My First Million - Meet The Man Behind Conor McGregor’s +$650M Empire

Episode Date: August 22, 2023

Episode 487: Shaan Puri (https://twitter.com/ShaanVP) and Sam Parr (https://twitter.com/theSamParr) talk with Audie Attar (https://twitter.com/audieattar) — the man behind Conor McGregor's +$650M empire. Audie pulls back the curtain on the MMA business empire he's built, sharing the behind-the-scenes story of signing and working with big names like Michael Bisping and Conor McGregor. He offers an inside look into the economics of the Mayweather vs. McGregor and dissects the evolution, explosive growth, and structure of MMA. He also addresses the challenges and public criticisms McGregor’s faced. Whether you're an MMA superfan or simply interested in the business side of combat sports, you’ll enjoy this conversation with the manager who helped shape modern MMA. Want to see more MFM? Subscribe to the MFM YouTube channel here. — Check Out Sam's Stuff: • Hampton - https://www.joinhampton.com/ • Ideation Bootcamp - https://www.ideationbootcamp.co/ • Copy That - https://copythat.com/ Check Out Shaan's Stuff: • Try Shepherd Out - https://www.supportshepherd.com/ • Shaan's Personal Assistant System - http://shaanpuri.com/remoteassistant • Power Writing Course - https://maven.com/generalist/writing • Small Boy Newsletter - https://smallboy.co/ • Daily Newsletter - https://www.shaanpuri.com/ — Show Notes: (0:00) Intro (6:13) Early UFC days (9:17) Signing Michael Bisping and discovering Conor McGregor (13:20) How Audie signed Conor (17:15) What’s it like managing fighters? (19:45) How they created Proper Twelve (23:00) The value of owning a brand vs. doing sponsorships (28:30) McGregor vs. Mayweather payout (34:00) The appetite for blockbuster boxing matches (45:00) What was it like after the Proper Twelve exit? (52:21) How he handles McGregor’s criticisms and allegations (57:24) Advice to his younger self (01:03:31) Conor's transition from beloved fighter to highly criticized (01:09:40) Closing thoughts on UFC — Links: • Audie’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/audieattar • Audie’s IG - https://www.instagram.com/audieattar/ • Do you love MFM and want to see Sam and Shaan's smiling faces? Subscribe to our Youtube channel. — Past guests on My First Million include Rob Dyrdek, Hasan Minhaj, Balaji Srinivasan, Jake Paul, Dr. Andrew Huberman, Gary Vee, Lance Armstrong, Sophia Amoruso, Ariel Helwani, Ramit Sethi, Stanley Druckenmiller, Peter Diamandis, Dharmesh Shah, Brian Halligan, Marc Lore, Jason Calacanis, Andrew Wilkinson, Julian Shapiro, Kat Cole, Codie Sanchez, Nader Al-Naji, Steph Smith, Trung Phan, Nick Huber, Anthony Pompliano, Ben Askren, Ramon Van Meer, Brianne Kimmel, Andrew Gazdecki, Scott Belsky, Moiz Ali, Dan Held, Elaine Zelby, Michael Saylor, Ryan Begelman, Jack Butcher, Reed Duchscher, Tai Lopez, Harley Finkelstein, Alexa von Tobel, Noah Kagan, Nick Bare, Greg Isenberg, James Altucher, Randy Hetrick and more. — Other episodes you might enjoy: • #224 Rob Dyrdek - How Tracking Every Second of His Life Took Rob Drydek from 0 to $405M in Exits • #209 Gary Vaynerchuk - Why NFTS Are the Future • #178 Balaji Srinivasan - Balaji on How to Fix the Media, Cloud Cities & Crypto • #169 - How One Man Started 5, Billion Dollar Companies, Dan Gilbert's Empire, & Talking With Warren Buffett • ​​​​#218 - Why You Should Take a Think Week Like Bill Gates • Dave Portnoy vs The World, Extreme Body Monitoring, The Future of Apparel Retail, "How Much is Anthony Pompliano Worth?", and More • How Mr Beast Got 100M Views in Less Than 4 Days, The $25M Chrome Extension, and More

what was reported, I think, was 30 to Connor and 100 to Floyd. Was that what was reported? I think it was certainly higher for Connor than I know. And, you know, for Floyd, I would imagine it would be probably around there or higher, just depending on what he did again. Wow. You really think that $100 million was true. Well, I mean, I, Connor was, you know, I'd say just under 100, right,

when it's all said and done. So that's his part. So again, he has a part, we had a partner in the UFC. So, and I won't get into the specifics. But yeah, so from Floyd's side, it's very reasonable to think that he could have pulled in 100, assuming that he didn't take it all. I feel like I can rule the world. I know I could be what I want to.

I put my all in it like no days off. Audi, I see all these interviews with you. I see you on the UFC, like, behind the scene stuff, and you're always wearing slick suits. And you're just nice right now. but I just saw that you're drinking out of a Stanley mug. Just to remind everyone at home that no matter how fancy someone is, we all have a little basicness inside of us. You know, I always say like, you know, it's business, much like sports.

You have to, you know, you wear your uniform to play the game, right? But we're all human at the end of the day. We all have our casual clothes or, you know, are at home. I've only seen one interview you. And I've watched a bunch of interviews. There's only one interview that you weren't wearing a suit. you're wearing like Lulu Lemon and a hat. I'm going to have to switch it up now, man.

I have to switch it up. But it's a pleasure to meet you guys, man. You should Zig and Zag the other way because I think a lot of people in the like agents, talent management, they all are all like very slick looking. You should go the other way, right? Like you should go at leisure as your main thing because you were an athlete. So I feel like you can pull that off. And a lot of guys in that space will all look like suits to, you know, in comparison.

I'm going to have to, man. I'm going to have to make people remember that I was actually one of them before I became a suit. Well, there was some bum out there in San Francisco who was the first person to wear just like, you know, pajama bottoms and a T-shirt instead of a suit. You just, that's your burden now, I guess. I was from Cali, too. So I got to start just rocking flip-flops. You know what I mean?

Just all go with the flip-lops in the shorts. In Silicon Valley, it's like the opposite. Like, I remember when I first moved here, I went to like this nice kind of like club speakeasy type thing. and everybody's waiting in line and a guy walks up with a hoodie and it just looks completely disheveled and the bouncers know like all right this guy's either homeless or a billionaire

we don't know which one we gotta just err on the side of maybe this is like the next Mark Zuckerberg let him in let him in first go that way I realize oh shit the status game is different here that's funny I heard a lot about that yeah certainly counterculture if you will to business the novel

the New York the New York hustle is all suit and tie whereas the San Francisco hustle is definitely flipped blobs and holes in your t-shirt. So your introduction here is, you've done a bunch of stuff. So you've started Paradigm, which is, you just call it an agency, a sports agency, sports management company? I'd say it's a sports management and entertainment platform.

It's what it is. Platform, all right, with the most famous guy being Conn McGregor, but I also think you have Izzy. Do you have one more champion on there? I thought you had three. So Izzy's a former client of ours, but definitely was an amazing client while he was with us. Michael Bisbing. Michael Bisbing.

Steve I want to boy, Thompson, Michael Venompage, Rieko Verhoeven, past clients. I was actually one of my first clients. That's how I got into the sport. But yeah, I'm very fortunate to work with some of the greatest fighters of all time. Yeah, so just a bunch of ballers. But then you also co-founded Proper 12, which we're going to ask you all about it. But according to the headlines, it was like a $600 million exit. So you've had some maybe even more success.

there than the main thing. What's cool is, so you run a talent, kind of like, let's say, well, part of your business is talent management,

talent agency. And that's cool. There's a bunch of our audience that also owns agencies, which I think is great. But what I liked about you is that you have also kind of the venture side. So you're like creating brands and business ventures off the talent. And we've talked about these kind of creator brands in the past.

