Web3 and Pro Sports w/ Julian Aikens and Terance Mann

Show is gonna be there. All this moments gonna be there. Get today Black Effect dot Com Forward Slash Podcast Festival. I'm Will Lucas and this is Black Tech Green Money. I'm gonna introduce you to some of the biggest names, some of the brightest minds and brilliant ideas. Your black building a simple using tech to secure your bag. This podcast is for you. Julian Aigan is founder at W three Sports, a web three consulting firm working to bridge

the gap between athletes and brands of the new Internet. Okay, his man is an NBA player currently serving one of the Clippers roster. With Julian as his business partner. They're cementing their names in the history books of Web three both athletes, Julian a former athlete, and tiors of present day NBA highlight reel. They're both keenly aware of life at the game time, so positioning themselves for the world

that the big lights is always top of mind. I think I was exposed to the reality of how good you needed to be to play professional sports. That being said, Um, my younger brother had played in the Nike y b L circuit his entire life. I was three years older than him. He actually played against Terrence back in two thousand and ten. Um, and taking a look at that, I just so your brother tears used to go at it.

So He's like, honestly, I got exposed to, uh, the level of basketball that professional basketball players played as as as youth and you know, as they grew up. So that being said, I took into you know, account, my skill set, and I knew that I wanted to take care of my family, and I've been lucky enough to see other black men that had done so outside of sports.

So I made that commitment that I was going to take care of my family to the best of my ability, and knew that basketball probably wasn't going to be the lane for me, so I was able to commit in both lanes and at the same time make sure, um, you know that I was going to be in a place to do so. Did you find it useful or even just just helpful as like a competitive advantage to

use your athletic successes to create business success? And I think that's something that me and Terrence have really started to eye down as well, is that we know, you know, within our space and I took a look at your interview on on the Breakfast Club, is that people that look like us, they have tons of role models to look at who when and when it comes to sports and entertainment, um, But when it comes to the business side of things, there's necessarily not a ton of people

that look like us, you know that a strictly strictly corporate of the tech world, of the crypto world. That being said, I knew that basketball had opened a lot of doors for me and that it could continue to through my relationships. So when I thought about business, I

used the same kind of things. Who do I know in the space and in other spaces that people that look like me are attracted to to bring them into our world as well and show them that this is also cool, this is also viable, and that you can take care of your family here as well. Terious, I want you to chime in on that because I imagine, you know, being a successful athlete also like you get an approach with a lot of opportunities to do stuff. Um,

what was it about, particularly Web three? And we'll get into like what you guys are working on, but what was it about, particularly the opportunity in web three that was interesting to units to say, you know what, I'm gonna find a lane here right? Um, I think as well as he said of than you know, not seeing people that look like us in the space. Um, just just wanted to learn about it, you know, just seeing so many people talk about it and how cool it

seemed to me. Um, and it just sparked my interests. So I just wanted to learn about it is what really got me started. So so Julia, can you can you talk a little bit about what if you were to give like the executive summary of W three sports, Like, can you give that to us, you know, so we can fully understand the services you provide, the opportunities you're trying to provide for your clients and et cetera. Yeah,

it's it's overall just crypto and Web three. Education is the first thing that I start with, you know, with Terrence, before we did anything in Web three, we just talked about what interested him in the space. When you think about, hey, it interests me what about it? Does? Is it the art? Is it the ability that it's a new economy that's forming, that's newer, and our people could you know, successfully get

in at the ground level. Um. And then further than that, you know, there's a couple of different things that we do, um from brand consulting, you know, working with Web three projects that exist. We also work with Web two projects that are looking to integrate themselves into the Web three space. As you know, and a lot of people out there have talked about a lot of those Web two brands

haven't done it necessarily the right way. So trying to work with those brands to define what the right way is, I don't think anyone knows as it yet, um, you know, in terms of what that may mean. So working with guys like Terrence, you know that have strong brands, are professional athletes, are approached by you know, tons and tons

of n F T projects and Web three companies. One thing that I had identified very early on was that, you know, on both sides, there wasn't a true understanding of how this partnership could go, how it should work, what success could look like, and really how to break down something as complex as Web three and defy to an athlete for them to be able to understand how

they can drive value in those communities. So I releast look to serve as the bridge between you know, obviously any athletes that I work with and Web three companies in the space as a whole. But you really want to protect the athletes and make sure that they don't get caught in any situations where they might have bitten off a little more than they can chew just by not understanding what this means. And you know, kind of got blinded by the dollar signs of whatever those you know, interactions.

