Jacob Ross | Olympic Basketball - 50% Facts with Silent Mike & Jim McD

Episode Transcript
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(00:08):
We don't telecom a lot of folksonly when we feel it's important or someone
we want to catch up with,and this is definitely one of them.
The man's worked with numerous pro athletes, Olympians, individuals. I don't know
if you've been with an Olympic teamyet. That's the main thing I want
to dig into, because I'm justpersonally interested. Olympic individuals is obviously a

(00:32):
great achievement in its own, butOlympic teams, it's just a little bit
different. Vibes. Father, husband, really good friend of ours, someone
I met through Barbara Brigade. Technically, I guess we kind of met on
our own, but in Barbara Brigade, I remember the day like it was
a rom com. I'm in theI'm in the lobby of Barbara Brigade and

(00:56):
the team. At the time,I was pretty close with it. They
had been there a long time.Some great folks, but a lot of
people aren't really I don't know ifathletes are the right time. They weren't
really into sports, and so Idon't know if it was barred or a
dime or someone came to me andsaid, Mike, I think there's an
NBA guy and his trainer coming in. I said, NBA, which you

(01:18):
got, dude, Luile Dang's comingin. And I was a big Bulls
fan, grew up in the nineties, so it's hard not to be a
Jordan fan. And then you justkind of keep that with you a little
bit. So I was a hugefan of the Derek Rose, Luell,
Joe Kim, Noah Era. Isaid, dude, that's fucking sick,
and they're like, yeah, Ithink like the trainer like knows all of
us somehow or something like he's justtapped in. I was like, oh,
sick. They're like, just kickit. So I think I kicked

(01:38):
it at the gym for like threehours. We did that anyways, because
we had nothing to do with youknow, we're all like just filming YouTube
and it was the happy days.But I was just kicking it. And
then I think you walked in andwe chatted for a bit and you had
some stuff to do, so Ikind of try to let you be.
But I don't know how we rereconnected, but we did reconnect, maybe
Instagram or something, and then manyadventure later, here we are. We've
been on cruises together, we've trainedtogether, watch basketball. We've been to

(02:02):
nightclubs only. I've probably been tomore nightclubs with Jacob than I have with
any other person on the planet.And neither him or I'd like nightclubs or
drink really true. Yeah, andwe end up in nightclubs together. But
some good times, buddy, somegood times. But there's a mini resume.
There's much more, much more tothe man, but there's a brief

(02:22):
for our listeners. Yeah, I'vebeen to add in your resume. Yeah,
add to your resume what you got. No, I'm just saying,
you know, I'd known you guysfor a long time, first via you
know, internet and podcasting and allthat stuff. And then I did get
plugged in through Barbilburgate and uh wekicked it at La FedEx Fo. Yeah.

(02:51):
And then Jim sixteen twenty seventeen,maybe twenty seventeen, gotta be yeah.
And then Jim came down to Laand him I had a really nice
breakfast brunch, yeah, breakfast,yeah, coffee something yeah. Yeah.
And that was the first time wemet in person. Yeah. Yeah.

(03:12):
And then I came up to Sacka couple of times. Yeah. And
then Louall came up to sack.Yeah, we end up in a hookah
bar. Yeah, in the middleof nowhere for those that don't know.
Sudanese player refugee to England, UKended up in New Jersey, played for

(03:35):
Duke and I've been a big Dukefan. That's kind of where that all
lined up. Jacob met him inChicago, correct, correct, and then
trained a bunch of athletes at thetime, but kind of was captured by
Luel to be more of an individualtraveling coach. And then yeah, Louell
obviously had in sat Creis, Chicago, Miami, LA, tapered off into

(03:58):
Minnesota and now is doing everything.But I think that's where the story leads
to the Olympics. So Luau alot of investments, money, business,
but also like lead charity, lead, giving back to where he's from.
He's been a big part of NBAAfrica with a president no, but he
is one of the investors in ballwhich is Basketball Africa League, which is

(04:25):
kind of a sister organization in NBAAfrica. Got you, so there's that.
You guys have run basketball camps allover Europe and he's always dragged you
along with that. So you've alwaysbeen a part of a basketball straight the
conditioning culture tapped into him, andthen South Sudan, right, South Sudan's
first big international run. Yes,first Olympic, Yeah, first Olympic push.

(04:50):
Obviously basketball has gotten insanely international andmost people tap it into like what
the ninety two Barcelona games kind ofgrew the international love. But even if
you look at the NBA right now, we probably have five of the top
ten players or not from America,maybe even more. You could argue,
you can go down the line andname a very very good argument that top

(05:13):
five players are not from America atthe time. And that's what you guys
have been doing behind behind the scenesforever though, right, Like, you
have a bunch of kids that fromSudan or Africa that are steeping into the
D one programs and you guys runa bunch of camps. Maybe tell us
more on that how that kind ofstarted and how that rolled into Olympic life.
Yeah, so you know, justquick background, I met Louwall in

(05:35):
twenty ten, who's playing for theBulls, had a couple of All Star
rears, and then we started doingcamps and all this other stuff for South
Sudanese kids and is his career wounddown in Minnesota. It coincided with roughly

(05:57):
the start of COVID, and sohe had some time to sit like all
of us did, and just reallythought about what does he want to do.
And he figured that his legacy shouldreally be giving back through basketball.
So he already had a foundation inSouth Sudan that he ran and I helped

(06:23):
him with and all that good stuff. And then in addition to that,
he said, well, I couldtake over the South Sudan National Basketball Federation.
So just like there's USA basketball,there's South Sudan basketball as well,
but nobody was really doing it orrunning it. And I think we talked
about this on here before that SouthSudan has, on average the tallest people

(06:43):
in the world. The average mailfrom a couple of the tribes is about
six six and so you know that'sinsane. I think you introduced me or
we were in like the booth inLa and like some of his siblings,
does he have like six siblings,he has a bunch of nine total.
Yeah, walked in and like hissister's like six four yep, like his
other brother's seventh foot. And thenobviously on the cruise we were hanging out

(07:06):
with all the brothers, like it'ssix it's seven foot six' nine,
and then one's like my hight,but everybody else's tall at shit. So
the joke I'm telling people is forthe Olympics coming up, I'll be on
the bench and we play the USonce in a warm up game in London,
and then they're actually in our Olympicgroup as well, so we'll play

(07:26):
him twice. And so I tellpeople like, if you'll see us on
TV, and I'll be the shortest, heaviest and whitest guy there. Yeah,
by far, by far, Andyou're not short, no, no,
I'm six three six four on agood day. Yeah, they're giants.
That's so crazy. That's like becauseeveryone that kind of uh area of

(07:49):
the world is often known for endurance, right like the Canyon Sudanese people in
general. Like if we're talking tothe genetics, yeah that's the East to
have the runners triathlons. Yeah,the East African is much different than the
West African, which is more likeyour russswols. You know. The Nigerians
are known for being short and jackedor maybe an NFL type build yep,
which in itself is fucking weird andinteresting, right, Like that would be

(08:13):
like saying like, oh, NewYorkers are six foot and California guys are
fucking five to five. But itjust doesn't work our way on our continent
for the historic reasons. Yeah,So Louell took it over in twenty twenty,
well technically end of twenty nineteen,and at that time we were underanked
in the world. So there's WorldFEBA Basketball rankings, and we were completely

(08:37):
underranked because we hadn't played enough gamesas a institution to be qualified for anything.
And we started playing some of thelower level qualification tournaments, which leads
into something called Afro Basket, justlike the Championship for Africa basketball specifically,
who's the leader in Africa right now? What's the leading nation? Who's the

(08:58):
lead eating nation in Africa? Likehistorically in basketball, probably Tunisia, Okay,
Egypt. Yeah, they've made theOlympics, yep, Nigeria. Yeah,
they famously beat the US and twentysixteen Olympics. Yeah yeah, yeah,

(09:20):
yeah, yeah. Because it's it'snot obviously something you think about,
you know, like basketball is obviouslyso American. And then there's a couple
like Slavic countries that have snuck inTurkey and them. And although it's popular
worldwide, you know, like thePhilippines and Japan, all those people,
they love basketball, they're just notknown to be on you know, the
stage quite yet. Yeah. Andone of the biggest issues is infrastructure.

(09:46):
So in Sudan, you know,we're going to the Olympics, but there's
not one indoor court in the entirecountry of South Sudan. Oh my god,
that's crazy. It's insane. We'regoing to live for a sport and
we don't even have a facility forit. Yeah. I doubt it's the
perfect weather to play outside. Ohyou know, if you like one hundred
and ten. Yeah, yeah,well I'm that kind of do. But

(10:11):
most sane people don't. And mostpeople don't like to work out in it
because like you and I are shootingon that cruise ship at one time.
Yeah, I love that swart,windy, humid. Yeah. Yeah,
we gotta play the elements. That'show you get better. Soft all these
soft ass kids in their ac Ohmy god, you want to hear a
story about that. So back ininfrastructure, in some of these lower level

(10:33):
tournaments, the some countries like wereone that they have a couple of stadiums,
one really nice stadium, but theydon't have a lot of practice facilities.
So if there's eight, ten,twelve teams in town, they try
to rotate us through. You literallypractice anywhere from six am to ten pm
because they're trying to get to thebetter facilities, but occasionally end up at
a crappy one. And we wereat this one facility where it's like a

(10:58):
roof over the court and just supersuper high, probably thirty forty foot roof.
It looked like it used to bea warehouse or something, but the
sides were open and there was likea yeah falcon or an eagle or something
that was like flying around and hewas just dropping turds all over the court.

