The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - GOOD FOLLOW - All Things Athletes Unlimited, Friendship & More with Sydney Colson & Theresa Plaisance

Episode Date: November 6, 2025

Today on Good Follow, Ros Gold-Onwude has two exclusive interviews with Sydney Colson and Theresa Plaisance while at Athletes Unlimited. Ros and Syd break down what Athletes Unlimited means to the players and what it has meant to Syd. How did her life change when AU was in Las Vegas? What is the focus going into this season? How is ACL recovery going? Sydney and Theresa discuss how they clicked with each other and how they formed a friendship. Then, Ros and TP discuss how the Athletes Unlimited format helps players grow both as athletes and as individuals. What is TP trying to establish at AU? Lastly, Theresa shares how she shifted to television comedy and how Syd helped build her confidence. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're listening to Draft King's Network. Hey everyone. Welcome to Good Follow show presented by Draft Kings. I'm Ros Gold on Wode. And in today's show, we have two. exclusive interviews for you. I had the opportunity to go travel to Nashville, Tennessee to attend Athletes Unlimited's welcome weekend, a whole tray of events. It was really exciting and the energy was amazing as they gear up for season five, which will tip off in February of 2026. And while I was there, I had the chance to have some exclusive sit downs and catch-ups with the players there. So we will be talking to and giving you access to these conversations every Thursday in this month of November. So make sure you're staying locked in.

And it starts today. Okay, in today's episode, I talk with Sidney Coulson and Teresa Placence. So buckle up because you know with Sid and TP, it is always a crazy fun time. I'm always so happy when I get to see you because I know it's going to be great vibes. I know it's going to be positivity, potential shenanigans and laughs. No, maturity, professionalism. That's the name of my get. Absolutely.

I think you do walk with maturity, professionalism. Every now and now. And shenanigans. And shenanigans. But we are in Nashville, Tennessee. Yes, we are. A.U. Season 5 is coming up. And it had, I mean, what do you love so much about Nashville?

You're running it back here. Right. Last year was really exciting. We went from Dallas in year three to Nashville last season. And it was, you know, a decision that we had to collectively make with AU staff. Like, there were a lot of changes in a business stance going on. But even though we wanted to be back in Dallas, they did present such a good case for Nashville that it was like, we really can't pass on this opportunity. Like, as you know, they have the desire to have a WMA team here.

We were like, the city's kind of prime for professional women's basketball right now. And so I think it would have been a real miss for us to not take that chance last year. And it didn't even end up being a chance. Like, people, they showed up. They were super supportive. like the city was excited about it and the players the players loved it so it was it's really good that we're going to come back because i think the the reception won't be even greater yeah it's fertile grounds here i mean i was at i was at a couple of the games and matchups last season and it was a

great crowd great energy all the things but before we i know we love when you pull up oh it was so nice i think we cried yeah you gave out roses i gave out roses i gave out and then you gave one back to me i do and no thorns or anything i was like you're real i do feel like every time I see you, there's a moment to cry. Like, because we have it hard to hurt. But be dead serious. No small talk. Let's get right to it.

You changed my life. It's deep immediately. You know. Every time. Every time. Hey, what's up? How you doing? Thank you.

Oh, thank you. No, seriously, I mean that. Why is she so? I'm not even this silly normally. You bring it out of me. When you came, though, I think because of. what you've done for like women in your profession and being a former player, like your presence at A.U, really anything that you go to is like a very good sign. It means that

because you don't just show up anywhere. So it's going to be thriving if Raws is showing up. So it's always, it's always good to see you and it's good to see you, you know, like advocating and doing so much for A.U. Honestly. Yeah, yeah. No, I appreciate that. And, I came, it became very evident immediately that the players really care about the league, which is sometimes not, you know, always the emotion that's shared. It's, you know, sometimes it's contentious or, you know, disappointed or angry or wanting more, this and that. But instead, it feels like, you know, you guys are fighting for the growth of this league and the opportunity to have this option when, you know, a WNBA season

isn't there. And a lot of that also happens, too. There's a player executive committee here. that's actually something I was not aware of before I pulled up to AU that this is player-led as well. How so? I mean, since season one, I've been a part since season one. And, you know, John Patrickoff and Jonathan Soros,

our co-founders, they started AU with softball, volleyball, and lacrosse. So we were the fourth sport. So before that 2021 inaugural season, we were having conversations because they wanted to figure out, like, how interested might W players be and professional players be? So for a lot of us, you would love to have an option to not have to go overseas.

