The SaltyMF GOAT Podcast with Brooks Austin Sports Media Personality

The SaltyMF GOAT Podcast with Brooks Austin Sports Media Personality.

Brad Banyas of SaltyMF Enterprises sits down with  Brooks Austin to talk shop and life. Behind the hedges interview with Brooks Austin on how his career was forged with passion & love for the game of Football.

Watch the Live Podcast on YouTube!
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About Brooks Austin:

Sports Media Personality,  journalist, broadcaster,lead editor, live streamer, football analyst  The Film Guy Network  @TheFilmGuyNetwork, Lead Editor @DawgsDaily on Fan Nation/ Sports Illustrated. 

The Film Guy Network
https://www.youtube.com/@TheFilmGuyNetwork/videos

The Dawg Walk
https://www.si.com/college/georgia/the-dawg-walk

*Everyone has a story to tell, it may not be perfect nor ideal, but it is Real. The Attitude Wears Well!
www.saltymf.com

*Special thanks to the  Space Giants for the show music. Listen to the Space Giants on  Spotify.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:00

Let's fing roll. Alright, everybody, welcome back to McBastard Studio here in Foco, USA. You're watching the Salty MFGO podcast. Today we're really excited to talk to uh Brooks Austin. Some of you guys know him as the film guy, uh editor of Dogs Daily. He's really a media personality. He's one of the best kind of sports analysts I've ever seen. And I'm not a big guy that watches a lot of sports analysts, but I think the guy's a really talented guy. So let's uh welcome Brooks Austin. Welcome, buddy.

SPEAKER_00 0:29

Yeah, man. Uh just for reference for the audience, we were talking before, you didn't even know who Stephen A. Smith was. So to say that I'm one of the best sports analysts of the world, uh, and not knowing who Stephen A. Smith was, not to knock your credibility, but you know, it's not high.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

That's truthful, and I'm really sorry out there, Stephen. I apologize, I'm just not a big TV guy, but I have listened to Brooks, so uh maybe I've got that reference point. Good point, touche.

SPEAKER_00 0:56

No, no, man. I've been no, I'm glad to be here, man. It's good to be here. Hey, by the way, lived in Georgia my whole life. I've heard of Hoko, Houston County, right? Yeah. Never heard of Foco. FOCO, Foresight. I will I figured that out. You know, I put it together, but FOCO, not one I've heard. So that's an interesting new.

SPEAKER_01 1:12

You know, it's kind of like Compton, but the East Coast.

SPEAKER_00 1:17

But to be honest, as a as a podcaster and as a content creator, it is very important to have a smooth like intro. Yeah. And like it took me a couple of years to find one. And you said you're only a couple months like here. Yeah. That's a smooth little, like it hits first six, seven seconds, doesn't take long. Boom. Welcome to the Bastards Studio. McBastards. McBastards, yeah. McBasters Studios here in Foco, Georgia.

SPEAKER_01 1:39

Yeah. So the story behind the McBastards, just so you know, is so I found out I was adopted last year at 53. So uh, and uh, so I got all my kids together and I said, you know, in lieu of this new information, um, I'm changing our name to the McBastards. So uh that's where the McBastards studio came from.

SPEAKER_00 1:56

So uh dude, to find out information like that at 53. Crazy. Wow. Crazy. I my mom just came in town, she lives down in South Georgia, and I don't get to see her very often. So when I do, I like I like to probe her about my childhood, and uh I find out new things about my childhood all the time that are like minor details.

SPEAKER_01 2:16

Yeah, like hey, hey, I'm just gonna give you some advice, Brooks. Here's stay off the damn uh, you know, what is it, the uh 21 and me or all these. Yeah, stay off those things.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

Yeah, not gonna give them my DNA in the first place, to be honest with you, but not too too curious of my distant past, just my immediate past.

SPEAKER_01 2:33

Well, you're a you're you're like, so when I did start following you, and we've met a couple times at Classic City and some other places, and I knew that, you know, you're everything dogs. And uh, so I was kind of wondering for whatever reason, I don't know why in my head it didn't sit like that. I didn't think you were a local, you know, Douglasville, Georgia guy. And I don't know why that is, but like I am my head, I'm like, is this dude from Georgia?

SPEAKER_00 2:57

People can't place me. I find people doing this to me all the time. They can't figure out where my dialect comes from. Like, like he doesn't have any type of accent. In fact, I had a neighbor tell me they thought I was from the Bronx the other day. They can't figure out my intellect. You know, and I Douglasville, Georgia is a very um unique place, at least when I was growing up, where it was, I mean, it really was America's melting pot, where like the origination of America is like all kinds of different, you know, intellects, all kinds of different environments, all types of different cultures. Um, so yeah, I think I'm an amalgamation of a lot of things. Yeah, I don't hold one like southern accent or one northern accent, but like my dad's from Colorado, like most of his family's from Colorado and Midwest. My parents, my mom's side's like super southwest Atlanta the whole time. So like I don't know, it didn't, I just didn't get one. So I didn't get a dialect. So yeah, when people hear me, they're like, Where's where's that guy from?

SPEAKER_01 3:48

Yeah, at least they didn't call you Ohio State fan, so that's good.

SPEAKER_00 3:52

No, when you people watch my content, they swear I'm a Georgia homer. And I'm like, dude, they are on top of college football. So if I say that they are good at something, I'm not crazy. Like they're dominating college football. So, like, yeah, I'm gonna say positive things about the team that's on top.

SPEAKER_01 4:08

Yeah, even me, a guy that didn't watch a lot of TV, knows that the dogs are on top. So uh that's awesome. Well, I mean, you you played football, you were a center, my dad was a center, all American linebackers center. So uh I have a thing for centers. I used to make my kids play center, and they get mad at me for doing that. But um, you know, the what's interesting to me is like your your passion for the sport, which is really cool. Like, because a lot of you know, a lot of people that are commentating or analysts, and they they they kind of break it down and they give you the X's and O's. And you know, one thing I liked like watching and listening to your shows is I mean, you're pretty passionate about it. You kind of you kind of say some you know, real, kind of real shit, right? So, what you loved football? I loved football. I coached kids for 22 years later. That's how I kind of fulfilled my obligation in football. But um, you know, what why are you so passionate about it? What like what gives you that passion? About the game of football in general and just kind of being around it. I mean, you know, you're still in it.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

I think those of us that were like touched and forged by football, like football touched my life at a very young age. It's like one of the very first things I tied my identity to. I find that a lot of young men like that end up gravitating back towards it, uh, particularly that if they leaned on it for their growth, like if they leaned on it for their opportunities as well. Like I was a relatively smart individual, don't get me wrong. Test scores were great, but the grades were not because I didn't really care about school. I was selectively uh applicable with my attention span, if you will, as a young teenager. So I cared about sports and I knew it was my path to at least college. But I never had these unrealistic dreams about my athletic abilities. Like my brother was the great athlete. I was the one that was just gonna use it to get to college. Never thought I was gonna play in the NFL, with just wanting to get to college. So I think that idea of I'm just using it to get to the next place taught like gave me a different love for football. Um, and when I got out of college, I'll be honest with you, man. I lost I lost a bunch of games in college, lost a shitload of football games. Brad, I'm gonna be honest with you. In five years of college football, I won seven football games.

