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Speaker 1: This is the Bloomberg Business of Sports show where we

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Speaker 1: explore the big money issues in the world of sports.

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Speaker 2: I'm Scarlett Foo.

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Speaker 1: Next in Sports is a Bloomberg Originals program. It's actually

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Speaker 1: a series that explores new sports as well as innovations

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Speaker 1: and existing pastimes. And what it does is highlight what's

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Speaker 1: happening around the corner and oftentimes across the globe. And

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Speaker 1: for this week's addition, hosts Jason Kelly and Vanessa Perdomo

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Speaker 1: explore Athletes Unlimited, which is a business model more than

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Speaker 1: it is a sport. It does dabble in sports, of course,

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Speaker 1: it's focused on four different sports, but I'll let them explain.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's I think it's an entirely new business model

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Speaker 3: in a lot of ways. I also love this episode

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Speaker 3: because I really feel like, of all of them, this

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Speaker 3: is like our world's colliding totally.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 5: I mean, it's like the money the women's sports that

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Speaker 5: we've been talking about for a long time and they

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Speaker 5: talked a lot about with Angela Riggio at Sports Innovation Labe,

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Speaker 5: but we've done a lot of work with them, so

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Speaker 5: it was a really inclusive episode, I.

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Speaker 3: Think, and it was fun because you know, this is

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Speaker 3: you know, we talk so much about sort of the

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Speaker 3: Bloomberg of it all, and I mean this whole idea

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Speaker 3: starts with John Patrick Coff and Jonathan Soros. It's like

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Speaker 3: if you walked around Bloomberg headquarters and you're like Soro's

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Speaker 3: Patrick Coff, people be like, what yep, paying attention. You know,

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Speaker 3: obviously these are legendary names on Wall Street. You know

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Speaker 3: their respective fathers, you know, Alan Patrick Coff is absolutely

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Speaker 3: a titan of the venture capital world.

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Speaker 6: George Soros of course, is like George Soros.

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Speaker 3: And so seeing I think sports through their eyes, at

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Speaker 3: least for me again from like a Wall Street perspective,

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Speaker 3: is like, ah wow, Like it's a true kind of

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Speaker 3: follow the money story.

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Speaker 6: I think yeah.

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Speaker 5: And I think that the way they talk about it too,

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Speaker 5: you know, and when you when you talk to them

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Speaker 5: about it, they're using their business mind. But I really

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Speaker 5: like what Jonathan had to say was it's not just

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Speaker 5: about making money. You know, you think you think about

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Speaker 5: all these other things that people care about in their lives,

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Speaker 5: and it comes together in that way.

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Speaker 1: So let's back up a little bit here, because Athletes

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Speaker 1: Unlimited does not pinpoint a specific sport. It doesn't even

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Speaker 1: pinpoint women specifically over men, right, it's more of a

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Speaker 1: business model. What is this business model and how is

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Speaker 1: it different from the NFL, the MLB, the NBA.

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Speaker 5: So they took this idea of there's not a lot

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Speaker 5: of some of these sports they start with.

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Speaker 4: So there's four sports they do.

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Speaker 5: It's softball, volleyball, lacrosse, and basketball, and it is just

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Speaker 5: women's sports, okay.

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Speaker 4: And they started with.

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Speaker 5: Softball and volleyball and lacrosse in this way that they

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Speaker 5: don't really have other professional leagues for women. So they thought,

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Speaker 5: let's create this, but let's create it in a different

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Speaker 5: way that's not a legacy of a man's existing league,

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Speaker 5: of a men's league like the NBA and the NFL.

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Speaker 5: Let's create it in a different way where all of

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Speaker 5: these things are. You know, you do a ton of

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Speaker 5: research on people care women's sports. Fans care a lot

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Speaker 5: about the players themselves. So they made this model that

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Speaker 5: is specifically for the players.

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Speaker 4: It's player run.

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Speaker 5: They actually each sport has a player executive committee where

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Speaker 5: they talk about what they need, what they want the

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Speaker 5: league to look like, what they want it to run like.