We had, you know, Mr. Beast on here and he's got all these kind of like feastables. He's got other, you know, corporate brands underneath it. We had an Instagram. starred Danny Austin come on and she's got divvy like a hair care brand that's doing

you know way more money than she can get kind of just in versus like influencer brand deals and so what I like is that you've got and Rob Deerick yeah Rob Deerick you've got both and that's been a theme that we've kind of been playing with so I think we'll we'll try to hop around a little bit but I definitely bless you bless you I mean I'll be remiss by then give you those two sorry oh wow what a gentleman look at that they edit it out and then that's not that's that's a character shower right there i'm like i'm talking if sam's dying over there i'm going to finish my point i don't care yeah he's good he'll come back yeah no no i appreciate the recognition look at i mean we we certainly i feel we're one of the early

um you know platforms slash agencies if you will that really saw not only um you know an opportunity but more so wanted to do more for our clients, right? We wanted to disrupt our respective industry, but also think far beyond that and not just think transactional. And for me, in mixed martial arts, it was an underserved market. And we wanted to not only advocate for our clients, but advocate for the sport, really push fighter, fighter not only earnings higher and higher, which still have a long way to go, but they've come a long way from when we first started back in 2009 in the sport. And we were very fortunate because we came in right before the first, you know, rights deal was actually paid.

You know, the UFC was paying to be on Spike prior to the Fox deal. And as, you know, most people know, that's the main economic driver of any professional sports organization, whether it's the NFL, the NBA, and now obviously from a mixed martial arts perspective, the UFC. They were paying Spike to put themselves on TV? That's publicly no. they were actually, you know, paying for that airtime. So the original ultimate fighter and then all that was broadcast on Spike back in the day,

yeah, they were not only funding their own production, but they were paying for that airtime. And Fox was that really first paid deal that the UFC garnered, you know, which was a monumental milestone for the sport and for the promotion. And sport of mixed martial arts, you know, is it wouldn't be here without the UFC. which is the catalyst for where the sport is today. Now you have other promotions that are competing. And promotion is very synonymous with leagues, right?

So when you talk about leagues, you know, there's certain terminologies within sports world that are very similar, although there's a lot of differences as well, right, in terms of, you know, athletes in the NFL NBA being employees and then fighters being independent contractors. So for us,

we saw an opportunity of it not only being the fastest growing sport in an underserved market for the athletes, but then also, really thinking beyond just management. How could we create, you know, more value for the clients? And, you know, it takes a special personality like Connor McGregor. So I was very fortunate to sign him 10 years ago. And, you know, and we had a vision.

And he was very, very bullish about that vision as well. Let's rewind. Let's rewind to that. So you, your story is kind of the, I'll give the first part very fast. So you play football at UCLA, end up getting injured. you move into management side of things. You got some kind of football players

as your first client. And then you branch into MMA and you discover Connor McGregor. Can you tell the story? How did you discover Connor? What was his situation like at that time? And what was those kind of the first meeting? It takes us back to those days.

Yeah, sure. So I think taking it back to the first days, the early days really working with guys like Chris Lytle, right? Getting into the business or working with a guy like that. I got to work with him for one fight and he retired. So then it was being able to sign Michael Bisping,

which was a massive opportunity for me. And someone that I'm so proud of not only as a client, but as a friend as well, went on to be the first British champion, first UFC champion from the UK. And he was a pioneer of mixed martial arts for all the up-and-coming athletes within Europe, you know, Ireland included. So I was very fortunate enough to start to work with Michael and

other clients as well earlier in my career in the UFC and mixed martial arts in particular. And so when I signed Connor was when he first came on to the UFC scene, right? He was fighting in the regional promotion in Europe, Cage Warriors, which is still around and still a, you know, let's call it a mid-major, if you will. And these are, to some extent, they're professional promotions, but their feeder programs from the larger promotions, if you will. And he had just signed to the UFC, and we were introduced,

interestingly enough, like, through Facebook. And at the time, it was, he was, you know, looking at signing with one of the agencies in the sport, and I got an opportunity to pitch him and coach his coach, John Kavanaugh, as to why I felt that we would be the best fit for him. So you got to put your best foot forward and give it a shot and hopefully you win that business.

And I was fortunate enough that we got the first opportunity actually to work with him heading into his first fight. We were saying, okay, well, let's pause now. Let's talk after his first fight. So he beats Marcus Brimidge. Was that the 50G's baby? That's the famous line that fight. And after that, his second fight was his U.S. debut actually against Mac. to Holloway and we started to work with with one another, um, heading into that fight. And so,

um, the rest is history. But one of the things, you know, we recognize is not only his athletic ability, but then he had special, a special, not only talent inside the octagon, but you could tell he was very special and charismatic. He had that it factor that, you know, is, is, you know, I think it's, it's once in a, it's once in a generation type of, of an athlete as well, not only from a physical perspective, but a qualitative perspective. And so, you know, the sky was going to be the limit in terms of what we could do together. And was that, I mean, I've seen all the, there's these older interviews where Connor still has acne, he has no tattoos.

And he says, like, you know, mark my words. You will see me in the UFC. We'll see me as a champion one day. And then, coming up, leading up to that Marcus fight. And then I think it was Dennis Silver in Boston, if I remember correctly. Like in the early days, you still see that he has some type of star power on camera. But behind the scenes, even at a young age in his early 20s, did you notice that the confidence and the Star Power was there

just in your normal hanging out sessions? Yeah, you could definitely see his charisma behind the scenes. And, you know, he was, like I said, he was very witty, very confident, but also very engaging. You know, I think one of the things I always tell people was that, you know, majority of people in the world know who Kahnama Gregor is. And I would argue that most of him have never seen him fight. They've actually seen more of his interviews and, and him talking because, you know,

when he talks, you can't take your eyes off at the process, right? He's just so fun. And whether you love him or hate him, you're watching him, you know? And that's, I think, what makes him special. Yeah, you find that Connor is kind of like we've had guys on this podcast that are like, yeah, I discovered Uber. I was like the fifth investor in Uber or, you know, like their early investors in Facebook or something like that, right? It's like an angel investment that goes on to become this, what do we call it?

It's like a unicorn, right? It's like this billion dollar brand that you discover at that early age. Were other people pitching him for business at that time? Because I remember that first Brimage fight. There was like a hype around him. Like even his entrance, people were like really excited about him. And I didn't know who he was at the time. So I don't even know how people were so.

excited about the guy at that time. So I imagine that, you know, there were other agents trying to win that business at that time. Do you have any good fun anecdotes or stories of like your hustle at that time to get him? Or was it like, no, people, it was kind of like an ignored asset. People didn't realize that this was going to be, that he was going to be a big deal. And it really, it didn't look like it was like this hotly contested thing. No, I definitely think that people were, were, you know,

you know, hot on him. But I think everybody was pitching him on the same idea. It was more transactional. And I think what were, where I stood out, Sterly, was because I had a broader vision. I had a broader vision of creating IP, you know, and creating media and content, but also creating business ventures, right?

And I really was bullish on that idea. And I remember even when I first launched paradigm in 2009, my business plan was not only to be the best in class from a management perspective, but build, clients, media and IP, whereby building more brand equities to them. And that will yield not only more answer their revenues from a sponsorship perspective, but increase their value from their playing contract or perspective athletically.

And also leads to business ventures. And, you know, I was laughed at when I first had that business plan. It's too busy, focused on what you could do, you know. And I think that that's what stood out to him because he had that vision to himself as well. And it was even if you think about what we did back in 2017 with the Floyd fight, I mean, everybody thought we were crazy, you know, that that fight was never going to happen. And everybody doubted us, everybody, even some of those ended up doing the deal and partnering with us. So ultimately, you know, we had to believe in ourselves and more importantly go out and actually execute, right?

Because you can have dreams, you can have visions, you can start something. but if you don't execute successfully, it means nothing. And now that trend is common. Those exhibitions now are commonplace. You see everybody now taking place in these exhibitions, and there's an appetite from a consumer perspective for these unique matchups where people are matched up from different sports just to compete in combat sports.