SPEAKER_01 6:08

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_00 6:09

Seven. We lost a shit ton of football games, and I was constantly getting beat up. Um, body was hurting, brain was hurting when I got done. And you go through this like decompression as an athlete once you get done. And I wanted no part of football. I didn't want any, I didn't want to be anywhere around it. Um, and then when I got back to covering it, I guess I just I like refound the love for it. The knowledge for football always was there. I had to play with a different knowledge of the game because I wasn't athletically gifted um like others around me. So I had to know where to be. I had to know where you were going to be based off things that I had studied. So these things are applied in my knowledge and in my coverage of the game now. But the traditional love for it comes from the impact it originally had on my like my formative years.

SPEAKER_01 6:51

Yeah, that's awesome. I I'd say I have a very similar kind of feeling towards that. I mean, I people ask me, I played a little bit in college, high school, I loved football. My dad was an all-American, all that. So I grew up in a football family. And um, you know, I kind of people asked me back, and like literally was my most favorite time during sports, not high school, not college. And I think that once you get out of that and you've done it so long and you've trained so long, I kind of had that phase where I burned out. And then when I had kids and started to get back into coaching, that's kind of like when I fell back in love with football and really the game of football, right? And what it truly means. Like you said, it it kind of you're forged in it. That's that's an awesome, that's an awesome word because you know, anyone that's ever played the sport of football, it it is the ultimate team sport. I mean, for sure. Ultimate. I mean, you depend on that guy next to you, behind you, whatever it is. And uh, I kind of loved that kind of that we're we're in it together thing.

SPEAKER_00 7:45

I that's just kind of my one thing I missed when I left the game was like the the critical like correction afterwards. Like you get you get out of playing football and you get out of the environment of sports, and I didn't have like someone to tell me, hey, you did this wrong today, yeah, and this needs to be fixed tomorrow, and this is how we get better. And like they would come and like like be abrupt about their corrections. Yeah, you get into the corporate world and people just kind of let you do what you do, yeah, you know, and then you get fired, and you you get evaluated quarterly, or you get evaluated biannually, or whatever it is, and then you're done. There's no like you know, corrective action day to day. Right. I I think that if there's anything that the corporate world might be able to take from the sporting world, it's that that corrective criticism that doesn't come off like, oh, that guy's hating on me, or that guy doesn't like me, or that manager doesn't like me, woe is me. I'm you know, yeah, for lack of a better term, the bitching and the moaning, like the complaining. 100%. The world could need a little bit of like, hey, we gotta get better right now, here. Yes. And that's I miss that when I got it.

SPEAKER_01 8:50

True honesty. You and I were talking about that before. Like, I don't like uh dickheads and people that are fake. And you were talking about that, we were talking about true honesty, and then Bill Hale was on our last podcast, and we were talking about the army and military, and you know, teams are always saying we've got a purpose, you've got to do this, you've got to execute these things. It's a very direct type thing you've got to do. Um, and then when you get kind of into the the the real world, um, some of it is oh, yeah, meaning quarterly numbers is not necessarily purpose. No, like why are we here? Yeah, what the fuck are we doing, right? I mean, what are we doing? Why are we doing this? What's the reason? Or maybe we're serving the best cereal to kids or whatever it may be. And uh people just uh I think they lose that. And sports and specifically football are so it's so structured and orchestrated to kind of you know follow that. I think it's you know, I I the older I get, the more I love it. Even when I was younger, I loved it. But now that I'm older and I kind of think about it more, you know, intellectually and what it meant from an emotional side and what it meant from teammate side and building relationships. It it's it's freaking awesome.

SPEAKER_00 9:49

So it's no different than anything else in life. I feel like you can take things and apply it to other things. I mean, but it's what I was formed in, right? You know, it's what I know and what I love. And and when I look back at the things that I'm like lean on the idea of discipline or the idea of wanting to be a part of something bigger. Like as I as I got bigger and better in the media space, the first thing I wanted to do was not to continue to stack income, but to find out, hey, who can I go higher? Like, what team can I build around me? Yeah, and who you know, that kind of environment. I think that initial nature came from. Yeah. Like, yeah, you want to be a part of something bigger than yourself. You don't, as much as what I do is put a camera on me and a microphone in front of my face, and it can seem self-indulged, like I don't want to be alone all the time. I kind of want to be with people, I kind of want to be around a team. I think that's not only football, that's like human nature. Yeah, I think we're made and created to like be around other people and have intellectual conversations and get to know other people and talk. Put your phone down.

SPEAKER_01 10:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:47

Talk and listen to people every once in a while.

SPEAKER_01 10:50

Yeah, and I I know it's like to me, uh, this podcast thing is pretty new, right? I mean, we have a business podcast and another venture we have, but I don't do it. We have professional journalists that run the podcast, and so I'd never been involved in it. But the the cool thing to me about this is like, you know, like like you're an expert of this compared to me, you know. You you learn from each other, but also it's really cool because you can really try to bring out sides of people that maybe they wouldn't bring out, or they would be specifically talking about Georgia football, or who's the top quarterback, or who's the best tight end, and they never really get to kind of see who the person is behind uh so I think that's why you've had some success because you're you're pretty genuine, and that's you know, like I said, we we want to deal with people that are that are fucking cheesy.

SPEAKER_00 11:31

You know, dude, I I produce so much content and I'm on air all the time by myself for so long that I figured out that hey, dude, if you're trying to create something, if you're trying to like be something other than yourself on air, that's just gonna get really like draining. Yeah, like you're gonna indulge and you're gonna have to you're gonna feel like you're performing. You're gonna feel like when the cameras are turned on, you're a different version of yourself. And that's no way to do this for long term. Yeah, and so and not only that, it's not original, like you're saying, it's not it's not genuine, it's not who you are. Um, so I at some point something clicked where I was just like, I mean, I always worked at it. Yeah, but I was there was something blocking me from just saying, man, fuck it, just be you, just be you, bro. Just like just go out. And if people don't like you, yeah, they don't like you. If and if they love you, that's great. But what they're not gonna have is no opinion. Like I made a decision, it's like, hey, I'm just gonna be me, and people are either gonna dislike it, they're gonna love it, or they're not gonna be like, oh yeah, Brooks Austin, yeah. I mean, he's whatever. I, you know, I don't have an opinion. Yeah, that wasn't I wasn't gonna allow that.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

No, that's and that's great. I think you know that you know where you stand in life if you if you kind of really who you are. I mean, I've always been like, if I if you're loyal to me, you're my friend, I'll do anything for you. If I don't like you, I mean, I don't give a shit. I might think about you. I'm never I'm never I'm not even gonna think about you ever again, I don't really care, right? Yeah, and so I think people, and it's a good point just for like a light lesson out there for the kitties, is uh you know, be yourself. I mean, you know, you don't have to, my dad always just say, hey, you know, when you die, Brad, if you have uh, if you can count the number of friends, good friends on one hand, not both hands, one hand, you had a great life. And the older I get, you know, that's true. Like, you know, you you can name three or four or five go-to guys, buddies, you're gonna help you out. I mean, you've you've you've had a good life. You're not you're not alone.

