Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
So some things happened, uh theCaden Proctor thing mainly, did everybody's money
get stolen? No, we're goingto get the clarification on that from this
man, Brad Heinriz today. Hetook on the collective basically by himself.
He's trying to keep Iowa at theforefront of the nation's football programs and more.
And we're going to get an updatefrom him on all things Swarm Collective
(00:21):
today. Enjoy the episode, havea day, Let's go. It is
(00:52):
what it is. I'm not savinglives or whatever he does. So well,
well, well, let's whoa,he's not saving lives either. He's
he's taken. He's taken people whoslipped on the sidewalk and just helping out
making sure they get the right kneeparts back in their placement. Okay,
anyway, yeah, anyway, Welcomeinto the Washup walk Ons podcast. Another
episode here, Brad Heinrich, leaderof the Swarm Collective, joins for the
(01:17):
third time. I believe you've beenon, Brad. We had you on
when it happened, when it allcame out, then we had you on
like after that initial season, anduh, now we have you back in
an interesting time. I'm sure Ie. When I texted you, I said,
oh god, Brad, you're you'reyou're probably getting all of the text
messages. This is this will comeout next Monday. So about a week
(01:38):
and a half, two weeks onthe heels of the Caden Proctor. Uh
third flip. I'm not sure howmany flips at this point. Uh what's
your like? What's your life likenowadays? What was that crazy for you?
It was crazy for me. Ididn't see it coming, and I
don't know that many people did.So, Yeah, that was a that
(02:00):
was a crazy day. And I'lltell you it's very rare when you are
in a situation where you know theInternet is about to blow up and you're
just and you're just wondering, Iwonder when the news is going to come
out and the Internet is just goingto explode. And I was just waiting.
(02:20):
I'm like, I'm going to giveit a few hours and then somebody's
going to say something. Then it'sjust going to blow up. And that's
what happened, is that you knewjust a few hours before it. I
knew. I knew the morning ofand the what's amazing to me is the
morning it happened, okay, andit took everybody by surprise, or at
least everybody at Iowa football. Andand then that same day is when the
(02:46):
internet blew up. So it's notlike it happens two or three days before
or you know, and it justtook a while for it to finally leak.
No, it happened within hours ofit happening. The internet blew up.
So yeah, and so did myphone. Why why do you subject
yourself to this stuff? That's agreat question. I love my Alma modern
(03:10):
I, and I really like thecoaching staffs and and helping out the players
to get pay to do something theylove to do, and forcing them or
asking them, maybe not forcing,insisting that they do good things for charity
along the way. That's been that'sbeen fulfilling for me. Has there ever
(03:31):
been a point during this process,because I'm sure, I'm sure there's been
plenty that you uh not that youwouldn't understand that because you're a businessman and
you know you're always going to runinto You're always going to run into unexpected
obstacles and hiccups, let's call itsure. But there has there ever been
(03:52):
a point during this process could havebeen the second week you were into it,
or now this whole thing that wentdown where you're like, boy,
would be nice if somebody else wasrunning this thing. You know, I've
had those moments, but they're notat the times when you think I have
the moments when we get like,for example, when the Caden Proctor may
(04:15):
come to Iowa talk was happening andpeople started making donations to the swarm,
what I would love to see,right. Unfortunately for me, a lot
of those donations are coming in fivedollars at a time, and you know,
if you're running a business and you'rerunning the books, I've got to
record every one of those five dollarsfive dollars donations on my on my quick
(04:39):
books. You know, you getit, you get two thousand donations of
five bucks. Well, I appreciate, appreciated the donations, you know,
having to type all of those in, you know, there's part of me
that's kind of going, all right, did I really what did I just
sign myself up for? Here?Is anyway because you're you know, we
(05:02):
sortays talked about it in the lastfew episodes that you've done. You're running
a lean operation, right, tryingto yeah, in those moments, do
you ever consider just getting a littlebit less lean, like, man,
it'd be nice to have one moreperson on staff. Yeah, and we
we do have some interns that okaymarketing people at IOWA that are trying to
(05:24):
get I Grant, you probably understandthe concept, right, you know,
you're you're going to work for verylittle, if anything, and you want
to put get something for your resumeand and uh, next thing, you
know, you're the star of theshow, right Grant. Yeah, No,
I mean I don't know, doyou have a do you you have
your interns for fifteen months? Isthat? Is that the usual span of
time for unpaid internship. It couldbe it could be, you know,
(05:47):
usually a year at least, andthen they graduate and leave and yeah,
no, I don't think. Idon't think you can leave now. Grant,
you're kind of a due price.You're a You're this You're one of
the stars of the show at thispoint. Oh you're too kind. You're
the guy that comes in and asksthe really good questions at the end.
See I listened. I listened toyour podcast. I know how this works.
(06:09):
Tyler and Kevin ask all the questionsup front and then then Grant comes
in with the Haymakers Zingers at thevery end, he gets it. He
just lets it build, just juicyquestions building, you build the crescendo,
and here comes Grant Man. Imight have to talk to you, Brad,
on running a business and keeping Grantaround, keeping good people around.
We'll talk about that maybe later.But yeah, it's been a crazy I'm
(06:31):
just I mean, and I knowthat through this gosh, just through us
doing this podcast, the amount ofconnections that I've made, yeah, with
former alumni football players, but alsojust people inside the Hawkeye community. I
can't imagine the amount of contacts you'vemade. Literally put numbers in your phone,
like, okay, now I know, and I talked to all these
(06:53):
people. Well, I'll give youa fun one. So I was I
was talking to Cayden's agents in thisweekend, you know, trying to figure
out the off boarding in all ofthis, right, And I had a
phone call call set up with hisagents and for whatever time it was,
and I was in Vegas with mybuddies for March Madness, So oh hell
yeah, how's the bracket doing.By the way, I'm no brackets.
(07:16):
I just made a bunch of betson on the basketball games. I actually
did pretty well. Let's call.Yeah, I don't. I'm not sure
how or why, but I did. And I had a call with his
agent, and so I, youknow, had to like temper my drinking
a little bit so that you know, I wasn't sloppy for this phone call.