You just weren't sure how viable this option really was and how it could have been a scam. It could have just been somebody, you know, but the fact that you had three other sports to see, okay, this is real because I have a product that I can look at. They're serious about this. They're paying good money. The things that have happened since season one, I'm glad. to have been a part of the PEC since them, but it's just their buy-in.

Like, you can't, I think we make sure to make sure that the rest of our player core is, like, grateful for this opportunity because just in year five, there's been so much growth, but also these men didn't have to start the basketball league. Like, we could have still been having to go overseas. People would have been waiting a couple more years for a rival to come about,

but A.U. has been here doing this for almost five years now, and, you know, it has literally changed some people's basketball trajectory and, you know, their careers. I was out of the league after the bubble season, and A.U was in Las Vegas, and, you know, it was a great first season. We had a lot of WNB players, so it was very competitive. And because we were right there in Vegas, Becky, and and the staff, they were able to come watch games. I wasn't the only one. A lot of people got training camp contracts, but for me specifically, being on that ACE's team that year,

we won a championship, and then we won another one. So it changed a lot for me, just being able to still be competitive in a league. Yeah. I mean, having the option can change not only the trajectory of a career, but of a life. I mean, you know, being a part of that team, the chemistry of it.

you guys were just irresistible in some ways people wanted more you know the branding the storytelling I mean your business the business of Cid explodes out of that too and like it puts you on a trajectory where like the rest of your life looks different than it did before playing A.U 100% that's why I always credited with you know giving me a chance to show what I can do but yes jump starting everything that's happened for me thus far yeah even meeting T.P. And us having a show after the season and everything that's come since then, like it's, the God's time in. I never question it. Yeah. And T.P. is here. Teresa Placantz. She's actually also in the room. Like, watching. What reason? I don't know.

And making this incredibly awkward. I thought you've held up very well during this, given that she is there. But, you know, you guys have this chance to play together in Vegas. And now you've got this thriving podcast. It's now unsupervised with Sid and T.P. Yeah. What was it where the two of you were like, you? And you were like, we are a fit, we're a dynamic duo, and I want to do this with you. Why did it work? It just worked.

I just, we hit it off immediately in Vegas, in training camp. And it's just one of those things, you know, when people say somebody's like a kindred spirit, you just, you see things the same, like, along moral lines, foundationally, the way you were raised. Like, I just, I like having good people in my life. life, people I can trust, people who add to my life and I add to theirs. And that was what our friendship was on top of the fact. I was like, this girl's hilarious. So I always jokingly say, like, I can make money off of this woman. That's exactly what's happened. But she's, she's a force and a talent in her own right. So it was just, like I said, it was God's time for us to meet at that time. And I'm grateful for it. Yeah. You know, it actually makes me think, too, of the

your WNBA team, you played with the Indiana Fever this year, y'all had to be the most talkative, podcasty team in the W. There were three different podcasts. Just three or were there more? It was you. I think so. It is Alia Boston. Sophie Cunningham all have podcasts. How did y'all navigate that? Why? He really came to the locker room where Jim talking about it. You just did your own thing off the court. Oh, okay. You know, because I don't know, it's just this is an interesting time in women's sports where like typically people weren't getting this many opportunities there were rarely players especially if you're not a superstar player you're not having a podcast or doing anything so the landscape of things have changed since