SPEAKER_00 13:22

So I so this is not the first time I've done something like this, but the first time I've done it in long form or at least like in person. Like I have a lot of people that have me on like smaller podcasts, they're like, hey man, like how'd you get started or whatever? And I was telling my wife, the next time someone asks me a question like that, I'm gonna explain to them that I have two phones. Okay, I literally do. It's not a joke. I have two phones. I have a phone that is like my life before I became obsessed with this. Okay, which I believe is my purpose. Yeah, this is my purpose in life to pursue this with like utmost attention, like the hardest I can go. Um, and my my original phone, my 404 number, it never rings, bro. Never rings. No one calls it, no one texts it, no, I don't send phones off. I don't even know where the damn thing is right now.

SPEAKER_01 14:10

And it is that's why you don't know when it's calling it, because you don't even know what it's like.

SPEAKER_00 14:13

Well, probably, but in my mind nowadays, like that that phone represents my life before. Yeah, my life before I became obsessed with what I want to do. And you know what? My relationships have been impacted, and like it is lonely, dude. Like I had a best friend of mine who stood like two doors down from me during my wedding, meaning like two people behind my best man. Dude, I didn't even get invited to like his bachelor's department because he ain't seen me. I've been in a lab for four years. I've been just like like consumed with this thing. And it hurt and it felt bad, and like my feelings were hurt, right? And then I got to thinking it's like that it's the cost. Yeah, like sometimes it's the cost of doing what you're supposed to do. And it doesn't mean you need to think less of that person or they need to think less of you. And in reality, it's just like like uh Steve Harvey said, some people are in your life for a season, not like you know, they're just there, like for a season of your life. I'm definitely in a very different season of my life than I was when I was 18, 20, 22 years old.

SPEAKER_01 15:18

Wait until you're 55.

SPEAKER_00 15:19

And you're right, man. Like those, like I don't need a whole team, I just need a couple motherfuckers.

SPEAKER_01 15:25

Yeah, I love that. I'm bad at names because I don't know, he's a big fat guy from New York. Joey Diaz. Yeah, Joey Diaz. There you go. Thank you. I don't need I don't need a team. Yeah, yeah. I just need five motherfuckers. He's a three three bad motherfuckers. That's why I'm gonna take over the world. And that that's true though, because once again, those those people, those friends, those business partners are all working towards something. They want your success. What I what I've seen in life as you get older is you you have to find, and you mentioned the the key word, and I tell my kids all the time, you gotta find your purpose. And your purpose may not fit you know, your wife, your brother, your dad, your mom, your friend, your girlfriend, whoever. It's your purpose. And if that drives you, and that's what your purpose is, you know, we we give a piece of ourselves away a lot. And some of that's necessary. Give it away to your kids, you give it away to your family, you would, and and some of that's really good. You don't want to isolate everybody just for that. You don't want to kill everything else, but but you give a piece of you away a lot, and when you find your purpose, that's for you, that's about you. That's what you are here for in life, and that's a cool thing when someone really finds their purpose. And you're gonna piss some people off, anyways. Who cares? You know, you, yeah, yeah, whatever. You know, if you don't like what I'm doing, great.

SPEAKER_00 16:46

It'll also, first of all, your purpose is not on your timeline, it ends up coming whenever it comes, it just happens. But I think it's also how you find the most optimal version of yourself. Like if you want your wife to truly love you, if you want your if you want to be the best father, if you want to be the best husband, if you want to be the best friend, like you kind of have to be doing the thing that fulfills you the most. Yeah, you know what I mean? If you're not miserable, or you'll be miserable, or you'll have to find you'll have to summon the energy to fake through the interaction that you're having, right? Um but no, I think yeah, finding the purpose is important. But I was I was telling the other Brooks, your producer, before uh he came in here. He was asking, I was trying to ask him what he was doing and whatnot. And I heard Mark Cuban say this the other day. You know, people talk about following your passions, like what are you passionate about? That's bullshit. Yeah, like passions are cute, that's awesome. But he said, follow your efforts. What do you put your effort and time into? Because if you put your effort and time into something, you're probably gonna be great at it. And I'll tell you right now, I don't know of a person in my industry that works harder at what I do, spends more time on it, studies it more, is more passionate about it. Like, that's the thing that's unmatched with me. There are people in the camera and TV business and the opinion giving business that are far more handsome than I am. Oh, come on. You know, they are a dead ass. Like, have you seen Jesse Palmer? Jesse Palmer is gorgeous. He is gorgeous. He's a beautiful man. I am not that. I am not that. Like, no, I like I have the work to be decent looking. Like, I understand these things, but like there are very few people in this world. I can't can't grow facial hair. Dude, if I go, you know who Caillou is? You're probably you're a little older than I, the the the French cartoon character? Yeah, bro. I would look like Caillou. I hear Q-ball head asshole. That's what I would look like, because I can't grow facial hair. So if I lose my hair, yeah, done. I'm telling you right now, PEDs, they're going in this thing. The performance enhancing drugs, they going up in this joint right here. All right. The moment we're going bald, we're losing it, bro. I I will not go bald.

SPEAKER_01 18:43

Yeah, it's it's brutal. It's brutal. But you you one thing, it's you were you were talking about you know, passion. The the other thing that I that I really like is you're not your thoughts, you're your actions.

SPEAKER_02 18:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:56

So, and I'm an idea guy and I have a million ideas an hour, day, minute, whatever. But reality is your actions and whatever you're putting your actions to, that's who you are.

SPEAKER_00 19:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:05

So you can think whatever you want, you have some bullshit ideology all you want, you can bullshit and pontificate about it, but your actions show whether you're gonna be great or not. If you took anybody in the world, whatever they were, musician, athlete, engineer, rocket scientist, whatever the hell they were, you could tell by their work ethic and their actions is why they're there. It's not because they thought, yeah, maybe I want to I want to drive a spaceship and I'm just gonna think about it. I'm gonna sit fucking around and just say, I'm gonna be an astronaut. I'm gonna be an astronaut, you know?

SPEAKER_00 19:33

I saw I heard someone say it this way the other day. You can look at yourself in the mirror all day and tell yourself you are who you are, but until you stack a pile of proof of concept and a proof of actions mile high, like it doesn't matter. Like until you you show and do, and like you're saying, do the action, until you have a stack of action as a mile high. Like you can tell yourself you are who you are all you want, but it doesn't matter until you have proof of concept until you go fucking do it. Do it.

SPEAKER_01 19:58

And I I love that because I if you I coached kids for 22 years, all kinds of sports, but football was my sport. And and P and I was a defensive guy. I grew up a linebacker, I grew up linebacker, I played some football when I was little, but checks out, yeah. You know, so I would always I ran the offense because the guy that was running it when I first started took too long to make the damn calls, and we were getting penalties. I'm like, you're done, dude. I don't know shit about offense, but you're done. You're done. The Tourette's chick. You're done. I know that because my kids have that. But, anyways, so every time I would do something and the kids would go wrong, we would like run a dive five times in a row. Run it again. I didn't, they didn't do it. Someone did something wrong, run it again. And the coach it would drive them nuts. But my point is like, you're gonna keep doing this action until it becomes so normal to you, so repetitive to you, that you don't even think about it. No, and like you're good at something now, or you might have always been talented at something because you've done it so many times, you don't have to think about it. I don't come in here sweating, I don't go in the bathroom and act like I'm gonna puke because it just is what it is.