And then we even launched our venture on the back of that. We launched proper 2018. And so, you know, again, at that time, I think it was maybe George Clooney and maybe Puff Daddy at the time, you know, but I don't think anybody else now, like spirits, everybody has some type of a liquor brand that they're hawk in. And then Ventures is commonplace as well. So, you know, to me, I'm proud of the fact that we had this vision

that we were able to execute more importantly, you know, because it's very hard to do. It's hand-to-hand combat every day, entrepreneurship. I want to ask you about the proper 12 stuff. but before that. So, like, I grew up watching Entourage. And so you see, like, Ari Emanuel or Ari Gold dealing with, like, crazy young actors who have money and money. And it's like, you know, drugs and sex. And then Ballers, it's like drugs and sex as well. But the difference between, you know, ballers, what's NFL? But then there's the difference I imagine with UFC fighters where it's,

you're not an actor. You're not a player. You're going to get out there in your underwear and fight to the death in front of millions of people. Can you, like, tell me a little bit about the difference between managing someone like Connor or an Izzy, like these, like, because I imagine them, are they crazy? What's that mindset like on a daily basis in that mentality, particularly when it comes to business? Are they, have you found that you've got to hold them back from being so aggressive sometimes or what's that like with that type of athlete?

Well, first of all, I don't think they're crazy per se. So it's not, you know, because of the profession or the sport that they're in. that they tend to be maybe a little bit, you know, crazy, so to speak, right? I mean, like, when I say crazy, I mean, like, high risk. Well, I think, look, it means, depending on the field you're in, that's subjective what you think high risk and not. Totally. Most people that come from, let's say, if you're a neurosurgeon,

you're going to think the combat sports is super high risk, right? But ultimately, I think every human being is different. There's certainly, there's certainly, when you're that competitive, you're going to be driven, you're going to be more aggressive. And I think I see it even in business. At the highest level, there's that chip on the shoulder. There's that edge that every high level competitor has, whether it's an athlete in different sports,

or whether it's a businessman or woman at the highest level of their respective field. So obviously, business acumen varies, right? So if you're talking about an institutional investor versus a professional athlete, that varies. But even within the sport, you have athletes that have a, very high-level business equity. I'm not trained from an institutional perspective. He didn't go get his MBA.

He doesn't have that academic background, as you will, right? But he's a very natural businessman. What's a story as an example of that? I mean, the story is proper 12. I mean, could have easily taken a check from a sponsorship perspective and been so short-sighted as opposed to putting up our own capital initially, finding the right operating partner, finding the right strategic capital, supply chain, route to market,

going out and creating our own, working without getting the sponsorship check for X amount of posts or Y amount of appearances, if you will, for an ultimate windfall that changes life and is generational wealth. So that in itself is a great example. Do you guys have like Jameson like, hey, we want to sponsor you? And you were like, dude, fuck this, Connor. Let's do our own thing.

He's always had a desire to get into whiskey. It's like he's Irish. It's part of their DNA, right? and his grandfather was a whiskey man. And we always had that idea when we were approached by a sponsor. And it was like, do we go and pursue a sponsorship and take a check? Or do we just go and own our own business? And when you study the category, you looked at the TAM and you looked at the opportunity,

you're like, this is right for disruption. We actually could really come in and do something here. Right. And so that's a perfect example of his natural business activity, right? because it's hard to do that. Especially at that level, he wasn't making, you know, a ton of money yet up until we got to the Floyd flight, which is, by the way, when we announced our entry into the market,

we announced our entry into the whiskey market in our Post-Fired Press conference. Yeah, I remember he's holding the glass. We started, though, the process in 2014. And we were doing a lot of research and development and pivoting from different groups. And ultimately, we found the right, you know, formula, if you will, on the right team, et cetera, right? And the rest is history. And that to me takes a lot of intelligence for an athlete to do that's not trained.

How does it have the experience of building a business and, you know, more over the patience, right, to really bet on himself? How much of your guys' capital did you put up to get it off the ground? And do you remember what your first year's sales was? Well, I'll tell you, I can't disclose all the information just due, strict confidentiality provisions that exist with our partners and our acquire. So I got to be safe. But I can tell you that we put up probably a few hundred thousand of our own capital initially.

I could say that, right? And that's, you know, I mean, that most of that went to lawyers, if you will, just before you can get started. So, but it's like strategically, I think the way we set it up, and we has great partners, you know, one of our partners is an operating genius and is a wizarding. genius and is a wizard in the spirits business Ken Austin so I gotta give him shout out because I yeah he had another company right I mean he did Avion

then he did property with us he's done Taramata now he's in the Lolo John Jayla he's a he's a jeep when it comes to the spirit business you know and when you find people like that are you doing just like a like a 30 30 30 30 like you guys all split equity

I can't go into the details of the cap table I wish I could but again there's strong confidentiality provisions in all agreement. But it's a fair deal, and I think everybody's happy in the end. But moreover, you bring on a black belt that knows what they're doing. Because at the end of the day, that's part of operating a business and being successful. It's like, you know what you don't know, but essentially, no matter what the cap table looks like, you've got to make sure you bring on the right expertise, right? From operational perspective, you have to have all the right

ingredients to be able to execute successfully. So even with something like that, let's say, just to put this in perspective, so the decision to say, well, we could just take a straight sponsorship deal, get a check, make a few Instagram posts, and, you know, cash that check versus we're going to do the entrepreneurial work and actually build a brand. The payoff difference, I imagine, you could tell me from it. I think it's probably 100 to 1. Would that be approximate?

So like, you know, if you just say, okay, over a few years, we would have a kind of an alcohol sponsor and we're doing, you know, kind of these scheduled posts with them or commercials with them or whatever it may be. I think it's probably something like 50 to 100 X bigger return by doing the work. Is that? I would say it's a multiple of that. A few hundred do a lot. How much what a sponsor should have been? I mean, I mean, back in that, back at that time, you know, when we first started the process, it would have been. like 250,000 or something like that.

I would have been a big one. By the time we launched, he probably was in the seven bigger range. Yeah. In terms of sponsorship annually, right? That's like an annual deal? Annual deal, right? Yeah.

Okay, so a million, some millions per year in order to promote a whiskey. Versus hundreds of millions. Yeah, exactly. So I would say, I would say like it was, you know, you could run any, you know, analysis in an NPV and look at like how we won

and one big. You talked about the Mayweather McGregor thing, how that came to, like how that, nobody thought that that was going to happen and then it actually happened. And it was kind of amazing.

I remember vividly where I was. I was in Australia and I had to get up at a certain time. I was at a bar at like five in the morning or something like that to watch that fight. But I also remember the buildup. Like there was the kind of back and forth, almost flirting on social media, talking trash to each other to try to generate interest. Because I think both guys,

Floyd and Connor, are probably the two smartest businessmen ever that come through combat sports. And they kind of knew, okay, this is the right dance partner for us to like execute something, orders of magnitude bigger than what we could do. And I remember at the time, it was seen as almost like the Elon Musk's Mark Zuckerberg thing today

or it's like, wow, it'd be crazy if it happened, but there's no way. I mean, just to get all these people, to get them to everyone to agree, seemed impossible. Can you take us back? Like, you know, like, I see all these videos. If you like hanging out at Connor's house or whatever and like you get you know the behind the scene stuff there had to have been just like a couch conversation where you guys like okay could we do this how could we do this what what was the early days like before it came to fruition so I to your point I think you know you have two of the smarter and shabby businessmen in combat sports that really understood you know the modern day fandom of both sports right and early days like he wants to do it and then it would be shot down

by UFC, by members of the media, by whoever that just doubted that it would ever happen. And I think that the banter is really what allowed it to happen. Because once they started going back and forth and you could actually see the level of engagement and interest from a market perspective and from a consumer perspective, it was hard to deny it, right? It was hard to deny it because it was like, this is real. It's viable. it's a win-win scenario and a win for all parties who'd be involved.

