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Speaker 1: On this episode of Sports Illustrated Weekly. Owners tend to

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Speaker 1: get blamed by fans when things don't go well, especially

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Speaker 1: in soccer. Anyone who watches the Premier League was aware

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Speaker 1: of Manchester United fans marching through the streets chanting Glazers out.

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Speaker 1: But what do we know about the glazers? Really? What

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Speaker 1: do we know about any of the extremely rich owners

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Speaker 1: who are throwing around gobs of money at various clubs

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Speaker 1: all over the world. Our producer and resident football enthusiast

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Speaker 1: Jordan Rizsieri takes a look at global football owners, what

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Speaker 1: they're after by buying clubs, and what they could do

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Speaker 1: to better serve the fans who support their teams. I'm

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Speaker 1: your host, John Gonzalez from Sports Illustrated and iHeart Radio.

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Speaker 1: This is Sports Illustrated Weekly. When things are going well

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Speaker 1: for our soccer teams, it can be the best fielding

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Speaker 1: in the whole world in the final minutes of the

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Speaker 1: final in them. But when things are going badly, we

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Speaker 1: turn our anger to the players, the managers, and when

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Speaker 1: things have gone disastrously bad, the owners. Who are these

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Speaker 1: mysterious millionaires and billionaires who found the clubs we love?

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Speaker 1: Can anyone purchase a stake in a major soccer club,

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Speaker 1: What does it even mean to be an owner? And

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Speaker 1: perhaps a better question, what should it mean not just

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Speaker 1: for the team, but for the surrounding communities. It's time

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Speaker 1: to call up some of our favorite soccer experts for

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Speaker 1: a course in global soccer ownership. I'm Jordan Rozsieri, producer

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Speaker 1: at Sports Illustrated Weekly, and class is now in session.

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Speaker 1: As an American soccer fan, the first question I have

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Speaker 1: to ask is simple, why is ownership in professional soccer

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Speaker 1: so different all over the world. The reason why it's

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Speaker 1: so different in Europe and South America as opposed to

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Speaker 1: the US, is because there's a pyramid system. In those

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Speaker 1: other places, there's a relegation system, and no matter who

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Speaker 1: you bring in and no matter how much you spend,

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Speaker 1: you better deliver on the pitch because otherwise all that revenue,

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Speaker 1: specifically your TV rights, et cetera, are just gonna keep

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Speaker 1: going down. That's not the case in MLS. There's already

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Speaker 1: a sort of infiltrated bubble that's you know, already exists

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Speaker 1: because those clubs are never gonna be relegated. Here at

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Speaker 1: Sports Illustrated Weekly, when we have a soccer question. We

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Speaker 1: always start by asking Luis miguel At, a Garai longtime

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Speaker 1: soccer media mainstay recently of CBS Sports and the Kega

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Speaker 1: Lots of podcast. I wanted to know why we're not

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Speaker 1: seeing the kind of reaction to big spenders coming into

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Speaker 1: Major League Soccer to buy up our clubs that we

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Speaker 1: are in Europe. It's controversial, it's complicated, but I do

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Speaker 1: believe that the core reason why there's a big difference

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Speaker 1: is because MLS doesn't rely on relegation. If relegation existed,

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Speaker 1: I think more clubs there would be much more apparel

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Speaker 1: to find owners that, no matter what, can inject the

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Speaker 1: level of financial sustainability. In fact, what we see in

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Speaker 1: terms of ownership in the MLS is a certain amount

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Speaker 1: of celebrity, from Drew Kerrey to Ken Griffey Jr. And

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Speaker 1: even Matthew McConaughey. But what are these famous faces really

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Speaker 1: adding to the league. So if you're a name, a

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Speaker 1: celebrity name that's coming in and supporting this club and

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Speaker 1: adding some money and to your points and fame or

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Speaker 1: your face, and you know you do like a monthly

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Speaker 1: Q and a on Instagram live and maybe that helps

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Speaker 1: you a little bit, so be it what's more important

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Speaker 1: And this is what I see more from Matthew McConaughey.