(11:20):
They crazy. They literally had aguy whose job was to have a
mop and just mop up bird shitas he would like swoop and poop.
Oh my god, that's so insane, because yeah, you think about like
this is like basically Olympic qualifier insome nature, right, whether it's the
lowest level, like yeah, you'retrying to up your power rankings, and

(11:41):
people don't think about that because likethey think about USA, they think about
their getting you know, filetman Yonmeals in the locker room, they're getting
all this stuff. But that's probablycommon around the world for other people trying
to qualify, like I I mean, yeah, sure, Brazil and Argentina
have a little bit more like athleticsbehind them because of soccers, so maybe
they have nicer facilities, but likesome of their ship may be JANKI two

(12:03):
or yeah, you head out tothe Slovic Nations, it's not like their
infrastructures built like the NBA. Soyou come here and there's courts every I
mean high school basketball here is insane, you know, like some of those
like I just saw an Instagram tourof IMG you know, like that's sick.
Yeah, that's insane. That's probablybetter than what the rest of the

(12:26):
world has. And it's technically ahigh school, you know, it's better
than a lot of colleges. Yeah, yeah, probably better than every D
two college for sure. You know, the only ones that are beating on
the Bama's, the Dukes, theNorth Carolina is. It's actually nuts,
right, No, it's insane.So your full time gig was not full
time because you wear many hats,but you were part of the crew,

(12:48):
which is something I've always thought aboutone kind of getting to look inside of
it, but in being a partof it for a couple of weeks.
But the crew you and lu Alhave built, like the community of coaches
and team like you guys all sticktogether, which I feel is like cool
and rare, especially as you goup the ranks of anything. You go
up the ranks of money, yougo up the ranks of power, you
go up the ranks of life,and that's something. And obviously Luel's just

(13:13):
a head of it because he's wasthe guy in the NBA, But the
whole team each has like a partand you're all friends. And I just
thought that was such a unique dudedealing with. And I've met some other
people that are very successful and athletesand stuff, it just doesn't seem like
their core is is tight, youknow what I mean. And it just
seems so so freaking unique. Andobviously you do know because you've worked with

(13:35):
other pro athletes as well and arepart of that community. But it's just
so like, I don't know ifthe world knows, because you don't think
about that stuff. You're like youjust think, like, oh, Lebron
James this, and you know DerekRose that and Stephan Curry this, but
you don't know like the inner workingsof like actual relationships or how happy and
fun people are. Like. Thatwhole group is just so unique. Yeah,

(13:56):
it's really interesting. The mix ofcoaches we have are some of his
guys that he grew up with inLondon playing basketball who are now scouts in
the NBA. One of his brothers, a Joe seven foot, was a
really good college player, good Europeanplayer. High school coach, UH coach

(14:18):
Montagna who coached the junior U sA team last year at the Nike Hoop
Summit. Yeah, the the Jerseyhigh school, Blair Blair Academy, Blair
Blair Academy. Because if they're basketballfolks out there, they'll know they've had
like five NBA guys. Yeah,Charlie Ville, Innueva, UH, Louall

(14:41):
and then our head coach, RoyalIvy was a went to school there with
Lou playpoint guard the NBA and nowhe's an assistant coach on the Houston Rockets
and he's our head coach. That'scool. That's a pretty good, well
established coaching staff considering you're playing oneagle dookie and a country that's never you

(15:03):
know, made like international tournaments,you know what I mean. Yeah,
it's and the cool thing is nobodygets paid. Yeah, everyone volunteers their
time. Lou All volunteers his time. He doesn't take any sort of compensation.
It's all the goal of promoting wellbasketball, but specifically South Sadana.
Yeah. I mean, if thecountry can't afford an arena, how are

(15:26):
they going to like pay? Y'all? And then sometimes when you're that small,
you like have to bring the productbefore the pay comes, right.
So you guys make a couple ofOlympics, you make a little bit of
noise, And I'm sure that's amotivation at least for the younger cats on
the team and maybe the younger coachingstaff. Maybe not you and Luel as
much, but you know that probablyhas a very different mentality going into this

(15:46):
thing. Yeah, some of theearlier tournaments, Louell actually self funded the
travel, the hotel because the governmentwas like, you know, eh,
what is this basketball? Yeah?Okay, job guys, you know,
way to go kind of very patronizingtowards us. But you know, now

(16:07):
making the World Cup, which wewere the first team ever to qualify for
the World Cup in their first try. No one had ever done it.
That tournament in Philippines. Yep,it was in the Philippines, Japan,
and oh my gosh, one othercountry maybe Indonesia, but yeah, Philippines
was the main location. But yeah, we qualified as a number one team

(16:32):
in Africa. We were eleven andone in qualification. And another random thing
is we qualified in Alexandria, Egypt, which was the CID that Louell was
a refugee in first and he hadnot been back to until we came back
and qualified for the World Cup.Damn, pretty cool. I can't imagine.

(16:53):
Yeah, I can't imagine what thatbrain documentary or at that with that
brain. Yeah, Luell's life setdocumentary. First, Oh, it's insane.
I mean, I mean I've seenthe uh. I always said the
story was so good, but themovie was so corny. They did a
mini movie on Yiannis on Disney.I don't know if you saw that.
No, I didn't watch it,and it's just yeah, it's worth a

(17:14):
watch, but like just how theyshoot it kind of feels Disney Channel esque.
But you can feel like, damn, this story is nutty and the
whole time I'm watching, I'm justthinking about Lou, like, oh my
god, his story has to beso similar, but maybe crazier because it's
like ten years prior, you know, and hopefully you'd imagine the world got
a little bit less racist than tenyears. Who knows, but uh yeah,
that seems to be on like awave. Yeah it was crazy,

(17:36):
it was crazy, but uh yeah, I can't fucking imagine. And yeah,
self funded, so you go toyou make worlds? Is World's a
qualifier the World Cup? Or isthat totally separate than the Olympics because it's
Feba. No, no, it'sit's a feeder to the Olympics. Yeah,
so that is the qualifiers. Youguys did decent well to make the
Olympics. Each like region of theworld gets a certain amount of automatic bids

(18:00):
coming out of the World Cup.So Africa, even there's fifty four countries,
gets one automatic bid. Yeah,just based on competitiveness of the past,
I assume, I guess, Idon't know how they put probably something
like that, Yeah, but weget there's only one spot, so we

(18:22):
finished the World Cup. Is thenumber one team from Africa, which gave
US the automatic bid for the Olympics. That's dope, dope, that's unheard
of. Have you been to theOlympics in person? I know you coached
a couple yeah, who won medals, not only went to the Olympics,
but won medals multiple times. Idon't know if I met her in person.

(18:45):
I've talked to her a couple oftimes. Just freak athlete to throw
up. Yeah, like throw upher training stuff. She's like box squad
and four or five box jumping likeforty five inches. Just an absolute savage.
I assume her backgrounds sprinting, whichmost Bob starters are Illinois. Yeah,
you don't really wake up. JustBob's ledding, like American Bob's letters.

(19:07):
Like for three years, they justrecruited crossfitters. Yeah, Like I
had like three homies trying to makethe Bob sed team that were just crossfitters
because they're like strong and semi fast. But did you ever go to any
of the games yourself? Because herOlympics that she meddled in was in Sochi,
Russia, And even at the time, I was like, eh,
Sochi, Yeah, not quite thedestination. You know, you don't really

(19:30):
want to take off work and travelfor that. So this will be my
first Olympics to actually attend in person. That would be so sick in Paris.
Can't complain. But you've probably beento Paris. Have you been to
Paris? I've been a couple oftimes, never for an extended period,
just kind of like layovers. Alot of flights. So West Africa go
through Paris, so you might endup there for a day or two.

(19:53):
Yeah, I just know you're veryworld traveled. But I tell you what,
I do hate Paris because of thelast of protein and breakfasts. One
time four England. What's that?What do they eat? England's the bean
breakfast? Right? Oh yeah fortheir beans? Yeah. What's Paris,
Scott? I guess croissant, Yeah, crossalts, begots and cigarettes. Yeah,

(20:19):
I don't know, man, soundskind of nice. I walked around
for like four hours trying to findsomewhere that would give me like a plethora
of eggs. Yeah, like it'slike three omelets with about a pound of
butter among them. Is about whatyou what you get? I mean,
it depends on where you are inParis. But like where we were staying

(20:41):
on the left bank last year,like it was almost impossible to find any
different food, Like every restaurant hadessentially the same thing unless you went to,
you know, one that was followingthe cuisine of another country. It's
crazy like and then you if yougo on the other side, there's more,
there's a lot more stuff, butthen there's also a whole lot more

(21:02):
tourists and waiting in line for foodis you know, never fun. But
you have heard a lot of mixedreviews from friends that went to Paris.
A lot of people don't love it. I loved it, yeah, but
just the food, Like I didn't. I thought we were going somewhat for
the food, and we were kindof not going for the food. Yeah,
you just get champagne and of courseantcigarettes, omelets, omelets, Yeah,

(21:22):
cigarette A'lmless swimming and better, justswimming and better. Yeah. I
don't know. I don't know what'swhat's going on personally, You're opening a
gym, you do some online coaching, the uh, you know a lot
of your life and career. Notto speak for you, but was like
a pro athlete, like you weretraveling with well you're living with them part
time. And then obviously when heretires you retired, like your your NBA

(21:48):
travel one on one situation kind ofended. You know you obviously you you
consult, you work Barbara ba Gayand you work with a bunch of different
companies and help. But you haveyour own companies. You have your own
gym. Again, you wear manymany hats. What's like, top three
leading focuses of Jacob's personal life.Yeah, so really good point. Actually,

(22:10):
and Mike, I'm surprised at howclosely studied you are on my life.
Not that we're not clothes. It'sjust, man, you gotta know
you're my buddy. Do I gottawatch. Yeah, I pay attention.
I pay attention. I talk aboutyou all the time. Yeah, I
talk about you all the time.Yeah, I show that fucking Uh.
I don't even know if you rememberit. But when we after the concert,
the migos on the ship, Uh, the migos came to our VIP

(22:32):
booth. Yeah, and uh,everybody's in there, like the migos,
Julio Jones, Like everyone's in ourlittle VIP booth. That was the one
night we drank and we weren't likeham or anything, but you like passed
me a drink and I was likeI'm good man, like it's whatever,
and he's like, dude, thisis like whatever, like five thousand dollars
champagne, just take it. I'mlike, all right, I'll drink.
So we're sitting there drinking and thenI get a air drop on my phone

(22:56):
and it's a picture of like Luow, Julio, the Migos, these people,
and then my fat face is likestuck in the deep corner. So
of course I saved the picture.It's like me and amigos hanging out.
But yeah, of course, buddy, I want to pay attention to I
mean, if it wasn't for COVIDand then you know, you got busy,
we got busy. Yeah, wewould have hung out more because pre

(23:17):
COVID we saw each other at leasta couple of times a year. Yeah,
but yeah, I'm dialed in.I'm paying attention. The last time
you were on the show, youwere trying to die too, or he
had been trying to die, soalso true, it was that. Yeah,
that was that was rough. ButI'm good, good on that front.
Yeah that's good. Yeah. Yeah. So you got obviously kids and
family, you got a bunch oflittle ones running around the house, that's

(23:38):
got to be a bunch of yourtime. It is, it is,
But you know, I kind offollowed Louell's footsteps in a way that when
I finished or when he retired,well, I almost died COVID hit.
My youngest son was born in Januaryof twenty twenty, and then my dad

(23:59):
passed in April of twenty twenty,So that four months was just I mean
life changing events. You know atthe max level could pop have. Yeah,
you got to change your schedule,you got to change your brain,
you got to change how you likesee life. Yeah, a lot of
times, honestly, like one ofthose things would be life changing. They

(24:22):
were all just smashed in there,and I had some time to sit and
think about what I really wanted todo, and I decided that I wanted
to help more with the Lewall's Foundation. I want to help more with giving
back. And at the same timewe started Tom Collis and I started our
online training, so I kind ofkept me connected in the training world,

(24:45):
and I started helping with Lewis Foundationin Sound, Sudan. Well, that
led me to a nonprofit uh calledMatter that I had met in Minnesota and
Lowell played there and I partnered Leuwill'sFoundation with them, and so now I
actually work full time for Matter.I still work on the wall stuff.

