Steve Hall: Growing the American Ultimate Disc League (AUDL) (Full Transcript)
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Ronen Ainbinder 0:45
Today's Halftime Snack features a man who's an ABSOLUTE LEGEND.
He is a former banker and private equity expert who worked at Goldman, Citi, and EHF Capital, amongst others.
Today, he's the CEO & Commissioner of the American Ultimate Disc League, and he's also the co-owner of a team in the disc league called Atlanta Hustle.
The American Ultimate Disc League is the only professional Ultimate sports league in North America, and they currently have 21 teams!
I can't wait for this chat with him, so without further ado
Ladies and gentlemen,
Steve Hall 1:27
Hey, Ronen, how are you?
Ronen Ainbinder 1:29
I'm doing very well. I'm excited about this conversation. How are you, Steve?
Steve Hall 1:34
I'm doing well. Thank you.
Ronen Ainbinder 1:35
The icebreaker for today's conversation is a very simple one. And I want to know, what is your favorite beer to drink when you're watching a game from home?
Steve Hall 1:48
That's a great question. And not because you are in Mexico City running, but Dos Equis is my favorite beer usually. Amber, if it's nighttime that maybe go something lighter. It's the middle of the day. It goes well with tacos. That's a great beer. I love it.
Ronen Ainbinder 2:07
You're you're right. It's a good beer. I agree with you that my favorite beer to watch while I'm watching a game is also Mexican beer. And it's called the Indio. I don't know if you ever heard of it. But I do recommend it. But I want to get our conversation off to talk about you and some of your banking private equity stories. So what's the best thing about working there in private equity?
Steve Hall 2:32
Let's say, Ronen, what excites me. And this probably has a little bit to do with my studies back at university; I was an engineer. So I always love to build things. As a little kid, I loved to build things. And when I learned about private equity, it's about building companies, whether it's small companies, medium-sized companies, or big companies. So there's something very attractive to me when I got to the world of banking and looking at private equity. So again, it's not necessarily you building a rocket as you think about engineering, but it's building a company. And you're not just building alone, you're building with people who are very passionate about the business. So as the saying goes, it's not a job. If you're passionate about what you're doing. It's fun. And so that's why I get out of private equity. I love working with people who have the same passion.
Ronen Ainbinder 3:28
That's great. See you then. I'm wondering why you decided to buy an owner team in Ultimate Frisbee amongst all the sports that are out there. Can you share with us your motivation behind that?
Steve Hall 3:44
Sure. That's a great question. I get that question is probably not asked too many people in the world. Well back, I started playing ultimates in 1985, many, many years ago university. And I'm not that tall is 5'10. And so as a sport that I could pick up and play. I had some quicks. So I was able to make some cuts in pretty good hand-eye coordination. And so it was just a passion of mine. I played pretty casually as I focused on my career, but I played one competitive year in the mid-90s. And I've always loved it. When I left New York and moved to Charlotte, I was playing with guys in their 40s as well. And during practice one day, someone said, Hey, I heard about this pro ultimately guess it now there's no way I've ever heard of pro ultimate. They said yeah, they're looking for people to be owners of teams. And so it fired off an email, didn't hear anything back and, and two years later, at the end of 2014, all of a sudden an email that says, hey, we saw that you're curious about our teams. We'd like to talk to you because we're going to expand into the south in 2015, so I was like, wow, this is a dream come true. Again, it's my chance to maybe build something, put a little money into it. And it's sports have been a passion of mine for 30 years. So, yeah, we learned about the South Division of the American Ultimate Disc League and jumped into it and bought the company's rights. And I've been off and running.
Ronen Ainbinder 5:24
I wonder how the transition was from dealing with private equity, business deals, and stuff happening there to owning and making decisions for this team? So can you share with us a little bit of your experience of the transition?
Steve Hall 5:48
Let me tell you, it was a learning experience. And I think I'm still learning every single day. Building a company, especially as an engineer, I knew a lot about manufacturing companies, a little bit about service companies. I had never thought about what it meant to own an entertainment company or sports entertainment company. And we've learned a lot in the last eight years, or I'm sorry, seven years, since 2014. And it makes you appreciate what goes on with the major sports leagues. It's all about the fans. It's all about entertainment. And what you've learned is, it's not just about what's happening on the pitch; you have great athletes, great athletes make great plays, and that's entertaining. But in today's world, it's completely different. We spend half our time with our heads either looking at our phone, seeing what Instagram posts are going on, seeing what best we've made, how's our fantasy team doing? Or we might be watching someone throw free promotional items up to us in the stands. And the other half, maybe we catch the plays and, and if you're into the sport, maybe you're breaking down how well the players are playing that day. So it's been a big change on something I have no background on. And so that's been a great learning experience. It's been fun. It's been hard. But again, I've got many other owners around who are passionate and, so it's I enjoy spending all my day doing it.