Why not, right? The fans want it, the fighters want it, and moreover, the numbers were speaking for themselves from an analytics perspective. So that allowed us to really use what the two fighters were intelligently doing on a very instinctive level, right? There wasn't planned, that wasn't scripted. It was very instinctive, but moreover, I think what my job is is to look at date and be like, right, there's something very viable here. There's something that, you know,

you have to be able to take and continue to advocate and push for your client because you could effectively have a successful business opportunity even for the UFC. And so I think it took them a while to come around, but eventually they did because they realized there was just such amazing and intense interest around this event that it was real. It wasn't. It wasn't. a gimmick. It was something that everybody wanted to see. And so I think that was credit to them, too, because again, it went against all their normal business practice. They'd never done something like that before. And it took, you know, I think for them to see the substance of it all to then move forward with us. And ultimately, it was a huge success. I mean, over four million buys. I mean,

I think there's probably, there was something, there was some report I remember receiving. We had like hundreds of millions of illegal streams. I mean, like, and we still did over four million buys. You know what I mean? Like, so could you imagine if, like, it was the most bootlegged fight ever? Yeah. If we would have just been able to even just plug some of those holes and how many more buys we would have had, right? But, I mean, it was such a commercial success.

I mean. Can I ask you a quick question about those buys? Yeah. So you said four million buys. I'm not attacking this strictly about this fight. But when I see pay-per-view numbers, like what the headlines are, I think most of them are complete bullshit. I think that with a fighter says, like, for example, I remember Floyd has multiple times said

he's earned nine figures, so 100 plus million off of one fight. And I think I've seen Conner say, I think he was just talking shit. But he's like, oh, I'm making this much money off this cowboy Saroni fight. I think those are nonsense. And the reason I think they're nonsense is it's almost like a. rapper bragging about how much money they have. It's like, part of the brand.

You're not, it's part of your brand. And also, no one's incentivized like Dana or Showtime or HBO. They're not incentivized to like tell the public that, yeah, this dude's full of shit. We gave him $2 million.

He didn't earn $20 million off this thing. Oh, no, let me, let me just. And like it's not public information. That's a loaded because there's certain elements of that, you know,

could be hypothetically true. But for example, compensation is not fully reported. when you're talking about UFC, particularly MMA, like that's not fully reported what the person's movie are at the highest level that is, you know what I mean? So it's actually more. It's even that true because it's just what's reported to the commission

and assuming that they don't have, let's call it another agreement. So that's at your, in terms of paper view, there's a speculation. So for example, May Mack in particular, there was, you know, I think there was rumors that were starting to trickle in that it did over $6 million buys or something to that extent. you know what I mean but it landed in like the 4-3-4 range and that's no that's actual right I mean ultimately you know that's those are not fudge numbers and so what you were hearing about what potentially Connor made and potentially Floyd made on our side I know it's more true

on the Floyd side I don't know if he divulges who he splits it with or you know what that what that looks like on his side so I can't comment on his right but you'll see was our partner so I know what they're, what we're reporting for Connor was Connors. What was reported, I think, was 30 to Connor and 100 to Floyd. Was that what was reported? I don't think so, but maybe, I mean, in terms of what, you're talking about reported to the commission or the papers? No, no journalist ever actually, like, breaks that down.

You know what I mean? So that's what I'm saying, like, these numbers are so high and I hear that. And I've, well, I was higher. I think for, for, I think it was, for certainly higher for Connor than I know. And, and, you know, for Floyd, I would imagine. and it would be probably around there or higher, just depending on what he did again. Wow.

You really think that $100 million was true. Well, I mean, I, Connor was, you know, I'd say just under 100, right? When it's all said and done. So that's his part. So again, he has a part, we had a partner in the UFC. So, and I won't get into the specifics. But yeah, so from Floyd's side,

it's very reasonable to think that he could have pulled in 100. Assuming that he didn't take it on, didn't have partners he split with. you're a business guy. So you see what Floyd did in the boxing business where he basically became his own promoter runs his own ship so that he can take the lion's share of the revenue or the profits that come from an event where like in the past guys like Mike Tyson and others sort of got screwed because they're out there fighting generating all this demand.

Then they look at 10 years later, they're like, where's all the money? And the promoter is basically enriched themselves in that way. And obviously the UFC is totally different. It's like a league. It works differently. But a guy like Connor is essentially as big of a brand as the UFC, a UFC. Like, you know, let's say it's debatable. They're in the same like, like, air.

And if Connor McGregor was to go do a fight on YouTube, pay-per-view, or whatever he wanted to do, he could pull the same numbers as a UFC card without the UFC's promotion. Do you think like, I guess when you see what Floyd did, do you think anybody's ever going to do that with the UFC or in the MMA, where they're going to become the UFC? their own promoter and have their own shows? I think the sport is still young and is still evolving, right?

And while the UFC is to some extent synonymous to league as a promotion, it's still structured to some extent, you know, like price fighting, right? There's still pay-per-view. And even though there's rankings, sometimes you'll see the rankings are not. It's not true meritocracy because it's still price fighting and entertainment to some extent, right? And I think that they have come a long way, but they're still a long way to go. in terms of how much fighters should earn, should earn. But at the end of the day, too, from a boxing perspective,

I think that's why boxing has been on the decline. It's still fragmented, right? And at the end of the day, there's not a true promotion that's stood the test of time. I know top rank's been around forever, right? But who do they really have? Matching seems to be doing more. Obviously, Premier is still around

and still, PBC is still competing, but you see it kind of fragmented, right? Canello fight for match for a couple of fights and a fight and for PBC for a fight. And the difference is, though, I think in boxing promotions could fight each other

and so they have to agree on that, right? I think in the MMA, it's going to continue to evolve, right? You now have the ability, can Connor do that? Of course, I think Connor's probably the only person could carry his own show. It's very difficult to do, right?

It's hard to go. How many million pay-per-view sellers are there in either sport? Not a lot. You know, it's like it's not that easy to do. So I think that from a UFC perspective, they've always looked at it as like, look, we're building something that's sustainable. And they are correct in that regard, but I think that fighters definitely should have a bigger piece of the revenues as this thing continues to grow, which I think they've come

a long way, but they still have a long way to go, right? Yeah, I was going to say, you know, the other group that's trying to do their own shows is the kind of Jake Paul, Logan Paul style thing where they're doing these kind of like kind of celebrity matches, high interest fights and getting people to buy paper views for that. Seems to honestly be working. Like, you know, like, I don't know what you think about those guys, but I personally used to be like, oh, you know, kind of wrote them off as just like kind of like they were like in the jackass crowd of like the YouTube generation or the Vine generation. And then they said they were going to do this boxing thing. Who knows? How seriously they'll take it. But honestly,

they've done a good job of actually building up interest and pulling these events off and being like respectable, showing up very respectably and winning several these fights. You can't hate on them, man. You can't hate on them. You're putting in the tie. Actually, our client, Dylan Danis is fighting Logan Paul coming up. Dylan Danis is your client?

Yeah, yeah. Oh, my God. That is so funny. Are you the genius behind his current. marketing strategy? Does you sign off on that? No, no, no. That's all Dylan. I thought you might have been his client. There's a famous video where Nate Diaz and Dylan are getting into it and Nate, there was a beer on Dylan. And I saw you in the video

trying to be like the father in the whole like, you're like, hey, Nate, Dylan, could you guys please walk away? Is that good? Didn't work out. My kids didn't listen. You know, but no, I, you know, you got to give those guys credit. I mean, look. I think they're putting in time in their craft. They're going in there and they're not only taking a shot and risk it. I could argue that they're not really doing it against real boxes. That's true.

I think they're being more strategic. But, you know, again, credit has to go to Connor, right? Who created that trend? Who started that? It was S versus Mayweather. And then now, I mean, even if Floyd goes and fight someone else, he doesn't get the same result without it being another two A side guys face. each other. And while I give all of them credit, too, I don't think you've seen this

blockbuster event that anybody's been hoping for. So at the end of the day, though, there's a market, though. There's an appetite from a consumer to go look at, you know, me and you, Sean. I don't, I think we may only get 100 people that tune in, but nonetheless, there's a market there. I don't even on YouTube. Sam is going to have to pay. You underestimate how many people want to see me get my ass look. Likewise, my friend. I think you're right. You're, Right. So what are the, they've been begging to get Connor and that. I think that that's the white whale that Jake Paul's chasing. What is the percent chance that a fight between Connor McGregor and Jake Paul ever happens? I mean, right now, Connor's focused on Michael Chandler. I'm saying ever, ever. I can tell you Floyd, Floyd, the rematch is there. Logan Paul wants to fight him. Jake Paul. Not as well as possibilities. Not zero. Yeah, it's not zero. It's just not top of mind right now, right? So you need to take off your sports jacket.