nil since just more eyes on the sports and partnerships and sponsorships that people have and so people are just trying to take advantage and maximize the opportunities that you have Yeah, yeah. And there's plenty of captivating human beings, you know, who also happen to be good at basketball. I didn't even get to ask you, like, how was your knee? How was your ACL? How was your rehab? It's going well. It's going well. Tomorrow will be 11 weeks. And it's been, it's very, I forgot how much of a mental journey it is, you know, as well as physical. But, you know, I just, I always try to look at stuff from Glass at Full. find the silver lining in things, like trust that, whatever God's purpose is for me. I don't have to understand it in the moment because every other time things have happened in my life, I've been like, huh?

But then it makes sense down the line. So the older I've gotten, I'm like, trust that you were, you got hurt for a reason. It's not the story you wanted to happen. You didn't want it to happen that way. But I can see like why I needed to be sideline and I was able to pour into other people more. I was able to, I don't think I'm a selfish person, but I became, I think, even more selfless. So, yeah, I just, since I've been there in the off season, I'm just, you know, strengthening it, doing a lot of bending, which was super painful in the beginning, but I'm in a

good place now. People are like, oh, I forgot you were hurt. You're like walking around normally, but, yeah, I'm just trusting the timing of it all. What is your focus this athlete's unlimited season? You know what? We're figuring out what is, what it's going to look like. but I told them, like, under no circumstance, do I want to be anywhere else? Like, AUU means a lot to me. I still want to support the other players who are there. You know, learn from them, have them learn from me because we have a lot of rookies.

But I just want to give whatever I can give, even if I'm not fully healthy. The roster this season for AU is extra star-studded. I mean, like, we're literally talking future Hall of Famers, things like that. You know, there was a really, fabulous welcome dinner. So good. That was so cool.

You guys have had a tray of events here in Tennessee. You're running it back in Nashville. I know. So would you say this is the most momentum, A.U basketball has, women's basketball has had so far? Yeah. I think this welcome week with our rookies and our events has made us, like, really excited for the season in February.

And so, you know, hopefully people will come out and show love February 4th. You know, the first game. You can watch you on TV, too. You can deal with ESPN. Exactly. you know, all eyes, big opportunity. And I know I'm really excited for it. Yes, me too.

I can't went to see her. I know. All right. Thank you so much for your time. I love you, my girl. I appreciate you. Is it time to cry now? All of your favorite NBA.

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We want to take out the competition. The substance. This balance is not working. And the naked gun. That was awesome. Now that's a mountain of entertainment. Today, Today, in addition to talking with me, you've been doing photo shoots and, like, media day type things, and I enjoyed watching you through the circuit.

How has it been for you? It's been so much fun. I think A.U just does a great job of allowing everyone to have their own self-exploits. their own self-expression. Like a lot of times in sport, they try to make you uniform and everyone fit into this mold. And here at AU, they really encourage you to like absolutely be yourself.

And even when they do like, okay, like, you're gonna wear this AU sweatshirt today, but you get to wear everything else to make it look like it's you. So like, I just love the individual out, individuality of AU and just how they celebrate that. Yeah, I mean, for you with AU, this is now four seasons in a row.

Correct. Why do you keep coming back to Athletes Unlimited? Like, what are you getting out of playing in this league? I've always played overseas. I was doing really well overseas. It was like good, easy money to make as a post player going overseas. And I was doing it for so long that I'm like, yeah,

you miss a lot going overseas, like birthdays, holidays. It's just hard to see life go on and you are just working really hard. I came to A.U. And I absolutely like fell back in love with the game of basketball. All the external pressures that come with pro sports are kind of taken away and you're surrounded by your peers who are also your teammates and your competitors.

So there's a level of like understanding and a level of why or understanding people's why. And it just brings a little bit more out of, you know, who you are and you just learn and you grow a lot as an individual on and off the court through AU. And I think that it just provides everyone an opportunity to be themselves. And I was perfect just the way I was showing up.