Maybe so can you So do you imagine the agency playing the role of like that middle person to go between between the person creating the n f T collection or whatever or some some sort of crypto project and the athlete who and you're leveraging the relationship between the two to help them, you know, protect against protect the athlete and create opportunity for the project exactly or on the players side, just helped them understand from Web three as a whole, what are you looking to achieve here?

You know, you might get offers to do this and to do that, But saying that web you know, kind of W three sports as a whole really came out of just seeing the disconnect being there. Even when deals were getting done, activation is not being done properly, athletes having no idea who the team or the investors are

behind these Web three projects. So the heart of it and the root of it really lies at protecting the athlete and ensuring that both themselves and you know, I've worked with Tease Agency as well um on there and have a full and holistic view of what these opportunities truly are, both short and long term. Um as I myself, yes, you know, obviously I've worked in sports business, but saying that I've worked in tech after the last ten years, it's something that I've been born kind of growing my

career through. UM so I'm a native to it. So Terris, I think about this. You know, you've seen like the horror stories with and again in music business, you know, you get you get involved in the contracts in the centera that they see not only your value as the musician, but then they see the value of your ticket sales, they see the value of your merge, they see the

value of your appearances. You know. So I wonder can you speak to how you know, let's let's let's talk about the agents or the teams, how they maybe maybe turning their head and seeing, Okay, there's other opportunity here to leverage the players persona um and getting involved there is that happening or do you see people pretty much saying in their lane in the sports world right, Um?

I think definitely. I think you know, you can hear it and in talks, you know, you can hear you know, when you're walking around moving around with agents or you know, in the facility, you can hear people talking about what people are doing off the court, um, different things, people are investing in, different things. People they notice, people take light in through their social media. So I think it's a lot of talk. So it's definitely being talked about,

especially you know in those bigger rooms. Because I think about this and even Julian and you or Terrance can chime in or I think a lot about how, um, you know, what web three does is allow you to not only have um, you know, sort of this pay for plaything. I play on the basketball court and you pay me. But there's an opportunity here to collaborate and

have ownership on both sides and shared value experience. And I just wonder how that might be evolving in the in the sports world where we see how it's evolving, you know, in entertainment where people kind of own even they may even own their posts persona if they are an established enough entertainer. Um, new entertainers have different experiences.

But how how you how are you seeing web three or the potential that web three presents to an athlete play out, Um, when you're talking about, you know, working with a sports team who's investing hundreds of thousands and often millions and millions of dollars into an athlete, I

could take that one. I think from this standpoint, there's a couple of different ways to look at it at the individual level, you know, for Terrance specifically, there's a couple of different ways that we look at what web three in blockchain technology can do and enable him to do. Number one, every NBA player has fans. Does every NBA player have a community built around them that they can

control and they reward throughout their career. I don't think so. Uh. And being around NBA players my entire life, being able to identify those moments where people can meet them, you know, they can get signed sneakers, whatever it may be in regards to that interaction, A lot of those times that

will build a fan for life. Uh. And you know, further than that, you probably would call that fan follower, um and a true follower and not a social media follower, but somebody that's actually integrated into his success and it's really going to you know, go to bat for him, support him with whatever he does. That being said, you know, I think what came to mind in regards to Terrence and thinking about this. You know, he has had a lot of success in the fashion space and breaking into that.

So when you think around web three, you know, how can we utilize blockchain to do a number of things and can we do them as of now? No, but we want obviously get to the forefront of the space. But things like you know, being able to identify who might have purchased tickets to Clippers games, who's purchased you know, Terence is sneakers with his anti deal things of that nature.