You need to have a proper 12. You need to like, I want the non-politician answer. You managers are so good at saying the best of everything. Listen, it's funny. It's like, I wonder if I just wore freaking streetwear and, you know, and dyed my hair and bleached my hair like I used to when I was a young Polkrock kid. You know, if everybody would really just hear what I'm saying, to see it's not bullshit.

I'm just telling you the truth. Like, if he's going to fight Michael Chandler next, right? it's not and we're not thinking about that you know what I mean but ultimately of course we know he wants to fight of course we know it's there and of course I think of everybody keeps doing their thing it's going to be a market for it right so well let's talk about the the biggest of these freak show fights right now is Elon versus suck and it was one of those things that like in our world's like that's never happened in the kind of business and tech world and then Dana comes out and kind of certifies it he's like no they wanted to have to have

happen. We're talking to them. We might make it happen. Yeah, but he always does that. Exactly. It's Dana White, so you never know. But, you know, it was interesting that it got a little bit more heat from that. What's your take on that and again? Same question. He does that, but I don't know

if Dana would have gone on a limb if he hadn't really talked to both, right? I mean, well, I'm sure he talked to both, but I don't think that he would have done that, you know, and even Zuck training with freaking, you know, a bunch of different fighters, Izzy, and bulk and John Jones and then Elon bringing in GSP and do you believe it'll happen?

And if so, who did you have? I believe Zuck would be down. Catch weight, whatever. It doesn't matter. Yes, I agree. Like, I think Zuck is down. Zuck is truly, you know, training. And regardless of this fight or not, he's in there.

Does that mean you think Elon might not be down? Because that's our theory here on this podcast. that Elon wants to talk about it. Look, from the outside looking in and all the information that I have, which is probably less than what you have being in the tech world, you guys have some freaking secret telegram groups and shit.

Who told you about that? Dude, knowing you or like knowing what I think of you, you're probably going to be managing them. No, sure. I mean, I'm like, I'll, you know, I'll definitely going to pursue them, you know, but so long as we get some rights, not just transaction. We've got to

build something together, you know? But I think it's up to Elon. I truly think it's up to Elon, you know? And I don't know. Can't tell you what's that. Dana came out and said, if it happened. They probably looked at the numbers, though, for both X and threads. They're like, this is great.

Yeah. But Zuck's more serious. Like, no, don't talk about it. I saw those text exchanges and all that kind of relief. And like I said, Zucks, Zex, Zex, Zex, Zucks about it. He's not bullshit, you know? Dana has said. If it happens, it would be the biggest fight ever.

He thinks it would surpass Floyd Pacow. It would surpass Floyd Conner. He thinks it would be that because it's just like, you know, the freak of all freak shows in that sense. Like it crosses over into so many different like fan bases or domains. You get all the combat force people, but you'd also get the business people to watch. I think so.

I think so. It would also be the saddest fight ever. Yeah, it'd also be really lame to watch. It was actually, it was actually kind of fucked up the way Eliol was all about it. And then all of a sudden, It's like, not going to be the UF state.

It's going to be charity. Like, wait a second. You can't play along all this fucking time. And then all of a sudden pull the rug. You know what I mean? Like, did you see the video of him curling a 40 or he had like a 20 pound or 40 pound weight at his office and he needed a live Twitter where he was, he's like, I'm curling to prepare. It's like, no way.

I swear to God. If you think doing curls at your desk is how you prepare, you're, this is not going to be good. Wrong sport, buddy. Wrong sport, man. You know, I didn't see that. That's funny. That's hilarious. Dude, I want to ask you, let me ask you a quote about some other slick guys.

So basically, a lot of people who don't watch the UFC, they don't know that. So Dana's the front guy. You know, he's doing a lot of the match setting and he does all the talking. And he seems like a wonderful businessman. But the Fratita brothers interest me most because they were, I think, I think Dana only owned like four or six percent of it when it sold. But the Fratita brothers owned most all of it besides some outside money because they were already wealthy. But they seem like those guys, they don't. do a lot of interviews and they're a little bit behind the scenes.

They seem like sharks. Have you learned anything interesting from the two brothers and Dana about business? Well, so obviously, look, they sold their business now, right? Endeavor ended up, you know, William Morris at the time. They bought it. But I had the pleasure of being able to, you know, deal across from Lorenzo Fetta on, particularly on a couple clients, particularly Connor, obviously, that level. And they're very savvy businessman, very, very composed, you know, I, it's not,

it's the dynamic when I'm on the opposite side, naturally, it's adversarial a lot of the time, right? And so, you know, at the end of the day, I'm advocating for my client. So it's, it's, I'm not their best friend, right? It's not like they're going to invite me over for Christmas and, and, and, but, but we do have, we did have a respectful relationship. And I really, really enjoyed dealing with someone, you know, that has been not only distrustful in our sport and a pioneer in it, but was a super successful businessman in the casino business and other businesses as well. And so you learn, you learn from the interactions and the dealings and the negotiations that you're doing. Like, for example, when Mayweather McGregor happened and we basically got what we were achieving

or were striving for from a negotiation, like, Connor and I really, we had that moment when we walked out of Lorenzo's office. were like, you fucking did it. You know, it was like a moment, right? And so do you guys like keep a straight face until you get to the parking lot? Yeah, do you get like giddy and start hugging it shit? Well, in the meeting, in the office, you have the smirk.

You know, you don't get it all. You're like, right. And then, yeah, when you get into car, you celebrate. You know, but yeah, man, I think it's the human shit. I think that's what people don't realize. I mean, it's like it's the same in all sectors, all sports. and even the most composed person that doesn't do any interviews, I'm sure have had those moments in their own journeys as well, right?

I read on front office sports, I think it's called, it's like a sports publication, that the final exit for proper 12 was $600 million, and I think that was only four years after you started it. Is $600 million in the ballpark? Three years, and I can tell you, listen, if it's probably printed, then you've got to go with that. because I can't necessarily comment on the specific numbers, but we're still involved, too.

It's not, you know, at the end of the day, it's, it's, we, we're still, you know, part of the team. We're still pushing it to grow the brand. We just came out with a new flavor, our Irish apple flavor, which is amazing, you know, dangerously amazing too. Because, you know, it drinks, it goes down so easy. But yeah, man, I'm super proud of that. Was that, was that like a new level for you wealth-wise? And what, I mean, or were you able to make money a little bit along the way? I think that was a whole other level, right?

That was a whole another level where you're able to achieve, you know, your, you know, your, you know, your ultimate goals, right? But ultimately, too, you're proving your concept. You know what I mean? Like, ultimately, like, we're not having to go sell the platform. We're creating liquidity events by creating opportunities left and right. And that's just for clients. Now we're creating ventures that are, you know,

accreative to the platform. We have a smart basketball technology called Hoop. We have some other ventures in the pipeline that are coming out that are very, very much focused on advocacy for the entire sport and creating something where we're putting our own capital on these things to create opportunities for everybody else, right? And so, and there's other things that we're creating specifically for our clients, right? So, you know, in lieu of having the opportunity to invest or, you know, an athlete maybe not having the brand equity to go start their own venture,

how can we bring them along the ride with us, you know, for the next proper trolle is, if you will, right? I always like to ask people this because I remember, you know, when you start out in business,

typically you have kind of nothing to your name. And you've got this. Literally, nothing, credit card debt, like, exactly. Nothing.