No one told me like what I need to do more. I need to be better at this. Like I was self-aware and I was able to self-coach. And also like take criticisms and compliments from my peers around me who I felt like truly cared about me. And this is just the perfect atmosphere for, for growth and I could have been more grateful for AU in my time here. This format, right? Because it's five on five. You switch teams throughout the season and also

individuals are scored. You can get a plus or a minus depending on if you're doing good things on the court or bad things. Like how does that work also in growing your game and the experience? So I love AU because of there's games within the game. You wouldn't play some things like you would traditionally play a traditional basketball game. And I love whenever you need a foul, when you wouldn't typically foul, but in order for you to win the quarter points, you would foul, put them at the free throw line,

and you're playing the long game in terms of all the games. But for you to win that quarter, you need to put them at the free throw line to get another possession so you can get another shot in. It's just the games within the game, the layers to A-U, and also the dynamics of when you play on a basketball team, you play with like 12 women, And it's the same ladies every day

that you're playing with and competing with. You're scoping out who on other teams, you feel like you would play best with. If you get to a captain's chair, like who are you gonna select? And also you're keeping good vibes because you don't want to be like that teammate that's like, oh, I don't want her on my team.

So like it's a really healthy environment. It's so much fun. I think that like the games within the game of basketball also make it extremely exciting. Yeah, it can be really exciting, like in the group chat to talk about the strategies or what you're seeing, even for fandom, just kind of following what's going on.

Absolutely. I'll take a look also at your time in the WNBA. One of your more recent chapters was with the Las Vegas Aces. You won a championship with them? First of all, what did you think of their turnaround back to the championship now cementing you as a part of this dynasty too? There's certain teams that like just will always hold

special place in your heart and for me the aces are are definitely gonna always have a piece of my heart and you just want to see teams that afford into you do well to see the way that they've been able to just take over the league in the last however many years four years it's been it's been crazy and it's also been really awesome like I was able to play with Asia Wilson one of the greatest players in the world and you just understand that you hear about these superstars, right, and how superstars carry themselves. And then you meet like an Asia Wilson or you meet like an Elena Deladon and you meet these people that are like beyond

humble. And you just like see their greatness every day at practice, their work ethic, just how they show up and who they are. And it's just like a really, it was a really special place to be. And like I just love to see their success. Yeah. It's also where you spent quality time with Sid, right? Sid Colson. It is. So obviously Sid Colson is. So obviously Sid Colson is. So obviously Sid Colson is. is here at AU as well. You guys have had an incredible run as co-hosts together, and you're now on unsupervised with Sid and TP. What is it about Sid that you guys are just like,

we go together and we're gonna smash this podcast game together. So it's kind of crazy, like they say the best things just happen naturally, right? And Sid and I were both kind of in the same boat. Like they signed us, but we weren't like sure if we were gonna like make the roster. So we were immediately, I like show up to practice and I show up late, I was playing in Spain.

when I showed up, Sid was like being herself and we've always known about each other throughout the league, like seeing each other on like scouting reports. We even have like a lot of mutual friends, but we've never held conversation or like met before. But people have always- Until year 2022. Yes, training camp 2022 is like when we had a conversation and it was just like kindred spirits. Like you just felt like there was some things that ran thicker than blood and Sydney is definitely one of those people in my life. And anybody that knows Sidney knows to love Sydney. She is one of the most generous, kind-hearted individuals

that you'll ever meet in your whole entire life. And on top of the fact that she's uber successful and hilarious, the way that she shows up for others, I think, is what makes Sid the most special. And I love seeing that in somebody, especially someone as outspoken and someone who can really draw a crowd Sid is an inspiring, influential person, and I just feel like she's the type of person that you want kids to look up to, you want kids to strive to be like, and to have a best friend