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Speaker 5: And it is very you know, they had a lot

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Speaker 5: to say, and then it's it changes every week. So

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Speaker 5: it's there's four captains every week and they get to

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Speaker 5: draft their own team every single week.

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Speaker 2: So a composition of the team changes every week.

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Speaker 4: Yes, crazy, Yeah, And so it's an interesting thing.

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Speaker 5: Where it's like, if you're watching a game, you'll never

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Speaker 5: see those two teams play again, you know, in a

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Speaker 5: lifetime kind of thing.

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Speaker 4: Exactly. So it was five weeks.

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Speaker 5: They have everyone come to one location and they start

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Speaker 5: with four players. They draft their teams, and then from

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Speaker 5: there they have a scoring system and a leader board

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Speaker 5: and whoever's the leaders of the next four of the

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Speaker 5: At the end of that week they become the captains.

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Speaker 4: They draft their team.

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Speaker 3: And what's what I found so interesting was maybe not surprisingly,

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Speaker 3: you know, these guys did an assessment of all the

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Speaker 3: teams that are out there. You know, they looked at NWSL,

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Speaker 3: presumably WNBA, you know, these existing women's sports leagues, and

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Speaker 3: they essentially sat back and said, but what if we

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Speaker 3: just started over? Like I mean, the exact quote is,

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Speaker 3: what if we started with a blank scheet of paper,

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Speaker 3: which you know, for a business person is like the dream, right,

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Speaker 3: It's like, what if we could just like start again

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Speaker 3: and build it from a totally different premise, you know,

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Speaker 3: player led, player focused, and you know they've raised thirty

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Speaker 3: million dollars I think they they raised in the last

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Speaker 3: couple of years, and you know it's catching on from

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Speaker 3: a viewership perspective.

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Speaker 6: But you know, I mean it's a it's a big swing.

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Speaker 6: It's attending.

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Speaker 5: It's a big swing to change the traditional sports model,

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Speaker 5: right it's and I don't think we have enough time

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Speaker 5: sitting here right now for you to actually unders all

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Speaker 5: the nuances that go into the changing of the teams

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Speaker 5: and all that stuff.

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Speaker 4: But when you look at just the idea of it.

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Speaker 5: Being player run, player led, and player focused, you.

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Speaker 4: You want to know those stories.

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Speaker 5: And we've talked about this a lot in you know,

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Speaker 5: the Drive to Survive and Formula One got really popular

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Speaker 5: here in the US because you started to learn more

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Speaker 5: about the drivers and storytelling.

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Speaker 4: So it's about the storytelling.

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Speaker 5: They are very you know, focused on that telling the

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Speaker 5: stories of all the women who play in this league.

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Speaker 3: The other thing that I think, as you're talking, I'm

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Speaker 3: thinking about this that you know, often we talk to

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Speaker 3: athletes and the athletes are really talking about like their game.

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Speaker 3: Maybe they're talking about their brand. This felt very different,

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Speaker 3: and you were there in Dallas VP to see it.

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Speaker 3: These athletes who are involved spend a lot of time

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Speaker 3: thinking about the league, which I think is really different.

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Speaker 2: And I don't know, they're not just hired guns and

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Speaker 2: all exactly.

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Speaker 5: And you know, when I spoke to one of the

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Speaker 5: players who's on the Player Executive Committee, who is a

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Speaker 5: w NBA champion, not you know, just a player, she's

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Speaker 5: a WAA champion, nine year veteran Natasha Cloud, she said

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Speaker 5: that this was the first time she genuinely felt like

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Speaker 5: as a professional athlete she had to say and that

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Speaker 5: people were listening to them saying, wait, maybe the players

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Speaker 5: are you know, the value here and they're they're thinking

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Speaker 5: of it in a in a different way like that,

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Speaker 5: and I think it's very It's very different.

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Speaker 7: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: No, no, So I'm glad you bring up Natasha, because one

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Speaker 1: thing I noticed when I was watching the video is

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Speaker 1: how you have these superstars in Athletes Unlimited. What is

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Speaker 1: the relationship between AU and the w NBA because there

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Speaker 1: is former WNBA talent that's now part of EU. Do

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Speaker 1: they coordinate with each other or is it former w

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Speaker 1: NBA players or do they kind of politely ignore each other.