(07:38):
I had to get it out ofthe way before we could let the
floodgates open. But in the event, I'm waiting for this call, and
I texted, I called him,got sent to voicemail. Then he sends
me a text and a screenshot andit says, and it's a picture of
his phone that he's on the phonewith Aaron Rodgers. Apparently he's Aaron Rodgers
agent too, and so he's beenon the phone with Aaron Rodgers. So
(07:59):
he's like, I got to Igot to stay on this call, call
you back. You're your second toa Roger. I guess, I guess,
I guess. I you know.When I did to talk to him,
I guess I asked him, Isaid, how is you know you're
so you're the agent of a vicepresidential candidate? Yeah, how about that?
All right? Yeah? Being acampaign manager now yeah, I guess,
(08:20):
I guess. But anyway that theseagents are are something that's wild.
So these kids have legit agents becauseyou can have one of those first they
have They almost all have agents.Now, wow, it's rare that I'm
actually talking to a kid and hisparents. It's just rared you in your
one half the time that was thecase. Now, well, yeah,
(08:41):
I talked to the agents of playerson our own team. Dude, I
mean, right, has this hasthis warped your perception of what the game
of college football is? Only itwarped it. I think it's made it
more real though. Yeah, thisis a business. Uh, And you
(09:01):
know, these football coaches are inthe business of winning football games, and
they can only do it when theyhave good players. And and so I've
learned how important in I L isin that game. At this point in
fact, it's almost everything. It'snot everything, but it's a lot of
everything, a whole bunch of it, high percentage of it. And our
(09:22):
coaches all understand that. Well that'sa good thing. Yeah they do.
And and the people that you mightthink wouldn't embrace it have embraced it.
Well. I think I think alot of people question that too. You
get these, you know, Isee you on Twitter, You're you're active,
you see all of these. AndI know that Twitter is just a
it's ass pool, but you'll seepeople on Twitter that just like have the
(09:45):
they're so convicted in these in theseopinions that they have, like oh,
I know old Kirk Old, Iknow I know Fran and they're just too
old. They there's no way they'rethey're doing the things they need to be
doing with n I l and like, right, I just I just imagine
sometimes I think about you or otherpeople like you with a little bit more
inside info, and I'm just like, I wonder what they think about this,
(10:07):
like you, It's it's hard toignore. It's there's a lot of
times when I want to respond tosomething on Twitter, and I give myself
a policy that I need to waitat least an hour before, because there's
several times I want to go,you know, you dumb idiot, you
don't have any idea what you're talkingabout. You need to shut up.
(10:28):
But yeah, you know, I'mjust there's not a lot of good that
comes from those kinds of comments.There's no there's no good, you know.
I just kind of refrained but butyeah, there's a lot of misinformation
out there in fact, you know, some of these barstool things, I'll
be I'll read like, you know, Cayden Proctor got a half a million
dollars and he left and the nilgot screwed at Iowa and all this stuff.
(10:50):
I'm like, you guys, comeon, and that's that stuff doesn't
help either, right like it doesn't. It doesn't because a lot of people
feel like where there's smoke, there'sfire, and people like wish things into
existence. What I was talking toTyler Barnes the other day and I said,
I just can't believe how many peoplejust make up shit and put it
(11:13):
out there as fact, and thenit spreads and people say, well,
I read it out there, soit must be true. And I'm thinking,
who's mind actually came up with thatin the first place. No repercussions
either, No repercussions, and it'sjust out there. And then it's up
to me to decide do I wantto, you know, how do I
want to respond to this? Andyou know, people gave me, people
(11:33):
criticize me because I didn't come outuntil the next day to really address what
happened, Like a whole twenty fourhours, you know, yeah, right
right right right, you know,and they're like, well, I'm sorry,
you could have done this the dayof. And frankly, the reason
I didn't is not for the reasonsthat you might think. The reason I
didn't was because I'm like, thisis still an eighteen or nineteen year old
kid we're talking about here. Hemay have He may wake up the next
(11:56):
morning and go, oh man,I think screwed up here. I'm going
to go you know what I mean, because if the minute I come out
and started talking about this and whathave you, it's harder to walk back,
right, and and its his agenthad no idea. His agent had
no clue that this was happening,caught completely by surprise, which I mean,
(12:20):
let's face it, you know.And I think Kateen even said he's
going to transfer back there the spring. Well, I know, Alabama probably
doesn't have the same standards that wehave in terms of like I don't think
so you know, academics, butI don't think even at Alabama you can
enroll in a class at like thelast week of March actually get credits for
(12:41):
it. It was you know,how are you going to pull that off.
So he's going to have to goto Iowa for the rest of the
semester and get credits in order tobe eligible to play football this fall at
Alabama or wherever else he decides togo. Yeah, so he's probably lifting.
He might be lifting weights in yourgarage, and you're just not telling
anybody, Tyler, because I'm Idon't know where he's lifting weights and working
(13:03):
out. I heard that rumor too, so funny you bring that up as
well. Interesting, man, That'sprobably what's gonna end up next on the
internet, is that clover Is ishosting Proctor in his in his garage and
helping him train for football season.This ball I was uh contacted by Caden
(13:24):
Proctor. You're right, Yep,that's true. It's all true, true,
And it's funny because I make apercentage and so now I've taken swarm
money. Actually, no, allkids, all kidding, all jokes.