Ronen Ainbinder 7:22
So let's talk about Ultimate as a game as a sport. Why do you think Ultimate is? Because I guess you have a vision of the sport's game, you have the vision, because you own a team, and you kind of see it going somewhere. So what is your vision with Ultimate moving forward? Why is it going to be exciting? Why is it going to be entertaining? Why is it not entertaining now? Or not entertaining enough? And what needs to happen in the next 10 years to be one of the top leagues in the US?
Steve Hall 7:56
Yeah, it's a great question. Number one, ultimate can should be, and I want to see these big soccer or football, to most of the rest of the world. There is scale. And we can get to a global scale, just like soccer, because it's a very low-cost sport. If the comparisons are tremendous. All you have is the disk cost of about 10 US dollars. You see many soccer balls that I have certainly bought from my youngest son. It can be 30 or $50, depending on the ball. And all you need is a pitch. Our pitches are about the same size as a soccer pitch. And the game can be played three vs. three, five vs. five, our game is played seven vs. seven. So it's got that flexibility. Instead of there's no barriers, you can play with boots or no boots. We have a lot of fun. So I don't see any barriers sometime in my lifetime. Now, that's obviously a big claim, but I do believe it. It's a game that can be played by men and women. Just one thing you mentioned we are one of the only men's leagues in North America. But there are two women's pro ultimate leagues in North America. I give them a shout-out to the ultimate premier league in the western ultimately. They just started the last couple of years. So it's a sport also that can be played by all genders, which is terrific. It's a fast-paced game. So it's got a similar stocker—lots of cutting, lots of running. What I like about our sport versus soccer is that we're a little bit higher scoring. Many of our games are from 24 to 21. There's always the beauty of soccer where a one-nil game hangs in the balance to the very end, but also, our games are usually pretty tight.
You rarely See blowouts. So I think it has that excitement. And the longer you look at today's media, world soccer matches are about two hours. Ours is also about two hours. And that's important for two reasons. One, the fans just in today's world have a hard time watching a video that's more than a minute long. It's the kind of world that we live in. But for the media partners out there, they want sporting matches that are two hours long, you're seeing a lot of pushback for cricket, baseball, other sports that have traditionally been multiple hours or multiple days. And so we are already by design, right in the sweet spot for the media partners. So I think we check all the big boxes out there. So I don't see why we can't be as big as soccer. And as you were kind of alluding to, it is good entertainment. We think we have great athletes on the pitch now. But we've got to do two things. As I mentioned, we need to make it more exciting for the fans while they're in the stands. We hope that they look at the pitch; we hope that they appreciate our great athletes. Still, we need to bring more entertainment to them, either if their kids are running around or having a good time. Or if you're in your seat, and you have your head. Your phone, we need to bring more exciting statistics, video, and games, whether it's a casual game or whether it's gambling, where you're making a bet on the game. You're making a prop bet on a player. We need to develop that. And so that's in the pipeline. Now. I'd also say the last thing is, if we're going to bring this game to the rest of the world, the players need to be more representative of our communities. There's too many people in our sport; now it's a heavily Caucasian game, we need to make this game. We need to bring this game to different communities, brown-black other communities out there right now. Once we show them how exciting it can be, I think it'd be great. It's embraced by many people in Colombia, Europe, Asia, so the seeds are planted. Still, we need the game and haven't expanded.
Ronen Ainbinder 12:18
That's very interesting. Steve, I want to touch deeper on the topics you were mentioning about including diversifying the type of people that play the game, and inclusion, women, and everything. So I want to know, what are some of the things that you guys are currently planning on doing or doing to spurt inclusion, diversification, quality? And what can other leagues and teams organizations do from either that sport or other sports? What can be learned from what you guys are doing?