(25:07):
I have our online training. Tomand I are opening a gym and then
I do the strength and conditioning forthe South Sudan national team. Damn.
What's tell us a little bit moreabout Matter, tell us a little bit
more your role maybe in what they'rethey're involved with. Yes, Matters really

(25:30):
interesting when you think about film dropicwork or nonprofit work. What kind of
boils into my head? Is this? You remember the Sarah McLaughlin commercials when
we were growing up. She wouldbe stinging over the dogs that were like
dying. Yeah yeah, I cryevery time like arms of an angel.
Yeah right, she fucks you up. Yeah, I'll give you a nightmares,

(25:53):
Like that's what I thought about.And obviously losing its eye yeah right
exactly. Yeah. And like workingwith Luell like really changed what philanthropic work
looked like for me because of hisefforts to help the southso needs to ask
for him. But Matter kind oftook it a step further because their thing

(26:17):
is sustainability, so they partner withpeople and then they create sustainable projects.
So just As example, one ofthe things that I work on is something
called the Victoria Falls Boxing Academy andChildren's Home. It's in Victoria Falls,
Zimbabwe, and it's a boxing clubslash gym that also is a children's home,

(26:38):
which is just the proper term fororphanage. And we built it in
such a way that we had awoman who donated money to help build the
facility. We had a guy whowas already taking care of about eight or
nine orphans on his own, andhe was a boxing instructor and kind of
a fitness guy. And we basicallybuild a new gym, a new home,

(27:03):
and we wrote it up in sucha way that thirty percent of the
business would go back into the children'shome to support kids. So we're trying
to develop philanthropic projects where we cancreate a sustainable impact in such a way
that it helps the people we're tryingto help directly, and then also sustain
the community around it, and alsodo it in a way that we're not

(27:26):
constantly fundraising and going back and sayingwe need more, we need more,
we need more. Can we doit in such a way that elevates and
uplifts that directly the people involved inthe community surrounding and so we get to
do a lot of really cool projectslike that. We work in education,
medical, space technology. I justposted something yesterday about chia. I don't

(27:48):
know if you guys saw that onmy instagrams. I did see that.
Yeah, So chia is this likereally green, leafy vegetable that's one of
the highest in the world in termsof protein per serving, lots of micronutrients,
all that good stuff, and itgrows really well in arid, dry
climates, which is great for alot of Africa. So we started working

(28:11):
with women's co ops to teach themhow to grow at and farm it.
And then the more you pick itand harvest it, the faster it grows,
which is also awesome. And sostep one was too, can we
just feed these women their families andtheir communities right around them? And then
step two is could we then buyx shaya from these co ops so that

(28:32):
they could earn money on top ofthat, and then we could process it
and then bring it back to theStates for use in protein powders or something
like that. Because there's people alwaysbe more organic, you know, vegan,
et cetera. Ways of doing thingsso like that's project we're working on
right now. It's really hard sometimesto describe in totality what we do because
we work in partnerships. So likeif you guys were to come to me

(28:53):
and say, hey, we havethis really good idea for whatever it is,
and I was to say, okay, well we have some expert tease
there, and we would meet aboutit. If we could come up with
a good synergy between us, thenwe would say, yes, we're gonna
do it. We don't just doX, Y or z and then like
you kind of get on the busor get off of it. It's kind
of more so, where can wemeet together and create real sustainable impact?

(29:15):
Yeah, I mean that it seemsso genius and it seems like a no
brainer. But I've never heard oflike that. Yeah, I mean maybe
there are other nonprofits out there,hopefully there are that do work similarly,
but yeah, just to be likea resource hub and not have like a
niche per se. So it's basedin Minnesota, but it works worldwide crastly.
But yeah, I mean, howhow genius is that? Like you

(29:37):
know, give a man of fish, teach a man to fish. Yep,
Like yes, self sustaining cyclical cancontinue, right, because you hear
about that all the time, andI don't know, people might bash me
or whatever, but like you hearabout the Miami or Maui fires, and
people help, they send some money, but then like then what like life
continues, but that money does notcontinue? All right, you got to
you fed them for a week andthat's great, but like their house has

(30:00):
still burnt, their insurance is stillhitting them up. There got loans everywhere,
you know they're getting they've got kidswhatever whatever. So to build any
project anywhere that is yeah, fullyhas a life. I mean you're you're
giving life to You're starting businesses,which is truly genius. You're starting a
bunch of mini seeds that will grow. That's dope. That's really really cool.

(30:22):
And maybe we will think of somethingthat we can use, y' all
with who started it? Or likewho's the main people that you work with,
Like what's their maybe background or likewhat's the real like what's the talent
that you work with? Does thatmake sense? Are they like finance people
that kind of like have networks orare they like business people so they know
how to like integrate stuff or amix of all of it. Our staff

(30:45):
is about thirty people. We're prettysmall, and I would say that we
really hire. When you look acrossthe board at the staff from an entrepreneurial
mindset, it's a lot of entrepreneurs. That makes sense. Everyone who's there
has or has had some sort ofside business at some point. And the

(31:07):
other thing that we do that's reallyunique is we're on track to be ninety
well we're currently ninety percent self sustainableand by the end of the year we're
going to be one hundred percent selfsustainable, or we're on track to through
social enterprise business for ourselves. I'dsay so basically, all the money that
is given two projects goes directly inthe projects, not into funding our overhead.

(31:30):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, becausethat's always like a touchy subject with
people that don't understand, you know, like, oh, you work for
a non profit, but you getpaid like yeah, bitch, like I
gotta eat also, right, Likesome of that money has to go somewhere,
and you need skilled people to runthese companies and to do this stuff,
and obviously some of them historically havegotten blasted for how much someone might

(31:52):
get paid for the duties they have. You know, Wounded Warriors comes to
mind. They had a big youknow, I guess scandal would be the
word, like twenty fifteen, twentysixteen, where ce getting paid you know,
seven hundred k a year or somethinglike that. And so yeah,
there's places to take advantage, butclearly nonprofits have to make money one for
what they do and two to feedthe people that are doing it. Yeah,
most of them. Though the percentageof that goes into the actual you

(32:15):
know, issue or problem they're tryingto solve is so much less than one
hundred percent. Yeah, yeah,yeah, right, Yeah, resources are
hard though, it's a hard game. That's why, like you guys,
setting up basically a business and lettingit run and make money off what it
runs makes a lot more sense.It really is like give a man of
fish, teach a man of fish, Like by definition, it's so good.

(32:35):
Yeah, and and so for us, we just kind of said that
if you end up developing this kindof organization, it kind of turns into
a monster that then has to existto feed itself, right, Like that's
what happens to some of these reallylarge nonprofits. Your your overhead gets so

(32:55):
large because of your staff that nowyour fundraise purely to feed the people who
are doing the work, which thenultimately becomes kind of what your mission is,
even though you're doing other good things. And I'm not here to judge
those people are say right or wrong, but just for us, we want
to do it differently because our thoughtis, if we can be entrepreneurs ourselves,

(33:19):
if we can go teach other peopleto be entrepreneurs, then why can't
we be entrepreneurial within this space aswell? Sure, And so our two
meetings enterprise businesses are we do somethingcalled Matter three sixty, which is medical
supplies. So you know, beingin Minnesota, we're in kind of medical
alleys what they call it, withMayo Clinic and all that stuff, and

(33:42):
a lot of the hospitals will justthrow away tons, literally tons of medical
supplies every single year, just tonsof it. They just go to landfills.
So we said, well we'll takeit, don't throw it away,
And we have staff that goes throughthe paletts. They just drop them off.
They're not sorted or anything. It'sreally just Mongou's palace just wrapped up.
They just drop them off at thewarehouse. We cut them off what

(34:04):
just like syringes and band aids.It can be inundated anything like one time
we found an amputated arm. Ohoh, well that it clearly expired.
That was expired. Yeah, thatone goes right on eBay. Make a
couple of bucks. Find a freakout there, freak cannibal. We've found

(34:29):
the glass. Those are like tengrands, I bet, like in the
package sealed up. Let's just gettingthrown away, you know, MRI machines,
hospital beds, old sounds, uh, clamps, surgical tools, catheters,
I mean, take your pick,anything and everything can show up in

(34:51):
there. Yeah. Yeah, Soso our staff sworts through it and some
stuff can actually that's not expired,can be resold to community hospitals. They
can't afford some of this stuff,and so we're kind of like Goodwill for
medical supplies. Yeah. And thena large majority of the stuff though,
we do give away. So weeither put it in containers to shif the

(35:13):
hospitals around the world to outfit them, or if there's different conflicts going on,
like what's going on in Ukraine rightnow, we've shipped I think around
sixty or seventy tons of medical suppliesto Ukraine because it's stuff that we said,
sorted through and said hey, wecan send it. So we just
put on a pallette, we getto someone and then they get over there.
Damn, wow, that's crazy.That's smart. Yeah. So again

(35:37):
it's stuff that would have been thrownaway, and now not only are we
able to generate some revenue to supportourselves on community, hospitals are buying it
or buying things that they couldn't normallyafford. And then we're giving things away
as well to places it wouldn't haveit. So everybody wins. Yeah,
that's dope. That's dope. Isthat a different staff or is that all

(35:59):
just run in house with your likethirty folks, it's all within the same
self. Damn Yeah, you guysare hustling. That's dope. I mean
if you are an entrepreneurial mind,yeah, you probably love shit like that.
You know, it's like problem solving, it's like selling. It's like
scavenging. You know, like GaryVee's a billionaire and that dude's still running
the garage sales trying to sell afucking Obviously he's just doing an Instagram and

(36:20):
make a point, but it's true, like there's something, there's something in
me that like likes to find adeal. Like me and Barb we're talking
about our basketball cards again. I'mlike, shit, man, I should
go sell these, i should goslang these things. You know, there's
something you always want to find,a gem. So it's kind of built
into the brain of an entrepreneur inthere. Absolutely. Well. And then
the other thing is, like youwere saying, like non for profit.