So you start at zero or usually you go below zero. You dip below zero for a period of time. It's way below zero. Well, the funny thing is, and this is what people don't appreciate. Like my wife now, she was my girlfriend and she had a job, and we were living back now credit cards. And for the first seven years of paradigm, I didn't take a paycheck. I was paying team members and staff before I was paying myself.

And I think people lose sight of that, you know? It's like, but then when you have huge success, you still try to do right, take care of people. But even that's sometimes no good deed goes unpunished, right? but ultimately it's a war of attrition. You have to be able to withstand all of it and really believe in what you're doing and eat shit sandwiches daily on your way there. You eat these shit sandwiches in your case seven years.

In my case, I remember like sort of eight or nine years straight of just, like in my case it was just kind of failure, but in your case at least you were building it up. And then you finally have the moment where it's kind of like validated realize a payday comes in, you get a windfall along the way. And like financially sure, that's exciting and things change at a logical level. But before it hits the logical level, there's kind of the emotional level of like, what does that feel like what thoughts go through your head at that time?

We had a guy come on the pot. He's like, dude, I used to just every day for the next week. I just drove to the bank and I would just go in an ATM, put my card in and say print receipt because I just wanted to see it. And he's like, I didn't even have anything. James Hong. He's like, I didn't even have anything I wanted to spend it on. He's like, I was just amazing to look at that because I knew the seven years or whatever,

the years that go into not being there, not having that. And we had other people that are like, you know, this is oddly numb feeling. I didn't feel anything. And other people are like, you know, I had a conversation with myself. I said, all right, now I'm here. Here's this pivotal conversation I had myself. So I always like to ask people about that moment because I think there's usually something interesting that happens. It's not just like just another day.

So it's surreal to me because, you know, on one end, it happened during COVID. So it was a weird fucking time for all of us, right? And, you know, you, you, you get there. And honestly, it's like you're pinching yourself. And, you know, because it's a new age, you don't have to necessarily go to the bank account to print the receipt anywhere. You could just look at that. I certainly did not a few times. Just like, what, you know?

But also, like, you have to make decisions. Like, I, we hired more people. We gave people raises. We gave people bonuses that had nothing to do with that part of the business. And we invested back in the business. And so I was, first thing I bought was my mom applied, my house and a car. And so I was like, you know, I was trying to really, you know, stay grounded. You know what I mean?

And more importantly, like try to do right, you know, as best as you can by for those that are important to you, both family and on your team, right? And ultimately still like just enjoy the moment. And because we were kind of everybody locked in at home, it was, you know, every night it was for my wife and I was just surreal. And it's like, you know, then you start to think about, okay, well, do you tell your kids? Do you not, how do you raise them right way? How do you make sure to keep them hungry and humble?

You know what I mean? It's not about that. And a lot of things change, right? Because it's like you get there and you start to realize, you've got to start planning, thinking, and acting differently. But then also other unintended issues start to come up, you know? Like, you know, more money, more problems. This is true, you know, at the end of the day.

What problems? Just a lot of different things. I think people want shit. People want shit. People think that they deserve shit. Unappreciative people, no matter what you give them. You know, they just unfortunately have a self-inflated view. you know, I think there's a whole list of issues that come up with it, right?

That's the reality. But it is, you got to take the good, the bad, the ugly, and just keep rolling to bunches and level up, and level up and evolve. That's what it is. I thought you were going to say you had a red panty night. I was waiting for it. That was the, you know, you said it for me. I did. And you had two bites of the apple, right?

If I remember correctly, like, I think you guys, did you guys sell a poor? of the business early on. I think you sold half of it and then another, I don't know if it was the half or the rest or another big chunk. Yeah. Right. Yep. Was it a hard decision to sell or did you have 600 million reasons?

I mean, it was, I mean, look, first of all, it was an amazing at the time, but always after the fact, you're like,

now we're still part of the business. So we can still keep making a lot of money into the next decade or and longer, you know, at the end of the day. Because it's always difficult to think about, oh, what it should or could have, right? But you've got to be

able to count, you know, the fortunes of it all, you know, and be grounded in that positive reality. It's not a negative thing. You know, it's very easy to always Monday morning quarterback something, like, oh, we shouldn't have sold because

this and that. You have those regrets, which I think is normal, by the way. I think most people who, not maybe most, I think who they sell. If you sell it right, you tend sell early, right? I mean, that tends to happen. I think, I think the way we structured the deal allows us to really, not only made a ton of money, but which is continued to make a ton of money. And, and, you know, ultimately, have I had those stocks? Sure. You always think about it.

And because it's, for me, it's more so, okay, it's so execution, right? So not only to be execute, but then how's, how is the deal, how's the terms, how's this, how's that? So I'm kind of like constantly watching the film to make sure that I'm learning and growing as an entrepreneur because I'm not resting on my laurels either. I'm not done. Right. And so I'm still playing the game. While you play the game, you've got to be able to not only celebrate the victories, but watch the tapeback is he where you could have gotten better, right? That's the only way you're going to be the best of what you do. So I have a partner who, a business partner who basically, he was already successful before, but his second company, he was about to get a $200 million check for the sale. And it was. a like a one of those like click baity websites on Facebook that showed like top 10 lists and then Facebook changed the algorithm and the sale sale dropped from 200 million to like 30 million and it was just a massive issue because of platform risk and there's a lot of fear of platform risk do you do you view Connor as like your platform risk like if he really because he gets in

troubles sometimes he gets accused of a lot of stuff sometimes maybe he actually did do it sometimes he didn't do it. Do you get nervous about platform risk with Connor of like, shit, if he does something really bad, I'm, I'm fucked. Yeah,

well, he's been accused of a lot of things and he's never been. That's the facts, right? But obviously there's always risk and everything. And I think when you look at, you know, such a,

you know, Connor's kind of like an enigma, right? And so there's certainly going to be, uh, those that may be diverse and not want to do anything. But at the end of the day, whoever gets involved with us understands the McGregor brand, right? And understands inherit risks that potentially come with that.

But ultimately, they also look at the track record and that is always going to win the day, right? Because you could make all these claims, accusation, whatever, but ultimately, with the facts of the facts and the results are the results and the data is the data. So I think when you look at all those things, some of all parts is why we have a healthy relationship with all of our business partners and we continue to incubate and launch other exciting businesses and around the kind of brand. For me, he's the biggest client. He's also the top 1% pop culture brand in the world. So it's like unless I go inside the other people in that small bucket, if you will,

he's always going to have, he's always going to have, you know, that, let's call it, you know, proportionate risk value across my platform, right? But ultimately, we're also, you know, much more than just one client and we're building something that for me is into the future, right? John, do you see what happened with Barstool? So basically Barstool Sports sold to a betting company, a pen. Penn. Yeah. And I don't remember the final sale. 600 million plus Dave made a killing. I think he got in stock, I think, right? A lot of stock. Yeah, he got a lot of stock. I think he got some I think he was able to sell some. I know that on Wall Street, you could see that he did sell a little bit.

And he basically, after three years, Penn was like, shit, you guys are insane. Like, it's really hard for us to do, like, because we're regulated as a casino. It's really hard to let you do what you want to do without hurting us. And ESPN wants to do this big deal with us, but they won't do it if we're with Barstool. You know what, Dave, here, look, just have the company back. And if you ever sell it again, we get half of the profit. Cool. and in exchange we're going to do this ESPN deal,

which is going to boost our stock, we're good. It was like the greatest coup of all time of like, you know, Dave getting, Dave selling it and then them just saying, here, actually, we don't want this. You know, maybe we have a world where the buyer of proper 12 is like, hey, this was cool and all, but you know what? You can just have it.