Steve Hall 12:57
It's a great question since it's a long, difficult answer. Number one, we all need to be open-minded; we need to realize that just because somebody doesn't look like you, they can have great ideas, be a great athlete, be a great friend, and can be a great fan. So I hope the world is more engaging and is more open-minded in the future. In terms of women, the women came up with their idea for their professional platform. A couple of years ago, the chairman and I were on the strategic Advisory Committee for the premiere, ultimately, the first of the pro women's leagues in North America. And we said, listen, you need to decide what is best for you. Don't just copy and paste what we've done; decide what you want. And we'll be here to support the other one, Western; ultimately, we're also speaking to them and offering our support. So that's, that's a very base. And there are other pro leagues in the rest of the world. There's the next league, and Australia is one example. So that's on the women's side or the nonmale side, in terms of racial and cultural diversity. We can't expect new communities to come to us. Some of the trainers we worked with a couple of years ago said that if you want more people to be included in your sport and play your sport, you need to bring the sport to them. Don't expect him to come to you, which was great advice. So the first thing we've done is to just make sure that we're being very open-minded. We created the AUDL inclusion initiative back in July 2019. Obviously, there's been a lot of racial discord over the last year or two, many police brutality issues. So we've tried to look inward first. We've partnered with a company or institution called We Rise. It's a Ross initiative and sports for equality. They work with Serve all the major sports leagues out there. And they they've your number one strategic advisor's strategic counsel on racial topics. And they've been great to work with us to make us first look inward. It's difficult to engage somebody if you're not open-minded. So they've done a good job of asking you hard questions that make us look. We're challenging the biases that we all have as humans. We're doing at the owner level, the coach level and will soon be having these same sessions with our players. And once we do that, we're going to spend more time being active and outreach to the external community, talking to them, seeing what's going on, understanding what's important to them. How can the AUDL play a positive role model in working with our community? We have this year a combine that's focused on diversifying our talent pool athletes. We think many athletes in high school and university don't make it to the major pro leagues, whether it's football, baseball, basketball, hockey. Still, these are great athletes who are fast, jump high, and have great hand-eye coordination. And those are the three characteristics that we look at for ultimate players. So we're creating the first-ever combine, we're going to have it in Atlanta on Saturday, April 17. And so we're going to bring our sports to them, we're going to have three events. And they're going to be events that they're they're used to seeing it's a 40-yard dash, it's a vertical leap, and then what we call a, an extended shall run something a little bit more like ultimate, it's got a couple of cuts, hard cuts, and it's going to have a long run. So it's going to be going to allow them to show their aerobics and their cutting ability. As I'm excited. It's the first time we've ever done this. We're bringing it to new communities, we're putting the word out to those communities. And we're excited to totally open up the pipeline for the first time.
Ronen Ainbinder 17:14
I like that, Steve. Now that you were telling me this, it also made me realize that your young players' value for a league is one that you cannot look away from because of you if you're thinking about sport, now, that's okay. But in 510 or 15 years, the players playing right now may not be able to play later. Academies, scouting combines schools or academies that train athletes to those three things that you mentioned, to then be able to just join the league. You have an automatic feeding system of players that generates new and upcoming talent every x amount of years or every year. And I think that's also important to consider in terms of like, how can you include the youth in the sport? While you're supposed to diversify, create equal opportunities for how you can include the younger generations in the sport to create this system to generate talent? On and on?
Steve Hall 18:37
Yeah, we've been studying at the academies; as you said, I'm a big man, city fan. And so we've been studying like, my son's a Barcelona fan. So we look at the EPL, we look at La Liga and the economies that they've created. And that's back to soccer. I think soccer is the business model that we look at. We like to have academies. Over time we're working on an idea for an extended clinic and camp concept. Our sport is great, like soccer; it has low concussion rates. So as more and more parents are concerned about concussions, we're a great sport for that. And, and we believe again, that you can throw a disc at the age of six or seven; they may come out of foam at a soft plastic. So there again, there's no barrier there. But one of the things I mentioned is, you were trying to be more inclusive. So we're trying to also have our games broadcast in Spanish is just one example. We're probably going to have a handful of games broadcast in Spanish this year. that there's a great following of the sport in Colombia. And so we think there's a lot of Spanish-speaking people out in the world that would love this game. And we're focusing on some of the big cuts. India's one we're also focused on. And again, we think once we get the word out about the sport, and we start to support the youth, then the academies will follow. And as you said, then you've got a great pipeline of people who are passionate about the sport. Whether they become a pro athlete, they have a passion for the sport, and therefore they become fans. And that's what that's what drives the economics of the business.