Who actually went to his camp? Anyone in the Boston area you know that, you know we're we're from UM taking a look at that who has supported and went to a celticstant Clippers game. And I think once we can start to identify what his community wants from him and what they really find value in, then we can start to cultivate obviously that fan base and to try

to turn into it. Do we have a thousand true community members here that we can continue to build off that we don't have to assume and guess what do they want from Terrence to his career? We can have those conversations live and just ask them, hey, guys, what do you on? What do you want from this? What

is the reward to you? UM? So that as his career continues to grow, both on and off the court, he also has that community base that can look back ten years later and said he actually took the time with us, So the next thirty forty years of his life he has those connections. Because I think us just going to n f T N y C, the amount of connections and conversations that we were able to have off of that who probably would have never been exposed to.

You know, I wonder if it's and this is a very superficial question, but it's not my thing about what the difference between like NBA players and NFL players. It's like NBA players have a much stronger opportunity to brand a persona because they're not wearing a mask the whole game. Like people, you can see them. Is there something to that or am I just tripping? Am I just speculating

on the opportunity here? I think so? I mean I think so, um, just because people are able to see us, you know often, you know, we play eighty two games in a regular season plus the playoffs, so you know it's not only you know, once a week. I guess it's very often a couple of three times a week. You know, they watch you place and seeing face. So

I think that definitely plays a big role. What would you say that you like, So, let's say you are advising in an NFL player to build value around the persona and they may not be you know, you know, the most popular athlete out there, but they're still opportunity. What our ways they can start to brand themselves so that you know, a Web three project, whether it be a token, whether it be an n f T project, could you know, be valuable for them. I think the

biggest thing and this this is coming. I don't know if you know her, but Kirby Porter is a partner of mine and um one thing she focuses on his content creation. So with that, every NFL player I'm sure has a personality that it's not doesn't equate to you know, who they are on the field. Start to open that up. You know, if you are comfortable being vulnerable, and that's something that Terrence does really really well. Agnostic of sport is he's comfortable and he's vulnerable to learn in public

and also show who he is off the court. That being said, when you expose and express who you are, they're gonna be tons of people that like the NFL but love something about you that reminds you of them. Those are the types of things that you want to

build content around. Start to test out different things, use TikTok, use Instagram, use Twitter, start to meet people outside of your sport, and then based upon what you feel is authentic and you actually like and can see yourself doing when you're playing careers over attack that introduce yourself to people. You know, if I was to get a direct message from an NFL player, you know, I would probably respond.

And I think that in terms of any businesses that they would look at and might want to collaborate with, they probably get a similar response. You know. Not a ton of businesses get that player reaching out to them. And I think when you do that, it really flips the table and shows that you're actually interested, you know,

beyond a dollar. You know. I like what you just said about Terence learning in public and Terrence as you I read something that where you were quoted as saying, um, hearing that Staples turned into crypto Arena definitely opened my eyes to what's going on in this space is and it's and that it's going to be huge eventually. And it definitely helped me realize that I have to get involved in get people who look like me on the wave.

And so it sounds like you didn't just dip your toe into the water of crypto and Web three, but like you went all in. So if you can tell me about like some of the ways you begin to educate yourself with regarding regarding Web three, I think, um, just through you know, Julian and his team and my team just collaborating, having a whole bunch of conversations around the space before even getting all the way into it.

And then obviously you know, when I went to the n f T n f T S events in New York, that really opened my eyes to where, um, I got to see how big, you know, of the space is and it's gonna be, and how many people are involved, and you know, all the different things going on, so you know, just jump it right into it. And just seeing it for myself going to New York and everything really helped me out. Um and and it brought me here. Do you which part of the web three conversation particularly

interested you? If you're talking about tokens one and you're talking about the metaverse or another a talking about n f T S like which what particularly interested you? I think for me? I think for me it's a metaverse

as a whole. Just um, you know, growing up playing video games as much as I did, um, it really gave me that that type of field, you know, that almost that type of granduff auto field, um, you know, where people are creating their own stuff, having their own type of vibe on there, playing different sorts of games, whinning tokens, whinning you know, exchanging real you know, crypto money on there. Just the whole whole vibe really you know, attracted me just from me being a game or growing up.