SPEAKER_00 21:03

I was never nervous to do what I was doing. I always knew at some point I was gifted, but I go back and watch stuff from like two years ago, and I'm like, that guy fucking sucks. That guy sucks so bad. Like he's not he's just not there, like he's not, he doesn't know quite yet what he's doing. He's just trying. But at least he's fucking trying. Trying, yeah. Like at least he's trying, and like I watch because we're about to debut something like a massive studio. I've I've invested a lot of time and money into my product, and you know, it it was very, you know, brick and mortar, not if that's the right term, it's very old school and like just grainy. Like we had two boards put up, and it's like I made it with my hands, like just built it in my in my driveway and then stuck in my garage at my old house. And now we're about to have this like massive brand new studio. And I went back and like watched some of my old stuff, and I'm just like, no, that guy sucks. That guy's not good. Two years ago, not good. And I was telling my buddy this the other day, and he was like, you know what? Your ass better say that about yourself two years from now.

SPEAKER_01 22:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:06

You better look back at yourself now, currently, two years from now, and be like, that guy's not what I am now. That guy's not good enough. That guy's not as good as the guy I am now. Because that's like the whole point. Yeah. The whole point is to get better and to continue to get better.

SPEAKER_01 22:20

Well, it's like even Cobra Bryant. You watch him and he talks about training and how he trained three times a day, like he's up at four. It's a bad thing. And he's like, you know, by the time I've done this, two years, three years, whatever the whole scenario was. You know, he's right. The same thing like Larry Bird, and I mean, we're, you know, you're the dog's guy when we're talking basketball and stuff. But same thing, the guy would go shoot a thousand shots, you know. And so I think maturation, you you always can outdo yourself. Correct. Always. If you want to put the effort in, you want to put the extra time in, you want to whatever, learn, take classes, whatever, go to acting school, whatever the hell you want to do. Um, every everyone can improve. And I think uh, you know, I have no idea of this, and I don't, you know, people ask me, well, what do you want for this podcast? I said, you know what I want for it? I want to interview real people and have real discussions, and I don't give a shit. It's not really about me. And if that takes off and people like it and they think we're entertaining or whatever, you know, whatever. Who cares? I mean, it it's it's to bring out like what people are doing that's cool. And I think you're in a really like a lot of people would die to be in the business you're in. I mean, let's be honest, it's a it's a cool business.

SPEAKER_00 23:26

I mean, it's an awesome business. There's not a day in my life where I go through and I feel like it's work. Yeah, you know what I mean? Um, but it it requires a lot of work, you know, like anything else. But like I was saying earlier, if you follow your efforts, it doesn't matter. Like, I had Deuce Robinson, I don't know if you know him, but he's Deuce Robinson had a decision to make this past year. Like, hey, am I gonna play professional football? Am I gonna go play at USC and play football? Or am I gonna be a first-round draft pick in baseball? Because I'm I'm the next Aaron Judge. That's what people are telling me. I can either go be the next uh Travis Kelsey, or I can go be the next Aaron Judge, or I can try to be a combination of both. And I remember asking him, I said, hey man, like, which you know, people ask you which one do you love more? That shit's sweet. That doesn't matter. That that's like that's during the game day. Every competitor loves to play.

SPEAKER_01 24:14

Well, they like you can go around and shoot who drive.

SPEAKER_00 24:16

What do you love to work at more? If I told you you had to go make have a 10-hour work day, and you can either go work for baseball or you can go work for football, which are you gonna go do? That's what you need to make your decision based off of. Because to be great at anything, it's not just your talent, it's your work ethic. Like my my work ethic is unmatched, and I know that, but I I didn't know that until I was probably, you know, I found something that I was not only talented at, but I loved. Yeah. Um, which I think is curious.

SPEAKER_01 24:46

Anyone, no matter what you're doing, if you're you know, you're digging ditches or whatever, if you love what you do, you like you never work a day in your life. You know, and I and I've heard that you know from a lot of older people when I, you know, growing up, and I really kind of didn't grasp it. Yeah. And you know, when you can find uh new passions and new love for things um in the thing you do every day, that's what becomes cool.

SPEAKER_00 25:08

Yeah, and I but I I I found until you know, I I love what I do for sure, but until I loved working at getting better at what I do, I didn't have any growth. I was just in there just getting the reps up, which is important, but it's almost like shooting the jump shot incorrectly. Yeah, like you're in there and you and you got bad form, but you're still putting it, like you're still shooting and shooting and shooting, and then like in critical moments, your lack of form and your lack of technique comes out. Um so until I started to like get better, which I didn't really start until I'd say like a year ago, right? Where I was like really self-critical about what I was doing, not only on camera, but like as a person. Like if you're not perfecting your person, you're probably not gonna perfect your passions and your craft. Um and that's what it took a long time for me to do. It's like work on myself, um, figure out the the why I am, the way I am, and you know, having conversations like with my mom. Like, hey, what was my childhood like? Well, come to find out, I was, you know, the word forged. I was I was forged confidence. I created confidence when I was a child because I was overweight. I was uh the younger brother of a really talented, really, really talented older athlete. Um and we had a divorced parent, so I was by myself a lot, you know. And you you carry yourself in conversations where you you have to become a better talker. Yeah, you have to be the funny guy. We had a funny phrase in high school called the designated ugly friend, where you know, yeah, got a group of you got a group of girls, and there's the one girl that's you know, she's designated to be ugly. She's there to make, and I was the designated ugly friend for my friends. My friends would carry me around.

SPEAKER_01 26:40

The best you gotta have the best wingman.

SPEAKER_00 26:43

Absolutely the best. Um but it was it all that all that all that all that childhood created kind of like my ability to talk. Like it's who I am, it's what it's why I am the way I am.

SPEAKER_01 26:55

Yeah, and that you but you know, I don't interject on that because people like a lot of people like I hear all these stories of all someone bullied me or someone, whatever, and then that motivated me to you know do whatever. Like, does it matter what the fulcrum is to make you what you're supposed to be? Like, whether it was somebody, not you know, saying bullying's good or whatever, but someone that was mean to you or someone that drove you, or your or your brother that was a good athlete, that like those external things drive you to like do something and really become who the hell you are, or better than just sitting there sucking up, like oh shit, you know, whatever.

SPEAKER_00 27:30

I'm just gonna sit in the room. I think once I started having these conversations, again, finding the why of like why I am the way I am or why things are the way they are, once I did that, I stopped harboring emotions after the fact, once I found the root, right? Like, for example, my ability to conversate with people, my ability to have confidence now, and walk into any room and have confidence. This comes from that forced confidence as a child. So I don't have any harbored efforts or harbored feelings and emotions about being bullied for being fat as a child or having to walk into those rooms and create that confidence nowadays because I know why I was doing those things and why they impact me today. I don't harbor any emotions. I can separate those two things. I am this because of this, right? And I don't have to worry about, oh, the kid called me fat in fifth grade. No, I'm not a victim of that anymore. Now it's a byproduct of who I am. It is it is a benefit for me.

SPEAKER_01 28:23

Right. And that's what I'm saying. I mean, points are like we all we all want life to go smooth and we want life to not have any you know rough edges, but the rough edges are really what forge you. Yeah, the rough edges are you deciding to make the decision. I'm gonna be whatever I'm I'm gonna be the best damn you know media personality in the world. You were forged by the things that happened in your life, good and bad, you know, good and bad. So when when after I found out I was adopted, it was like, oh, are you really mad about my absolutely not? I have more respect now for my parents that adopted me than I ever had before. They were awesome fucking people, anyways. And now, like, that's really badass. Like I never knew. They weren't so those things that we think sometimes they may be negative or perceived negative, but when you get older in life, like you were, and you make you kind of analyze it, same thing. You're at a point now where you can kind of analyze things and say, well, that's you know, that's actually maybe the reason I am who I am, yeah, or it drove me to do what I wanted to do. And most people just want to harbor the negativity of stuff and don't see positive things that come out of it.

