: something that I think can get better and should get
[47:12] Speaker 3: better just about anywhere. If you spend maybe a little
[47:14] Speaker 3: bit less time worrying about lobby and Congress, you might
[47:17] Speaker 3: have more time to think about how many more places
[47:20] Speaker 3: in this facility can we sell stuff and have portable
[47:23] Speaker 3: bathrooms and have a better experience. Because you're right, and
[47:29] Speaker 3: this is part of why I try to go to
[47:30] Speaker 3: at least a couple of games a year without a credential,
[47:33] Speaker 3: to remind myself what this experience is like and see
[47:36] Speaker 3: it in other places. Because if it costs forty five
[47:41] Speaker 3: dollars to park and it's difficult to go get food
[47:44] Speaker 3: and difficult to go get sidelined, you can't complain about
[47:46] Speaker 3: not being able to sell tickets.
[47:49] Speaker 2: We're going to do this conversation in twenty twenty seven, Matt,
[47:53] Speaker 2: What are we going to be talking about?
[47:54] Speaker 3: Then? I think we're mostly the same stuff, right. I mean,
[47:59] Speaker 3: if you go back and we played the last couple
[48:00] Speaker 3: of episodes we've done together, we're still talking about anti trust,
[48:03] Speaker 3: We're still talking about athlete compensation, about the employment question,
[48:08] Speaker 3: I would be blown away, especially given where we are
[48:11] Speaker 3: in the election cycle and where we are with Congress
[48:14] Speaker 3: right now, if that gets changed or decided in a
[48:16] Speaker 3: meaningful way in the next six months, I don't think
[48:19] Speaker 3: we're going to be looking at an imminent P two breakaway,
[48:23] Speaker 3: or a super league or a private equity coming in
[48:26] Speaker 3: to buy the SEC or anything like. Most things are possible,
[48:29] Speaker 3: but I don't think that they're likely in the next
[48:32] Speaker 3: nine or ten months. You know, if we're lucky, maybe
[48:35] Speaker 3: next year. We're also talking about college baseball game or
[48:39] Speaker 3: different college basketball video games, or indie developments in college
[48:43] Speaker 3: football games beyond DA Sports, or something maybe a little
[48:46] Speaker 3: bit less catastrophic. But the major issues are the major
[48:50] Speaker 3: issues from the we had in twenty twenty one, and
[48:52] Speaker 3: if we're being honest, most of them are the same
[48:54] Speaker 3: things we've been talking about since the nineteen twenties. Just
[48:56] Speaker 3: the numbers have gone up.
[48:59] Speaker 2: His name is Matt brand now and you can find
[49:00] Speaker 2: us find work over at Extra Points with Matt Brown
[49:03] Speaker 2: extra Points mb dot com. I'm saving the best for last, Matt.
[49:08] Speaker 2: I know how hard you work on your site and
[49:11] Speaker 2: on this business. I'm I'm curious what all you are
[49:14] Speaker 2: working on now. Actually haven't talked to you about this recently,
[49:18] Speaker 2: so I'm curious. I'm asking more for myself maybe than
[49:20] Speaker 2: anybody else, But I feel like you're always working on
[49:23] Speaker 2: like a million things over there. As you have kind
[49:25] Speaker 2: of expanded your operations. So what is the state of
[49:29] Speaker 2: play for extra Points right now?
[49:31] Speaker 3: You know, this is a good reminder that I'll have
[49:33] Speaker 3: to share this link with you guys once once we're
[49:35] Speaker 3: done where I have spent just an enormous amount of
[49:38] Speaker 3: work over the last two and a half months. It's
[49:41] Speaker 3: been trying to completely redo our Extra Points library product.
[49:45] Speaker 3: The main the number one thing that pays my salary
[49:49] Speaker 3: and the salary of my employees and and you know,
[49:51] Speaker 3: buys Pokemon cards for my kids is the newsletter and
[49:55] Speaker 3: the subscriptions the newsletter and advertisements in the newsletter. But
[49:58] Speaker 3: we also have a data product where mostly schools but
[50:02] Speaker 3: also some newsrooms and some academics and some fans can
[50:06] Speaker 3: look up everyone's budget, everyone's contract, all these vendor agreements,
[50:10] Speaker 3: and schools use this for like benchmarking and to save money.