(36:42):
The only there's been a for profitbusiness and a non for profit business is
the goal at the end of theday, both are businesses. The goal
of both is to take as muchmoney as possible. The difference between the
two is if it's for profit,you get to pocket the extra. If
it's not for profit, you giveaway the extra. Yeah yeah, yeah

(37:02):
yeah. But to do a nonprofit, well you should be really good at
business. Yeah, you gotta makemoney. Yeah, it doesn't mean it
sounds so bad or whatever. Butyeah, it doesn't mean that just because
your nonprofit means that you should belike bad at business and you know,
not good with money and not resourcefuland not all of those things. You
have to be all those things still, it's just at the end, goal

(37:23):
with that excess revenue is that youuse it to do good in the world.
That's the basic difference for sure.For sure, So that takes some
majority of your time you're coaching.You just opened a gym. From the
outside again, just observing this seemslike very old school powerlifting, where it's
like, all right, we haveequipment, we got a bunch of buddies,
like, might as well start likea clubhouse rather than like training separately

(37:46):
or training in a garage. Howdid that story come about? And how
accurate am I? Man? Youare? I think? Yeah, I
got the crystal ball. I hackedTom Kallis's phone. I see all the
weird shit that kid's into. Yeah, I see it all. We tagged
it the last time that we sawyou in person, and yeah, yeah,
I'm observing his life like a hawk, that little freak, climbing fucking

(38:08):
electric wires at night or in themorning and squad eight hundred a night.
Oh my gosh, No, you'reyou're one hundred percent right. So Tom
had a you know, home gym, which is a probably under selling it.
It was a four car garage witha mono lift and fifteen piece of
equipment in there. I had ahome gym, and we've been looking for

(38:31):
a while for a smaller space wherewe could kind of combine equipment and then
create a club. That's why wecall it a be Better Barbelle Club because
it's not a gym, because wedid with that kind of community, smaller
field, and Tom finally found aspot that's seven minutes from my house,
one minute from his house. Itwas like, you guys are eight minutes

(38:52):
from each other. Yeah, that'scrazy, it's awesome. Yeah, that's
so funny. And that's by circumthat was before you knew each other ish
ish yes if yeah, because Iknow your house is newer, but like
you were in the general facility beforeyou even knew each other. Yeah.
When I first met Tom, helived at that point, only about fifteen

(39:13):
minutes from it. That's so funny. So for those that don't know,
Tom Callis' is a OG powerlifter.We've known him since he was maybe eighteen
something like that, maybe nineteen yearsold. He competed in this building itself,
is where I met him. Yeah, at that time, I think
he was a world record holder atone sixty five or at least going for
it squatting in the sevens and we'retalking like probably twenty twelve, maybe even

(39:36):
twenty eleven. I ended up afunny, funny kid, good dude,
becoming friends with him. I coachedhim for a couple of years along the
ride. But yeah, we've knownhim already. Yeah, thirteen years or
something something like that. Insane.What is he thirty? He's thirty?
Yep, yeah, yeah, soyeah, we probably met him when he
was fucking eighteen, which is absolutelyinsane. He was part of the Little

(39:58):
Bridge Crew if that rings a bell, front of and listening, kind of
lifted weights and yeah, northern Chicago, right, aren't you guys? Kind
of north Yeah, in northwest yep, yeah, in northwest Chicago. So
yeah, I mean Chicago's been ahub for strength. Obviously, ed Cone
is one of the first names thatcomes to mind, but then the Little
Bridges took it up, Tom Callusand now all you guys are out there

(40:19):
in the Manwest. That's so funny. Yeah, huck fins up in the
general area. I don't know whatthat guy's doing. I don't, I
don't. I didn't hack his phone. I didn't want to see. I
don't even want to know. Yeah, I don't want to know. It's
like the dangerous feed that's not safefor work. The roller blades, lighting
your hair on fire and a stripperpole isn't quite what I need to see
in my off time. You know, you're you're in Tom's Feed's a little
more uh yeah, a little morefairly friendly, a little more yeah,

(40:42):
a little more innocent. Yeah.So like I'm Disney Channel, Tom is
FX and Huck is f XX.Yeah yeah, yeah, he's HBO after
Midnight. Yeah, he's that freakyship. Yeah, he's that real freaky
ship. Also a very nice gentlemanto be with, very funny, but
a little wild. Did you guyssee the two hundredth episode of the Let's

(41:04):
Get Stupid Podcast? I might haveseen a clip. We did it live
inside of the Lamplighter Strip Club.Oh I've heard of the Lamplighter. Yeah,
the legendary that's crazy plastic furniture usedto have dirt floors. Yeah,
you might a strip club. Itis not that, it's not that,

(41:28):
it's like it's like having a stripclub in a barn kind of. And
that's also northwest of Chicago. Ishuyes, the birds. Yeah, just
what I imagine that whole area is. I need a visit one day because
my brain is. You know,it's running with ideas of where Tom Callus
and Huck Finn because you're not fromthere, you know. So I'm not
judging you, buddy, you're fromTexas. But but I know, I

(41:52):
know Tom is from there, yes, and I don't even he told me
the story one time of Huck Finnhow he met him. But I've heard
a lot of Insano stories from thosetwo. So it seems like there's real
uh gems up in the north northwestof Chicago. Characters. Characters, yeah,
yeah, yeah, hidden, that'swhat that shall be remained, hidden

(42:14):
people up there them. No,no, no, no, no,
yeah. I don't need a dirtfloor strip club in my life. I
would say that, you know,like from the time that we met you,
if we were like choosing among thepeople and the types of people in
the world that we would like pairyou with, you know, just like
put a little little house of cardstogether, Tom Finn would not have been

(42:35):
on my list for you. Soyeah, Tom callis neither that. That
is probably not, but maybe alittle more, but yeah, yeah,
probably not. The predictive friendship Isaw you and Bart made some sense,
you know, me and you makesome sense. I understood where we can.
And look, I can't judge becauseI'm friends with Tom too, you
know, so I'm just as fucked. But uh yeah, there it is
odd pairings. There's odd pairings upthere in the Northwest. Well, us

(42:57):
three, if we lived in thesame town, would be all best friends
because we're all very I agree.Yeah, Tom's a good kid. He's
just got Yeah, he's just alittle wilder than you and I. I
think, Yeah, he's got abunch of kids. He's old. Now
to Tom Finn, I think isolder than all of us. Yes,
you're maybe a year older than me. And he has not changed. It

(43:20):
seems it seems like he is stuckin his waist. He seems like there's
a lot of yeah, Miller Liteor whatever drink he drinks flowing. He
does not change morning, noon,night, doesn't matter what year. Hug
Fin is hug Fin. Yeah.Yeah, that's wild. That's wild.
So when's the gym opening? Soit's a club. If people want to
get involved, might as well plugit now while we're talking about it.

(43:43):
It's a club, But there's gotto be some way to get in.
You got to do a secret handshakeor something, a code yeah, secret,
we need to get that going.No, I mean knock on the
door a certain amount of times.Through our website, you know, you
can go on my Instagram or bebetter more of club or Tom's. You
can sign up for monthly, yearly, day pass all that good stuff and

(44:05):
there's a code on the door.You get email the code, So twenty
four to seven access. It's notsuper big, but we do have a
mono lift. We have a coupleof power well power rack, combo rack,
all the dumbbells, reverse hyper Ithink we have eighteen or nineteen different
bars. Yeah, you're jamming now, I saw, I saw the videos.

(44:29):
I mean, club I think isa good term just in the sense
that you have everything you need.There's just not thirty of them, correct.
Yeah, but like who needs thateither? I mean we started kind
of off in that general idea too. You know we we're obviously in a
slightly bigger facility just by default ofnostalgia we ended up here, but kind
of similar idea, like you wanteveryone to know each other, you want

(44:51):
to say what's up, you wantto spot and load, you want to
you want to hang out, youwant to respect the space because you feel
like it's part of yours, right, you know, no one is a
shit about a twenty four hour witnessor the people in there. Yeah,
so that's dope. That's dope.What's the official openings coming? So this
weekend we're doing our grand opening onSunday, sweet, and that's June ninth.

(45:13):
This might be retrospect. We'll bein the past by the time this
comes out. Yeah, but that'sright. So then you're open. Congratulations,
you're open. We're in the future, all right. Forty five pound
place do you think we had betweenthe two of us. I don't know,
because I feel like you guys collectshit over time. Like logically,
if you guys were smart, you'deach have like sixteen each right in your

(45:36):
garage because you don't need much morebeyond that, Right, even Tom,
who's world record. You're a verystrong guy, but Tom's world class,
he wouldn't need a ton beyond that. Maybe he would need eighteen whatever,
But you guys are both obsessed withwhat you do, so you probably have
more like one hundred and fifty totalor something crazy. No, we had
fifty four, okay, somewhere inbetween. Yeah, yeah, which is

(46:01):
I do all the math by likefive hundred. I take a five hundred
pounds squat for like a good toabove average squat in this style gym,
and so you have you know,ten people squating five hundred at the same
time if you need. Yeah,that's kind of how I do the math.
That's how I do the math onhow many places to buy in this
place. I was like, allright, we got nine squat stations.
Hypothetically, if everyone needs to squatfive hundred at the same time, how

(46:22):
can we accommodate that? Yeah,So what's the square footage there? Ooh,
sixteen fourteen hundred square feet something likethat. That's super big. That's
not that small, that's not toosmall. Yeah. Yeah, Actually,
it sort of reminds me. Thewhole thing kind of reminds me of of
Masonomics gym, which is I thinkthey have I don't know, I think

(46:45):
I heard recently they had maybe youknow, ninety something members or whatever.
But a private facility club style shouldbuy lots and lots and lots and lots
of bars. My first gym waseight hundred, six hundred square foot and
I fit six people in there duringa session pretty decently. Yeah, so

(47:07):
you get to yeah, you getabove a thousand year jamming. Yeah you're
jamming just fine. That's exciting,bro. And so it's on it's unmanned
obviously, right right, because there'sthere's codes. So again on your entrepreneurial
brain, you can still travel theworld, end up in Paris, do
whatever. Tom's got a full timejob plus investments in business. You guys
have kids, jamming smart, verycool man, very excited for you.