SPEAKER_00 29:30

You mentioned edges, I I find that important because like I obviously, as a father, you're a father, try to create a better life for your child. Not that I had a bad upbringing, but there were certain aspects of my childhood and certain things that happened to me that created edges, created hardened aspects of my life, you know, that created who I am. And I wonder, as someone who's creating or really or trying to create the best life for my child that doesn't have a lot of difficulties, how do I go about creating those edges in him? Because as a man, you gotta have edges and you gotta be hard. Like you can't walk through life and and and be not soft, but for lack of a better term, soft. Like you can't be you can't be smooth. Right. You can't be smooth and be a successful man in this world. I don't believe you can't just walk through life letting things just fall off you. Right. Like we've got to have edges, we've got to have a point. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:21

I I agree. I mean, I've got four kids and whatever, and I mean I didn't, I mean, I didn't have a rough life at all. My you know, my parents uh had a obviously a pretty decent light. But I mean, the hardest thing with kids on that, and as you know, you with your two kids, is um, you know, I think you you just need to be disciplined with kids and discipline them and teach them things of basic rights and wrongs and whatever, and life will give them some of those edges.

SPEAKER_00 30:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:48

Like you don't it doesn't matter. Like, I as much as I want to protect my kids from all the horrific things that happen and go on, life has a way of creating edges. Yeah, even if even if the parent wasn't hard on them. And I think what most parents do in that case is they're trying to prolong it. I see us and I see myself trying to prolong them having to like hit hit the, you know, shit, this sucks, you know? And that's a natural instinct as a parent to protect them. But I think the edges in life are they're common, folks. If you haven't had any, they come and they suck sometimes. They really suck. Well, I know that as a content, I I wouldn't, I'm not a very big content creator as from a length of time, it's a very short time for me. I find it like like you know, you everyone's content. You gotta have content, you gotta have content. Well, you gotta have good content, and you gotta have volume of content, and you got and you're just like, oh shit, you know, like how do you how do you deal with that? Regardless, I know you've got sports to pull from and a lot of things going on, but how do you organize that in your head as to all right, what what am I gonna do? What what really is gonna be good content versus just pushing shit out?

SPEAKER_00 32:04

I let my ADHD fucking roll, bro.

SPEAKER_01 32:08

You and I are brothers from another mother.

SPEAKER_00 32:10

If my brain tells me to do it, I fucking do it.

SPEAKER_01 32:13

I love it.

SPEAKER_00 32:14

I fucking do it.

SPEAKER_01 32:15

I love it.

SPEAKER_00 32:15

Um I love it. But here was the end thing for me. Like, I had to cut out alcohol and I did it because I had a problem with it. Um, I couldn't, like, I admire people who can have like a couple of drinks, call it a night. Like, I feel buzzed. I need to stop. My wife's this way. She feels like she's getting too intoxicated, she just calls it a night. Not me.

SPEAKER_01 32:33

Yeah, not me, brother. I'm full gas, full tilt. Let's fucking go.

SPEAKER_00 32:36

That's like all day long me. So I had to cut it out. Um, but what I found when I cut it out was that I wasn't building upon thoughts. So like I would get to the end of the day, and it'd be like five, six, seven o'clock, and things would start to get fuzzy, and then come eight o'clock the next morning, whatever I was working on towards the back end of the day was just not being built upon the next day. It was almost like getting to 100% completion, shutting the computer off, and it rebooting the next morning at 75%. Yeah. Well, I was losing a quarter every single day. And I don't think I realized that. But in my life now, like I had to set schedules. You know, like I'm a live streamer. I'm not I'm a content producer, but I produce live stream content. So if I'm gonna be a live streamer, well, by God, dude, they need to know that you're gonna be there Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. I went back, like again, went back and watched some of my old stuff. Do you know how most of my shows started? They'll be like, hey everybody, welcome in. I know normally we're at such and such time, but today we started here. Yeah, I know normally on Tuesdays we do such and such content, but tonight we're doing this. I'm basically telling my my customer, hey guys, I ain't really prepared today. I'm just kind of fucking showing up. You know what I mean? But at least I'm showing up. But like once I cut out alcohol, which again was February of last year, like I'm kind of a thing at this point. Like, I'm successful as my career. And I wasn't perfecting it. I was just kind of bullshitting. My talent had gotten me through it, my abilities had gotten me through it, my general work ethic had gotten me through it. But it wasn't refined, it wasn't refined at all until like, I mean, no shit, like four, four or five months ago, six months ago, yeah, I believe. And now, like, thank God I got to where I was, luckily, because I think I had a lot of blind luck, but I like worked myself through all the barriers, but like I'm I'm I'm at a different place in my life now, and I'm really ready to rip.

SPEAKER_01 34:23

Well, you you you you you love it and you're passionate about it, and that's cool. I mean, I like people can pick that up. Like, if I just got here and I'm like, yeah, yeah, it'd be like, ah, this guy didn't give a shit, you know. And I mean it's funny because you talked about um ADD, right? And so I laugh because uh growing up, I all my boys are like me, they're spazes. I mean, and and I was never diagnosed with that or had Redlin or whatever, but we just got a spanking.

SPEAKER_00 34:48

That's what I was lucky to have stayed away from it.

SPEAKER_01 34:50

Yeah, that's what I you know, I just got a spanking when I was little. And I this I was talking to this woman, she's like, Oh, my kid has ADHD or whatever. And I'm like, look, lady, it's a fucking skill. And she's like, What? I said, when your kid gets to the work environment and he's placed against little Susie or little Johnny that used to go in A, B, C, D, E, and fucking E's over here and D's twine and wise. That kid's gonna be a superstar. Yeah because he can process and do a bunch of things at once, and it's been the greatest thing that ever happened.

SPEAKER_00 35:22

Wait a minute. You're telling me Buddy's motor don't stop? Let's stop that. Let's slow that down. Let's put some amphetamine into that shit. Shut up.

SPEAKER_02 35:31

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 35:32

Like, if Buddy's motor don't stop, let him go outside and run into the blows. Like, just let him go. I'm so glad my parents didn't do something like because they were all we were offered riddling riddling.

SPEAKER_01 35:42

Riddling, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:43

You're giving five-year-olds, six-year-olds, seven-year-olds, eight-year-olds riddling.

SPEAKER_01 35:46

Yeah. Like, stop. You're an idiot. Let him be there. The army won't even take them, or the military won't take them if they're on Riddling. So that ought to tell you, you know, parents that are big Riddling sports out there, that uh something might not be right if they're gonna let your kid go into the military services.

SPEAKER_00 35:59

Like, it's it's good that I don't, I can't sit still. It's good that my mind doesn't rest. I need those things. My like I was telling my wife this the other day. I don't know if other men are like this. I don't know if other I know other business owners are like this because you have to be.

SPEAKER_01 36:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:14

But my mind's constantly going.