[50:14] Speaker 3: And we've had this product for about a year and
[50:16] Speaker 3: a half, and like we've rebuilt it to make it faster,
[50:20] Speaker 3: more intuitive. Uh you know this this I used the
[50:23] Speaker 3: new version to write the story we did by a
[50:25] Speaker 3: week and a half ago about Ben's basketball budgets that
[50:27] Speaker 3: made every Indiana fan so angry at me. But I
[50:30] Speaker 3: think some of the storytelling that we can do with
[50:32] Speaker 3: this new tool is so much better than before, and
[50:35] Speaker 3: I'm excited about that. We should be ready to release
[50:37] Speaker 3: it to the general public DEBTA testing now. We wanted
[50:40] Speaker 3: to be ready maybe two weeks and then. I'm also
[50:44] Speaker 3: interested in continuing to make and refine our games. Ever
[50:50] Speaker 3: so often people joke that you should put the Athletic
[50:52] Speaker 3: Director simulator in like the next EA Sports college football game,
[50:55] Speaker 3: and like, that'd be great. You know, I'd love to
[50:57] Speaker 3: be friends with the A Sports again and consultant and
[51:00] Speaker 3: build something for that. But if that never happens, we
[51:02] Speaker 3: have talked to other video game studios about like, hey, well,
[51:06] Speaker 3: how much money wuan to take and how can we
[51:08] Speaker 3: work together to make an out of the park baseball
[51:10] Speaker 3: but for college football? Yeah, or turn this into something
[51:13] Speaker 3: more sophisticated, because now I know enough like JavaScript to
[51:17] Speaker 3: be annoying, but not enough to be a triple A
[51:22] Speaker 3: video game developer or even a single A video game developer.
[51:24] Speaker 3: And this isn't a world that I know as well.
[51:26] Speaker 3: But yeah, because I'm not capable of just doing one
[51:28] Speaker 3: thing right, I'm trying to build something to help athletic
[51:32] Speaker 3: directors save money. Build something better that I think fans
[51:35] Speaker 3: will enjoin goofing off with in May and June when
[51:38] Speaker 3: we're writing for actual football to start back up again
[51:40] Speaker 3: and then hopefully keep writing stories that people want to read.
[51:43] Speaker 1: I'm ready for you to create the seediest possible recruiting game.
[51:48] Speaker 1: I'm not talking about what exists within NC double or
[51:51] Speaker 1: excuse me, eaeA Sports is college football series right now.
[51:55] Speaker 1: I'm talking about so much more detailed about like giving
[51:59] Speaker 1: options about how pushy to be at camps right how
[52:03] Speaker 1: weird to be with the recruits. Dad, I want you
[52:06] Speaker 1: to create the absolute most creepy recruiting game possible with
[52:11] Speaker 1: the worst possible graphics.
[52:12] Speaker 3: I think, you know, honest to god, my like I think,
[52:17] Speaker 3: I think, like my my dream game project would be
[52:20] Speaker 3: to make like an early nineties Lucas sort of like
[52:23] Speaker 3: Sierra style point and Clicks game, and I, you know,
[52:27] Speaker 3: experiment with this a little bit in college. I think
[52:30] Speaker 3: what you're just describing as college football leisure suit, Larry,
[52:32] Speaker 3: but exactly what coach correct I'm in. I'm absolutely an
[52:37] Speaker 3: out low. If you're still alive, my email is Matt
[52:40] Speaker 3: at Extra Points MB dot com. I'll you pixel artists
[52:43] Speaker 3: out there what. I love to work on that this
[52:45] Speaker 3: summer instead of doing spreadsheets. Absolutely, I would love to
[52:49] Speaker 3: make a Michigan football coaching simulator. Leisure suit.
[52:53] Speaker 2: No, don't do that. Don't do that. Let's pick a
[52:55] Speaker 2: different school.
[52:56] Speaker 1: Do we call it leisure suit? Larry Scott, I don't know.
[53:00] Speaker 1: It's just an idea. It's just an idea. There are
[53:02] Speaker 1: no we're just whiteboarding guys, Laura. This is Larry Fedora. Yeah,
[53:07] Speaker 1: oh god, I'm trying to think of my other big
[53:09] Speaker 1: time college football Larry's and fitz Fitzgerald. I don't know.
[53:14] Speaker 1: But he's like we look at him in a positive way.
[53:16] Speaker 3: I don't know, so I don't I don't think.
[53:19] Speaker 1: No, he's just so Larry Scott, easy to spell, easy
[53:22] Speaker 1: to remember, and.
[53:23] Speaker 2: Nobody likes the guy. So nobody likes pretty much in
[53:26] Speaker 2: the clear, Matt Brown, keep up the good work. We'll
[53:29] Speaker 2: have to talk to you again sometime in the very
[53:31] Speaker 2: near future. But enjoy the off season whatever that looks
[53:35] Speaker 2: like for you. Get some quality time up in Wisconsin
[53:38] Speaker 2: whenever you can. And uh extra points MB For everybody
[53:43] Speaker 2: out there who does not subscribe to Matt's fine work,
[53:45] Speaker 2: go and sport them.