And this is this is one for both of you, guys. I'm super interested in, um, the benefits of having an athletic background. UM. So I think about, you know, when you're coming up as an athlete, you've got a couple and one maybe you've got a coach who's there for your development, UM. And then you have you know, the camaraderie, you have a team environment, UM. And those all helped to build character even outside of the field, off of

the court. UM. Like, what would you say, are some of the things that sports equipped you with outside of you know the ones I just mentioned, um to helping you find business success? Myself, I would say understanding the

grind UM. And when I say the grind, when you're playing and you're achieving in any any skill or any type of job and you reach that one percent, which obviously the NBA is, But even if you play Division two like I did, UM, you're gonna go through tough times, you know, as as we've see now with the economy, almost every business out there is cognizant of what's going on in regards to the economic downturn that we're looking

at here. Same things that that happen in business. You're gonna have your ebbs and flows, You're gonna have great moments, you're gonna have your very low moments. But I think playing sports and also being a leader, specifically in basketball, you're very used to, hey, we might be down fifteen, but there's twenty when it is left on you know,

obviously on on on the clock. Here. That being said, you're able to identify what you need to do personally to win, and if you're a leader, you're also able to identify what you need from everyone around you and how to bring it out of them. Same thing in business. Obviously, the motivation is a little bit different. People a families, people are working for financial gain, things of that nature.

But within sports you learn how through you know, obviously they kind of like going through hell that the only way is through, and um, that's something that I've seen in business that's been really really helpful for me. And then obviously starting a career, any industry, any any any skill that you you you want to continue to learn.

At first, you know you're gonna go out there, you can barely make a layup, but you might look back twenty years later playing for the Clippers, So you know, you're also very very aware that you have to start somewhere. What would you say, Yeah, I think for me, you know, other than the grind, you know, that's a great one.

I can relate to that for sure. But I think just everybody kind of knowing their role and knowing what they bring to the table, and just being all so many different teams that I've been on, you know, being in college for four years now, going to my foard year in the n b A, just all the different teammates I had learning, you know, learning about your team

and learning about what everybody can bring. Kind of have an understanding of your team and what you can bring, who's who can lead, you know, who needs to follow, different types of sorts of things like that definitely go directly hand in hand with business, um and that's why we've been able to, you know, kind of who we've been doing because we understand that everybody has been grinding And yeah, so Julie, like I think about this because as you mentioned, a couple of things that actually both

of you guys talked about this. So any either one if you can chime in, but I'll ask Julian two. First is you know cryptos not performing well right now, the tokens were down in the moment um. How do

you both and Julian go first on this um? How do you manage when you're building something based on blockchain technology and so you're betting on long the long term here and so when you have these wild swings like we have right now, how are you managing the ups and downs um of crypto mentally hand um, you just gotta be cognizant of of of the waves that are

sucom and obviously prepare for them. That being said, you know, with crypto going up and down, one thing I always like to spread, especially you know with people that look like us, is you need to have leverage. Don't put all your eggs in one basket. That being said, you need to make sure you're diversified where your money is. So crypto being down, I'm also invested done the things that benefit by that um. But looking at it, from a holistic perspective, it really makes it boil down. So

what are you here for? Um? You know, specifically with myself and Terrence and Mellow, our other partner. Um, we haven't asked a dollar from anyone in regards to any n f T s in the crypto space. You know, we haven't done anything to say, hey, this is Terrence Man, this is a celebrity. This is why we want you to go and buy this project. That's not really what we're looking to do here. We're looking to draw an awareness.

And I think something that you had mentioned I watched a couple of year podcast was really talking about the black experience and culture being at the foundation of all of these apps. And I work in tech and I'm around NBA players a lot, and I always try to bring that awareness. Said, Hey, everything that we're utilizing, no

matter what happened, is somebody created this. And I take a look at the NBA guys I know the NBA, at the NFL guys, I know the w NBA players, and I take a look back at how many people I know and just how many slots are in those leagues. And I want to put that attention to say, hey, even in crypto, when it's down, things aren't going well, things are not you know, soaring in terms of evaluations, We're still continuing to build because our mission doesn't change

whether a theoryum is or four thousand dollars. We're still going to continue to do the same things. And we started doing that when it was high. When it's lower, not going to change, so the mission remains the same. Would you say, tears, how are you managing waves? Yeah? I mean, like he said, it's gonna be ups and downs, and you know, I think I think just the conversation around it, you know, I think we needed to keep the conversation going. Um, you know, keep having people talk