I haven't seen any six eight,four hundred pound lineman in my garage recently,
at least, uh, that'd becool. The so it sounds like
(13:46):
the way you're kind of talking aboutit, his agent didn't know. You
didn't know this all, you know, kind of inside Iowa Football. I
also heard the same thing. Itwas like it was quite literally he was
there at a team dinner the nightbefore and the next morning he didn't show
up and he left the group textand he's gone, yeah, I mean
(14:09):
that is I and he got hegot absolutely pummeled on social media. Yeah,
he doesn't need any more of that. I was we all well,
Grant, it was a very shorttime for you. We were all eighteen
nineteen years old at one point,and I was pretty dumb. Stuff is
(14:33):
still pretty dumb. But it's justlike, man, it just seems like
a very confused sort of like doesn'treally know what where he wants to be
or what he wants to do.And it's just like I do sort of
feel bad for him in a sense, but it's just like at some point
he does click over, like man, like your decisions have these like consequences
(14:58):
downstream, and and it is crazywhat he's put himself through, Like he's
he's done it to himself. Idon't, I don't know, there's no
doubt about it. And ands soto be clear on and on your side,
I know you came out k Xand know the next day and kind
of cleared it up again, somepeople still don't quite understand the two let's
(15:22):
call it the two sided approach ofthe swarm. We'll lay it out here
again. There is a charity side, which is where the average joe,
you know, Tyler Kloever, Igo to swarm dot com tonight whatever,
and I donate fifty bucks. Mymoney goes into a pot that feeds the
charity. Don't I'm not sure howyou describe it, but like the charitable
(15:46):
they the players, they sign upor you give them opportunities, and they
earn that money by doing things.That's correct. Yes, so I swarm
dot com if you if you venmo, or if you just go through the
website and you sign up and givetwenty bucks a month, or one hundred
bucks a month, or just hey, one hundred bucks. Here's twenty or
fifty bucks as you just mentioned,right, you know that money will go
(16:07):
eighty percent to football, ten percentto women's basketball, ten percent to men's
basketball, and that will compensate theplayers that choose to do work for charity,
and that's sort of their base.It ends up becoming a base sort
of pay for them. Sure,and depending upon the year they are in
school, or or how are thecoach wants to to you know, might
suggest that we structure our program.You know, certain players are I have
(16:33):
different opportunities depending on who they areand I The reason I set up two
separate entities was because, as youmight imagine, taxes are in. You
know, taxes are important. Uhhey, it's tax season. I wish
we had a I wish we hada tax sponsor I could insert right here,
right right, and and maybe wecan work on that. Let me
(16:55):
interject right there. We don't havea tax sponsor, but I do have
a race sponsor. It's get warmerout, get the running shoes out,
and sign up for the damned DSMright now, Come on, do something
good for your body. The damnedDSM is happening in just over two months,
which conveniently gives you, the listener, the perfect amount of time to
train for this beautiful half marathon runin Des Moines. You heard Dallas talk
(17:19):
to Kevin and I about his triathlonand how doing something hard, doing something
physically challenging can elevate you as aperson, help you become more disciplined and
motivated in other areas of your life. This is it right here. The
half marathon is perfect for that.It's not too far, but it's still
challenging enough to push you through twotwo plus months of training. It's starting
(17:40):
to warm up outside, sun's comingout. Our bodies need exercise anyway.
Why not use code washed washed forten percent off this run. Grab a
buddy or a group of friends whocan all keep each other accountable. Hell,
I'll give you the training plan.Just dm me. I'll literally give
you the running that I doing.All you have to do is put in
(18:00):
the work. You can run threeor four times a week, and you
can train for this thing and completeit. This will be my third time
running this route. It's a gorgeousrun. It's an incredibly well run professional
event, and you simply won't regretit. You'll feel great once you once
you complete it and cross that finishline. Code washed at damned DSM dot
(18:21):
com and you will get to runon race day with a custom h BAM
hawks by a million commemorative bib thatis exclusive to the walk on listeners.
Damn to DSM dot com. Rightnow, pause the pause the show.
Go there, sign up, joinme. You're gonna look at my back
the whole time because I'm gonna berunning like lightning on this race, or
(18:42):
maybe not. Maybe you can challengeme, try and beat me and join
me on the run June first,Damn to DSM. Thanks so much.
Excited for everybody to run this thing. For all that do sign up and
use the code Washed, I can'twait to meet you on race day.
Let's have a blast. Now backto the show. People want a donation,
(19:03):
we want their donation to be taxdeductible. Sure, and so I
set up this special entity five ohone C three public charity that will allow
those folks that go to I withSwarmed to donate to have a tax deductible
donation. Okay, Now I havethis other entity set up that is the
Swarm, Inc. And it isa for profit entity, although we have
(19:26):
no interest in making profits, butit's a for profit and it essentially will
hook up certain athletes with corporations,busy and businesses. So the corporation could
pay a student athlete to do marketingfor them, Sure, do a commercial
for them, what have you?And when they do that, they get
paid. And so this way nownow the the corporations, of course will
(19:49):
get a tax deductible expense because it'sa marketing expense for them. But if
Tyler Klover wrote a check to SwarmInc. It would not be a tax
deductible donation because it's a for profitentity. If you did so. Again,
it's it's semantics, But I wantedto make sure that our fans,
and especially our bigger donors that maynot have businesses to run this through,
(20:14):
could get tax tax deductible donations onone entity versus the other. Caden Proctor
had done one commercial for an entitythrough the swarm Ink. He had done
nothing in the Swarm collective where JoeFan has contributed their money, so we
got zero out of that. Yeah, he was hardly on campus long enough
(20:36):
to even and then the Swarm Inc. He got paid right before he went
off to spring break with his Alabamabuddies. And he comes back and he's
gone. I'm still in the processof of working through whether that that the
monies he got there are going tobe forfeited or kept or whatever. We'll
see how that how that all playsout. But that's that's that's essentially what
(20:57):
you know, the long and theshort of it. The right so those
listening your money unless you happen tobe that business guy. If the if
the business guy is listening, Uhsorry, yeah, I'm sure you're sure
you're talking with Brad. I'm sureotherwise everybody else your money's safe. That's
(21:18):
right. Smart, smart by you, Brad, semantics you said, But
important to have two different routes.It almost inserts a little bit of a
gatekeeping situation where that could be.I don't know if the way you've set
up the collective is the is thegold standard. Feels like it maybe should
be. Yeah, for all collectivesaround the country, at least ones that
(21:40):
are interested in I don't know,you know, staying as protected as you
could. Because this is this isbrought to light sort of sparked, you
know, I saw on I sawon huge accounts across social media basically pick
this up and say, okay,this right here, this is like the
next biggest thing that has happened,and that really shows the danger of what
(22:03):
you know. So, you know, let's imagine that for some reason Brad
Heinrix is just not a smart guyand set this up poorly, and you
know, all these guys are gettingthese donations or these this the fans money
without that having to go through anddo the charitable things. And now we've
got legitimately those Barshal tweets are actuallytrue. And now all of a sudden,
(22:25):
there's five hundred thousand dollars worth ofHawky Nations money in a kid's pocket
that he just blew thirty thousand ona spring break and he's taking the rest
back to Bama. This this posessome some red flags, Brad, doesn't
it? Like? What what hasthis in your world sort of brought to
light? And what do you whatdo you think about that? Where do
you do? You guys scramble andnow have to like, oh, we
(22:47):
gotta we gotta put some more les. You think about is do you do
you want to backload some of thecontracts so that the players had to play
games in order to start getting somethingright? Yeah, and I've thought about
that. Of course, if theyplayers are going if you do that,
the players aren't gonna love that,right, the players are going to be
(23:07):
like, wait a minute, that'sno good. Well, from your side,
your side, you're you'd like tobackload it as much as possible,
and on their side, they'd liketo frontload as much as possible, exactly
exactly, and and so uh,you know, I've thought that through.