(47:28):
Yeah, we just want fifty sixtymembers cap it at that, Like you
said, exactly what you see.I said, everybody knows everybody. Everybody
feels like you're a part of it, like you have some ownership in it,
and help each other out, youknow, get to know each other
spot correct, you know, justreally build that community because I think all
of us got into this originally becauseof community. Or maybe we got into

(47:52):
it to get stronger or look betteror both, but you stayed in it
because of the community, I thinkfor sure, especially where we all come
from, Like training backgrounds were alwaysin gyms like that, you know,
and I think that is the keyto stay into anything and anyone. You
see. That's besides like the topguys who are probably just wired different.
You know, you talk to aPhil Heath or a Ronnie Coleman there,

(48:14):
they're probably just wired to be greator like to prove something or to win.
But you talk about anyone who's generallyfit, very strong, or even
semi strong, the chances are thatthey train on their own, I think
goes way down. You know.Again, you have the Dan Greens that
that broke record sitting in a garage, and that's definitely possible. I'm not
saying it's not possible, but Iknow I wouldn't be training if I didn't

(48:37):
have people around, you know,if I was only in a garage gym
for the last twenty years, there'sjust no way. It's just not fun.
There's no excitement. There's like nota lot of reason to be committed,
you know, like sure I wantto be strong, and sure I
worry about my health, but toput that in the forefront is so important.
So they had to have like aspace like you guys are creating,
and even Tom, you know,Tom came from like the Little Bridge crew.

(48:59):
They all squatted together Saturdays or whatever. You know. It kind of
builds the fun and camaraderie in anindividual sport, whether you're competitive or not.
You know, you just want toget better than anything. It's kind
of there, so makes sense.And I assume there's not a ton of
gyms in your guys in general area, we're the only mono lift at least
in a forty five minute drive anydirection. Yeah, wow, Yeah,

(49:22):
I believe it. That's probably oneof the reasons that we don't have one,
because there are yeah, there's someto the north, in the south
of US there, you know,there are some, and we just don't
have that crew. We just donot have. Yeah, the West,
I mean, the monolift in generalis getting a little bit less popular on
the West coast. It's yeah,not very popular at all. Well,
in this one Tom had built forhim during COVID. That's crazy. Wow.

(49:45):
Yeah, because he can't walk outof squat because he's a pussy.
Yeah, I need one built too. Yeah, Full can't walk out of
squad. He has a custom Yeah, he has a full custom monolift built.
Full can't walk, can't walk withfive hundred pounds quite high too,
of course, yeah, way high. He's gotta use raps on his knees.

(50:07):
Squad normal don't walk into all thesetools. That's great, man,
that's great. Chef can only cookwhen there's perfect ingredients. Poor workman blames
his tools, right, Yeah,yeah, yeah, that's true. That's
Tom. Yeah, can't bench worthship, can't deadlift for a ship,
just a one trick pony and afucking monolith. Oh my god, it

(50:31):
sucks to be him. You'll haveto share that with him when you see
him. He got fat again too. He was jacks for a second.
I was proud of him. Nowhe was all fat and gross. He'll
be posted. I tried. Itried to unhack the phone because every time
I turn it on, I thoughtGimmly from fucking Lord of the Rings was
facetiming me. Just his big hairygut, his big Harry so gross,

(50:52):
he's so gross. He's jumping intowater in and out and his hair sticking
to his body. Just fucking disgustingTom. Stop doing that, bro And
the threw up in my mouth thinkingabout it all. The Manscape ads,
Yeah, he needs another one.He needs the bonus Manscape. He's Harry
is ship in that cold punch.Well, you know, fucking gross.

(51:15):
We've broken Jacob. He's broke.He knows how gross he is. The
truth lies funny lies in the truth. Funny lies in the truth. Click
on Tom's fucking story and it's justthis hairy, wet ass so gross.
I'm gonna go right now on Instagram. But if there's something of him wet
and Harry watch, it's gonna bethere. There's zero chances there's not something

(51:39):
of him. No, he's onlygot he's only got one story that doesn't
count. They reset reset Bell.Yeah, yeah, he looks like a
Yeah, he's like a pigmy versionof fucking Dan Bell. Yeah, they
really. He shaved in this one, and he looks good. Here.

(52:00):
I'll put it on camera so sothat people know I'm not hating him.
He looks good. There you go, he's doing good. There, he's
doing good. There. That wasprobably a while ago. It was April.
I don't know. Well, you'vegotten uh, pretty lean yourself there,

(52:22):
my friend. Yeah, bodybuilding showwas on the horizon. Yeah,
so I was gonna do my firstbody but well, first my own show
in a very very long time.I did one eleven years ago. Sorry,
I gotta wipe my tears from crying, and I ended up pulling out

(52:43):
because I had to travel some towardsthe last month of prep and it's like,
man, you can't. I don'tcare how disciplined you are, it's
really hard to hit your nutrition sodiumJim, like you were saying about the
butter earlier, you know, likecontrolling that stuff. When you're traveling.
You can eat healthy and all that, but that little minuscule level. If

(53:05):
anybody's ever been that lean, itmakes a difference, especially that last four
to six weeks in prep. ButI'm in the best shape I've been in
a very long time, and Iwould still like to compete at some point,
but it'll have to be after theOlympics, and when I'm after that,
I'll go back to Africa in October, and then when I come back
from that, maybe I can prepthrough the winter or something like that.

(53:27):
We'll see, because it is fun. I mean, I love powerlifting.
I squatted seven hundred last year inTom's garage on a mono in wraps,
probably high. How you cheated too, Yeah, dude, he got your
hot me. You used to bea legit lifter, used to be so
legit. Now you're hanging out withthat gun. I'll hang it out that
bastard. Yeah, Wrapping fucking kingsized bed sheets on your knees just to

(53:52):
just to put a plate on thebar. But you know, when I
squatted that, I realize how farI was for eight hundred. I hurt
for probably two weeks, not aninjured way, just muscles that you don't
feel unless you try something like that. Yeah, pains, just general pains,

(54:13):
right. And also, you guysknow, I hurt my peg probably
five or six years ago, andso I don't really bench anymore. I
do dumbbells and flies and crossovers anddips, but I just don't flat bench.
So it's like powerlifting for me.I just don't see it in the
cards. But I still want topursue something. And the idea of being

(54:35):
leaner and strong and big is kindof probably always a good idea, right,
So something to keep me going.Yeah, theory, I mean when
everyone got into lifting probably influenced mybodybuilding and sums oh yeah, you know,
like, yeah, I lifted veryfirst to play basketball and shit.
But like the first stuff you're watchingis Arnold and Ronnie, and you know,
it's kind of always in the backof most people, at least our

(54:58):
generation's mine. Maybe newer kids becausepowerlifting's cool now, maybe they directly,
you know, the door directly ledthem powerlifting. But I feel like if
you're born pre probably even pre twothousand, you got some kind of influence
to get jacked rather than just squat. You know, like even Tom Tom
got jacked and want to get abs, and you know, there's something in

(55:20):
the back of our brains that youwant to look as good as you lift
right somewhere, Yeah, somewhere,especially the raw, the raw part that
we all kind of grew up on. Yeah, makes more sense. What's
the Olympic schedule? Look like?I assume you guys got to go early.
It starts July twenty sixth or something. But I assume you got some
kind of training camp or things leadingup to it. Yeah, do you

(55:43):
have notes or something? God,dog you are I don't know, man,
I just I'm on Twitter a lot. You know, you start reading
shit, tend to be smart.Are just pulling? Yeah, surface level
and it's surface level intelligence. Idon't know. You're you're this fifty percent
about one hundred percent today? Yeah, Yeah, we're ba good. No,
we leave at the end of themonth for training camp. We're gonna
do it in Rwanda. The presidentthere is a huge basketball fan. He

(56:09):
loves Lowell. The Basketball Africa LeagueFinal just happened. It's it's in Rwanda.
They have a really nice stadium.That's awesome. So we'll do we'll
do training camp there. Then we'regonna go play two friendlies in Ivory Coast
and then we'll go to warm upgas YEP, a couple of warm up
games, and then we'll go Londonto play the US and a warm up

(56:30):
game, and then we'll take atrain to France, which I'm excited about.
I've always went to. I don'tknow why. That's a fun ride.
Yeah, you can hardly even tellyou know that you're going as fast
as you're going. It's like nearlytwo hundred miles an hour. Oh wow,
under the water, wow, carrythe water. Yeah, it's a

(56:51):
whole thing. Yeah, I'm excited. Little signs tell you how fast you're
going, and it's amazing. Andthen the Olympics some so or what probably
two or three weeks depending on it'salmost like a guaranteed what two weeks with
group play and then who knows.Yeah, you play, you play three
games. There's four teams to agroup, and there's three days in between
games. Well, two rest days, so you play every third day.

(57:15):
Yeah, do you know the groupyou got USA? Yes, tough draw.
Who else you got, especially withthe whatever team they're calling it now,
but the we're pissed from losing teamright again? Right, Yeah,
it's not good. It's not goodwhen you got lebron and whoever else wants
to play. Well, it's it'ssupposedly the last run of this generation lebron
kd But steph, all those guys, there's even I think yep, why

(57:39):
even Yeah, Yeah, we're stacked. We're stacked. If we don't win
a gold medal, I'll be I'llbuzz my head mould. Yeah, like
it's gonna be. It's gonna bea rough, Like it's a rough for
the world. When when our bestget a little angry, Well, the
problem is the other team in ourgroup is Serbia. Okay, So earlier

(58:00):
you were talking about the best playersin the NBA being international for the most
part. Yeah, let's see theMVP. What four last four years has
been international? Yeah? What Isaid? Yeah, you named the top
five. You could easily go MbiJokic, Jannis Luca and then even like,
if you want to make an argument, like Shai or someone I know

(58:22):
he's Canadian and people don't it.But like you could easily make an argument
we have absolute international freaks in theNBA. They really are taking over.
Where in the past there would belike good players, you know, there'd
be like a Vladie d Vok who'svery good. He's not the top ten
conversation, Hakeem would probably be.Yeah, the other best argument for top
five at a time, but hardMatumbo or something who's probably a top ten

(58:43):
you know, another African legend,both of them, him and Hakem.
But it's rare that you got thedensity of international talent who's on actual Slovenia
is that? Is that Joe Kitchenis Okay? So that's a problem because
in the world, Yeah, itis. We played Serbia, they were

(59:05):
in our group and I saw thebest basketball I've ever seen in my life
when we played Serbia. Yeah,you know, before the games you exchange
like these gifts like soccer that youknow, you go give each other stuff,
and they gave us a pin thatsaid one hundred years of Serbian basketball.
Yeah, holy shit. Yeah,you know, best argument for soccer,

(59:30):
Like people don't talk about it,but like So in the US,
you grow up playing whatever sport youdo, and you're ripped up into your
AAU teams yep, and then maybemaybe and a senior year in high school
you'll get on an under eighteen USAnational team. But the chances you even
advanced from there to the NBA whateveris low, like not everyone, because
it's like recruiting, like you're scouting. You don't know that that kid's gonna

(59:52):
be the best, but he's thebest right now. So he makes that
team and you play together for likeone tournament, but then you go back
to your high school teams and yourAAU teams. You grew up in a
different country playing soccer or basketball,and your national team is it like you're
already You're already the chosen one.So Messi's played with these cats from Argentina
for twenty five years. Joe Kitschhas probably played with these guys literally since