Ronen Ainbinder 20:24
Yeah, that's a fantastic answer. Steve, thank you so much for sharing that. And I want to switch over now to talk about tech in terms of, like, how do you guys consider tech in your plans? What is the role that technology is playing in the evolution and growth of the AUDL? So share with us your thoughts around that? Sure. Well,
Steve Hall 20:46
I think, yeah, the two things we're spending the most time on this year. Clearly, health and safety is number one, we've got to make sure our players are safe. And we're using technology more to trace who's got vaccines, how well they're feeling. So that's the one part of technology that's first and foremost. But in terms of the fans, I'd say that's where technology comes into play. And we want to create more content, and I split the content into two worlds. And we've always had very good video content. But we can do even a better job. The biggest thing is getting statistics from the game. We like every other sport; we track the game statistics, wins, losses, point score, defense assist, things like that. But what's exciting, both for fan entertainment and for the gaming gambling world, are the statistics, the data that you gather from players. And in our case, it's not the ball, but it's the disc. So we are focused quite a bit on player wearables, you've seen that in soccer, where the players will have a vest. And they have a tracking device that goes between their shoulder blades. It's a GPS-enabled device; it shows how far they run how fast these devices had accelerometers on them. Sometimes it can show how high they jump, which is clearly important. Some of these devices also capture biometrics like heart rate, perspiration rate, so we're going to capture a lot more data on our players this year. And then, we're also working on ideas to gather more data from the disk itself. So that's it's interesting, but when you start to put all this together, you get some exciting things from it, again, more opportunities for gaming and gambling, which is very popular around the world. It also lets us go after things like video games, where we're one of the few sports where we're creating our own console-based video game. I don't know many other sports or any other sports, you've done this. It's usually a video game maker who says, Hey, sport, I would love to make a video game. A, how will we kind of deal in royalties or licensing agreement, we're our own subsidiary that focuses on a technology called Ulti-X. And so we're creating the video game ourselves. And so that control is exciting for us a lot more visibility for our players. They get going to be super exciting, that younger generation that we were just talking about. You need to be 21 in the states to make a bet that if you're 14, you can play casual games, you can play the video game. And we want those fans, whether in the stands, to see all this exciting stuff going on. Or if you're in your home and you're watching a game, you're watching the screen. It's the screen that focused on the field on the pitch is shrinking. The banners will show all the scores for the day. And the player's statistics caught up and flashed onto a screen. So there are so many exciting things planned out there by great companies that we can partner with. I think that 2021 will be a huge leaping point for us where you're going to see this technology come to life. It's going to come to life on your screen on your big screen. It's going to come to life on your smaller screen, your mobile phone. And we are so excited about 2021, and then we're going to have some even bigger launches for 2020.
Ronen Ainbinder 24:40
What is it about statistics that everyone loves? I love stats. Following how many points my favorite players have scored, or the ratios or the percentages. What do you think is about statistics that just pulls us so much into engaging with the game?
Steve Hall 25:00
Yeah, I think it tells the underlying story, right. And you and I can watch a soccer match. And we can say, Well, yeah, that player played well, or I think that player did okay. But when you start to see the numbers behind, it's the story behind the screen. We typically see the players who score; we can all tell you how many goals Messi has. But again, as a man, city fan, how many props does John Stones get playing great defense. Maybe he heads away a couple of corner kicks—people he's recognized for that. But I think some of the information that we can pull from the numbers that we haven't been able to tell another story is that sports are all about storytelling. we're talking about Michael Jordan earlier, and I love the special done to Michael Jordan. It was the story behind what went on. And then information brought to life Michael Jordan made it even bigger than he already is. And, and so I think those statistics tell a bigger story. And we all get excited to hear another story.
Ronen Ainbinder 26:11
I love that answer. Steve, I love it. My last question for you, Steve, is a bit more personal, but I want to know who's your biggest sports inspiration? And why?
Steve Hall 26:23
Why? That's a great question. I'd probably say, well, maybe a little background would be helpful. You mentioned I worked at Goldman Sachs. I remember one of my interviews at Goldman Sachs. The gentleman said, Steve, there are two kinds of people that make it to the top here, the ones that outsmart and the ones that outwork; which one are you? And I was smart enough to know that I was not the smartest person in the room. I also know that I'm a very hard worker. So I answered, honestly, I said, I'm going to be the guy who outworks everybody else. I'll get in, again, the office book for everybody. I'll be the last one to leave. I think that just that work ethic has always been near and dear to my heart. It's been something that's important to my family. And so Originally, I thought of Jerry Rice, the star receiver for the San Francisco 40. Niners. But I tell you running back to Michael Jordan, I always say Jerry Rice was my answer until speaking of that, the session on Michael Jordan. What I learned about Michael Jordan that set him apart as the greatest inspiration is that not only did he worked hard, he came in early, he left late, he took extra free throws. But he worked harder at the mental game as well, both on the court and in business. What was fascinating is he would find some reason to get himself fired up. I mean, there's some great stories that were told that someone didn't say something properly to him in a restaurant when he was passing by, which got him fired up for the game. And so he found ways little ways to motivate himself, not just physically but mentally. And in business, he thought about who he wanted to have around him. So it was not only the physical game, where he outworked the news, the mental game where he also outworked everybody. That was special. I think I hold him up as a great role model to not only what we do and Ultimate. But all the kids out there need to do a lot of reading; they need a lot of watching Michael Jordan. I think to get behind the scenes. And I think they'll be impressed.
Ronen Ainbinder 28:38
That's a great answer. Steve, I want to thank you so much for your time and your insights on the halftime snacks. I'm so excited to see what's gonna happen with the Ultimate Disc League and Atlanta Hustle. I'm so excited. Now I'm a big fan of the Atlanta hustle after this conversation. So I hope they win the championship. And I'll be following and rooting for you and the league for the rest of my life. And I can't wait to bring you back to the podcast in a few years and talk about the success you guys are having. So thanks once again, Steve, for coming to the Halftime Snacks.