like her is, honestly, it's, like, hard at times because she's Sid, and also people that are around us, like, get tired of our jokes, and we have, like, a really good time all the time. Everyone, like, tries to put us on a word count. It never works. But we have a really great time together and uh yeah i'm very grateful for my my friendship with sid and everything that's come of it no she speaks the same way about you i literally just had to sit down with her i hope so i hope so and um mostly just about the character and the kindred spirits but also you guys are a riot together yeah um also individually when's the first time you recognized in yourself or considered yourself funny so i've always been a clown my whole life like but i was like a clown in like

small spaces like my family knows i'm funny my classmates used to think that i was funny i was voted class clown in high school um and then professionally like i was funny in my pockets like in the locker room and stuff like that but i didn't really take my humor to television and i showed up to training camp and sid starts like dropping little tidbits like hey you could do TV, right? And I was like, oh, no, no, no. Like, I don't do TV. Like, this comedy is just for, like, locker room stuff. Like, close friends. You get it. And she was like, yeah, yeah. A week later, hey, you could totally do TV. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, definitely never doing TV. She just kept being, like, that little bug in your ear that would just drop these, like,

tidbits throughout the season. And eventually, she was just like, hop on a Zoom call. I hopped on a Zoom call. And they were like, all right, so we're going to do a show. Like, it's going to be 10 episodes. I was like, episodes. I thought we were doing like Instagram, some like social media. And they're like, I like jokingly said. So how many minutes are these episodes? And they were like 30. And I was like, Sid, what are we doing? She was like, oh, girl, it's a TV show. And I was like, no way. This is crazy. So that's how it all started. And like, my comfort grew in front the camera because of how comfortable sit is in front the camera. And I was just kind of like going off of her being 100% myself,

but just like feeding off of her energy and she like brings this like comfort, at least to me in the space where I was, outside of second grade, I was humbly merry in the nativity scene, but outside of that large rule, I haven't done acting since. So I took a large hiatus and now I'm back. We've been doing some stuff.

So it's been a lot of fun. I've also really enjoyed acting and being in front of the camera. and being like a personality. It's something that I had to get used to, but it's been a lot of fun. You've been great. Also, what a testimony of friendship, you know?

Sometimes a friend will pull you into a great opportunity or see it in you before you see it in yourself. She absolutely did. You guys have crushed it so much with all of the podcasting that, like, I know about your talent, how funny you are. What are you trying to establish at A.U. About your basketball game? So I've been, you know, injured.

injured, I got injured in Seattle. Like I've had, I've been going through like little bouts of stuff. And I really want to show that I'm going to finish my career strong and on my terms. And I'm just going to come and do exactly what I've always been doing and I'm going to enjoy myself. I'm not putting any pressures on what I need to be or what it needs to look like because I don't think that's what makes basketball fun. I think just seeing yourself do which you have been, not necessarily training, but what you've been practicing within yourself,

self-confidence, patience, understanding, all these things, because I feel like I'm a good teammate to others and I like beat myself up on the inside. So this year, it's gonna be a year of I'm coming in, I'm gonna be a badass, I'm gonna do what I do, and I'm also gonna have a lot of fun doing it. And I just can't wait for this season of A.U. with the roster that we have.

The women showing up this year is absolutely incredible. Future Hallfamers potentially, WMBA All-Stars, future All-Stars, et cetera. And this is gonna be a really fun season for everyone. And I'm really looking forward to stepping back on the court. And, you know, tapping into the college version of myself and like the prime version of myself and, you know, really get myself going.

Yeah. I want to run through a wall right now. Brian, let's do it. Let's go! I am so excited for you and just so, you know, moved by your passion and emotion and everything you're holding on to right now. So I wish you the best in this upcoming season. And we appreciate you.

And we appreciate everything you do to highlight women's basketball and to bring us to the forefront. The way that you cover us, it's just you can tell that the passion for women's sports is deep within you and as well, and it radiates through the way that you cover us. So we greatly appreciate you showing up here to AAU, but also what you do for the sport just generally. Absolutely. And I receive all of it.

Like you, I just, thank you. Absolutely. So, yeah, appreciate the time. Oh.