about it. No, just so people can see there's something and it's there and people are because I think, you know, that's the thing about it right now, a lot of people are like, no, I don't see nothing happening. It's going down. They're just here, say you know, he says, she say, so, I think just asking questions and learning more about it, educate yourself on it, and just keep the conversation going. You know. So I said this, I

said this is often um. In a couple of places publicly where it's like at the at the core, you have to believe in blockchain technology and that ultimately there will be a currency on the blockchain that is well embraced, right, whether that's gonna be Ethereum, whether that's gonna be Bitcoin, whether that's going to be you know, light coin, pick one, but ultimately there will be a currency that we use in in this new world. And so that's where my

personal belief is. Yes, you may see Ethereum down crazy amount of money. You may see Bitcoin down sixty dollars last year, what's twenty or something right now? Yes, but do you believe in the fundamentals and that there will be a winner? And my job is just to position myself to be on a wave of a winner ultimately. No, what do you say, Julie, No, A hundred percent, A hundred percent. You really got to believe in it. And

I think you know that. The part that gets me excited around Web three and sparked my interest initially was that athlete to fan engagement and what can be done with it, because I think the athlete to fan engagement as it is now, fans are always at that arms length distance. Um. That being said, any community they have. They don't own any of those platforms. That those platforms go down. Any social people are Web two platform, any social network as of now, they really won't have any

control over that. That being said, when you look at Web three, you know whether it's in the form of a doubt, whether they launch a project with utility backed on what their community actually wants to get from them. They have control of that. They have that complete foundation. So if Instagram is not cool ten years from now, Terence can still have its community. And hey, we might have start of that five dred to a thousand, maybe we're at fifteen thousand people by the time Terrences is

forty and his dreads are gray. But at least he'll learn that he'll he'll he'll own that community and also by then have a really, really finite understanding of what they want from him. And I think take it a step further, he probably is going to meet a lot of people um that he finds himself interested in within his community, and from there, who knows what can happen

in terms of the opportunities. I mean, you're doing a great job of giving me these allues because it's that segways beautifully into what I wanted to talk about next, and that was, um, the opportunity in Web three for influencers and athletes versus what happened in Web two. And I mentioned this, I tasted this earlier where I mentioned, like, you know, in Web two, it's like you do something

and you get paid. So there was this you know thing about and you probably tarency to even have these opportunities. Somebody wants you to post something on I G and they pay you, right, and so that's that's an influencer type of relationship. And Web three allows you more collaborative opportunities, more long term ownership opportunities. How do you imagine those sort of deals, Julian and you can chime in on this two Tim, But how do you imagine those Web

three deals might be structured? Because most people who think about okay, you know, we want to a brand wants you to do something. Okay, they pay you and then y'all I do it and I'm done. But how might those deals play out as we start to evolve and mature in Web three when the car dealership is calling and saying, hey, we want Tarmas to do this, the good or the bad. Let's do both. First, I'll say I feel like the bad. I'll talk about the bad in the sense I mean, I feel like the bad

can be in a similar way. You know, just post my oh what three space or whatever on your Instagram and we pay, and you know, the athlete has no idea a you know, what's going on with that, with that n f T or that whoever you know, pay them and be they don't know what's a text to it. You know, they're just doing it for the money and to post. So I think that can you know, that's definitely a bad way of going about it. And I

feel like that's happened to a few people so far. Um. You see a lot of bad cases that has happened so far. So um yeah, Julie, Yeah, I mean I think on the web three side, it's not as cut and dry, just due to regulations. You know, obviously some cryptos not being securities. People wanted them to be securities. So you open yourself up potentially if you go and partner with the wrong project, um to a lot of legal stuff that could happen to you, you know, if

you partner with the wrong project. That being said, Um, when I think around our approach in terms of a good Web three deal and what we need to do. We do really really in depth research in terms of who this project is, who the team is, who are the depths behind it. If it's a player arm ecosystem, who are they going and outsourcing it to potentially, if so,

to actually build this game? Is it possible? So? I think in that model, um and even through the Web three community, I think they're doing a really good job of kind of blocking out that influencer model. If people are coming and just dropping projects. You've seen some celebrities that have done it as of recent that haven't sold as much. No names mentioned. Um So, I think that model is going to be pushed away. And if you're not of that crypto community, you don't make that effort