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Speaker 1: Actually I'm very impressed with his influence for us Austin

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Speaker 1: FC is is how much are you given to your community?

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Speaker 1: And Angel City actually are doing a lot of stout there.

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Speaker 1: So I don't care what kind of celebrity comes in,

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Speaker 1: just make sure that the community is being represented and

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Speaker 1: being nurtured. When we think about soccer clubs and owners

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Speaker 1: relationships with the community, with the supporters, perhaps there is

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Speaker 1: no better example than in Germany in the Bundesliga. The

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Speaker 1: term fifty plus one gets thrown around a lot to

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Speaker 1: describe how the fans are involved in the ownership of

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Speaker 1: their clubs. So I decided to ask matt Ford football

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Speaker 1: journalists with Deutsche Vella to explain very very simply. The

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Speaker 1: fifty plus one rule stipulates that the majority of voting

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Speaker 1: rights in a professional company which runs a professional Bundesliague

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Speaker 1: football club, that those majority voting rights who main in

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Speaker 1: the hands of the parents club, the pairment football club

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Speaker 1: and its members, in other words, it's fans. This ensures

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Speaker 1: that while it's possible to purchase majority stakes in football clubs.

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Speaker 1: No outside entities, no external investors, no external business interests

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Speaker 1: can ever tame majority voting control over these clubs. That's

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Speaker 1: this ensures that of the voting shares in these clubs

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Speaker 1: remain with the club itself with its members plus one share,

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Speaker 1: hence the term fifty plus one. And this wild has

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Speaker 1: been in place since. So what does voting actually consist of?

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Speaker 1: What are you voting on? What are the fans actually

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Speaker 1: participating in? And it can vary slightly from club to club.

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Speaker 1: Were generally speaking, the fans will have a chance, usually

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Speaker 1: once per year at an annual general meeting to vote

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Speaker 1: for the bard all supervisor be barred. It's not that

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Speaker 1: direct voting. Nobody is directly voting for the manager. Nobody's

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Speaker 1: really even directly voting for the CEO, and there're certainly

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Speaker 1: not voting for the new striker that you sang in summer.

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Speaker 1: But that there isn't an indirect voting system. So when

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Speaker 1: we compare this kind of structure and this relationship between

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Speaker 1: the supporters and the club itself and where the money

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Speaker 1: is coming from to what's currently happening in the Premier League.

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Speaker 1: You're wearing a Manchester United shirt. Right now, we've seen

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Speaker 1: a lot of vocalization from the fans outside of the

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Speaker 1: stadium at Old Trafford, with a lot of opinions about

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Speaker 1: the owners of the team with the start the first

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Speaker 1: couple of games. What's your message to the Glazers. Absolutely

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Speaker 1: get out of this club because we don't need you.

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Speaker 1: You're a pathetic bunch of owners. You took this club

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Speaker 1: dry and all you do it's just take, take, take.

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Speaker 1: Can we talk a little bit about the difference between

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Speaker 1: those two things, because it's it seems to me that

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Speaker 1: there is a place in the Bundesliga for you as

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Speaker 1: a fan to have a voice when you're unsatisfied with

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Speaker 1: something that's going on, whereas in the Premier League there

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Speaker 1: is a limit to what you can do with your

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Speaker 1: frustration in terms of actually affecting change within your club.

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Speaker 1: One of the most common phases that you hear from

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Speaker 1: I suppose football fans all over the world, but I

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Speaker 1: think made particularly in England fans of Premier League and

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Speaker 1: other English clubs lower down the pyramid. We all, and

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Speaker 1: I include myself in this, we all talk about my club,

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Speaker 1: our club was we which is fine, That's that's only

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Speaker 1: natural However, at the end of the day, if we're

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Speaker 1: being if I'm being totally honest with myself, legally speaking,

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Speaker 1: Manchester United is not mine at all. It belongs to

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Speaker 1: the Closer family, and it has done since two thousand

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Speaker 1: and five. I have no possession or ownership or control

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Speaker 1: at all of Manchester United, and this applies to every

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Speaker 1: other club in the Premier League and elsewhere in the pyramid.