It's yours now. I think it was brilliant. It's a great move for him. I think he still has Penn Stock too. So then the stock goes up and he win it again. So good for you. for him. Yeah, then that's an interesting sector we're getting

ready to enter into as well. I'm interested to see what they do with it now, right? Barstools and see what they end up, who they end up, you know, partnering with to try to get that off the ground. You probably, I'm guessing, you kind of studied other people who had

talent like this. I don't know if you're in a group chat with like Cooter Braun and like, you know, Don Chihadi or some of these guys that are managing, you know, the sort of the big stars. Those same top 1% kind of like people who can move the needle. John's a friend. I don't know Scooter,

but John's a friend. Who's John? What's his last name? The guy who manages the elf boys now. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah,

and stuff. Yeah. So he's, he has probably, he has, he has like a dozen or so of some of the top podcasts and personalities, you know,

he's, he's certainly an entrepreneur of respect. And he, and so you, you kind of studied them a little bit. If somebody was studying you, and they see what you're doing with, Connor and how you built like I'm just going to name them off so you did the whiskey brand proper 12 you have Netflix

documentaries and like entertainment that way you have roadhouse just like a new movie coming out you have the august mcgregor the the suit lines you have title which is like the recovery spray you have the fast app which is like fitness like app plus and i think like gyms coming or whatever like you know something like a fitness brand that obviously fits and we have actually have a event based uh competition coming called 3KO. So that's going to be, you know, think of, of Spartan race meets, meets, CrossFit games, you know. Very cool.

So you have that. You have, I think it's like a mobile game that he's in. You do like kind of the celebrity fight with Mayweather. There's all these different things you've done around that person, that brand. And I'm sure some of them worked amazingly and some of them probably were too much work for what they were worth. You just, you learn as you go, right? You're not, I doubt you were the one entrepreneur who just magically had everything right,

from day one. No way, right? So if somebody was studying you or somebody had, you know, was it was with the next McCrugher was another star creator, would you, what would be your kind of like advice to that person? How would you advise them based on your learnings of the last 10 years of trying to figure this out? Yeah, I mean, first and foremost, I'm still learning, right? I'm still learning. I'm still growing. What I would say is, you know, you have to be ready to, you know, not only dream, but act on those dreams, right? And come prepared from a research and preparation perspective, building out a plan and be fluid because it's not always going to go to plan, right? But if you're prepared and you do have a plan, you're likely more, you know, you're likely to execute,

even if you have to deviate a little bit because you have to stay fluid. But, what reality hits you with, right? You have to also have thick skin men. Like at the end of the day, it's a war of attrition. You're going to eat shit sandwiches daily for a long time. And so you've got to be able to withstand that with a smile, but be able to see through all the noise, the pressure, and more importantly, have that ability to communicate with that client, right?

Because you guys got to stay in sync in terms of what you're building. I would say, you know, one of the things I wish I would have done, build a team around you that's more experienced than you, right? Because ultimately, I think that that's what's going to allow you to accelerate your plan as opposed to bringing people and then having to deal with other things like those people turning on. Or one reason or another. How big is the paradigm team?

It's still boutique. So we're about 15 on the whole co level, but then every brand co, if you will, has its own respective team, right? And what I would also say is, you know, don't stop innovating, right? Don't stop trying to create new opportunities that have to align, right, with their client, organically, but you've got to make sure you're able to clearly define that. What's your criteria? So, like, you've gone into these 10 different categories.

How do you pick which category to go into? What is it just what they're interested in? Well, first of all the line organically. Right. And they have to have a genuine interest because you can't sell. something that's fake. I mean, everybody thought, and it's another thing, everybody thought proper trouble was going to be a gimmick until they tried it. Obviously, if you don't drink, you don't drink. But if you try it, you're going to be, oh, my God, this is great. Make sure we

created a substantive brand, right? It wasn't going to be just something that we just put his face on it and try to sell. And that's important. I know to him as well. And that's why he believes in the ventures that he's involved with. He's very passionate over, but they're of substance as well. They're quality. So you have to understand the market. You have to understand the players in the market. You have to understand how you fit in or how you can disrupt the market and grab market share.

And you have to put a plan together that allows you to have a higher probability of success with the black belts that are going to help you operate the business, you know, And then having all the other components, they're making sure that you could actually build a product or service or substance. By the way, did you ever consider just putting his name on it? It's like you have like Jameson or Johnny Walker or Jack Daniels. Like,

McGregor's name is so famous. It's an interesting brand decision. It's actually take. It's taken. We did think about that. Okay. But actually there's a, the McGregor clan,

I think it's a Scotch. I'm not mistaken. So that was certainly considered. We also considered notorious Irish whiskey at one point. Right. And, and, you know, again, even earlier days, there's a couple other names that were floating around. No, proper 12 is a good name. Proper 12th is a great name. Again, what does it mean like the 12? Is it like the 12 districts of Dublin?

He's from Dublin 12. So each, let's call it borough or city where the Dublin is a number. And where he's from is Dublin 12th. And so and proper, I mean, they always say that was a proper night out, you know, like, oh, it's proper good time. So it's the proper number 12. That just made sense for the brand. And again, after pivoting several groups and finding the right partners, we came up with the brand together. Sean and I are big fans of words. You know, like we'll hear someone say something and we're like,

oh, man, the language they used was beautiful. That was really good language, whether it's writing or just someone talking. The cool thing about Connors, he's got a beautiful vocabulary and beautiful timing and beautiful phrasing. So he uses wonderful words. And so, like, I remember when he was fighting Jose Aldo, he would talk about like, he was like, if this was another time, I would storm your pavilla. And then he like talks about like what he would do to the. And like he like, you know, the whole red panty night. Like he just has like really funny, catchy phrases.

I guess Trump kind of did this too where he just like, it was just really catchy stuff. Are you guys ever just shooting the shit? And you're like, oh, that's a line. We're going to have to use that. He's very natural. Going back to the acumen, I mean, that is stuff that it's not rehearsed. It's very much stuff that he just comes up with. But we'd be there and he'd say some stuff like, that was hilarious.

That's another, that's another McGregorism. You're like, put that in the bank. I have two fan service questions that are around that. Number one, during the Mayweather Press tour, which was just like a big thing. That was so much fun. But it looked like, because all UFC press tours are the same. you go, you sit and they ask you questions and then you react. Whereas that one was like

stand up and give a speech and it almost looked like Connor was almost ambushed like, oh, I just got to give a 20 minute improvised speech in front of millions of people right now. And then he kind of did it. Was that an ambush? I always wondered. Yeah, no idea what the format was going to be like. And Sam, yes, it was exhausting

at the time. But just thinking back to it, every time it kind of comes up from whether it's the anniversary, whatever it may be, it was such a great experience. man. And it was like once in a lifetime thing because, you know, Sean, there was no format. To your point, I don't know if he felt ambushed,

but certainly we're like, oh, what, how is it for this one? How is it for that one? Right. But the energy of all of them was out of this world. And so I think that they fed off that energy, which gave them the ability to deliver these legendary lines, answered back and forth. I remember watching it.

And it was clear that he was like, wait, there's no fucking questions. I just have to, I just have to go. Okay, I'm a comedian now. All right. bet and he said this line he goes you know they've they tried everything they didn't tell us the format my microphone doesn't work they're trying to put me in a uncomfortable situation but they don't know i thrive in uncomfortable situation i almost feel like he was giving himself a pep talk during the

speech i i really love that line that was that was great but i also have another kind of fan service question on almost the other side of the coin so as you can tell me and sam both fans of you of the ufc of connor like we we really it took a lot of inspiration from some of the you know it's just a badass thing to go out there and just fight and put yourself on the line like that every single time. There's something to be admired on that for sure. And I think Connor came in with a very, like at the beginning, how could you hate the guy? Like he was, he was bold. He came from nowhere.

He was like, you know, this guy who was like a, you know, apprentice plumber and then was like all of a sudden beating everybody exactly this way he said he would. His fighting style was electric. Like there was nothing to dislike about the guy I thought on the come up. I'm sure some people did. But the majority of fans, I think, on the come up, we're just like, this guy's incredible.

And then there's sort of almost like a heel turn now, where I know a lot of people who I watch fights with, they sort of feel like he's kind of jumped a shark. Like, oh, you know, now he's this like, first of all, he's like super jacked now in this huge way.

He's like more of a boxer. He hasn't fought in a long time. You know, he talks trash. Maybe he's crossing the line too much. Oh, he's getting in trouble. Like, there's all these things.