[53:45] Speaker 1: This episode has been brought to you by Milwaukee's public investment.
[53:51] Speaker 1: It's mostly mostly it's a curd based currency tie, but
[53:55] Speaker 1: it's a pretty big deal.
[53:56] Speaker 3: Drink wisconsinly.
[53:58] Speaker 1: There you go, Ye, all right, there you go.
[54:01] Speaker 2: Matt Brown. Check out his fine work at extra points
[54:04] Speaker 2: mb dot com. That is his newsletter, that is his business.
[54:08] Speaker 2: Matt does an excellent job reporting out all things college
[54:12] Speaker 2: football business. Dan, I would have been cool to just
[54:16] Speaker 2: talk about Milwaukee. I have never been. I have heard
[54:20] Speaker 2: great things about it, not just from you, but from
[54:23] Speaker 2: some former colleagues of mine who sent both their kids
[54:27] Speaker 2: to school in Wisconsin. So it seems to be a
[54:30] Speaker 2: bit of a hidden gem that I have not yet
[54:32] Speaker 2: to I'm not yet fully experienced.
[54:35] Speaker 1: I'm looking at the lineup for Summerfest twenty twenty six,
[54:38] Speaker 1: which is a huge deal in Milwaukee. Okay, I think
[54:42] Speaker 1: it's over. I don't know, a couple weeks of just
[54:45] Speaker 1: like live festival concert situation after live festival concert situation.
[54:50] Speaker 1: You got a lot of thie hit makers in here,
[54:53] Speaker 1: but really you got Okay, So June twenty fifth, June
[54:56] Speaker 1: twenty seventh. By the way, summer Fest twenty twenty six
[54:58] Speaker 1: not a sponsor, could be could be absolutely, could be
[55:00] Speaker 1: Ed Sheeran, the Roots, post Malone, You got Muse on
[55:06] Speaker 1: July second to the fourth. I don't know you. You're
[55:09] Speaker 1: probably a jelly roll guy. If you're not a jelly
[55:11] Speaker 1: roll guy, Boom, there's Sean Paul right, shun the ball.
[55:16] Speaker 1: He's ready for you.
[55:17] Speaker 2: Sho.
[55:18] Speaker 1: There's so much happening. You got buck Cherry in there.
[55:22] Speaker 1: You've got then I do like the Mountain Goats. That's
[55:25] Speaker 1: like a got goldfinger in there. Tye Old ninety seven's
[55:28] Speaker 1: vertical Horizon. I know you're big with vertical horizon. Sure,
[55:32] Speaker 1: echoing the Bunnyman. Oh my god, ty, there's so much
[55:35] Speaker 1: happening at Summerfest twenty six.
[55:38] Speaker 2: Is that in Milwaukee?
[55:40] Speaker 1: That's in Milwaukee, That's what I'm saying. That's like their
[55:42] Speaker 1: big summer concert festival thing. Garth Brooks is the headliner.
[55:47] Speaker 1: Early June sixteen seventeen.
[55:49] Speaker 2: Well, it only rivals music fests over here, because Third
[55:52] Speaker 2: Eye Blind is coming back. They're here, Third Eye Blind,
[55:55] Speaker 2: They're coming back into the twentieth I had no idea
[55:58] Speaker 2: what to expect because there can considerably older than they
[56:01] Speaker 2: were back when they were you know, much more a
[56:03] Speaker 2: cultural phenomenon. That show was awesome for people of my age,
[56:08] Speaker 2: I should say. And Yellow Card is coming here this
[56:12] Speaker 2: year apparently still playing. My friends and I have all
[56:15] Speaker 2: signed up for that one. So yeah, let's look forward
[56:19] Speaker 2: to this summer. I'm like five lines deep, hold on,
[56:23] Speaker 2: don't take that out. It settles.
[56:25] Speaker 1: I'm like five lines deep into the first weekend, the
[56:27] Speaker 1: first full weekend of summerfest here and I know bands.
[56:31] Speaker 1: There is an Eagle here. Don Felder of Eagles Kid
[56:34] Speaker 1: is playing and it's not the the Eagles, it's just Eagles.
[56:37] Speaker 2: By the way.
[56:39] Speaker 1: I've heard of Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. I think they're like
[56:41] Speaker 1: a one hit. We got modern English. I'll stop the
[56:43] Speaker 1: world to melt with you. Tie, you know modern English.
[56:47] Speaker 1: I've actually heard of post Sex Nachos because they're my
[56:50] Speaker 1: favorite band name of twenty twenty five. Pretty good. That's
[56:55] Speaker 1: Juliana theory. They go way back in the emo scene.