(01:00:13):
he was twelve years old, likethey're probably his best friends. Sudan might
be similar now for you guys,like they at least probably grew up Yeah
two separated, Yeah yeah, no, eleven of our twelve players are refugees.
Yeah, just too separated. Yeah, just because it's a different country,
but you go to Europe and inSouth Latin America and probably Asia and
they just grow up in these systemsand so they're either hate each other or

(01:00:35):
love each other. But they've playedtogether for decades. It's such an established
group, and that's what people havealways talked about, like when Pasia and
then were in the Olympics Spain andthe Gasol Brothers, even the UK team
a little bit with Ben Gordon andLuel and them, like they had a
squad that at least knew each other, well did Ben Ben? And Ben
was UK right? Yeah? AndChicago, Yeah, that's crazy because they're

(01:00:58):
on the bulls together too, Butat least you have like some friendship in
the background, you know, wherethe US builds it when you're a pro
like you. Sure, Lebron andSteph are friends now, but the chemistry
is just so different. And that'sexactly why we got our ass whooped,
because it doesn't matter what we did, they adjusted instantly to us and it

(01:01:22):
was so in sync and so unified. It was like a fucking alien hive.
Mind is incredible. And Yokis didn'teven play because of the They just
won the Championship. Oh yeah,so he's just chilling, so he didn't
come. But they still got secondat the World Cup, they beat the

(01:01:43):
US. So now you add yolksinto that team for the Olympics and they're
in our group with the US.The groups are random, right, the
groups are a lottery allegedly. Yeah, yeah, you guys got the fucked
Yeah, you guys got apps life. Yeah. Probably the two best teams
of the nation right now that Ican think of. Well, having said

(01:02:04):
all of that, then what doessuccess look like for South Sudan in the
Olympics. Yeah, it's a greatquestion, and I don't want to take
the easy way out, but itis true. South Sudan has never been
represented as a team level in theOlympics. They've never sent a team in
any sport. So the country,it's this has been a really unifying thing

(01:02:25):
for US to be unranked to numberone team in Africa, World Cup,
Olympic qualifying. When the team flewback, they had a parade and I'm
talking thousands of people. They closedthe airport, they let thousands of people
on the tarmac to cheer on theplayers as they came off the plane.

(01:02:45):
I mean, it is Disney movielevel s stuff super cool. Yeah,
wow, and so yeah, Imean yeah, it's your first time.
I mean it's your first You're inuncharted territory, yes, and right,
and not only that, we're unchartedbasketball territory, uncharted African territory, Sasudan's

(01:03:05):
youngest country in the world. There'sso many things if you stack them up,
we shouldn't be there and we are. And the country is so proud
to be represented and to be representedwell. And there's there's you know,
if you know you're Sa Sudan history. Some of the civil war came out
of tribalism, different tribes fighting forcontrol, and we have people from all
sorts of tribes on the team.It doesn't matter. We have refugees,

(01:03:28):
they're all refugees from all over theworld, doesn't matter. You know,
when we play, you have fansin Australia, South Sudan, Europe,
America, they're all watching. Wehave the most viewed social media of any
FEBA team, simply because there's somany people spread out everywhere. Yeah,
that's no. And South Sudan iswestern, no eastern Eastern Africa. It

(01:04:00):
is to the north, Yep Ethiopiais to the east and Uganda is to
the south. Right, Yeah,yep, okay, yeah, what's the
average age of the roster. It'sgot to be like under twenty five.
Yeah, I don't know the exactnumber, but for sure under twenty five.

(01:04:23):
Yeah, because like I've seen youplay, and I've I've seen other
kids on your roster that you've workedwith for years, because you guys have
been doing stuff there. You'll postthem you know, some in the G
League even or college or whatever,and so like I assume you and Lou
have known these guys for a while, which is a cool part of the
process too, because you guys,you're not brand new. Yeah, you're
not just showed up and oh let'sgo to the Olympics or something. You've

(01:04:45):
been a part of their growth asbasketball players. But for them to be
so young and kind of lead thatway, I mean, that's how it
all starts, right, Because thenthere's there's an eight year old kid in
South Sudan right now that's going towatch the Olympics for the first time in
his memory and just be so stokedthat there's basketball there. You know that
there's there's some someone that looks likehim, that that's from where he's from,
that knows these tribal histories and no, maybe he knows their cousin or

(01:05:10):
some shit. And now they're onTV playing against Lebron James. I mean,
that kid's gonna go pick up abasketball. There's just no way he
doesn't, you know. And likethat's how it started everywhere. And that's
like the cool unifying thing about sports. It's easy to say, like,
oh man, like they're just dribblingballs and making billions of dollars, but
like the cultural individual impact that asport can make on a kid is so

(01:05:32):
insane, you know, Like he'llwant to make friends, he'll want to
be part of a team, he'llwant to be something, which is the
big difference between individual sport and ateam sport. You know, I think
a team sport can take you sofar in terms of your skills in life,
right, whether it be business,you're working on a team, whether
it be how we talk about training, You got to work as a team.

(01:05:56):
And just like that, the happinessthat comes along with that will be
super to see the next ten ortwenty years. What Sudanese basketball may or
may not look like So here's maybethe most important question. Obviously, this
this story makes us think a littlebit about did Jamake and Bob's led team?
Yeah, cool Runnings which led toCool Runnings. Yeah. So my

(01:06:17):
important question to you is who wouldyou like to play you in the Disney
movie version of the South Sudanese.It's got to be a movie in like
ten years. Within the ten years, it's got to be Disney plus you,
is it? John Candy? JohnCandy? Yeah, yeah, John
Candy. Have you seen cool Runningsub us? I have Cool Running?

(01:06:38):
Is good? Bro? John Mager, we got that Bob sled team.
Yeah, it's so good. Yeah, so good. So we've actually had
a couple of camera people filming forthe last three years, and we're talking
to a couple of production companies aboutmaking an actual documentary like a third for

(01:06:59):
thirty. Soyle, I don't knowwhere all that's at right now, but
I do know that like Brad Pitthas a company that kind of invests in
African stories, and he was interested, and I think Netflix they're always interested
in very sports oriented Right now atNetflix, this is a good time to
sell at sports property Netflix, andobviously your team and network with Luau and

(01:07:24):
his managers and should are so tappedin they can get a hold of people
well. And the story is socompelling because again you interview these players individually,
they'll say, you know, Igrew up in a kartoon, in
a refugee camp. I grew upin Lebanon, in a refugee camp.
I grew up in here. Myfather was killed in the war and my
mother was killed in the war.It's nobody has a linear path to this

(01:07:48):
place. Everyone's path is just sofucked up compared to what we traditionally,
like quote unquote Americans deal with.And again it's not to compare issues or
problems or misery. There's plenty ofshit in the world for everybody. It's
just what you normally see for thislevel of an athlete. We don't really

(01:08:12):
have those stories. And it's reallyinteresting. And even in Egypt when we
qualified for the World Cup, there'sstill a lot of South Sudanese refugees who
live there. A lot of refugeesfled there during the war, including Luol
because you could actually walk there,I mean wasn't close, but you could
walk there. So when we playedin Egypt, we had two or three

(01:08:33):
thousand fans show up to the stadiumto watch us play. Well, Egypt
had not qualified yet, and theysaid we're not allowing any South Sudanese fans
in the stadium. They're security risks. The history of racism there as well
between Egyptians and South Sudanese, andit's a whole another thing. So we

(01:08:58):
had two or three thousand fans outsideof the stadium. They brought police and
riot gear. Nobody was riding,nobody was anything like that. But I'm
talking those shields, all that shitwater cannons. This is for a basketball
game. It's insane. And whenwe left this because the tension, there's
no like tension with the rival teamor something. No, we weren't even

(01:09:19):
play that night. Yeah, yeah, that's what I mean. If we
were playing Egypt, like all,I could start to see something, you
know, but yeah, nothing,Yeah, we weren't even playing them.
And when like when we left,it was like we were on the bus
and literally like the right police likepushing the people apart, and they were
just trying to cheer. They weren'ttrying to do anything but cheer. Well,

(01:09:42):
Egypt played after us, and theywere playing Tunisia, who's another really
good team, and Arrival because thosecountries are close to each other. And
at halftime the game was tied.So guess who got in the stadium for
second half Egypt? Oh yeah,yeah, Wall The whole stadium was empty
when you guys played then, orthey let in some egypt people. No,

(01:10:04):
no, no, empty, Yeahno, wow, that's weird.
Were you there for this? Ohyeah, yeaheah, I was on the
bus all that stuff. That's crazy. So we have footage of all that,
which is crazy. But the otherthing is because there is this history
of racism between Egyptians and South Suitees, and again I'm not saying for everybody,

(01:10:26):
but there is a lot of alot of incidences of it. We
did play Egypt and we beat themby twenty four twenty five. Yeah,
and we had some kids who messagedus on Instagram and said, for the
first time in my life, he'slike eight nine year old kids. I
walked to school head held high becausethe Egyptians couldn't talk shit to me because

(01:10:47):
I can say we're better than youand something. Oh jeez, yeah,
zir Price, I mean, they'releft out on everything. They look a
little different. They're from somewhere different. Yep. So I'm just saying it's
bigger. So I'm going to makea couple, don't say, Jim,
just real quick to answer your question, I would say, like us being
there is the success. I thinkthis is more of the reward phase of

(01:11:11):
it, if that makes sense,like trying to enjoy the process, enjoy
being at the Olympics, enjoy representthe country. And of course we want
to play well. Of course wewant to play well. But if we
win, you know, against theUS or Serbia, it's gonna be a
Disney movie and of itself. Okay, it's just the I mean we should
what's the Yeah, what's the thirdteam? We don't know yet. They

(01:11:31):
have one more qualifier from those,Yeah, two or three random spots.
Yeah. Yeah, it's like aplay in kind of deal. Yep.
Interesting. Yeah, maybe you geta little win or something. But again,
if the team's average age, andagain I know you don't know,
but they're they're college ish kids.You're like just finishing college ish kids.
They got another Olympics in them,right, they'll be twenty nine the average

(01:11:51):
age. Then we'll be twenty nine, which you know in basketball seems to
be prime. Obviously there's Anthony Edwardsand freaks out there, but generally speaking,
you're like twenties. You got thewisdom and athleticism. They got another
run at the Olympics, you know, So to have some fun gain experience
here seems like the right mindset totake. I have some nominations for who
could play you in the Disney movieyou Know Who I Got? Who You

(01:12:15):
Got? I Got. He's alittle short, but based on looks,
I think, and I think hecould turn his charm up, because Jacob's
very positive and very charming, andthis guy isn't known for that. Maybe
like a Tom Hardy. Oh he'sTom Hardy's a little too old, though,
I think, Oh what is TomHardy? He's probably forty. He
probably just looks older. Jacob looksyoung. Jacob's older than me. Yeah,

(01:12:36):
thirty six, thirty seven, Yeah, yeah, Okay, here are
my nominations. If I liked him, I would say Miles Teller, but
I don't. But yeah, Teller'sall right, But yeah, that that's
one that could work. He canbe cheery. Yeah, THEO James,
I don't even know if I knowwho that is. THEO James. He
was in Okay, he was intothe Divergent movies. He was just old.

