Starts out talking about Paul McBeth touring at 19 in 2009
Hard time with meager winnings and crappy cars that barely ran
Won the Memorial in 2011 used the money to buy new Jeep Patriot
$4,000 purse
“Under occupation, I put ‘professional athlete,’” McBeth says. “I guess they didn’t believe me because they wouldn’t let me finance it. I ended up having to buy the car with cash.”
He has deals with
Discraft 10 years $10 million
Adidas undisclosed
Celsius Energy Drinks undisclosed
As of 2019 only 70 athletes have endorsements over 1 milllion a year
Jazz Guard Mike Conley Jr.
Astros Pitcher Justin Verlander
Da Bears Linebacker Khalil Mack
This is achieved through growing your own brand even in niche/smaller sports
Passion Economy
Attract large audience on twitter/instagra/tik tok/ etc
Get them to a platform the influencer owns
Turn them into paying customers through merch or ads
“That is how influencers turn social capital into financial capital.” -Atekier Ventures founder Li Jin
In 2020 Dynamic Discs paid over six figures to get their tournament on CBS
Compared to the NFL who gets 113 billion FROM TV partners
Average viewership for Pro Sports (MLB, NFL, NHL, NBA) combine to 29.1million viewers
Compare that to Dude Perfect at 56 million subscribers
TV is not the ultimate status symbol anymore
Enter Brodie Smith
Over 2 million youtube subscribers
Over 1 million twitter and Instagram followers
He is forcing disc golfers to look at these platforms and build better brands
Paul McBeth
“Brodie has made everyone in disc golf up their YouTube game. He’s inspired me a lot. We used to try to find the time to post videos when we could. Now we make the time. It’s become a priority.”
Brodie paid $1000 to rent the WHOLE driving range at Mulligans
Big facebook discussion about how the PDGA has dropped the ball over the last few years
Some blame TD, organizers, and sponsors
OB was unclear at Mulligans
Tee times for round 1 were posted very late
Zackeraith Johnson hit by golf ball during practice
This will get your blood boiling:
“When the Utah Open was a Pro Tour event [the warm-up] area was the same set-up used then. This was really the first we heard about players wanting to be able to air the disc out down the range,” said Danny Voss, PDGA Director of Marketing.
It’s like these guys have never played a tournament before
“Given the feedback we received from players after Brodie’s post, the PDGA worked with Mulligans to reserve the other half of the range for the remainder of the event. This not only helped us provide an amenity requested by players, but also afforded the same opportunity for other pools to have the same warm-up area for subsequent rounds,” said Voss. “We discussed this adjustment with Brodie after his first round and offered to reimburse him the money he paid to the golf course for the other half of the range. He declined the offer, so instead we’ll add at least that amount back into the payout to be distributed back to the players.”