SPEAKER_01 36:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:16

My mind's constantly thinking about the next thing. Oh, yeah. How oh, oh, oh shit, I need to, I need to do that. Yeah. Oh, wait, oh, right. I like that.

SPEAKER_01 36:24

My problem is I'll have 100 and I'll never write them down that's fine. We'll do we'll get back to it. We'll get back to them.

SPEAKER_00 36:28

My brain will circle back too. My circus will come back, bro. It'll be back. No, man. But yeah, don't don't inhibit that. Like if you're if you're someone who's constantly go, first of all, pursue that.

SPEAKER_02 36:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:41

If your brain is constantly thinking about something, if it's the right thing, if it can serve you purpose in life, it gives if it can bring you value, do it. Fucking go. Do it. Go do that. I love it. Don't do anything else.

SPEAKER_01 36:53

Do that. At least give it more than a couple hours though. Yeah, make sure you're consumed with it, buddy.

SPEAKER_00 36:59

Make sure it's like year over year. Yeah. You know, make sure you're like me. Like, it's so funny. I ended up doing construction for like 10 years, you know, from when I was 16 to 26. I was working in road construction. Um, because it was my dad's business, and it was something that I was working to take over. And uh the whole entire time, I'm like skipping class listening to Dan Patrick's show. You know who Dan Patrick is? It's like I'm like skipping class to listen to these radio shows that I love and these streaming platforms and these guys who've branched out and become their own business and become their own content creators and like all of these things. And I'm like consumed with these things at 15, 16, 17 years old. And then I go to college and I have just like one little bump in the road. Yeah, and everybody's like, just go into business, man. Just get a basic business degree, give up on that dream, and just like be a normal business guy.

SPEAKER_02 37:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:49

I'm like, all right, be a business guy, get into business and fucking hate it. I'm like, I'm I'm I don't hate it, but I'm never gonna pursue this with like the intent to be great at it.

SPEAKER_02 38:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:00

So I can't do it. I can't do something that I can't not think about all day long. Like I need that.

SPEAKER_01 38:06

But most people too that are like successful musicians, people like that. I mean, you know, like I said, you perfect your art and you become, you know, not just a commodity of millions of people that learned how to play guitar, but you become a master at it. I mean, people will come to you, people will will flock to you, right? And I I know that uh I know that the things that you're doing, um, because even even Brooks, so it's funny here. So we have Austin Bruce, who works with us, and Brooks Whitley. So when Brooks came in, I said, Hey man, my ADD goes whack, and I call you something something different. Don't get mad at me. But uh, you know, Brooks is uh, you know, his family went to Georgia, a big dogs fan, and he was just like, when I told him you're coming, you would you would have thought, like, you know, I would have been like Sophia Loren when she was alive, that would have been cooler. So yeah, he's good too. And he was so psyched about it. So I mean you've got some good loyal fans, and that's I mean, that's key, right? I mean, I think you gotta have the loyal fans that they believe in you.

SPEAKER_00 39:00

And I think the loyalty only comes with the originality. Like, you they resonate with what you're doing, and if you're not being yourself, that's probably not gonna be something that resonates with them. And you're right, it is the energy. Like, I do fucking love this stuff, man. It's good stuff. Like, I love it. I love doing this, like I love talking, I love communicating, I love building relationships. Like I had a football coach in college, Phil Jones, RIP. Um, used to talk about relationships all the time. He said, Football is a great game, but it's it's a matter of life, like it's a prospect of life, and it's no different than anything else. Where like you walk into a room with a stranger, there is something between you two that you can form a relationship upon. There's some commonality that you share somewhere that you can develop a relationship with. And I find that when I'm staring into a camera like this, I'm I'm staring into the abyss. I'm looking at you know, the person across another, and I'm just trying to develop a relationship. And the only way to do that is to be honest and forthcoming with who you are and not bullshit anything. Yeah, just and positive energy. Go.

SPEAKER_01 40:04

And yeah, a lot of juice. Like in the juice. A lot of juice. I mean, and people don't realize, but energy, you know, give energy is give and take. I you I can tell, and I have my wife always used to get mad at me because I've come in and I'd meet something like my guy's a dick. I don't like her. And she's like, you know, you haven't even spent any time with him. You know, I'm like, no, I can feel it. I can feel it. Yeah, he's an asshole. I don't and I don't want to hang around him. You know, I don't want to hang around anyone that isn't sharing ideas or having energy, or you know, I don't want to be around them as you get older. And I think uh I think that's some good advice to people. Like, you don't you don't have to deal with assholes if you don't hey kids, you don't have to deal with assholes if you don't want to be around them.

SPEAKER_00 40:39

You ever seen Yellowstone?

SPEAKER_01 40:40

Yeah, that's good.

SPEAKER_00 40:41

So, Rip, there's a point where he walks up to Jimmy and he tells him, he says, uh, there's two things in this world, Jimmy. There's sharks and there's minnows. And if you don't know which one you are, you ain't a fucking shark. And I think that's true, and I love the statement, but I also think there's a third animal in this amalgamation, if you will, and it's snakes. There are people who are out here just eating the other because they're a shark and there's shark behaviors. And some people would call that alpha behavior, right? Like I'm gonna eat or be eaten type shit. And I'm fine with those people. Like if I sit across from you and I know you are an alpha, or if I know you are a shark, we can we can swim in the same waters. I'm good. And if you're a minnow, that's fine. There's a lot of minnows in this world, there's a lot of rounded edges in this world. There's a lot of people who are just, you know, they float with the ocean and they're fine. But if you're a snake, if you're out here slithering around with devious behavior, you need your head cut off. I can't be around you. I cannot associate with you, I can't be around you, I can't deal with you.

SPEAKER_01 41:39

So yeah, I I think we both agree. No, nobody wants any snakes, and I think you see a lot of that in business in general, and in people that are aren't genuine or or can't think of their own ideas or or steal your ideas. I know in a lot of the world with with competition, a lot of people, a lot of people take what salt the MF as wrong. Like they they really think like we're the fucking good guys. And they think like, you know, MF, you guys are you know bad guys doing something different. And I think you just kind of have to uh you just kind of uh gotta ignore some of these people. But it's interesting when people when we first started, they said, hey, and I can't tell, I can't tell a story because we tried to get a uh I won't do it because I I think I don't I don't think it'd be right, but we tried to get someone that just went to the pros to um to be uh you know one of our kind of athletes, and they were okay with it. And uh their dad said that uh you know, my kid will never represent anyone that has MF in their name. And then something happened pretty drastic, and uh I I call one of my friends and go, well, maybe he should reconsider maybe his kid's not all white and clean like he thinks it was. So it was kind of it was kind of funny, like that they were thinking like we were bad or it would hurt someone's reputation, and then the kid went off and did something absolutely stupid, you know.

SPEAKER_00 42:53

I understand this idea of like I guess the the PC culture is the wrong term, but like, dude, I cuss. Okay, I'm sorry. I'm 28 years old. You know, I'm 28 years old. I I grew up in a household, I grew up on construction sites. Oh, yeah, you know, it it people swear it fucking happens.

SPEAKER_01 43:12

You know what I mean? I'm 55, I'm brad.

SPEAKER_00 43:18

I'm brad, I cuss. No, but like, how how else do you I mean, how else do you describe what you were trying to describe? I want salty motherfuckers. Like I want I want someone who has some something about them.