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Speaker 5: No, they are current WNBA players. You know, Natasha Cloud

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Speaker 5: was literally playing for the Washington Mystics, right, So you

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Speaker 5: can still do this on this se because it's they

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Speaker 5: they time, they staggering right in a way that it's

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Speaker 5: they started playing in February. They only do five weeks

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Speaker 5: so that it was done. The idea behind it is

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Speaker 5: they're not the same. And every player who is a

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Speaker 5: WNBA player in this made sure to say this isn't

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Speaker 5: a mini WNBA, this isn't a g league, this isn't

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Speaker 5: a player development. This is for women who don't get

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Speaker 5: a chance to play in the w to play here.

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Speaker 5: As well as not having to go overseas.

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Speaker 3: In the office, that's a huge point I think, I mean,

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Speaker 3: as sort of a it's complementary because you know, the

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Speaker 3: entire saga and the tragedy I would say of Britney

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Speaker 3: Grinder's imprisonment was she had to economically, she had to

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Speaker 3: play overseas. She was not making enough money as a

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Speaker 3: professional athlete in the United States, so she had to

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Speaker 3: go play in Russia. So I mean, the underlying economics

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Speaker 3: of this I think are extremely important. You know, we'll

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Speaker 3: sort of see whether this particular model catches on. But yeah,

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Speaker 3: I think that's as it's really important to understand sort

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Speaker 3: of this how the world fits together.

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Speaker 1: And then you were talking about stretelling and how there's

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Speaker 1: an emphasis on storytelling and athletes unlimited because it's so

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Speaker 1: player centric, it's so player driven. I mean that makes

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Speaker 1: me think about how women's sports have to kind of

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Speaker 1: create their own storytelling and then amplify it on their own,

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Speaker 1: whereas men's sports don't really need to do it. They

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Speaker 1: have the infrastructure around them, right there are sports radio,

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Speaker 1: there's regular beat reporters covering each team and the league itself,

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Speaker 1: so they can kind of take that for granted. It's

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Speaker 1: generated on its own.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, absolutely, and I think that they the women's athletes

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Speaker 5: know that and it's not lost on them that they

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Speaker 5: need to tell their own stories. You know, one of

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Speaker 5: the players we talked to who is also a WNA player,

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Speaker 5: but she has a thousand jobs. You know, she's an

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Speaker 5: acc analyst, Lexi Brown. She plays for the Los Angeles

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Speaker 5: Sparks and she does all these things knowing that she's

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Speaker 5: the one who has to put her voice out there more.

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Speaker 5: And she's very big on social media. She's tweeting all day,

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Speaker 5: Instagram all the time, TikTok's whenever she can't. And I

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Speaker 5: think for her, she knows that it's her job to

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Speaker 5: put her her face and her voice out there so

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Speaker 5: that other little girls or other little boys can know

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Speaker 5: their story and look up to them in a different way.

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Speaker 6: Can I ask you a question?

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Speaker 3: What was because you went to Dallas, I did not

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Speaker 3: like you saw it in action the basket, Like what

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Speaker 3: was the vibe?

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Speaker 6: Like how was it different? I mean you've been to

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Speaker 6: a lot of basketball games.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, I think that the cool thing was they hand

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Speaker 5: out you know, everyone hands out of towels.

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Speaker 4: And you know whatever. But they don't have anyone's name

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Speaker 4: on them. They can't have numbers or anything. It's just

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Speaker 4: like color.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, it's just the color of the jersey that you're

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Speaker 5: like wanting to hold up that day. Like whoever you

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Speaker 5: came to, boy, you know, there wasn't a ton of

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Speaker 5: people there. They had definitely you know, there was a

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Speaker 5: couple of local AAU teams like there usually are in

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Speaker 5: I guess most professional sports have that, but typically.

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Speaker 4: Women's sports do have to invite more teams like that.

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Speaker 4: And then they had.