to really indulge yourself in the Web three space. I don't know if those paid you know, kind of pay to play type partnerships will I will even work anymore, And honestly, for good reason. If it's not authentic, you shouldn't do it. Um So, that's kind of my approach there. Let's talk about some of the good stuff. Yeah, in regards to the good stuff, I think it's gonna be I think it's gonna be uh, you know, way easier to activate your fans and turn them into communities by

actually opening up who you are as a person. I think we look at too many NBA players and say you are what you do. It's not true. You meet them and you start to figure out, Okay, who are you? And that being said, I think in regards to what's your would have doing the blockchain in terms of just

identity verification of who that person is. Once we start to get more wallets connected to web two sites, I think Web three users will become really really powerful, uh and knowing hey, this person has also taken the time to see what my buying history is, my purchasing history, who am I interested in, and based upon that, they're now cultivating an experience for me where someone in going paying them to do something is now worth it because I'm gonna be able to drive value back by understanding

who's actually in the community, what they want, and how I can be a value to them. You want you do? You said you in chiming or something terris about the good stuff that's happening. No, I was, I mean, I agree with that, and I think um, you know, when you get to the NBA or to the NFL, whatnot, A lot of people tell you that you're now a business. And I think this is a you know, the Web three space. It would be a great segue to really showing yourself and I guess you know, your family or whoever,

that you are a business. You know, whether that's interacting with your fans or you know, knowing where you're gonna get certain stuff from certain interactions, from what they want, what they don't want. Um, And I think that will be more you know of athletes realized walk more like wow, I am a business, and maybe it'll you know, make them make smarter decisions or you know, just help them a lot off the court knowing that their business for sure.

You know, you you make me think. I remember Rich Paul talking about this where he's like, well, he he tries not to say it too directly because there's because they can cause trouble. But he did mention a couple of times that you know, these agents haven't done a lot of work over the last few year because they

haven't had to. And so you call the same people for opportunities for your athletes, you call the same studios you call the same things and then you know, I go back to the athlete and like, yo, I put I put in this work for you. Some things work, some things don't, but they haven't had to be innovative. You know, it's so long because they got all the cards and when he comes in the league, he's trying

different things. And so around Web three are the but who surround athletes and your experience and things that you're aware of. Are they trying to find ways to be more innovative to UM, to be more attractive to athletes who are coming into the game these days. UM, I could add some color there, I think, UM, from that standpoint, it definitely does. That. Being said, there's also tons of money, you know, to continue doing what agencies are doing now.

They have tons of you know, endorsement deals and partnerships. From that standpoint, I think the ones that really focus on it, you know, you can open your players up to make alternative incomes and streams. On Terrence's end, he's got a great agent. He's with the great agency with w M and b d A. UM, so I think

he's taken care of. From that perspective, everyone out there, you know, there might not be some agencies that are working towards that Web three space and starting to figure out, hey, how can we get our guys involved in this and really help them continue to build their busines. This is I think on myself, Um, I work with athletes, but it's not really a passion of mind to say I'm going to go out and work with a ton of athletes. Myself from Terrence are locked in from that standpoint as

well as Mellow in terms of building his business. Or if Web three is a part of that enterprise that a player wants to indulge into, I feel that their agency or you know, whether it's a business partner should help them in doing so. Um, but it really depends

that you want to put your put together your team honestly. Yeah, speak more on that because when you when you think about We've had this conversation a lot on this podcast and other places when I'm talking to athletes, is when you know, you gotta hang the shoes up, or you gotta put the boxing gloves down, or you gotta you know, hang your your the net, you gotta take the net down or whatever, like when the game is done, how

have you prepared yourself for the life after that. And the reason I bring this up because there's still ways to stay involved in the game, just from a different perspective. And so when you're thinking about people who don't even reach the levels that you two guys have made, um and being the one or the two athletes being in the n b A, Um, can you talk about the

other opportunities? I imagine even with W three sports, there's still other ways and there's still other opportunities in the NBA, the NFL, the NHL that you know, the baseball league, like, there's still other opportunities to get involved even if you're not playing anymore. So can you speak to the other opportunities people may not be considering when they realize that they may not be the actual person on court or on the field anymore, right, Um, I think you know,

there's there's so many different ways nowadays. UM, you know, especially with you know, social media booming as it is now. UM, you know, the web three, n f T talk. There's so many different opportunities you know, where guys can get back involved. Um, you know, with with athletes they might have played with who went on to you know, do more than they did. You know, get on there, you know, talk to them about getting on their team, bring them opportunity.