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Speaker 1: I might have something of man United, which is called

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Speaker 1: a membership, but it entitles me to absolutely nothing more

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Speaker 1: than what I might get if I have a bonus

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Speaker 1: card at the local local supermarket. That's all this entitles

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Speaker 1: me to. Ultimately. In Germany there is a fundamental difference

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Speaker 1: in it because of the fifty plus one whole. When

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Speaker 1: a German fan says it's my club, it literally is,

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Speaker 1: and that by its very nature influences the decisions which

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Speaker 1: those elected officials, and there the board members or directors

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Speaker 1: that they appoint influences the way they behave knowing that

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Speaker 1: there is an element of accountability. At some point when

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Speaker 1: it came to for example, the Super League by a

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Speaker 1: Munich and Bussy dartmands, they didn't even dare accept the

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Speaker 1: invitation to join the Super League at first, because they

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Speaker 1: knew it would have been impossible in their own club

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Speaker 1: statutes to take such a step without consulting membership. In England,

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Speaker 1: there was absolutely nothing stopping the Glazers of Manchester United,

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Speaker 1: or FSG group at Liverpool, or at the time of

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Speaker 1: Ramovich Chelsea or the Abu Dabi royal family in Manchester City.

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Speaker 1: Notebooks out everyone because now we're onto something. So there's

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Speaker 1: almost nothing stopping a singular person, a group or an

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Speaker 1: organization from taking over ownership of a club outside of

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Speaker 1: Germany and making decisions that may or may not be

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Speaker 1: in the best interests of the club and its supporters.

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Speaker 1: One place that Matt didn't mention is France. In Legua,

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Speaker 1: so I called up Justin Sahani, a Paris based journalist

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Speaker 1: and writer who works for Oh My Goal, to talk

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Speaker 1: about the ownership of one of the biggest clubs in

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Speaker 1: the world PSG. Let's talk a little bit about France.

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Speaker 1: So first of all, it's hard not to automatically start

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Speaker 1: talking about p s G as a club and their ownership,

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Speaker 1: but can we talk about what makes it possible for

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Speaker 1: an organization like that to even own a club in France.

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Speaker 1: In Germany there's this fifty plus one rule. I believe

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Speaker 1: in the Premier League there's sort of like a board

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Speaker 1: that determines whether or not a team can be bought

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Speaker 1: by a certain entity. And while those they have certain

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Speaker 1: like levers in place or certain rules in place, those

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Speaker 1: are fairly easily circumnavigated. In the case of while everyone

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Speaker 1: knows that it is owned by the state of Katar,

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Speaker 1: is effectively the owner, it's ran by and was purchased

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Speaker 1: by Qua side, which is the cut our sports investment,

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Speaker 1: which is essentially a means of the cutter government being

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Speaker 1: able to kind of operate and do things and say that,

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Speaker 1: you know, it's not exactly the emir who's who's in

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Speaker 1: charge of things. In France in general, I mean, we've

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Speaker 1: seen outside investment come more and more. We've had a

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Speaker 1: lot of American investment in recent years. For example, marse

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Speaker 1: which is maybe historically the biggest club in France, or

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Speaker 1: at least the most well supported club in France, has

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Speaker 1: had an American owner. Recently, international owners start to get

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Speaker 1: in and try to get ownership in the way that

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Speaker 1: you've seen in the Premier League and elsewhere. Monaco, which

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Speaker 1: is owned by a Russian individual who is on certain

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Speaker 1: lists that have seen consideration for sanctions in the US,