SPEAKER_01 43:30

Yeah, you know, like yeah, it's it's just like you, your life is salty. I mean, you know, it it it's not it's not to any genre, it's not to any, you know, demographic, it's not to any gender. It's like, you know, hey, my grandmother's pretty salty, my granddad was salty, my dad was salty, you know. I know a lot of salty people that didn't never got never got any credit, never got recognized, never, you know. So the whole idea is like have real people that are honest, open. Uh tell us their life stories. I mean, I think it's really cool that we're talking about this and we haven't really talked anything really about football to an extent or dogs or what you're doing. And you know, that's cool because uh look, it's life.

SPEAKER_00 44:15

Dude, like the more I am obsessed with football. I was up till one o'clock last night studying football. I was. But like the more I get into this and the more I understand that like success is tied to the other things. It's it's nine times out of ten, success is tied to the things you're doing outside of your own work.

unknown 44:33

Right.

SPEAKER_00 44:34

Like, if you're if you as a person are not working on you and you're not trying to open up and trying to find out, hey, how do I improve this about myself? Like, clearly I have a drinking problem. How do I address that? Well, this is how I do it. Well, the origination was finding that the problem, anyways. And like, if you're not, if you're not inward thinking, if you're not working on yourself, particularly as men, you're just not gonna be successful. You're just not. So the football is important. Do it. That's my job to understand football and to be able to communicate football and make football entertaining on my content. Yeah, but that's not who I am, that's not why I am. Those things are tied into what we're talking about.

SPEAKER_01 45:14

Well, you know, and we all think we're so different, right? I mean, I'm a lot older than you, whatever, but we all think we're so different. If you really look at the commonalities of people and you really sit down and talk with someone and really figure out who they are, what they're about, whatever, we're not that different. Like it, and it's it's like we try to divide people and this whole divisiveness in the country and all the between genders and race. It's it's bullshit. Yeah. You sit down one-to-one with a person, you can have a conversation, you can debate. And what I what I don't like in the world today is no one can debate. Like you and I sit down and well, I like Georgia, well, I like Alabama, tell me I like Alabama. You know, we can debate that and in the end, like, you know, not be pissed off because somebody like there's a few people like Nick Saban out there. But you know, my my point in that is is uh I think people just uh they they need to just like listen, shut the hell up, and and have a conversation.

SPEAKER_00 46:08

So it's the extended conversations is what's neat. So like what I was talking about earlier. Like I I enjoy this. I think this is what we're supposed to, as humans, this is how we're supposed to interact.

SPEAKER_02 46:17

Right.

SPEAKER_00 46:18

We're damn sure not supposed to interact in 160 characters, like we were made to do on social media. We're forced into this. Like, you better get your opinion out and you better be loud as hell. You better let everybody know right now this is how I feel. And that's how you do it on social media. That's not how conversations are supposed to be had. It's damn sure not how debates are supposed to be had. Like the idea that we're gonna like sit here and debate, and I get two minutes to explain my position, and you get two minutes to explain your position. This example, me answering right now was 90 seconds. Yeah. How am I supposed to explain who I am, what I am, how I feel about something, and to its full extent in 90 seconds, two minutes. You're not, you're not gonna, you're not gonna effectively communicate that way.

SPEAKER_01 46:58

And I think people need to understand like that people come from different backgrounds, different socioeconomic. And reality is you're never gonna see it eye to eye with people, anyways, on everything. You're you're not. You can find common ground, like that's the most unifying thing. It's like you went all this COVID bullshit thing and they started closing down sports events. You know the one thing that unifies everybody? Sports. Sports. Sports. You go in a bar, you can be an Indian, an Irishman, a Scottishman, or whatever. And man, you got your Philadelphia Eagles or Georgia Bulldogs shirt. You're the boys, you're family. The one unifying thing, and that's the greatest thing about sports, is it unifies everybody, all walks where you don't have to be a great athlete, you could be a terrible athlete, whatever it may be. I coached this kid one time, he knew everything about football, a little Indian kid. I called him scrap battle. He was awesome, great kid. Wasn't gonna be a wasn't gonna be a high school football player, wasn't gonna be college football, whatever. But he loved the game. And he loved it, and like to me, that was one of my favorite people because he got it at a five or six-year-old kid. He knew it, like he got it, you know, and he loved the game. And that that was just that was awesome. It was one of one of my best experiences.

SPEAKER_00 48:05

I think one thing I've learned from this conversation, and especially you speaking about the the energy and the passion. I think passion is palpable. Yeah, like you feel it. Yeah, someone walks in a room and they love something, you feel it. Yeah, and you don't even have to be in the room, you can be through the camera. Yeah, no doubt. If they're bringing the juice and they're bringing the love, like you feel it.

SPEAKER_01 48:22

What were you saying before on the TV? What did you say you had to have that presence that uh what do you call it? Emphatic energy? You know, where you were talking about where we're oh uh the mute test. Mute test, yeah. I I I never heard that, but to explain that because the audience, because that's I thought that was cool. Well, that was a good way to.

SPEAKER_00 48:37

So airport television is what we were talking about. And I have uh a thing called the mute test, and I think Stephen A. Smith is the definition of the mute test. If you're on television nowadays, I better be able to turn the volume off, okay, no sound, and be able to know that you're fucking cooking. That whatever you're talking about, you are just here, man. You're out here giving it. Like, you don't have to be outrageous with the take. You know what I mean? Like, I don't have hot takes. I start my show, I'll tell you by intros, I start my show with a little thing called uh Nothing but Rance, the show where I find topics that I'm oddly passionate about and I pontificate upon them. These are not hot takes, but rather takes that I'm hot about. So if you watch me, man, you can turn that fucking sound off. And you know, man, this guy, he was looking forward to this all day. This dude's coming in here ripping. Like, that's what I tell myself, like before I go on that camera. And I try to apply that in life, man. Like, I if you're juiceless, man, get the fuck out. Like, I don't want you around me. If you're one of these, I don't want you, I don't want you around me, I don't want you in my energy. You're fucking with my function. Like, I gotta have juice, man. I gotta have people around me that are juiceful. Um, but this is newfound in me. Like this this idea that I want to have like exuberant energy and I wanna I want to be passionate about what I'm doing. This is new to me. This isn't been around forever. And if you knew me at 17, you probably would agree.

SPEAKER_01 50:00

Yeah, but you know, I like I said, that whole maturation process. I mean, you you people go through it. I've gone through my life, I had kids, all that stuff. Now my kids are getting older, they're going out. You kind of find yourself again because you have time for yourself, you have time to do stuff, you have time to pursue things, and you don't have to worry about you know, necessarily, you know, providing everything for those little guys, which you have little guys now and a guy and girl. But so to me, it's like when someone told me that whole adoption thing, I was like, man, I'm like, I'm brand new, man. I just found some shit out. They're like, shit, I really am brand new because this wasn't this, that wasn't that. I can be whatever I want to be. So I think through life, people think it's over. Like, oh, you reached 40, oh shit, it's over. Oh, you reached 50, oh shit, you're gone. Oh, you reached 60. It's never too late to find that passion and bring it out and you know, just kind of put it out there, man. It's gotta be talented. You gotta be talking about some type of talent. Yeah. How talent or don't be boring. Yeah. You can you cannot be talented. It's like that kid that uh my kids used to watch this kid that would open like toys and stuff. I never see this kid, but the kid was making like 20 million bucks a year. And all he did was sit in front of a camera and like open a toy and bring out the dinosaur and play with it and think what he thought. And I was like, God, this it's almost mesmerizing, though. I mean, it's stupid as shit, but you know, it's mesmerizing. So maybe you can open toys or something if you you don't have any talent.