I think that's what it is mainly, especially for me when I was building my team, is to see, you know, who can bring our tunity And a lot of it were guys that you know I played with who you know didn't get to make it as far as I did, but you know they played D two, D three. That's mainly my whole team. You know, a bunch of guys who loot before, went out and educated themselves, um in different sort of ways and are bringing something to the table.

So you know, I think, just educate yourself on something you you know, value and you think you can bring to the table and do such because there's so many different ways of doing it nowadays. Julian, were you looking for a way to get involved in athletics and you said, hey, Web three is my way or Web three came first and you say, okay, this is something I can bring value to the table with. It's a great question. People

ask me all the time what I do. I said, I'm a tech guy that knows a lot of people in sports, mother sports guy that got into tech. Um. So from that standpoint, I think I was able to identify early on my brother's best friends with Kyrie, what his team consisted of, and what somebody at that level was interested in in terms of how they could build their own career up off the court to build an enterprise.

That being said, from there, um you know, nine years later, I've been working in tech, ventured in venture capital, in real estate. Um So, everything that I do with Terrence, um, it's all things that I've been able to do myself. Anything that we're going to take a look at from an investment standpoint, from a Web three standpoint, I don't really take that manager approach or anything of that. I look at uself as a business partner. Anything that he or any athletes, um, you know I work with, I'll

be in as well. Um So, from that standpoint, I real least identified what what what what does value mean? You know when I ask you, hey, where do you want to be in thirty years? And I think I have a much different approach because I'm focused on where

is Terence gonna be in fifteen years? How can we at forty now turn back and say, you know, to NBA rookies, Terrence is exactly his path is exactly what something you should mirror and this is why, and we break down exactly how we started, and people might see, you know, a business enterprise at that point and then reverse engineer of how we got here, because I think that's Those are conversations that a lot of people we don't have with the NBA players because once their career

has done, there's no more money to be made. But if you actually care about the person, you're gonna take that approach and whether or not he you know, continues to play till these forty or he plays till these thirty. I want to be in a position to say we're gonna go make money in these five different ways. We've already built that brand equity while you were in the NBA, so now it's time to continue and really go grow

those avenues for you to start your next career. Both of you guys have mentioned this UM phrase in this building a team around the athlete, and I wonder, UM, and I'm gonna imagine it's not like just you know, you know, you trip over building a team, but there's some intentionality in building that that that circle of influence around you to provide opportunities to protect you um, to look out for the gout for you in different ways.

How are you intentional about because you mentioned Kyrie's gout one, you mentioned entire uh, um, tie this guy here's got one. How are you intentional about putting the right people around you to find those opportunities for you? Because I imagine that it's not just the team or the agent. You

need this suite of people. But as you saying, these are the people that I want around So for me personally, UM, as a professional athlete, for me, it was watching people closely, UM, at each level, like I went up and up, so like starting in high school, you know, checking my friend's circles, seeing who's around me, see what they're doing, seeing what their interests are, seeing if they're taking you know, life serious, seeing if they're taking their stuff you know, off the

court real serious. UM. And then you kind of you kind of start to you know, build a picture in your brain, like you know, if I make it, I'm gonna bring I want to bring this person with me, and I want this person working with me. UM. And then I get to college, you know, seeing different how people started moving when I was in college and UM, and that's where you really start to see where guys,

you know, take off, which direction they're going. I think it's really you know, when you're at like nineteen twenty, you really get to see, you know, who stands out whose head, whose heads on their shoulders and right directions, and so at that point you're like, all right, if I really make it now, I'm taking you know, I'm gonna ask this person and if they want to be on my team, I think they bring value in this area.