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Speaker 1: but in France until now through Friends Football, that they've

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Speaker 1: decided not to sanction him, which you know we saw

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Speaker 1: in the UK with Chelsea's owner Roman Abramovich. Abramovich has

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Speaker 1: now been added to the UK sanctions list. He was

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Speaker 1: placed under sanction and had to sell the team and

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Speaker 1: has since sold the team. So in France there's just

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Speaker 1: no sort of rule that that's tip relates anything like

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Speaker 1: the Bundesliga, which I think opens it up to people

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Speaker 1: being able to invest more freely, and like the sort

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Speaker 1: of owners that come in can kind of be from

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Speaker 1: you know, almost anywhere in particular. So there's lots of

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Speaker 1: reasons why somebody would be interested in purchasing a club.

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Speaker 1: You mentioned Frank McCourt who owns Marseille, who comes from

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Speaker 1: the l A Dodgers. He's got experience owning a franchise

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Speaker 1: team in the US and Major League Baseball. I think

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Speaker 1: there's probably some cloud involved with getting your ownership on

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Speaker 1: a really well known, well respected, globally recognized team, And

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Speaker 1: that's how we end up talking about the term sports washing. First,

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Speaker 1: let's define what the term actually means. Yeah, sports washing

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Speaker 1: is a means of essentially laundering a reputation. So for example,

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Speaker 1: you know, you might buy a football club because it's

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Speaker 1: a way for you to get in and get into

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Speaker 1: new circles, to get into new in business and investment

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Speaker 1: circles or political circles. Particularly with PSG, that's what we've seen.

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Speaker 1: We've seen that the Katy government in various figure years

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Speaker 1: have used the ownership of PSG to make political connections

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Speaker 1: in France, particularly with somebody like the former French president

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Speaker 1: Nicolas Sarkozy. Why they're getting involved is more for the

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Speaker 1: political cloud but also for the associative clouds. So for example,

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Speaker 1: now when um, you know, you go around and you

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Speaker 1: talk about the state of cud Art two people in

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Speaker 1: France with the greater Prissian area, you know, they might

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Speaker 1: talk about things related to the upcoming World Cup. They

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Speaker 1: might talk about the labor violation issues, because this is

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Speaker 1: something that has been fairly well documented and shared among

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Speaker 1: you know, around the world. But you know, you also

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Speaker 1: see kind of the inverse of that at times. For example,

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Speaker 1: Messi has tonight signed for Parry Saint Gemin, officially ending

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Speaker 1: his twenty one year stay at Barcelona. He's completed his

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Speaker 1: medical examinations and signed a lucrative two year deal with

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Speaker 1: an option for a third year. You know, a bunch

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Speaker 1: of Parisians started to post things on social media to

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Speaker 1: essentially overseeing the PSG operation and has now also taken

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Speaker 1: like a very high profile role with UEFA as well.

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Speaker 1: So some interesting conflict of interest going on there, but

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Speaker 1: in essence, you know, the reasons to get involved here

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Speaker 1: and this is what sports watching comes down to, is

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Speaker 1: to change the association in your mind. And it's not

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Speaker 1: just happening in France either, It's happening in other places too.

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Speaker 1: I mean, we've talked a lot about what's happening with

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Speaker 1: complicated thing for fans of Newcastle, longtime fans who have

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Speaker 1: seen the difficulties that the team has had in terms

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Speaker 1: their team be successful and who understand that Unfortunately, in

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Speaker 1: the Premier League that means you need money. You can't

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Speaker 1: win the Premier League if you don't have a lot

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Speaker 1: of money. However, when we see things like I think

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Speaker 1: maybe towards the end of last year, at the beginning

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Speaker 1: of the summer, we saw what their new kit was

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Speaker 1: going to look like, and it's basically the Saudi Arabian

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Speaker 1: flag right and speaks exactly to what you were just saying.