SPEAKER_00 51:21

Nah, I think uh I think we've found a niche in the film stuff. To be honest with you, man, we're doing all right. Yeah, no doubt, no doubt. Nah, man, but I think if if it comes down to like if you are creating content or if like if you want to do something like this one day, I think we were we were talking about the word different. I don't think different is the proper term when it comes to creating content. I think you have to be unique. Um, I think you have to stand out, and you're like you have to create the content first. You're not really gonna find out what you're unique about until you start taking the shots and start producing the content. Like I was producing content for three or four years before I found out, oh, I'm uniquely gifted at football knowledge. Yeah. So I better be pounding that, you know. Um so once I figured out that, hey, my audience is clearly in search of someone who can explain and break down football to them. Well, I hunted that, and that's all I did for a little while. And then you start to build on to everything else. But once you find what you're uniquely gifted at, what you're uniquely talented at, go. That's it.

SPEAKER_01 52:21

Well, that's good advice for all the aspiring, you know, media presence, specifically in sports, football, basketball, whatever it may be. Um, you know, that that's great advice because I that was gonna be a question I was gonna ask you. Like for young Brooke Austin's out there and just getting started, you know, what advice would you do them? And you just you kind of just gave them that advice.

SPEAKER_00 52:40

And the only other thing I was like, it was so hard to you look at other people and you're like, I'm better than him, or I'm better than her, why is she getting the gift? And or why she getting the brakes? Why he getting the brakes? What's going on with me? I used to have a football coach used to talk about like horses and they have the blinders on their head on their face, right? They put the horse blinders on them. And the reason that being is because they want to run their own race. Yeah, they don't want them looking at their peripherals. And he would talk, he would apply that to football. He's like, hey man, just run your race, man. Be out here and do you and have laser focus on what you're trying to do. Because any of this outside noise is going to impact your ultimate like trajectory, like how you go about your business, if you're worrying about other people, it's gonna impact you. So just like put the horse blinders on and be a harder worker than everybody else. And something you're talented at.

SPEAKER_01 53:31

Yeah, that's so true. Because I remember even playing sports, I remember like I would be so focused, like when we were in a game or something, people would be screaming and yelling, whatever. And like I was looking back, I was thinking about that, and I didn't hear anything. I guess literally looking back, I like and people are screaming and yelling and whatever. And I think like that's the part of that I miss in sports, like that. You're sitting there, you got your visors on, just like you said, right? You're so zoned in on something. And I think if you can find that in work or you know, whatever you want to aspire to be, and you can get to that point where you can block all that out, then you can do some you can do some really amazing stuff.

SPEAKER_00 54:10

Sports psychologist psychiatrists have actually studied it, psychologists have extra studies, they call it the flow state. So it is when your body and your mind have matched up into something that you are like you're in the zone, if you will, where have you ever seen for the love of the game? Yeah, yeah. Remember when he like clears the mechanism? It's like that's what it feels like. Yeah, when you reach your flow state, ain't you ain't seeing nothing else, man. Like you're only focused on what you're doing.

SPEAKER_01 54:35

Yeah, that's awesome. Well, I mean, I you know, I I think this has been awesome. You know, for those of you listening that thought we were only talking about Georgia Bulldogs, you'll have to go and listen, uh, you'll have to listen to uh Brooks Austin on his show. Uh, this is more about life and uh the way he felt about stuff. And I mean, I've really man, I've enjoyed you. I haven't spent a lot of time around you, but I've met you a couple times. And uh, you know, I hope I hope you'll come back and you know, we can you know cut the shit, whatever, do stuff with like this, or we can come back and show by the way. Uh I appreciate that. You know, I'm a pretty I'm a pretty uh normal kind of guy, and uh I mean I enjoy this stuff. I was I've been blessed uh many times. Salty was a blessing to us. It was kind of something at a later age that I always wanted to do and uh you know kind of have the heart of an 18-year-old at 55, and we're gonna fucking do it. So just do it, dude. Well, anything you want to say in closing? Because it's been it's been awesome.

SPEAKER_00 55:29

No, I mean, I I had this one, not that I'm like some philosophizer or anything like this, but I had since this is kind of a people watch this to learn about life. I learned this one the other day. I was I was driving home, and this was during my every spring I take a long trip. I see as many high schools as I possibly can. This year I saw 37 schools in 17 days. So we're everywhere from like northwest Georgia up in the mountains all the way down to Valdasta. We try to cover the state and see as many great players as we can. And in the meanwhile, I was also producing my shows, my live streams, Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. So I'm exhausted. And one of the days I was driving home and I had to get on and do a live show for an hour by myself in like 90 minutes, and I had no show notes, I had nothing. I was just like feeling sorry for myself. I was like, I don't want to fucking do this. But I promised my my people I would do this. So I like self-talked my way into doing it. But it wasn't enough because I had no show plan. Like I was still like I was mentally prepared to go do it, but I had nothing. So I'm like reaching out to my guys that are helping me produce now, and I'm reaching out to my wife, and I'm telling, I'm like putting my plight on them. Like, this is what I got going on. And next thing I know, my producers are rat-a-tat-tatting me with show topics. And by the time I drove home, I had a show prepared. I had what I was gonna talk about was ready. And when I get home, my wife already has my coffee ready for me that I go every show because she knew, she knew I was struggling, and she had a note for me. And I came to a realization there's two things that are important. Okay, you're only as good as the the thoughts that you allow yourself to have and the people you surround yourself with. Meaning you're only gonna mentally be prepared for what you tell yourself you're allowed to. Like whatever your self-talk is, that's it. All right. But the other thing is what your team is, who you surround yourself with, that's it. If you have good self-talk and you got good people around you, you'd be alright.

SPEAKER_01 57:20

Well, you heard it, guys. Brooks Austin just told us uh the success in life. Um, and uh, I really enjoyed you being on, and I and I have an idea since I've ADD, I'm gonna flip it up now because I'll forget it. Is uh so when you're going around to all these high schools, you know, as us, we've done some stuff in the NIL stuff and we're sponsoring kids, but we started this um salty spotlight for high school kids because we we want it's about the kid, it's not about us. Like we want to highlight them, we want to do video. Maybe we could do something in collab, and when you're out finding guys, we could do stuff and spotlight them and and give them, you know, we give them free gear and stuff, but um can't pay the high school kids. But but I that might be a really good idea. I'd love to maybe we can go offline on that.

SPEAKER_00 58:04

Yeah, no doubt. I I I think there's only one other person in the industry that sees more high school kids than me, and that's Jeremy Johnson. And I know who you are. I'm running you down, bro. I've come over you. Salty's on the team.

SPEAKER_01 58:16

Well, hey, you know, so salty nation, we appreciate you. We're talking to Brooks Austin. You can check him out, um, the Dogs uh Daily. Uh check him out. He's known as a film guy, but more or less he's he's a good person. He's a talented guy. Uh watch him, listen to him. Um, I don't think I could stream like that. Um I think I'd bore the shit out of people. But uh uh stay tuned to the next uh Salty Meth Go. Let's go.