I also know that if I dothat, then you know, other collectives
will now suddenly have an advantage overus because they don't do it, they
(23:30):
don't do it that way. Iwill say, though, that the way
we've got it set up, Ithink will be more immune to the scrutiny
of the I R S. Ifthe I R S decides to to come
sniffing around. If we just hadone big, one big collective and we
decide we're going to pay a playera certain amount of money yep, just
out of nowhere for doing basically nothing, then you know, they may have
(23:53):
a hard time, you know,preserving their their tax preferred stats, which
of course, and if they don't, if they lose it, then all
the people who donated suddenly they're theirdonations are no, we're not tax deductible
when they took a deduction, andthey may have consequences which you know,
could could bring about a giant mess. So yeah, there's there. It's
(24:18):
not perfect at all, Ni lIs. It's continuously evolving my proposed solution,
not just so that you know,because you asked me last time,
what's the solution, and I kindof looked at you like deer in headlights.
Yeah, yeah, ground on thatat all. Yeah. Well,
I've drank a lot of wine sincethen, and so I've I've come up
(24:38):
with some ideas and and my thought, well, first of all, like
Caitlin Clark, that's sort of howwhat NIL is for, right, you
know, State Farm and Nike,And I mean that's that's a great example.
She's a perfect, a shiny exampleof what ni L should be.
(25:00):
You got any idea? How muchyou got any? Dad? How much
she bringing in? By the way, do I know? Yeah? Do
you know I have an idea?Is it? I can't tell you if
you could, Oh I could,I could. I could get sued too.
And I know, let you justblink? For how many millions?
Right now? We'll cut this out, all these beautiful palm tree leaves for
(25:22):
how many ms? I really don'thave an answer to that, but no,
I know you probably don't know exactlyI do. Quickly, I would
like to interject into her for asecond before we come back to your solution
for the NIL and in general,the collectives in general? What do you
think about how impressive is it thatCaitlyn Clark a twenty two year old,
(25:45):
twenty three year old whatever some ofthem are, twenty twenty one, Like,
does it dawn on you as ayou know, you're a successful professional,
that's you know, past the halfwayof being you know, finding a
way in life and setting yourself upand your family and all this stuff.
Like do you ever think about thetwenty year old who now has like ten
(26:07):
million dollars or five million dollars?Like is that crazy to you to think
about? It's crazy to me tothink about whatever she has she's earned,
Oh for sure a lot of She'stalented, no doubt, but she's worked
her tail off. I mean,we move this recording up to six o'clock
so that we could be done byseven to watch her exactly, yeah,
(26:30):
exactly. You know that she's probably, I would say, easily top three
most popular athlete in sports right now. I'm going easily top three. Yeah,
I don't know, doubt. Idon't know who the two people ahead
of her might be. I couldn'tWe'll see because he's dating Taylor Swift and
maybe Patrick mahomes Y. I'm puttingthose two up there because I'm a Chiefs
(26:52):
fan, and man, they allhave this state farm sponsorship. Right,
and my mother in law is astate farm agent. I can't even get
one. Yeah, so uh anyway, Yeah, it's it's what's what's It's
amazing what she's accomplished financially. It'seven more amazing how she's handling it.
(27:12):
That's what I'm saying. Right,has taken a penny from the swarm either
she doesn't need you know, shehasn't. She hasn't and she doesn't necessarily
need to. I don't think,oh no, she's leaving. She's leaving
the swarm to her teammates, whichI think is pretty cool. Oh I'm
sure. I'm sure the rest ofthe women's team is very thankful. Yeah,
(27:33):
yeah, so yeah, it's incredible. But has the women when people
come to you and they're like,I don't know how many of those companies,
the organizations, the businesses come toyou and they say, we would
just like we'd like to work withathletes, Yeah, are the women's Has
the women's team in last year beenlike a hot commodity? Like do they
(27:56):
want to work with the women's basketballteam just as much as the foot Yeah?
A lot more than than before.It way more than before. Honestly.
And you know, I was inIowa City, gosh, whenever it
was. I think it was inthe fall for a game, and and
I think Gabby Marshall was signing autographsdown at the Riverside Casino, and I
(28:18):
was going to dinner at that RuthieSteakhouse I think they have there with one
of my buddies. And I wasblown away by the line of people there
to get Gabby Marshall's autograph. Andthat was great and she obviously she was
getting paid through the swarm to doit. But yeah, clearly there's there
(28:41):
is a lot of support for women'sbasketball. Well, I mean, tonight
the place is going to be.Oh, it's not. You know,
I can't imagine what it costs ona stub Hub to buy a ticket,
Grant to be north of five hundred, gotta be look it up, Grant.
We are thirty five minutes away.If we if we wanted to sneak
into Carver right now, what wouldbe the what we have to pull out
of our wallet? All right,we'll go back to he finds out,
(29:03):
we'll go back to your Uh,you're drinking some red wine. Maybe you're
about thirty right now. Only thirtyminutes before am Tom. You can get
it probably top Row. He's actuallyin the parking lot. You have to
you have to watch through the window. Yeah, you can to watch it
with Dan Gable. So I'd payI would pay a lot of money to
watch with Dan Gable. Maybe justnot the statue. Not the statue.
(29:26):
You might have a we might havean end to getting Gable on the podcast.
By the way, Oh, thatwould be a terrific podcast. So
stick around, maybe episode eight hundred, we'll get we'll get Dan on.