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Speaker 1: Is that now when people see those color combinations, are

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Speaker 1: they going to be thinking about the Newcastle away kit

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Speaker 1: or are they going to be thinking about Saudi Arabia

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Speaker 1: and the country and the things that have happened there

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Speaker 1: and have happened elsewhere in the world. But I think

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Speaker 1: those are the things that we talk about when we

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Speaker 1: talk about sports washing. Is it's kind of like having

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Speaker 1: your brain rewired, not even realizing it at the time.

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Speaker 1: There's a number of threads to pull up there. If

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Speaker 1: you take Newcastle as an example in particular, you really

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Speaker 1: have to empathize with some of the fans, you know,

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Speaker 1: I mean, because I think there there are levels to

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Speaker 1: what's been happening, and there's levels of culpability and responsibility

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Speaker 1: as well. Obviously, the major responsibility here lies with the

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Speaker 1: people highest in power that happens to be the Premier League. Um,

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Speaker 1: you can even argue maybe the British government to some extent.

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Speaker 1: You know, Newcastle fans have been they've been relegated a

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Speaker 1: couple of times in recent years. And this is a massive,

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Speaker 1: massive club with a huge fan base that was challenging

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Speaker 1: for titles you know a little over a decade ago.

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Speaker 1: The message that we've been receiving from watching football on TV,

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Speaker 1: watching all the highlight shows and review shows is that

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Speaker 1: the only thing that matters is winning, and the only

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Speaker 1: thing that matters our trophies. And if that's that's the

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Speaker 1: message we're taking away from playing football, then the kind

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Speaker 1: of natural end game of this is arriving at a

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Speaker 1: point where, well, we need money. Anytime a new owner

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Speaker 1: is coming in, there's gonna be kind of like, great,

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Speaker 1: just get us out of this guy's ownership. We saw

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Speaker 1: what happened with Man City and Abu Dhabi, and we

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Speaker 1: saw what happened with ps G N Kuta. So suddenly

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Speaker 1: there's this association that, Okay, we know this is problematic,

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Speaker 1: but we also know we're going to get investment, we're

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Speaker 1: gonna win. So maybe nobody has quite figured it out

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Speaker 1: yet from what Matt told me, it sounds like the

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Speaker 1: Bundesliga has some of their own problems, and there's obviously

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Speaker 1: plenty of problems in the Premier League and League in America.

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Speaker 1: Even if you lose, basically always, you're never going to

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Speaker 1: end about of the league. So you know, maybe there's

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Speaker 1: no perfect answer to what football ownership should look like.

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Speaker 1: The Amber consisted at an interesting comparison because as a nation,

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Speaker 1: as a culture, in the United States, it's is the

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Speaker 1: pre eminent free markets, unregulated sort of capitalist economy in

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Speaker 1: the Western world. However, the US sports systems are among

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Speaker 1: the most highly regulated in the Western world to ensure

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Speaker 1: their competition. There's actually quite interesting to see how that works.

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Speaker 1: And then we're seeing it in the Premier League at

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Speaker 1: the moment whereby it's no longer just wealthy business people

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Speaker 1: who are owning football clubs, but it's across the state

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Speaker 1: now where literally nation states are owning football clubs. Then

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Speaker 1: you're getting into a whole different ball game of why

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Speaker 1: are these people involved. If you're a Newcastle fan or

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Speaker 1: a Manchester City fan, you can tell yourself whatever you want,

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Speaker 1: I supposed to make yourself feel better about it. But

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Speaker 1: ultimately the Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth for them arm of

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Speaker 1: the Saudi government, and about how they spin it. They're

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Speaker 1: not involved in Newcastle because they primarily care about football

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Speaker 1: or sports in Newcastle, in a city in the northeast

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Speaker 1: of England. They're doing it because it suits the state

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Speaker 1: of Saudi Bavia to be a oociated with the glamorous

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Speaker 1: entertainment products all over the world, which is the Premier League.