[56:57] Speaker 1: There's a bunch here, Tie, there's just a bunch happening.
[57:02] Speaker 1: I saw somebody else that you've heard of. The Academy
[57:04] Speaker 1: is David Lee roth Sticks. This is all just in
[57:07] Speaker 1: one weekend, Tie six.
[57:10] Speaker 2: That was the first concert I was ever at really
[57:14] Speaker 2: Rio Speedwagon and Sticks at the Bryce Jordan Center. Could
[57:18] Speaker 2: you go just a bunch of a bunch of friends.
[57:22] Speaker 1: Just like nine year old Tie getting down with sticks?
[57:25] Speaker 2: No, this was like nineteen year old Tie.
[57:27] Speaker 1: Oh that was your first concert at nineteen.
[57:30] Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess it would be eighteen. Yeah, it was
[57:32] Speaker 2: the fall of my freshman year.
[57:34] Speaker 1: Hanka's area is playing Bruce Springsteen covers at Summerfest with
[57:38] Speaker 1: the Easy Street Band. Okay, Geene Simmons Band, So it's
[57:43] Speaker 1: not kiss right. Is there a Baja Blast stage? That's
[57:48] Speaker 1: a great question. Probably not, but I can't for sure
[57:51] Speaker 1: say no. That was a big hit, you know on
[57:55] Speaker 1: our last stage.
[57:56] Speaker 2: Yeah, when we talked through who on the Baja Blast
[57:59] Speaker 2: stage would lure you away from your tailgate? Oh, that
[58:03] Speaker 2: was a very big deal. So we'll have to make
[58:05] Speaker 2: sure we pay homage at some point to the Baja
[58:07] Speaker 2: Blast stage and have that conversation again.
[58:10] Speaker 1: At what kind of concert? At what kind of festival?
[58:13] Speaker 1: Could you get both Sean Paul and All Time Low
[58:16] Speaker 1: and Mega Death and Spoon and Rev Run and the
[58:22] Speaker 1: Gin Bloss only in Wisconsin, Man only in Milwauller. A
[58:25] Speaker 1: whole tourism pitch dude, I'm not even done with this
[58:28] Speaker 1: weekend Soul Asylum, Spin Doctors, TI, there's I'm just I'm
[58:35] Speaker 1: talking myself into summerfest. I was gonna say I should
[58:38] Speaker 1: leave the room and let me say last, Milwaukee say last.
[58:41] Speaker 2: Let you work this out, all right? With all that
[58:44] Speaker 2: being said, Matt Brown go and check him out again.
[58:46] Speaker 2: Extra points NB dot com. He does a great job
[58:50] Speaker 2: support independent journalism and what Matt is doing, I know
[58:53] Speaker 2: we do. We would encourage everybody to make sure that
[58:56] Speaker 2: they do it as well.
[58:57] Speaker 1: We can you play the breaking news real quick? Can
[59:02] Speaker 1: you find breaking news as I vamp? I know you've
[59:05] Speaker 1: got breaking news somewhere there.
[59:06] Speaker 2: I have it here here.
[59:13] Speaker 1: Also that final weekend Baha men, we might get answers
[59:20] Speaker 1: about who, oh my god, the Baha men at the
[59:24] Speaker 1: Baja blast age. It's too good, all right?
[59:29] Speaker 2: Uh, I don't know where to go from here. We've
[59:32] Speaker 2: got an exciting episode planned for you on Thursday. It
[59:37] Speaker 2: is nine years in the making. I will not give
[59:42] Speaker 2: too much away. People on Patreon know where we are
[59:44] Speaker 2: going with this. Verbowlers dot com. Even if you are
[59:47] Speaker 2: not signed up as one of our paying members. If
[59:50] Speaker 2: you go and sign up as a free member, you
[59:52] Speaker 2: can see the direction that we are appointed. I am
[59:55] Speaker 2: excited about this. I think going into the weekend, it
[59:59] Speaker 2: gives us a nice little opportunity to explore the world
[1:00:01] Speaker 2: beyond college football, which is something we do not do
[1:00:04] Speaker 2: as often as I think you and I would like.
[1:00:06] Speaker 2: But a little bit of a different show coming up
[1:00:09] Speaker 2: later this week. Hope everybody enjoys it. For that guy
[1:00:12] Speaker 2: over there, Dan, for our honored guest Matt Brown, for myself,
[1:00:14] Speaker 2: Tie Held to Brand. Thank you as always for downloading
[1:00:17] Speaker 2: and supporting, Hit follow, hit subscribe. Until next time, stays solved. Peace,

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