You're sitting there drinking wine, You'rehaving thoughts, and you're like, wait,
I think this might answer some questions. F and I own the collective?
What what are your thoughts there?So here's what I think, and
I hope this is where we endup. I think that student athletes need
(29:51):
to become employees of the athletic department. Okay, and I'm sure they'll they'll
form unions and collectively bargain and theywill, you know, each team will
have a salary, a salary cap, so to speak. Okay, Now,
does that mean that the swarm nolonger exists? No, They're still
going to be an il right,But what I think the the the additional
(30:15):
n C DOUA A rule needs tobe is that when they become employees of
the university, they sign contracts.Okay, so, and I think this
is a This goes to the CadenProctor thing. You sign a contract like
you do in the NFL or anywhereelse. Is to say it's a one
year contract. Okay, it's aone year contract. You can't leave right
(30:37):
there, you're you're there. Butfrom an NIL perspective, I think that
they need to the revenue from TVneeds obviously be shared with the with the
student athletes. That's what mass formoney goes for. Yes, but that's
part of the salary money that theyget. But no longer can have fans
(31:00):
donating to NIL to pay student athletes. Okay, However, getting back to
the Caitlin Clark thing, you knowshe has she has her sponsors, and
you've got State Farm and you've gotIV and you've got them all Bows and
all the other one farmers whatever itis, right, those places, their
principal business is not paying student athletesno right, and so it would seem
(31:26):
to me that there should be arule that student athletes cannot take money from
any entity whose business principal business isnot serving student athletes. So a collective,
for example, we're serving charities andstudent athletes essentially, right, And
that would wipe out the swarm collective. The swarm ink side would still exist,
(31:51):
and we would have businesses that wouldcome to us and say, hey,
we want Gabby Marshall to sign autographsat our casino or wherever, which
will bring a whole bunch of peoplein and we'll make money because they'll want
to gamble and do fun stuff atour at our either our restaurant or whatever
else while she's there, and that'sworth our money, right, Okay to
me, that's that's that's beautiful,right, that's actually that is a win
(32:15):
win situation for the corporation and forthe student athlete. That's what NIL is
for. But NIL was not intendedfor me to go out there with my
hat, passing the hat asking JoeFan to give me twenty bucks a month.
I don't think that's what it wasintended when it when it was,
you know that that wasn't the ideaoriginally. Yeah, that's where we are
(32:37):
and that's where we're going to be, and let until the rules change and
I just hope that the Hawkey Nationunderstand this and support us while we're moving
through the transition. It's it's afair point that you bring up, and
it is the one thing obviously asa former player, I am like pay
these players somehow we came in soby the way, our only little nil
(33:00):
nugget that we got or had opportunityto get was NCAA fourteen. The video
game was the last year. Itwas. My freshman year was the last
year that it was available, Beautiful. And then that whole thing went down
with the guy that played at NorthCarolina or whatever, and over the years,
they like they finally got it towhere everybody that was ever on that
(33:22):
game got like a check in themail one day, beautiful. How much
did you get? You remember?Not a lot? Yeah, some guys
that were there for like the seniorsthat had just graduated, they've been on
five games. Oh, they gotlike two or three thousand Bucksky, I
got like two or three hundred bucks, which I still love, right,
(33:42):
it's a free three hundred bucks.Yeah. But it's like even though I
was I got nothing, we gotnothing as of someone. If I just
put myself back in that eighteen yearold body. I want that kid to
be able to make money. Right. The one thing that has always come
up is like it feels a lotlike the fans now have to pay for
their athletes, pay for their teams, and that doesn't seem right. And
(34:06):
I agree with that. It feelsthey should. They should have the maybe
the ability to if they want to, they can find a way to do
it. But but you shouldn't haveto the success of your team, the
culture of your program, the stabilityof your coaching staff, and and the
success should not rely or stand onthe on the legs of well, our
fans just didn't pay enough this year, you know, yeah, and and
(34:30):
and I agree with you. ButI'll also say that the fans are already
even before this, we're paying forthe paying for SAT licenses and and and
season tickets, and that was payingthat revenue, was paying for the coaches,
and the facilities and the right andand and the recruiting trips and everything
(34:52):
else. So now it's just thatthat, you know, I will tell
you what I want, what I'vebeen, you know what, I'm very
unsuccessful, and with Gary Barda askingfor and now with Beth Gets I'm getting
some traction, but I haven't gotas much as I want yet. Well,
you're probably going to feel that way. I know, I know,
I know, I'm I'm you know, I'm used to. But it's good
(35:15):
to hear that Beth is a littlebit and maybe we understand that more now.
Like Gary was on his way out, He's like, I don't want
to mess with this stuff. Yeah, but what I want is on the
season ticket holder renewal form, Iwant a box that says, give one
hundred dollars per set to the swarmYeah recommended, Yes, and you know
(35:38):
one hundred bucks times how many howmany tickets there are seats? Do we
have? Tay So we're talking aboutsix point nine million, even if half
people don't even check it, we'relike three and a half million. We
can, we can, we cancompete with the big boy, you know,
with some of the big boys withthat kind of extra revenue. What's
(35:59):
the where's the legality? Uh?Hang up within that or is it?
Because it's there's no way. That'sjust there's two there's two. There's two
problems with it, problem one andto me, I think they're both.
I'm not compliance. I'm not theone that that that gets beat up.
If sure, if the hammer comesdown. But the two issues are one
(36:23):
that if Yeah, from the athleticsdepartment compliance people tell me that Title nine
is an issue. If they're collectingmoney, then they need to spread it
evenly between men's sports and women's sports, even if it's a football ticket thing.
Yes, okay, okay, we'regoing number one. We're gonna have
(36:46):
to go number two. Yeah,Drake would love that one number two.
There's another rule that says that theAthletic Department cannot fund the n I l
okay fair point, So they can'tjust shuttle us money. Sure, I
get that. I get it.And and of course they said, well,
we take everybody, take the money, and then we write you a
(37:07):
check that's funding the nil. Andof course my response is, well,
wait a minute, just give meall the renewals that have the check mark
and then I'll take their credit cardsindependently. Yeah, and so the money
never goes through your gate, itjust comes straight to me. Yeah,
that's bypassable. And that to me, now, granted that that doesn't sound
administratively fun. Logistically that sounds likea nightmare. But for six million dollars,
(37:32):
you'll do it. We'll find away. Yeah, I'll come,
We'll add people. I'll add peopleto do that, to run this stuff.