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Speaker 1: The same applies to Abu d Abbey in man Manchester City.

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Speaker 1: The same applied to Romano Gramovich and the adults ulterior

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Speaker 1: motives to be involved, to be associated with the high

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Speaker 1: profile Western assets. Other reasons why high profile individuals or

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Speaker 1: entities my own football clubs are argue even more dangerous

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Speaker 1: when you consider the damage that has been done to

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Speaker 1: Manchester United by the Glazier families since two thousand and five.

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Speaker 1: You know, over one point two billion pounds effectively stolen

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Speaker 1: from the football club's own profits and own turnovers in

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Speaker 1: order to repay debts and pay our dividends. So all

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Speaker 1: these zones all have ulterior motives to it to own

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Speaker 1: these football clubs and it ultimately leaves the fans the

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Speaker 1: support as the people to whom actually do these clubs

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Speaker 1: mean the most? It is a hugely important socio cultural

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Speaker 1: assets and socio cultural institutions in their communities. They end

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Speaker 1: up being little more than puppets, to put it bluntly,

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Speaker 1: and for whatever cause that owner might want, whether it's sportswashing,

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Speaker 1: whether it's cash machine, whether it's protect your assets or

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Speaker 1: whatever the reason might be. The fans are the ones

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Speaker 1: that end up being puppits in this, and the fans

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Speaker 1: of that they held hostage because they can't say no.

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Speaker 1: So what exactly is the point of a soccer club owner?

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Speaker 1: What are they meant to be doing besides pumping money

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Speaker 1: into the team to be competitive. How are these owners

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Speaker 1: supporting the communities that support their teams, that house their stadiums,

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Speaker 1: that come and work on game day. Louise has a

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Speaker 1: suggestion every single MLS club should have a community based department,

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Speaker 1: and their entire job has nothing to do with like

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Speaker 1: posting on Twitter or social media admin or videos, but

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Speaker 1: it's literally going out there into the community and engaging

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Speaker 1: with them and perhaps creating events, whether it's twenty four

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Speaker 1: hour days, soccer marathon days, you know, trials for the

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Speaker 1: under nines are under tens, food and culture festivals, whatever

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Speaker 1: it is, just begin to create a tighter bridge between

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Speaker 1: the club and community that has nothing to do with digital.

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Speaker 1: The moment that you yourself show yourself in the community,

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Speaker 1: and I'm speaking directly about the multicultural, underprivileged minority communities.

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Speaker 1: The more you do that, the better served. I mean again,

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Speaker 1: I go back to l a f C. The Mexican

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Speaker 1: American power that is the soccer fan in the United

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Speaker 1: States is so prevalent, and you go into that stadium

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Speaker 1: you can feel it. And it's not just because like

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Speaker 1: Carlos Vela is there. It's because they go into the

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Speaker 1: community and they try and create more relationships with whether

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Speaker 1: it's an amateur club or a youth club or a school,

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Speaker 1: et cetera. And I think that's the key. Like every

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Speaker 1: MLS clubs should have a community outreach department that specifically

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Speaker 1: focuses on one thing, and that's engaging with the community.

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Speaker 1: If you do that, you'll be better for it five, ten,

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Speaker 1: fifteen years from now. The kind of community engagement from

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Speaker 1: the club itself that Louise is talking about also helps

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Speaker 1: to encourage an outspoken and participatory fan base back in

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Speaker 1: German football supporters have been extremely vocal about their feelings

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Speaker 1: on a number of issues, made clear through the colorful

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Speaker 1: and vibrant displays known as TIFO. I asked Matt about

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Speaker 1: how the fifty plus one rule intrinsically ties the values

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Speaker 1: of the community to the clubs themselves. The very way

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Speaker 1: in which the club substructure in Germany makes them much

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Speaker 1: much more accuate and embedded representations of the communities they

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Speaker 1: come from, much more so than Premier League football crowds.