Honestly, like, I know he's your client and he's your friend. And you probably never going to say, bad word about it, but I think there are some fair criticisms that, like, you know, it's understandable why somebody who was a super fan might now feel like, ah, you know, I can't really, you know, get behind everything that I'm seeing here. Do you think about that at all? And do you, I guess, like, what's your reaction to that? I don't really know how to phrase the question, but I feel

like you're one of the few people on earth who would have an opinion about this that I would really care to hear. I mean, look, it's just like you are engaged with these conversations. Naturally, I'm going to hear everything, right, from people around me. You know, whether it's my friends or there's family. And ultimately, what I'll say is this. Like, you know, everybody's entitled to their own opinion. I know who the person is. And obviously, I do have an intimate relationship.

It's something that's more than just transactions, it's more than just a client and business partner. Someone that I'm loyal to whom has been loyal to me. And so at the end of the day, you know, I know that history wants to start. being written will be interpreted by everybody differently. He's definitely not perfect. He's definitely made mistakes.

But a lot of the criticism, too, is subjective. It's based on where you stand on what you believe in or what you want to see, etc. But A, never been legally, all those accusations have not been legally found to be true, right? B, it was the cleanest and most tested athlete before he got to the Saddipool. and when he returns to fighting, he's going to do it the right way, and everything's going to be legal, so everybody can say what they want to say.

There's nothing that was done wrong, right? And so he's constantly being vilified because ultimately the stuff that they love them for, he still does. They'll outspoken. Still says what's on top of his mind. But maybe because he has the riches now, and it's not the rags anymore,

sometimes we try to tear some people down. I don't know why. I can't tell you, right? but ultimately I do know proofs and the pudding. He has to continue to go out there and show that he could continue to evolve, be the best version of himself, not just athletically, but as a human being as well. And ultimately, that's on him to do, and I can't do that for him, you can't do that for him. But criticism is going to come.

And when you're in the public eye, you've got to be ready to take it on. And at the end of the day, heavy's the head that wears the crown. You can't just want the good and not take the bad with it. So ultimately, that's something that we constantly talk about, something that I know he says, I say to him, we talk about, he understands that, but it doesn't make it easy. It doesn't make it easy. Because ultimately it's like, you know, you know, you talk about that aha moment. I don't know how many entrepreneurs you've had on this podcast, but when they have that big moment, they don't need to be seen by everybody. They're probably

enjoying it with nobody watching them. Or if they go somewhere, nobody really recognizing who they are, right? Myself included. So ultimately, it's very different. And that doesn't, you know, essentially absolve him of the responsibility that he has to take upon himself in certain instances. But more importantly, it makes me understand the pressure is real, not only to win and succeed, but on another level to live your life so visibly for everybody to just critique every little thing. In today's world, man, everybody has an opinion, you know. You guys, before you met me, you thought I was a square suit because of how I appeared visibly or visually to you. you without ever talking to me before, right? So it's like very easy than fast judgment based on whatever your belief system is,

how you're raised, your experiences with someone that look like me, whatever it may be, or your opinions of agents just because you watch Andre, and some paulers. But I can't change that ultimately, right? And so when you live in today's world like that, for everybody to critique, man, that's going to come with not just the good, but the bad and the ugly as well, and you got to deal with it. I like the fan questions.

You know, this is, it's fun. We've had Ariel Hawani on here. You know, we've become friendly. We've been asked for, and I think we've talked to Mike Bisbing. We've talked to a bunch of folks. It's, you know, Sean and I are super fans. So it's always fun to, like, get, like, the insider.

How many fights have you guys been to in person? I've only been to three or four. I think there's, I, the, the, in-person event is definitely, like, the best in-person sporting event. But in my opinion, if you're like a nerd and a true fan-fan, it's so much better to hear the commentary and to see it on, And to see like the replay of the Sean Malley knockout on Saturday. Like it was really awesome to be able to like see it close up.

There is one challenge with UFC, which is that the cage and the cameraman on every post of the cage does kind of screw up the viewing experience depending on where you're at. Like I'm sure if you're right next right ring side, it maybe you don't have that issue. But like we went to one event at the Vegas place, the one where Mazvedal need Ascran into like, you know, you know, the next realm. And, and, you know, the guy, I saw it, but the guy next to me, like, literally couldn't even see the thing. They missed the moment because it was like a split. It was like in the first five seconds of the fight.

And secondly, like, you know, just because of the cage, like, if you go to a football game or a basketball game, it's an open field, it's, you know, it's very easy to see what's going on, whereas you're almost watching on the Dembo Tron. Well, it's interesting. First of all, I think, look, there are pros and cons to your, both of your points. The energy of big fights is something else. It's electric. I mean, just the walkouts and the crowd and you feel it.

And then you hear the thuds. And, you know, it's like, it's pretty amazing. I was at Jorge and Nate and it was like spectacular. Right. But it just, it's just nice to be able to like, you got to go home and watch the replay. Yeah, yeah. But then from a view perspective, to your point, unless you're like the first few rows of the floor, it's actually that the mid low riser, which is the perfect view because you're looking into the octagon.

but you're still really fairly close. And I think that's the best view live, right? But nonetheless, no matter where your seats are, I think for big, big, big events, the electricity of that place is something else, you know? So what's going to happen? Like, I'm following this whole circus with Dylan Dennis and Logan. I've never even seen Dylan Danes train.

I went and watched his two Bellature fights, but that was like years ago. What's going to happen? Like, I don't know. I've never even seen spar or anything on like leading up videos. what's going to happen on that? When's that in August, it's August 14th?

Logan is obviously has a leg up having, you know, box before, right? Yeah, but that was years ago. I think he's bigger. No, listen, listen, I get it. You know, the fight's actually scheduled October 14th, but, but.

Oh, October 14th. Dylan has made all the necessary, necessary adjustments to his life, to his preparation, but this is his boxing debut. So he has to go in there and really prove it. Right. Now, I can tell you the banter that's going back and forth, I mean, you know, he's confident in his abilities and he's definitely putting in the work.

So ultimately, you don't make, you know, you don't take that position with the banter that he's doing if you're not going in there with the level of confidence in yourself, right? So and I'm sure it's given Logan a little bit more trained for it, right? Because ultimately it's personal now, I would imagine, right? Oh, yeah. Not even Connor, you know, King of Trashaw, Connor wouldn't even, he never even went that far to talk about family. I don't like that he's talking about family, but I like it in the sense of like, I'm going to stare at it. You know what I mean? I'm a kid on the internet and I think it's funny too, you know?

Yeah. Like it's too far, but at the same time, I'm like, but it's there. You know, what I mean? I'm watching that. Listen, I think what's interesting is the, you know, love it or hate it, the engagement for that is to the roof. and, you know, it should help sell the fight. And more importantly, like, it's about now performing, right? Because ultimately, you can talk all you want.

Now you've got to go in there. But he's made all the adjustments to his life personally and professionally, which I'm very proud of him for doing that will give him that high chance of winning this. I think he's going to press and shock a lot of people. People are not giving him enough credit. And I think when he goes in there, it's his time to shine. Now he's going to put, he's going to basically put his money where he's, his mouth is because the mouth is getting it ready

is going to make people want to watch him, love him. Well, you're kind of implying you're like, well, it doesn't matter unless he loses. And I kind of disagree. I think he's already won whether he loses or not. He's already kind of, like from where he was starting to where he is now, like, you know, he's

already gotten a, it'll be okay. Even if he gets knocked out right away, he'll probably be better off than where he was. Oh, this is a great opportunity for him, no doubt, no doubt. Thanks for doing this, man. Where should people follow you if they want to get more. Just my first and last name.

At Adiatar, Twitter, Instagram, threads. X. X. Sorry. Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. At Auditart X.

At Auditr. X. At Auditr. Instagram. I think one of three still remain. All right, Adi. Thanks for doing this, man. All right, Jen.

Sean, Sam. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. And that's the pod. I feel like I can rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I put my all in it like no days off. On a road, let's travel, never looking back.