Absolutely, you know, to takethat kind of you know, because
we're just cranking revenue continuously. Thatone sounds like you could bypass it.
The first one tougher. The firstone's tougher, and that's what you wake
(37:52):
up every day and you're trying tofigure out how to fight and get it.
But that's also you know, thoseare the people that we need to
reach, you know. We yeah, think about I have I told you
how many season ticket holders we havethat are members of the swarm? No,
guess, I'll let you get fungame guess football season ticket holders?
(38:13):
How many season ticket holders are there? Is it thirty thousand? I think
it's less than that, twenty thousandprobably in there. And how many of
them are members of the swarm?Correct? Oh? Man? Is it
gonna make me sad? Probably?Oh no. And this is because they
won't just give you the season holderticket list, will they. I've tried
(38:36):
to get that, they still won'tgive it to you. I haven't gotten
it yet. What's the rule onthat? It's is that working on that?
Is that because the university is scaredto infringe on the privacy of like
giving the contact info out. Yeah, that's such horseshit, Brad. You
don't have to say it. I'llsay it for you. That is horseshit.
(38:59):
Those those people are donors for areason. Yeah, okay, anyway,
twenty thousand maybe around there total,I don't know, a thousand of
them a little over four hundred.Oh no, okay, well, what
right? I mean, that's thepart that makes me think I'm doing a
(39:22):
horrible job, not gonna it's nothat I've got to do better at getting
to these people somehow. We advertiseon our our our logos on the we
pay to have our logo on thethembotron or whatever. We'll have a commercial
with Kirk every now and again duringthe game that's said, how much is
that we got to get the walkon logo up there? Yeah? You
Ford, Well for you got,oh for sure with your budget, no
(39:45):
problemah, no problem. Yeah.Yeah. And and they probably yeah,
you probably get we probably get moreseason ticket holders if they knew that that
was Well, we've been we youknow, we've been through trying to promote
the universe and its product and itsteams before, and now we've run into
some pretty Yeah. I've gotten totalk to a lot of the a lot
(40:06):
of the people in administration and acompliance and UH and licensing that I never
thought I would. So that's fine, you get it. Yeah, And
I will tell you that the newregime, you know, Beth, Beth
is Beth is really working hard forgood us, try to help us.
I've been nothing but impressed with herefforts so far. She comes to our
(40:30):
tailgates, she's you know, everytime, every chance she gets, she'll
she'll acknowledge us, and she understandsthe importance of n I L. But
you know, the point of thematter is, though, is that we
have to do a better job ofof tapping into the season ticket holders if
we're going to be successful. Yeah, until the until the rules all change
(40:52):
whenever. And that brings me tomy next question, A big one that
I had for you is how muchhave you in this process talked to other
people in your situation where Hey,I'm at Oregon State and I'm running the
collective. I'm at NC State andI'm running the collective here. How much
(41:12):
dialogue have you had, if any, with other collective leaders? I don't
know, you would call it yeah, quite a bit. Yeah, yeah,
And you know a lot of timesit's just a e vent session where
people will complain about what their yeah, their issues are. But a lot
of you, I've had a lotof them reach out to me, you
(41:35):
know, from a structural standpoint,because we're structured differently, and I think
we've and I don't I don't mindhelping some of these other folks out.
Sure, not always stayed, butno, no, no, no,
absolutely not no, no no no. But like it's it's a weird game
too, write because you're it's like, okay, you guys are all trying
to figure it out. You havethose vent sessions. Maybe you're in a
group text with like ten other collectiveleaders and you're has anybody encountered this issue
(42:00):
in a way around it? Right? But in the same vein, if
they give you an answer without knowingyou could literally be giving them an answer
on a way to make the swarmbetter, in which we get a player
five years from now that could havegone to their school. It's such a
weird interconnection, it really is.It really is. But you know,
(42:21):
say, for example, North Carolina, those guys call me, yeah,
and you know, I asked them, hey you get you get the season
ticket all information? Oh yeah,the first thing they gave me whenever I
started this, you know. AndI'm like, you know, no,
so so so that's why I shouldn'tcall them out specifically. But but that
looks good. That's the kind ofthing, you know, you know,
(42:44):
when you're trying to run this right, everybody has pride in what they do,
right, you guys have pride.You have to have one of the
best podcasts for in the world.In fact, you probably have the for
I would imagine you even know thenumbers, but for for IOWA sports.
Is there a bigger podcast than yours? Probably not, we do not.
Before I had no idea that howwhat an honor it is to be on
your podcast? Yeah, in anyevent. Uh but the point of the
(43:09):
matter is that these these some ofthese other schools. Yeah, we're we're
in competition, but I also havesympathy because they're going through some of the
same challenges and I want to helpthem to an extent because then they might
help me, uh knowing. Butbut sharing some information like hey, they
(43:30):
get this from their athletics and theircompliance doesn't have a problem with it.
So that makes me go to ourcompliance people and say, hey, guys,
yeah, like you know, youcan bring It's like it's like it's
like this is a freaking court room. It's like, hey, I have
I have precedent here? Yes,which you know, You've got three years
worth of precedent. It's not alot, but wow, that's uh,
(43:52):
that's a lot to handle. Howdo you You're still working your day job?