So then once you get there, I feel like once I got there, I knew, I knew exactly what I needed, exactly what I wanted, I knew exactly what to look for. UM And that just came with time and watching people closely. Julian Chiman on this because I imagine this has implications for people who aren't professional athletes, where people who will find success in whatever path in life is they need those key people around them. Yeah. I think a really big part of it is understanding who the player is

and what they want. You know, what does success look like the terrence off the quarter or any player UM for that And the reason I think that is when you think about the team as soon as the season starts, the main thing is the main thing that's your job is if they're getting paid for, you gotta really complete that. So one, you gotta look at people that have expertise in areas that you want to build into. Have they done this without me? Could they do this without me?

Or am I the key to get in the door? And again you could always think you're always gonna have that. Look at Lebron. You know everyone that he was brought on that was their first time and you're one of the most powerful circles in sports. So that being said, it's not to say, hey, you need to come from a certain place with a certain pedigree to work for me.

And then secondly is can you trust them? Can you trust them if you're if you're not in that room, can that person be swayed whether it's hey, this this could is what could happen for you, or this amount of money could go here, or or is it someone that you can really say, Hey, this person has my back, I trust them, think I can build with them, and this is a long term thing. So no dollar sign, you know, backdoor deal, whatever it may be, because I think a lot of that happens in the sports world.

To ensure that will never happen. I think when you do that, you know the ship will continue to sail. And I think when people get stingy and start to, you know, think about themselves, because again, in representation, management, partnering, you're there to support the talent. It's always about them. And I think a lot of people start to gain their egos and kind of build themselves up once that team is made. But it's really just about playing your part and doing it to the best of my ability.

You know. Also within t S team, I just do what I do to the best of my ability, and I want to be the best at that, and then the rest of the team happles up. Um. I want to I want to end here because I think we have this huge conversation happening in athletics now, particularly non pro athletes where you're talking D one, D two, D three high school even um about the n I L name, image and likeness, right um. And I wonder your thoughts on how um, because right now it's almost like in

a Web two space. It's like, hey, I'm gonna pay you to post, right um. So it's pure Web two right now. But I imagine somebody like you Julian maybe thinking maybe about how this could play out for them in a Web three space. So can you talk about number one, just your position on how athletes can take better advantage of their their their n I L their name, image and likeness, and how the how the third version

of the Web may assist there. Yeah, I think this is, uh again a little bit of a different approach than most people have. When you think about collegiate athletes, two percent are gonna play professional sports. Even less than that are going to be in playing any type of professional sports. I think it's like point oh three percent are going

to be playing within three years. So that being said, if you are in that top top, top top portion, put a team around you to obviously put you in a place where you can succeed more so than just posting a picture. And when I say that, it really does turn to content creation that by expecting you to go sit there, cut up TikTok's things of that nature. No, of course not, but people put people you know around you that can do that give a little bit of

a you know, peel the layer back per se. In terms of what you maybe do off the floor, I think Ben Simmons did something really really good when he was in college he had that entire documentary. It really kind of created and sprouted his brand when he got to the NBA of who We Off the Floor. Um, but my advice to most people within the n i L space is, again, look at the statistics. Only two

percent of you were going to play professionally. Utilize who you are as an athlete to separate yourself in whatever lane that you're going to delve into after sports. And that being said, I think there's endless ways that you can do that. But you know, if you're a fearless competitor, um, you know, you're a captain of a team, you're someone with a really really large success story as you know, well those are all stories that you're gonna tell in interviews.

Start to prepare yourself for that and kind of get collateral now while you're playing that sport. So you know, maybe with an n i L deal, it's not even about what you do on the court or what you do off the on the field. Maybe it's about the content creation and the person that you obviously are starting to bring to the world, and that's backed by your

sports and obviously your play. But um, really show the world who you are and you know, start to identify what in sports, as you had brought up earlier, connects really well with the real world, because even if you go pro, you're still gonna need to identify those things around you and that can care you not five ten years, but fifty years. And I think that's black people, that's what we need. Black Tech Green Money is a production of Blacky Afro Tech on the Black Effect Podcast Network

and iHeart Media. Is produced by Morgan Dubonne and me Well Lucas, with additional productions supported by Love Beach and Rose McLucas. Specially thank you to Mike get David's if That's a Serrano. Learn about my guests and other tech destructors and innovators at afro tech dot com. The video version of this episode. We'll talk to Black Tech Green Money on YouTube next week, So tap it, enjoy your Black Tech Green Money, Share this with somebody, get your money,

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