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Speaker 5: The court side was the same as like any NBA

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Speaker 5: WNBA game. People were stunted out, you know, like they

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Speaker 5: were ready.

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Speaker 4: To be on camera. Yeah, yeah, I was ready for it.

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Speaker 4: So I think the vibe was very made sure that

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Speaker 4: whoever was going to.

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Speaker 5: Be shown looked great height, and they looked the part,

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Speaker 5: and it was a professional environment. It genuinely did feel

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Speaker 5: like very professional, very real. But there wasn't that many

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Speaker 5: people there.

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Speaker 1: So this is five weeks of an intense tournament. Is

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Speaker 1: it like that for all five weeks or does it

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Speaker 1: kind of peter out towards the end because you might

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Speaker 1: be a big, big sports fan and you could go

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Speaker 1: for a bit of it, but you're not going to

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Speaker 1: stay there for the whole five weeks.

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Speaker 5: Right, So I think that's the interesting thing that because

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Speaker 5: it's five weeks, they have to rely on and they

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Speaker 5: only stay in one place. They have to rely on

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Speaker 5: their broadcast more than people showing up, and John and

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Speaker 5: Jonathan both said that they really want to make sure

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Speaker 5: they're putting out a good product for TV because the

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Speaker 5: people were coming are mostly just local people. You know.

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Speaker 4: There is one little.

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Speaker 5: Girl who is a huge, huge basketball She's like an

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Speaker 5: AU super fan and I think her parents do stay

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Speaker 5: there all five weeks. They're like always there, and she

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Speaker 5: has like little jerseys made like it's really cute.

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Speaker 4: But I think she's the.

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Speaker 6: Only one there that's she's an outlier.

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Speaker 4: She's an outlier.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and the players definitely loved her.

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Speaker 5: Oh my god, they know her. She knows all the players.

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Speaker 5: She has like all their jerseys. Yeah, it's really.

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Speaker 2: Is this a profitable league or business?

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Speaker 3: I think yeah, our understanding is not yet. I mean

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Speaker 3: they're they're definitely investing, you know, into it at at

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Speaker 3: this point. I mean what they are betting on and

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Speaker 3: you know, whether it's you know, NWSL, which we talked

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Speaker 3: about in a later episode. You know, there's an investment

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Speaker 3: in the future for sure. Sponsors are starting to show up,

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Speaker 3: you know, Metea writes are or are a huge part

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Speaker 3: of this. So I think profits still tk as we say, but.

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Speaker 6: You know, certainly they're in it for the long haul.

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Speaker 6: That was the sense we So.

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Speaker 8: The players are getting paid anytime, Yes, the players make

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Speaker 8: eight weeks base salary for five weeks, eight thousand dollars

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Speaker 8: for five weeks, and then they can bonus depending on

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Speaker 8: where they are in the later board up to like

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Speaker 8: twenty thousand, I think, and when you look at that

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Speaker 8: compared to WNBA salaries, it's actually very comparable already because of.

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Speaker 5: The short amount of time they're already they're there, and

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Speaker 5: then when you look at how long the WNBA season is,

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Speaker 5: they're actually very comparable. And I think that one of

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Speaker 5: the things for them is they made sure to invest

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Speaker 5: in not just player salary, but the way the players

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Speaker 5: live in you know, the way they train. They you know,

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Speaker 5: they give them a place to stay, they give them

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Speaker 5: gym memberships and nannies for moms who want to bring

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Speaker 5: their kids, you know, like everything like that.

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Speaker 2: It's thoughtful.

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Speaker 4: It's thoughtful.

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Speaker 5: You know, it's there's more to it than just what

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Speaker 5: they're getting paid. And I think that they, the players

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Speaker 5: themselves are really thankful for them.

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Speaker 1: It's I mean, it was fascinating and I'd like the

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Speaker 1: idea of these intense tournaments. It's how aware are WNBA fans,

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Speaker 1: for instance, of athletes unlimited.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, we did a little work around that, I mean,

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Speaker 3: sort of anecdotal work around. I mean, it's it's definitely

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Speaker 3: working to get some recognition. I mean, I think the

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Speaker 3: idea and VP, I'm sure you have an opinion about this.