Yeah, yep, so you doyou sleep? Yeah, not as
much as I'd like. I Iprobably work. I mean, it's it's
I'm just constantly working, you know. And and this the swarm stuff is
actually a nice diversion from the actualworld. I'm not this may come as
(44:16):
a surprise to you, but uh, in my actual world job, and
I'm I'm pretty popular in the actualworld. I mean, I'm a big
deal in the actual world space guys. I mean, I don't know if
you know that or if you researchme. I mean, I'm a real
big deal in the actual world whenI've done all my actual Yeah, I
know it's your name comes up.Yeah, it does a lot, I
(44:37):
know. Kidding aside, The pointof what I was gonna say is I
don't get this much uh attention onsocial media for my ACTU World position as
I do. I mean, whenwhen Proctor announced as he's leaving, uh,
you're the most popular guy in thein the most unpopular guy. I
(44:59):
was. I was the reason heleft, according to a lot of people,
you know. And then and andHeinrix let the guy steal all all
everybody's money. He wasn't watching thestore, Cayden, you know, took
his bag of money and took off, and you know, and I'm just
sitting there going, oh my god, I wasn't worried at all because I
know that we have you behind thewheel, and like, to be honest,
you were talking about the I Rs earlier and like them getting involved,
(45:22):
and I'm like, I'm actually like, we're pretty bulletproof with brat Heinrich
behind the well. I'm trying,guys. It's it's a labor of love,
as you completely understand. So,uh, you know, not perfect,
but we are, We're We're workinghard. Jane Oswald is fantastic to
(45:44):
work with. And yeah, Ithink we're I think we're we are.
We're gaining, we're gaining gaining traction, and the portal is open for batman's
basketball now and women's basketball. Soyou know, you think about you're asking
me about my two jobs, youknow, running the swarm and running my
actuorl firm. You know, I'mamazed at these coaches now, like Lisa
(46:07):
Blue. I'll give you one.Lisa Bluter is gonna play in twenty minutes,
right, yep. I was onthe phone with her twice today about
portal, about a portal girl.Get with Lisa Bluter today to get a
portal girl to visit, and youknow, and I'm talking to her agents.
I talked to him twice when Iwas in Vegas and once today,
(46:28):
texted him yesterday, and we're tryingto get this girl to come visit.
Hell yeah, which, by theway, about Addison deal, five star
recruit got hurt on it and thisgirl that we're gonna that we're trying to
get to visit and the portal isa real deal. Yes, Hi,
How much money do we How muchmoney do we got to pay Chad Greenway's
daughter? Huh my god? Canwe get Madden on the on the team?
(46:52):
Wouldn't that be great? But doyou think Madden needs money? I
think I don't know, I thinkI would bet you Niel is not going
to be a deciding factor in herrecruitment. That's just my hunch. I
don't either. How could you notgo be a hawkkey when your parents were
hawk guys? Right, Well,I'll tell you this. There's there's two
sides to that. Well, yeah, my kid was doing it, was
(47:15):
being recruited a bit, and andI will tell you he's playing basketball,
and then he decided not to anymore. I didn't want to play in college,
but in the early stages he wasbeing recruited and and had an unofficial
at Iowa, and and and youknow, and I thought really hard about
that. And I ultimately came downand thought, you know, if he
went to Iowa and didn't like itfor whatever reason, that might taint my
(47:40):
allegiance and view towards the school.So I'm actually happy that he's probably not
going to go to Iowa. Thereis because that just because that that keeps
my my my, my love unblemished. So I get it as a parent
now. When I when we werebefore we knew the gender of little Kinley,
I was like, if it's aboy. I started to have these
(48:02):
little like these thoughts of like,Okay, someday he might want to play
football, yep. And if heplays football and he's like okay and doesn't
get my hYP genetics, like whatif he's good? And like, is
he gonna feel like he needs togo to Iowa because I don't. You
start to get these parental feelings thatare totally like, oh, I don't
care where he goes. You justwant to be happy, right, So
(48:23):
hopefully Madden feels like she'll be happyin the Black and Gold. But I
hope so too. But you know, I will understand if she wants to
make her own ways, that totallymakes well. That's the other thing is
you're fighting these sixteen seventeen, eighteenyear old kids, and when you're that
age, as we've seen with KdenProctor, you kind of feel like you
got it all figured out. Andif you want to go make your own
(48:46):
name and make your own path,that can be a thing that is enticing
for kids. It's like, ah, my mom and dad played at Iowa.
I'm gonna I don't want to.I don't want to live in their
shadow. Well, look at Luke. Look at Luke Lache. Yeah,
okay, I mean his dad iswith the voice of Ohio State. Yeah,
played at Ohio State. Yeah,played in the NFL. And where
(49:09):
does Luke las go a great example? Well, tighten you right, tighten
you right exactly, So it's agood example. No, you're right.
You know you don't fault Luke Lashaffor doing that, right. No,
no, no, no, I'mnot trying to make the case for Don't
get me wrong. I think Iwant her to be a Hawk too.
But walk Ons can throw in acouple of bucks, like literally a couple
(49:31):
of dollars. You make a greatpoint, though, these coaches, Uh,
I don't know how they do it. I don't know. I know,
that's what I'm saying. It's anotherit's another wrinkle that they didn't have
to deal with before. And it'sfor some coaches out of the out of
the business. Well right, andsaid Tyler Barnes. Oh yeah, Saban,
(49:52):
For sure, Tyler Barnes his job. He doesn't have to go recruit
high he's recruiting high school kids.He's recruiting and I hate to say it,
he's recruiting his own team. Becauseyou know, being in the Insider
night and I with football. Now, I'll tell you that during the season.
(50:13):
While we're playing, these other programsare reaching out to our players and
offering them money to come to leaveto go to their school. That's that's
aggravating, honestly, is it not? And and and so you know,
once the season's over, then youknow the agents are all, you know,
(50:35):
all up. And the other thingtoo is you know you'll get call
from an agent and agent and say, well, uh, you know how
much you're gonna pay so and sonext year because this other school here is
offering X. Yeah, and youdon't know that you and I don't know
if that's if that's garbage or notright. And and then of course I've
got to find out, well,how how bad do we want to keep
(50:59):
this kid? Oh, I'm gladthat you really need them to stay.
That's such a dirty game, Brad, Oh my god, that's how this
works. It's so annoying. Andso we're having to deal with I'm having
to deal with that. I'm justgiving you the reality of the college landscape.
Grant. I have a we're gonnapivot from a podcast and we're going
to become college sport agents. Finewith me. I'll text Searles after this
(51:22):
sokay, yeah, let me tellyou. That's it. It's what's really
bad is that these agents are gettingsome of these agents are getting twenty percent.
Oh my god. Yeah. Andand I know this for a fact.