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Speaker 1: I was an old trafford in Manchester and it always

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Speaker 1: strikes me that how how comparatively old football crowds are

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Speaker 1: in England compared to Germany. I believe it. At one

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Speaker 1: point in recent years the average age of a season

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Speaker 1: ticket older at a print league football club in England

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Speaker 1: was about forty five to fifty years old. In Germany.

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Speaker 1: That is certainly much lower. It's certainly not forty five.

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Speaker 1: That's the result of the ticket prices being a lot

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Speaker 1: more affordable. That's the result of undeserved standing stervices being present.

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Speaker 1: Because if you abolish a standing terraces in a place

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Speaker 1: with seats, suddenly you can charge forty fifty are those

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Speaker 1: per sits rather than only ten. You are boys, per

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Speaker 1: stand where you want. It also attracts arguably a more

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Speaker 1: moneyed and perhaps slightly more controllable demographic rather than a

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Speaker 1: younger demographic, which there's a subculture which by thirty nature

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Speaker 1: as a youth subculture is rebellious. There has to be

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Speaker 1: a space for young people to rebil abit on the

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Speaker 1: Saturday afternoon within reason, and that is very much present

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Speaker 1: in Germany. So I think, like you said before you

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Speaker 1: mentioned the huge flags that capture people's attention, I think, yeah,

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Speaker 1: they're great, fantastically you know, they made for viable tweets

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Speaker 1: and videos and look spectacular blah blah blah. But they

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Speaker 1: I think, as we probably as I hope is probably

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Speaker 1: clear now is tip of the aspect? What what is

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Speaker 1: underneath that? The structures, the societal and impart and fifty

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Speaker 1: those one and that's that's all beneath that, that's probably

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Speaker 1: more going part and then simply a fantasy flag. And

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Speaker 1: and what a great example too, because literally the people

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Speaker 1: you're talking about that represent those structures are quite quite

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Speaker 1: literally underneath those giant flags too, So it was great,

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Speaker 1: a great metaphor, excellent, I'll use that sale. So what

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Speaker 1: have we learned about global soccer ownership. Well, we know

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Speaker 1: that clubs need financial backing in order to be competitive,

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Speaker 1: but because of the global popularity of the sport, the

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Speaker 1: tradeoff could be investment from individuals, groups, and even nation states.

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Speaker 1: We're looking to benefit in the socio political sphere as

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Speaker 1: well as with sports fans. Money make will wins, but

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Speaker 1: at what cost? And we also know that with ownership

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Speaker 1: structures varying were wide, the rocket powered globalization of top

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Speaker 1: tier soccer continues to widen the gap between the teams

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Speaker 1: and the communities they once represented. In order to strike

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Speaker 1: a balance, there must be true regulation of club ownership

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Speaker 1: and the elevation of each community's values within the clubs

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Speaker 1: they support. That's it for today, Class dismissed. Sports Illustrated

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Speaker 1: Weekly is a production of Sports Illustrated and I Heart Radio.

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Speaker 1: For more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I

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Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your

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Speaker 1: favorite shows. And for more of Sports Illustrated It's best

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Speaker 1: stories and podcasts, visit SI dot com. This episode of

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Speaker 1: Sports Illustrated Weekly was produced by Jordan Rozsieri, Jessica yard

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Speaker 1: Moski and Isaac Lee, who was also our sound engineer.

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Speaker 1: Our senior producers are Dan Bloom and Harry swart Out.

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Speaker 1: Our executive producers are Scott Brody and me John Gonzalez.

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Speaker 1: Our theme song is by Nolan Schneider. And if you've

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Speaker 1: stuck around this long, we leave you with this. So

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Speaker 1: actually the first thing, justin, would you mind just introducing

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Speaker 1: yourself quickly so that I know how to refer to

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Speaker 1: you in the in the podcast. This is always my

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Speaker 1: part that I liked the least, just letting you know, um, sorry,