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Speaker 3: I think there is like a rising tide situation. I mean,

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Speaker 3: the WNBA, I feel like, is having its best year

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Speaker 3: in a while. There's some really great storylines. I mean,

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Speaker 3: here in New York, we went to a watch party

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Speaker 3: for the opening game of the Liberty this year, first

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Speaker 3: Liberty game, and it was bumping' and so I think,

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Speaker 3: you know, one of the things VP mentioned Angelia Rigiro

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Speaker 3: in her group Sports Innovation Lab, who've done a lot

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Speaker 3: of work around the fluid fan like the fans are

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Speaker 3: showing up and so it really is about if you

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Speaker 3: can get it to the fans, they will continue to

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Speaker 3: consume it.

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Speaker 6: But I mean, it is it's a climb.

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Speaker 5: They've made a deal with WNBA, so the AU games

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Speaker 5: were on WNBA League Pass this year. So I think

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Speaker 5: that after this season, they're probably more aware than they

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Speaker 5: were for the five season of Athletes Unlimited. But yeah,

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Speaker 5: I think that what Jason saying, it's when we went

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Speaker 5: to that bar, it was about maybe half and half

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Speaker 5: maybe half people knew it watched it also, but some

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Speaker 5: people were completely unaware. So I think, you know, with

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Speaker 5: any startup and it's only their second season of basketball specifically, Yeah,

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Speaker 5: so I think with anything it's it's going to take

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Speaker 5: a little bit of time. But I think the reason

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Speaker 5: they started basketball was one the whole give somewhere, give

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Speaker 5: them place to planning off season. And two because of

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Speaker 5: the star power you have with a Natasha Cloud and

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Speaker 5: someone like that being on board to do it.

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Speaker 4: It's a little bit different than doing.

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Speaker 5: The softball and volleyball and things like that, which they

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Speaker 5: have very big audiences coming out of NCAA, right, huge.

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Speaker 3: And I think that's a huge point. That's a huge

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Speaker 3: point around across all these sports. Is this like that

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Speaker 3: the top of the funnel is at work coming in

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Speaker 3: from the nc double A level. You know what we

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Speaker 3: saw with March madness this year on the women's side.

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Speaker 3: You know we've seen with softball and this year, you know,

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Speaker 3: record ratings, volleyball is getting you know, sixteen eighteen thousand

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Speaker 3: people in the stands.

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Speaker 6: You know, this is.

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Speaker 3: You know, we talk about this all the time. I

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Speaker 3: think we even say it in this piece like it's

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Speaker 3: having a moment. And so the question is really like

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Speaker 3: can they seize it and sort of you know, consolidate

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Speaker 3: the gains as.

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Speaker 7: We see And it's always been a thing where we've

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Speaker 7: talked about how can the WNBA capitalize on the you

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Speaker 7: know of March madness saying those stars, So that's basically

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Speaker 7: what they're trying to do with every big NC double

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Speaker 7: A sport that for that women are.

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Speaker 1: Right right right, especially since once you've excelled in the

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Speaker 1: NC Double A, what do you do after that?

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Speaker 2: There is no insisting league for these star players.

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Speaker 4: To graduate into.

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Speaker 5: The Only like softball, even since it's not really in

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Speaker 5: the Olympics anymore, is is they don't really have.

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Speaker 4: A place to play. They had a league that folded

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Speaker 4: actually like two first three years ago.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, you just can't. You can't play your sport anymore. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: you have to move on and get a dust.

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Speaker 5: It's pretty insane when you have her play in front

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Speaker 5: of sixteen thousand people.

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Speaker 1: Well, it's a great episode and I really enjoyed watching it.

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Speaker 1: Athletes Unlimited, Episode six of the Next and Sports series

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Speaker 1: And of course you can watch that on Bloomberg Television

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Speaker 1: at ten pm Eastern Time. It's also available on YouTube

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Speaker 1: and Bloomberg dot Com the following day and where you

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Speaker 1: can also catch up on previous installments.

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Speaker 2: Thanks guys,