NFL agents get three I know,I know. Yeah that's so because
don't know any better. Oh andwhat's what's even worse is that. And
(51:45):
I'll tell these agents and I'll tellthese kids this. You're gonna get the
same money out of the swarm whetheryou have an agent or not. Jeez,
okay, I'm gonna throw up,Brad. Yeah. And so these
kids are just getting ripped off.Where is uh do you see this?
We'll leave it here. Do yousee this? Uh you know, employee
(52:07):
of the school or or however youput that. Do you see do you
see these changes happening soon? Doyou guys? Does someone like you ever
hear from the n C double Aor do you like do you like from
the n C double A? There'susually a problem, right, It's kind
of like hearing from the I R. S. You really don't want to
(52:27):
pay, you know, to provideassistance to you. Right right, We're
gonna we're gonna come in and provideassistance and the answer, the answer to
question I think is you know whenis this going to happen? And I
I don't have any idea. Well, you don't have time to worry about
it. What I see, Yeah, what I see is is proposed legislation
that usually is half cocked most ofthe time, makes no sense. Someone
(52:50):
didn't really think all this through.And you know, if I only had
one if this was my only job, I would probably try to because I
have some political I don't know cloudsaspiration beresident. No, no, no,
I've got clouds. I've worked with, we worked with. I work
with governments, so I've worked withwith federal government, state governments, local
(53:12):
governments. I would probably be prettyinvolved in trying to get this thing fixed.
And maybe someday I will if it'sstill broken, Hey, no longer
doing my action. But once I'mdone with the actual firm, then I'll
then I'll I'll maybe spend more timeon this, but trying to fix this.
But it's as it stands right now, it's a mess, and that
I don't see it changing real soonuntil then. If we want to be
(53:35):
good, if we want to winchampionships dot com and let's just say last
thing. Look at our football team, our defense. Those guys. Are
those guys coming back without an NILprogram zero chance. I'm not trying to
say their mercenaries are not that.No, no, no, but like
but you get but they're they're gettingoffers to play else where. Many of
(53:59):
them are getting off or some pellelsewhere for more money. I would like
to know a lot more money.And they love the culture here. They're
satisfied with the NIL program. Satisfiedenough with the NIL program. I'm wanting
to make it, you know,I want to make it so that it's
an absolute slam dunk continually getting better. You guys have done it better.
(54:20):
But but I can't do it alone. I need the help of the Hawk
nation. So that brings the light. The thing that I think is evergreen
in college major college sports, andit's like and it's something that that coach
has put at the forefront of theprogram is like, you recruit the right
people and it will pay off.And it seems like that is more important
(54:42):
than ever it really is. I'mgoing to do my thing now where I
say, hey, Grant, yougot any good questions for Brad, We
let them go. Well, thisis the good part. Oh, well,
I want to hear about power Aidthe new deal going on. So
is that like can I drink Swarmpower Aid now? Or like, how's
this all come in to be?So Atlanta bought Attlantic Bottling Company out of
I guess it's the moini Ish,So they're they're going to be making power
(55:08):
Aid and I believe eventually putting theSwarm label on it. There's still a
few hoops I think to go through, but you know, obviously the goal
will be to get in the footballfacility. You've had a few power aids
I think at the Tyler. Yeah, there was a power aid uh fountain
in our old locker room. Actually, I believe it. I believe it.
(55:29):
Yeah. And and so we're goingto get a piece of the of
the proceeds of all the power aidssold in the state of Iowa. Again,
I'm trying to get as much passiveincome into this as I possibly can.
That's that's less money I have tobeg for. Yeah, but yeah,
that's that's what's going to happen.Ultimately, the goal is power Aide
this year and then maybe the CocaCola products next year. We also have
(55:53):
swarm water coming out probably in thenext few months. So you're so so
Tyler. It's that you don't justhave to be an alcoholic. I'm in
on the swarm water, Brad.It's going to compete with smart water.
Are already smart. They don't needto become smarter the smart water. They
need to drink the swarm water.I will, I do want to.
(56:13):
I should have led with this,Brad. We actually we uh, The
walk Ons did come out with acompetitive beer in the space. I saw
that. I saw that, andyou know what, I had it and
I enjoyed it. And we don'twant to take away people's donations to Swarm.
But we also donate to the children'shospital, so you can you can
choose whatever you feel. If youwant to donate to the kids or the
bigger kids, it doesn't matter.How about some day drink twice as much.
(56:37):
Yeah, just drink, don't drinkdrink, just drink. Drink the
walk Ons back pocket beer, ye, and then drink the Swarm beer and
someday maybe it'll take us a lotlonger than Brad and the Swarm. But
maybe that beer could be sold inKinnick alongside the Swarm. That'd be cool,
Brad, Thank you so much forjoining us. Thank you, guys.
(56:58):
It's a beautiful back there. It'sa real honor. It's a real
honor. I don't think I knowit before, but I know it now.
This is a big deal. Alot of fans listen. I'm sure
you'll get a couple ats or tweets. If you love Brad and you love
that he's at the forefront of ourswarm collectives, shoot him a tweet to
mention that you love the episode whenthis comes out. But we really do
appreciate it. I think it helpsto clear up a lot of the you
(57:21):
know you there's just not a lotof places I said, I suppose maybe
that's what we're good for nowadays.Is you know, you can go on
KX and O for fifteen minutes ora half hour. Yeah, but and
you can, you can make atweet, you can come out with a
statement, But a fifty five minuteconversation like this, where people get to
you know, ride their peloton ormow the yard or whatever it is,
it helps clear up a lot andI think hopefully it helps people buy in
(57:43):
too. Thank you, so thankyou guys for listening. Another episode of
the podcast. We'll be back again. I don't know if this is a
Monday or Thursday episode. I guesssome Monday episodes, So we'll be back
on Thursday, hopefully in six minuteswhen the Hawks tip off we get a
w against West Virginia. We'll talkto you guys next time. Till then,
Hey, thanks for listening to theshow. If you want more,
you can check us out on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube by
(58:05):
searching Washed Up walk Ons. Andif you're interested in supporting the show,
head over to patreon dot com slashwashed Up walk Ons, where you can
find bonus podcasts, merchandise, andother cool perks. Best part, half
of your subscription benefits the kids atUI Children's Hospital. We'll see you next
time. Hawks buy a million