01:21:07 · Jordi Hays, John Coogan, David Rader, Jared Allen
[01:21:07] S2: Says generous. I was asking about the revenue, not about contributing to it. Anyways, good good fun. Good fun. [01:21:17] S0: Our next guests are already here. We have two. We have David Rader and Jared Allen. Welcome to the show, guys. How are you both Thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show. [01:21:29] S2: Oh, good. Thanks for having [01:21:30] S0: us. Please. [01:21:31] S2: Great to have you guys. [01:21:33] S0: Tell us about about how you guys work together, introduce both of yourselves, then we'll go into the story today. [01:21:41] S6: It's Sure. [01:21:42] S1: You alright, David? [01:21:43] S6: Sounds good. It's great to be on you guys. [01:21:46] S0: Thank you. [01:21:47] S6: David Rader. I'm one of the founders and principals at Unisports Group. We're an investment group that looks primarily at emerging sports where we do control and high influence investments across sports. So we're investing today. We announced our investment in in The Curling Group [01:22:06] S0: Yeah. [01:22:06] S6: Where we're working alongside Jared. Jared, jump in. [01:22:09] S1: Yeah. So I'm just a retired football player. And We're [01:22:13] S0: gonna hit the gong for you for this... We're very excited. [01:22:19] S2: We gotta we gotta make gongs a sport. We gotta work on this. [01:22:22] S0: Gong smashing? [01:22:22] S2: Gong smashing. Baseball players might have a good edge. I think you'd you'd out compete us. Sorry sorry to interrupt. Yeah. You announced the investment I needed
01:22:22 · Jordi Hays, Jared Allen, John Coogan
[01:22:22] S2: Gong smashing. Baseball players might have a good edge. I think you'd you'd out compete us. Sorry sorry to interrupt. Yeah. You announced the investment I needed [01:22:29] S1: rotation right there. Know, you gotta do horse right there. Yeah. Yeah. It was like going to Gong Smash. Gong Smash. Anyway, so I got into curling on a bet years ago, like trying to [01:22:39] S2: make the [01:22:39] S0: Olympics. Okay. I'm up [01:22:41] S1: with the sport. I met our CEO of The Curling Group, Nick Selsky, up at an event in Toronto. Yeah. Him and I started talking about how basically underfunded, under, you know, promoted as curling is, and how it's this kind of this this crazy sports niche sport game that that is... Takes incredible athletic ability, but no one kinda knows about it. And there's a bunch of really smart people that play it, but it's always kinda like, you know, been the side job of everybody. [01:23:11] S0: Yeah.
01:23:11 · John Coogan, Jared Allen, Jordi Hays
[01:23:11] S0: Yeah. [01:23:12] S1: And just all the different opportunities that the fan base, how loyal it is, and and and all the content creation around it. And then with Nick's background in in in gambling and and stuff like that in gaming, it was like, man, the opportunities for that was like a whole another level of all the different all the different metrics that come into a curling shot. Right? All the different measurables. But but more importantly, it's it's these athletes that don't get a credit for being elite level. I mean, you're talking about throwing a stone a 140 feet and having to hit like a millimeter or a centimeter of of a rock to to make certain shots. And so it really is fascinating, the athleticism to sweep on ice. If you watched our very first grand slam of Curling in United States, you'll see I snapped a broom. So it's not it's not always the easiest [01:23:54] S2: thing I mean, hey. Hey. We break these mallets all the time. So we're we're we're familiar. By that? Yeah. We...
01:23:54 · Jordi Hays, Jared Allen, John Coogan
[01:23:54] S2: thing I mean, hey. Hey. We break these mallets all the time. So we're we're we're familiar. By that? Yeah. We... [01:24:01] S1: So we got together. I was one of the founders of the group, and it's done a great job of taking it. And, you know, we we bought the grand slams at Curling. We've... We got the Rock League. And now with with people like David coming on board, it really it pushes the sport to the next level. Yep. It it... When... You know, as an athlete, I always tell people, you know, football, basketball, all that stuff would be nothing without the outside support, without the media attention, without the influx of revenue for people other than athletes Mhmm. The the game wouldn't be wouldn't be what it is today. And that's what we're trying to create with, The Curling Group and The Rock League. And that's why people, you know, like David are so important to to see that dream, to see the the the business side of things, to to create that, to bring exposure to those athletes, and and to create revenue based around it is is fantastic. [01:24:48] S0: Yeah. [01:24:50] S2: We covered that story of an American guy who's like a lawyer, I believe, who was competing in the Olympics and is kind of like a... I believe acts as somewhat like a father figure for the team. I really, really enjoyed that. Then and then I wanted to [01:25:05] S1: That's one of my old teammates. Awesome. Go
01:25:05 · Jared Allen, Jordi Hays, John Coogan
[01:25:05] S1: That's one of my old teammates. Awesome. Go [01:25:08] S2: Yeah. He seems seems like a legend. And then and then talk about the talk about, like, the the drama in the sport because I remember there was also this last Olympics. There was, a bunch of cheating scandals. Seemed seemed like cheating happening and they were, like, catching them in four No. They were catching him in four k. [01:25:27] S0: Oh, yeah. You were. I [01:25:28] S2: remember that. I I don't know. I think it was pretty black and white. [01:25:31] S0: Double touch. [01:25:32] S1: Yeah. I don't... You know what? Listen. I don't know why... I think it was Jacob Brad Jacobs with team Canada. Think he was the one that was involved with with Switzerland. You know, you look at Sophie Cunningham, she got all the attention for, you know, his pointing and sticking her tongue out. I'm like, Jacobs did it first in curling. [01:25:47] S0: Oh, you did that. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. [01:25:51] S2: All sports are downstream of curling. Yeah.
01:25:51 · Jordi Hays, David Rader, John Coogan
[01:25:51] S2: All sports are downstream of curling. Yeah. [01:25:56] S6: Well, and Jared brings up a good point of of the... You know, about the drama and and all of that. Yeah. There's there's... It's coed. Right? There's there's women involved. There's men involved and and on the same team, on the same ice at the same time. It's one the things we love about it. And I think it it drives the the excitement. It drives a whole different audience for it. The, you know, these these kinds of scandals and and and, you know, the the drive to to win is what gets people excited. And we actually, you know, the the the numbers are fantastic. The interest from from women is actually, it's actually outdrawing men. The audience is more female than male for the most recent Grand Slam event. And it's, to Jared's point, like it's because it's exciting and the drama from from many of it really, really gets people going and gets a good mix of an audience. [01:26:47] S0: Yeah. How are you thinking about the revenue mix over time? Is it like a third tickets, a third merch, a third ads and sponsorships? Like, give me a rough feel... Feeling for, like, how these businesses evolve. [01:27:01] S6: Yeah. So so, look, we invest in a lot of emerging sports. Yeah. We've we've had investment in the in the X Games League Sure. Which is is super fun. That's amazing. [01:27:10] S0: We love the X Games. [01:27:11] S6: Won the championship over the summer for for Club New York. And and a lot of these these sports had a similar model where [01:27:19] S0: it's Yeah.