00:54:25 · John Coogan, Ice Cube, Jordi Hays
[00:54:25] S0: We're doing fantastically. Thank you so much for taking the time. Get us up to speed on Big3. Can you take us back in time? How did this get started? [00:54:35] S4: Just as a fan. Yeah. I wanted more basketball. I missed I missed Kobe's last game. He scored six points. I wasn't there. I was a little, you know, PO because I wasn't there. So I was like, man, it's it's a shame that there's nowhere else for this guy where I could see this guy play. [00:54:58] S0: Okay. [00:54:58] S4: And why? And looking around, there's nothing there. No other pro basketball, you know Yeah. Is around the world but not in The United States. And so... And and and then, you know, being at the time forty seven years, going through forty seven summers between basketball and NFL, you know, I used to have a... I used to hibernate. So [00:55:33] S0: You're like, I'm not... [00:55:34] S2: I can't do this again. [00:55:35] S0: No baseball. Don't another [00:55:37] S2: summer in me. [00:55:38] S4: And there's gotta be millions of people out there just like me [00:55:42] S0: Yeah.
00:55:42 · John Coogan, Ice Cube
[00:55:42] S0: Yeah. [00:55:43] S4: That needs more hoops after the finals. You know, we have the we have the finals hangover. We we just... We need more. And we found, like, a void in the industry because three on three was sitting there. Like Yeah. Why isn't it professionalized? We looked at what Fever was doing, and it was very amateurish. And we was like, we can do 10 times, a 100 times better than what they're doing with the game of three on three. And so me and, my partner, Jeff Quandins, we we we just tried to figure out... We spent a year trying to figure out how to professionalize three on three. [00:56:26] S0: So what was the first step? Was it you built a deck? You made some phone calls? Are you calling athletes or investors or stadiums or locations? Like, what's the sequence of events to actually get this off the ground? [00:56:39] S4: I mean, the first step was coming up with cool rules [00:56:44] S0: Oh, yeah. [00:56:44] S4: That were cooler than what you see in three on three. [00:56:48] S0: Yeah. [00:56:49] S4: And why, you know, why was the FIBA game... Why did it feel so like a backyard playground game when we're trying to create a pro sport. [00:56:58] S0: Yeah.
00:56:58 · John Coogan, Ice Cube
[00:56:58] S0: Yeah. [00:56:59] S4: So, it was just to build a better mousetrap, so to speak, and make our game, more fun to play and fun to watch, to make it bite size where you can watch a big three game in a in a hour. Mhmm. Where, you know, most games are three hours. So those kind of things, making a game faster. So rules was... And we argued, you know, back and forth on, you know, the intricacy of the rules and and how we're gonna make our game, you know, great for the public to watch. [00:57:37] S0: What was the most contentious rule, or or what rule were you... When you found it, you were like, this is the secret. This is the rule that's gonna that's gonna make it work. [00:57:48] S4: First to 50 win. [00:57:49] S0: Yeah. [00:57:51] S4: Meaning this was a sprint. No garbage minutes. Okay. Because there are no minutes. And and, you know, there's a fourteen second shot clock though. Yeah. So you can't play around with the ball. You gotta get a shot up. [00:58:05] S0: Yeah. [00:58:05] S4: So those rules, that was to me every game, there's a winning shot. Yeah. You know, there's always a game winning shot in every Big three game. And so to eliminate the clock was to eliminate lazy play. Yeah. And people just watching the clock. Oh, we got a big league. Let the game. Let the time run out. No. You have to score 50 points. So it's a all out sprint to the finish line.
00:58:05 · Ice Cube, John Coogan
[00:58:05] S4: So those rules, that was to me every game, there's a winning shot. Yeah. You know, there's always a game winning shot in every Big three game. And so to eliminate the clock was to eliminate lazy play. Yeah. And people just watching the clock. Oh, we got a big league. Let the game. Let the time run out. No. You have to score 50 points. So it's a all out sprint to the finish line. [00:58:34] S0: Yeah. How did you think about marketing promotion of the league, obviously, of deep roots in media broadly? But what did you think was gonna be the key to raising awareness, getting attendance up, getting distribution in the modern era or through traditional channels? [00:58:55] S4: I mean, we looked at a lot of leagues and, you know, what what fueled them. You know, we we had to look at Vince McMahon. [00:59:04] S0: Yeah. [00:59:06] S4: Dana White. [00:59:07] S0: Yeah.
00:59:07 · John Coogan, Ice Cube
[00:59:07] S0: Yeah. [00:59:09] S4: Leagues that had personalities that could, you know, evangelize the league to the public and and and show the public why they should be interested in professional three on three, and yours truly was the guy. You know? Passionate guy and Founder. Built. Build up, you know, decades of credibility of, you know, I'm not gonna steer you wrong when it comes to, you know, hopefully music and movies and the things that I say are cool. Usually, you know, people agree. So, you know, we had that. And then it was connecting with the history of basketball. You know, some of the greatest names, Doctor. Jay been with the league ten years. Clyde Drexler been with the league ten years. Iceman George Gervin just retired, but he was with the league eight years. Now he's in the front office in our Detroit franchise. Gary Payton been with the league ten years. Nancy Lieberman, eight years. So, it's been, you know, connecting with those great basketball greatness and having them endorse what we're doing, overseeing what we're doing, making sure we're doing it the right way so the athletes are taken care of. And, you know, everybody's happy coaches. We want everybody to have fun with the Big3 and and and make it an enjoyable experience. [01:00:59] S0: How are you attracting new talent, new athletes? Because I can imagine if, somebody who's in the NBA sees you calling, they're gonna pick up. But, at the same time, they might say, hey. I got a couple more years in me. I'm I'm not ready to move on. What what has it been like building the talent pipeline?
01:00:59 · John Coogan, Ice Cube, Luke Igel
[01:00:59] S0: How are you attracting new talent, new athletes? Because I can imagine if, somebody who's in the NBA sees you calling, they're gonna pick up. But, at the same time, they might say, hey. I got a couple more years in me. I'm I'm not ready to move on. What what has it been like building the talent pipeline? [01:01:17] S4: What's been, you know, awesome, we've had some of the greatest players that ever played a game come through our league, you know, for as first round picks, all stars, champions, you know, even hall of famers, you know, when you look at, you know, people like, Allen Iverson playing in the Big3. So, you know, we don't have a problem attracting the talent. The thing is, you know, we wanna offer more. We we we have eight teams. We need to expand that. We need 12 teams. [01:01:49] S3: Mhmm. [01:01:50] S4: We need 16, 20 teams. You know, we always have a pool of players who, you know, wanna play in the big three but can't because it's a numbers game. So this is what, you know, this IPO is gonna allow us to do is expand and to really, you know, grow and have a bigger footprint, which is more attractive to sponsors. Yeah. You know, what's holding us back is we only got 10 games. You know, if we had 20 games or 25 like the NFL, you know, we could really expand, you know, our sponsors, you know, what we can offer to, you know, platform broadcasting, media deals. You know, we just gotta offer more of this good stuff.