(01:12:59):
Yeah, okay, he's good.J Courtney also in those movies.
And I think that, like hiscareer trajectory would probably work because you're not
going to be a major character inthis story unless they just make it about
you because you're the white guy.But you know, uh, not a
bad choice. I think that likethe reach would be maybe Glenn Powell.

(01:13:27):
Hold on, I'm looking it up. Okay, all right, yeah,
who's playing lou Is Lou? Gottaplay Lou? I don't know we could
play lou Yeah, I don't either. There's not a lot of six nineties
stomping around. All right, here'sthe dark horse. Are you ready for
me? Yeah? Alan Richson,Oh wow, he's a little bit,

(01:13:53):
a little bit bigger than you,just a little bit came pounds. Can
I think he's your your same heightthough. I think he's six three right,
yeah, six ye or six four? Yeah? Yeah? Yeah,
oh he could do it. Yeah, he's that's a big gentleman. Yeah,
he's big, big dude. Likeyeah, I mean, Hollywood always

(01:14:15):
takes everything up a notch, andyou know, he's that much bigger than
you and I'll take perfect. Yeah, he's got all the trt in the
world behind him and you know,yeah, up, what made that?
What made that dude famous? Iknow he's in Fast and Furious. Uh,
he's been in a bunch of things, but but Reacher is the thing
that really made him famous. Buthe's been in he's been around for a

(01:14:38):
while. Is that who we weretalking about for Batman? Yes, yeah,
yeah, I know he is.Yeah. I didn't know about him
really until a Reacher. Yeah.He was in the twenty fourteen uh teenage
Ninja Turtles. I don't know ifI even't seen it. He was not
a turtle as far as I cantell. Maybe he was the hockey guy,

(01:15:00):
not Jason Casey Jones. Is thatyeah, Casey Jones. He might
have been him, uh to teenageteenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Out of the Shadows
and he was He's just a voice. I assumes a cartoon it maybe no,
it's live action. Oh really,Steven mml was in that one.

(01:15:24):
I haven't seen. I don't knowif I've seen any of the new live
actions. Oh he was Raphael.He was a turtle. Oh that's crazy,
really, Yeah, huh, youhaven't seen it, Huh. I
mean I hope this story in generalgets some play on American Olympics because one

(01:15:44):
thing that makes the Olympics cool isthe stories, right, Like, the
games are cool and who wins ascool, but like everyone forgets who got
a medal or if they got silveror gold, Like, it's always the
stories that go along with them.And to have like such an international team
and an international impact for a countrythat's new ish, right, that doesn't

(01:16:05):
get a lot of spotlight for anything, even the negative, you know,
it doesn't get a lot of likepeople. You know, there's obviously tons
of negative happening everywhere in the worldnow, but it's always you know,
we don't have to dive into politicsand shitty media. But media chooses what
they decide to show, and theydon't always show the dark side of things

(01:16:26):
that we're not don't have our handsin. And so for these kids,
whether they went through it, theirparents went through it, someone they know
has gone through heinous things to makeit to the Olympics as like, yeah,
kind of like a cool running typestory, you know, where they
had to learn how to bobs thaton a dirt hill and you're telling us
an eagle shitting on your free throwline. You know, like'll y'all went

(01:16:50):
through it. You guys really wentthrough it. And hopefully, hopefully I'm
hoping NBC or whoever the hell's coveringthis thing, yeah, at least has
a blurp on it. Those athleteand team packages are the things that make
worth watching watching the Olympics, youknow, so much more worthwhile. Alan
Richmond Richman Richmond Richson was on AmericanIdol he sings in two thousand and four.

(01:17:12):
Interesting, Yeah, he was alsoI think the thing that most people
would who have been watching him fora long time would would get is he
was in Blue Mountain State. Ohthat was the frat boy show. Yeah,
football college football team show. Yeahyeah, drama never was Yeah,

(01:17:33):
comedy kind of. I think HungerGames also, So yeah, okay,
I approve this casting. We'll gethis people on the phone. R Brad,
Yeah, mister Pitt, What thehell is going on? Well,
I mean they don't anymore. Theydon't make a documentary without figuring out what

(01:17:54):
the what the narrative movie is goingto be, you know, because that's
you know, you have you haveto put the whole package together to make
the money, I think, yeah, especially with the turnover a media.
Now everything's cool for a day.Well, but I got one more question,
and you could take as little oras much time as possible with this

(01:18:14):
question, and that's when back backin the days when we met you,
and if you were looking forward totwenty twenty four, what did you think
you could be doing versus what you'redoing now? M Because I mean,
the majority of your twenties, you'repretty dialed in as a strength conditioning coach
yep, right, whether it befor multiple athletes, lou whatever, across

(01:18:38):
the past, that was a largechunk of what you did was pure coaching.
Yep. Man. That's a reallyinteresting question because I've known you guys
a very long time, coming upon ten years. Yeah, that's crazy,
And I would have never thought,and this is like total fanboy,

(01:19:03):
but like I would have never thoughtI would have met you guys, because
I listened to you guys when Iwas going to the gym work, and
I loved you guys at that point, Like I never thought I actually meet
you in person, much less becomefriends with you guys. So that whole
la time, I never even sawthat coming. Yeah, I bet louldn

(01:19:29):
neither. No, for sure hedidn't. Yeah, I was a hell
of a I was a hell ofa twist to everyone's lives who it was,
you know, like even Barbil Brigade. Like when I first went there,
I didn't know anything about it.I didn't. I was so un
plugged in to that world, youknow, YouTube, and I just I

(01:19:53):
just didn't know what I didn't know. I just went there because the gym
looked like it could be a dopeplace where we could get some good kid
and they were so friendly and kindto being the I was like, this
is a place for me to sayAnd same thing when I met you guys
in person, I'm like, wow, you guys are so friendly and kind.
I still squat in the belt thatyou signed for that ad. You

(01:20:16):
remember that you signed this belt forthis ad and you say, here's Jacob,
you can have this belt. Istill squat in that belt. I'll
squatted in the Friday. That's crazyout of a monolitht Disrespecteah, sorry,
son of a bitch. Sorry.So it's hard to say because I don't
know that I had time to stopand think about it back then. I

(01:20:38):
first I can imagine your schedule.Then people don't like pay enough attention to
that, Like I want to playpro basketball my whole life, and even
after playing college, I just knew, like, man, I don't know
if I can mentally keep up withthis schedule and the NBA schedules times a
thousand and you lived the NBA scheduleright, traveling every other day, flights
at two am to get to thenext game. Plus you got to act.

(01:21:00):
You work work, so you gotto wake up whenever you got to
wake up to train lou to trainthe team, make sure his nutrition's block,
make sure to sleep block. Likeyou lived a very torturous decade.
That is tiring. That is tiring, you know, And so for you
not to have foresight in the futureis very understandable, you know, because
you're you're on the go, likefor eight months out of the year.
Yep, you're screwed. Yeah,you're lucky if you get a meal in

(01:21:24):
well. And I will say this, I will say that I know that
coming out of my like mid twenties, I wanted to work with good people.
Number one. That was huge forme. I had already worked enough
in my life with some real greatturds that I did not want to continue

(01:21:45):
to do that moving forward, andLouell is one of the best people I've
ever met. He continues to bethat. So I knew I wanted to
work with him in some capacity,and I didn't know the national team and
all that would happen, but foundationobviously was a part of that and one
reason why I chose to go thatroute. I finally went to Southset last

(01:22:06):
year for the first time, thevery difficult place to get to. Man,
I cried on the court. It'sjust so many full circle things for
me in a bigger goal and aspirationthan the training has taken me to.

(01:22:30):
And so for now for me tobe kind of half in the nonprofit,
half in the training. I wouldn'thave drawn it up this way because I
didn't have enough foresight or wisdom todraw it up this way, but really
grateful for it, and I'm alwaysif I really didn't think about it.

(01:22:53):
I'm grateful that I can get onthe phone and call guys like you and
talk to y'all and we have afriend and relationship and mutual respect, because
that's really what it's all about.It's all of us been around this long
enough and around this quote unquote gamelong enough to know you can do things
for views, you can do thingsfor life, you can do things for

(01:23:15):
shares and all that good stuff,and there's a place for that. You
have to market yourself and you haveto blah blah blah. But really what
really matters is when Jim and Iare sitting there having breakfast and just talking
about life and just really enjoying eachother's company, or you know, Mike
and I are on a cruise shipshooting hoops, you know, hanging out
like like, that's the stuff alot life that actually means something. Everything

(01:23:38):
else is just an avenue to getto that point. Our businesses, our
jobs, it allows us to dothose things. And so honestly, I'm
really grateful to be in a placewhere I've met some amazing people like you
guys. And I don't mean thatin a blow and smoke way. I
mean in an honest and genuine way, because that is why I do any
of this stuff. It's the onlyreason I want to do this stuff.

(01:24:00):
If it was up to me,honestly, I could live on a farm
I grew up on, take careof cows, work the land, not
see very many people, and I'dbe fine. But the fact that I've
met an unusual amount of high qualitypeople really makes me want to keep pushing
so that I can be around youguys more. I want't successful so I
can fly to Sack and hang outwith you guys. It's our goal,

(01:24:23):
It's our goal of life. Idig it. I dig it. Well,
you're one of the best people thatwe've ever met, for sure.
You got a ol piece of ourheart, for sure. How do I
get a South Sudanese basketball jersey?Yeah, I gotta call lou you gotta
call it. I don't even know. I don't even have one, dude,

(01:24:45):
I need one because as long asy'all aren't playing the US and as
long as y'all ain't playing Argentina,I'll throw this all were the Studentese every
day, all right, I'll seewhat I can do. I can do.
Yeah. Yeah, there's a timeyou knew we were in a room
and everyone's shooting these but us.True. Yeah, fucking fifteen dudes in
a room. I will say this. Hey, yo, there's a guy

(01:25:09):
on the national team named Coman.You probably see me post about him.
He just started a duke. Yeah, but he'll be uh at the Olympics
playing for US. He was sixteenat the World Cup now he's seventeen.
He was the third youngest player he'sat the World Cup. And he's a

(01:25:30):
projected number three pick in the draftnext year coming out of Duke. Yeah,
so was it Cooper Flag? Yeah, he's he might be number one
and come on, is supposed tobe number three. So Duke should have
a really good team this year.A uh yeah, Cooper Duke too?
Oh no, where did Cooper go? Don't do right? Yeah? Yeah,

(01:25:50):
that's crazy. Yeah, they're fromall that after coach K too.
For them to recruit that well aftercoach K is a big statement. Well,
Combine is seven two seven to three, about two fifty to fifty five.
Yeah, and he moves like he'sone eighty. It's insane as the

(01:26:11):
Kevin Durant build. Yes, it'sinsane. Yeah. So the point I've
all got to play like that ishe gonna play on the wing a little
bit. He can do anything,right now. Yeah, that's crazy.
Yeah, I mean the talent inthe world is insane. Well, but
the point is is that I dothink, you know, if I had

(01:26:31):
to plan I could see myself potentiallygetting back into training because he's the person
that I would do. I've workedin for the last three years. He's
a really good kid. I couldsee myself doing some of what I did
for Lou for him. Probably notto the same extent, but some of
that. But the point is isthat at the minimum, will have some
basketball games to go to and wecould go wat. Yeah, you have

(01:26:53):
a kid at sex State, right, you and I talk about that.
He was. Yeah, he's playingat sex State and Sex State's program's coming
up a little bit. They're true, they've been recruiting on the national kids.
Is he on the national team orno, he was just a kid
you met through the system. No, he was an NBA Africa, which
is like the prep school for Africa. Basically, it's kind of the better

(01:27:13):
African kids, regardless of what countryyou're from. It's a boarding school slash
basketball program. And he played withUS in one tournament and he went to
college and so he hasn't really beenin the national team fold. But yeah,
really really good kid man, reallygood kid. Yeah. I mean

(01:27:34):
the Duke connection runs deep obviously withLou and everything else there. That's exciting.
That's exciting. You see the bestplayer on the team. Then he's
the best player on the South StudentEast team. Yeah, he's got to
be in the conversation. Uh man, I would staff point, but you're
the meat head coach. You're allowedto say these things. Yeah right,
Uh well, I mean the MVPof the World Cup was a guy named

(01:27:57):
car Leak who was a G Leagueplayer on the Bulls. He's our only
naturalized player, but he actually hasSouth Sudanese roots. That guy tore it
up. He had some thirty pointgames in the World Cup, like,
just tore it up. Another guynamed Nooni who was G League flirting in

(01:28:17):
the NBA level. He's really reallygood. There's a guy Nam Wingan who
played on the Lakers last year.He's the center. He's really really good.
I mean, just the experience overthe seventeen year old, right,
I mean, the G League basicallyis pro. Now it's almost getting to
be like baseball where guys are goingback and forth. Often there's a couple
of guys with two way contracts.So like, if you're playing the G

(01:28:38):
League even a year, you havereal pro experience, which is similar to
like an international where yeah, ifyou're seventeen. Your experience is just less
regardless of your skill. And yeah, you may be the best player of
Duke and all this, but youjust haven't played pros for eighty games or
sixty games. It's just a differentvibe. Well, and that's the thing
about Kaman, Like he win theWorld Cup and gave guys like, you

(01:29:01):
know, six points and eight reboundsin ten minutes and these are thirty year
old pros. He was sixteen seventeen. Yeah, that's insane. People don't
understand. Yeah, that's insane.That's a gifted. Yeah, yeah,
keep an eye ot. I needDuke Jersey to Duke Jersey and the Jersey

(01:29:23):
rack them up. All right,Duke's probably hold. I don't know.
Duke's hard to get ahold of too. I try to find it. Yeah,
I try to find I mean,Lou only played there one year,
I think, But I tried tofind a bunch of Lou. I think
Jacob got it for me. Yeah. One of my old manager and then
my old high school basketball coach werebig Duke fans. So I got to
lose to sign those. But thoseare I was deep into eBay to find
them. They just don't make themwith names on them. Maybe now with

(01:29:44):
the nil and shit, like,the whole business is different. But back
in the day, most university didn'teven put your name on it, let
alone like put a number. Theywould just sell like a generic jersey.
It would all be number one orsomething number zero. It was hard.
But the game is changing, CaitlinClark changing the game. That's the hot
topic. That's what we should havedove into. That's the hot topic.
Yeah, yeah, yeahous topic.Yeah, a little racism going on,

(01:30:09):
a little sexism talk. I loveit all. It's all controversial. It's
complicated. Dudes on dudes on ESPNcorner a bitch love it. You've been
in a positive way. But hehad to back up, you know,
Pat back a careful about Yeah,some some words. There's some words I
just don't use in particular ways.Yeah, at least not on the airway.
Yeah, it's a hot topic forsure. They're making money for the

(01:30:30):
first time ever. Shout out tothem. Yeah. I think the WNBA
New York in particular, I thinkwent profitable for the first time in ten
years or something, which is sadand wonderful at the same time. Basketball
did. It's moving, it's movingand then you're getting some people. It's
interesting they're getting seems jealous, youknow, like I was a part of
this too, and it's like,come on, like, oh my goodness,

(01:30:54):
does it everybody was a part ofit? Who gives a crap?
Just play basketball, bake your money. They promote your brand. I guess
that is brand. But I meanthere's similar things people say happen with the
Isaiah Thomases and shit when Michael Jordanwas really exploding, you know, and
that's where the negativity some of itmay lie between Isaiah Thomas and maybe he's
just a dick because no one elseon the league liked him, but there's

(01:31:16):
bound to be yeah, jealousy andwhatever. But I agree with you,
and it's not that you can't promoteyour brand and market, but talking negave
on someone else, especially on thatlevel of stage, isn't gonna step you
forward. So like you let yourgame talk. You all got sponsorships now.
I think Angel Reese is the mainone that's been vocal like this,
and I think she's sponsored by Rebok, Like just go, yeah, go

(01:31:38):
run your own show. Then ifif you think they're coming to watch you,
they'll come to watch you. Youdon't have to like tell them to
come watch you. But some ofthe yeah yeah, yeah, yeah right,
like then it shuts it all up. Then it shuts it all up.
And I get it, Like becausethe argument is Kaitlin Clark's losing,
and I get it. You know, they're two and ten or something.
I do understand. But that's happensin the league always. That happened to

(01:32:00):
Jordan Lebron's a rare case where thatdidn't happen to It kind of happened to
Kobe in a sense. I mean, Kobe's at the bench for a year.
Like people just don't understand the scopeof it all. But I think
anything that promotes the sport, youknow, as the rising tides rise all
ships, I would just I wouldride that fucking boat man. Yeah,
it is exciting, always great chattingbuddy plug away. Where can people find?

(01:32:26):
You got your gym? What isit? Technically? Are we still
into calb? No, it's notquite to the calb. It's on the
edge of Oh boy, are youready for geography that you've dive here?
Yeah? Sure, on the edgeof Campton Hills, Lily Lake, Elbourne
in Maple Park. Okay, Soif you're in that area Illinois, if

(01:32:46):
you have any idea where this is, you can go there. Yeah.
Well, if you know where itis, you probably need a gym membership
there. Yeah. If you don'tknow where it is, you're probably nowhere
close. Yeah. Yeah. What'sthe website again if they want to join,
whether it be coaching, some help, or the gym itself. Yeah,
so it's just official be Better brand. That's a website. Instagram is

(01:33:09):
be Better Barbelle Club for the gym. Obviously, my Instagram is Jacob dot
w dot Ross. I use Instagramthe most. I don't really use anything
else. At this point, wechanged the name to be Better. We
used to be called Smart Strength becausewe felt a little piginoled with that,
you know, we could kind ofonly talk about string training. And Tom's

(01:33:30):
really big into self improvement. He'sbeen going to therapy, which Huck Finn
makes fun of him all the timeabout, which is really funny because Hucks
are the most exactly right. Yep, they should go together. We're trying
to get Tom's therapist on the episodeLet's Get Stupid. That'd be great,
It would be great, That wouldbe good. Yeah, that'd be really

(01:33:51):
good. I thought about that whenI was seeing one, and then I've
decided that was not a good thingto do. A little tommy so yeah,
so anyway that would be better?Is everyone's got something called be better?
Yeah? Yeah, so it's thenames get a little weird with the
branding. But we're trying to No, you guys are killing it. You're

(01:34:13):
doing great. You got a newgym. Check it out. If you're
in north eastern northwestern Chicago, ish, what else is up there? Is
there a city up there? Likea legit, like there's Chicago in Illinois?
Is there anything north? Well,really, we're more west, like
Saint Charles is probably the last suburbthat is size. Uh. You keep

(01:34:33):
going closer to the city. Youhave Schomberg, Wheaton, Lumbard It.
No, you keep going, youget to Rosemont and then you get to
Chicago. I've heard of Chicago.None of the suburbs that are in John
Hughes movies. In other words,correct, they're all the one that's Ferris
Bueller. Uh watch McCall's out there. Maybe uh home Alone north Side.

(01:34:59):
Yeah, it's just I think Ithink all the John Hughes movies happened in
the same is he John Hughes,I don't know. Yeah, he just
makes all his movies in Chicago.Well he did and before he died.
Yeah, interesting pretty much. UncleBuck interest, Uncle Buck, oh,
John Candy. Yeah, the Bob'sled coach exactly. Full circle. Yeah,
I've seen some of those. Appreciateyou as always, buddy, Hopefully

(01:35:20):
we'll see you. I know yourschedule is busy. I was finding and
thinking of ways to find my wayto Paris, but I don't think it's
happening. Come to West coast,East coast, bro, I'd be down,
to be honest. That would beinsane. That would be insane.
Shoot some hoops, be the waterboy. That's how I get a jersey.

(01:35:41):
Yeah, you should have hired allmof the fucking Eagle Shit. I
don't care. Yeah, I'll cleanthat up. I've swept so many basketball
courts in my life. I've swepthundreds of thousands of basketball courts. That's
in my beloved Yeah, give mea couple of mopst worry. Yeah,
ladies and gentlemen, New episode Wednesdayand Friday. Thank you so much.

(01:36:03):
Good company. Discord dot com ifyou want to tap in, and I'm
seld Mike where you want to findme. I am Matt the Jim McDean
on on all the social media.This show is fifty percent Facts, for
percent is a word and fifty isjust numbers. Fifty percent Facts is a
Spreaker Prime podcast and association with iHeartMediaon the Obscure Celebrity Network. And We'll
talk to you next time.

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Jacob Ross | Olympic Basketball

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