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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 1: Michael barn I'm Starlett Film Big Money Headlines and sports

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Speaker 1: from this week involving former NBA star Meta sander Ford

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Speaker 1: Our Test, also known as Meta World Peace. Thank you

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Speaker 1: for having me. It's good to be here. Oh my goodness.

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Speaker 1: Before we even get into the business ventures, you did

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Speaker 1: something very cool and I hope a lot of men

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Speaker 1: out there understand what you did. You change your name

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Speaker 1: to Meta sander Ford our Test and can you tell

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Speaker 1: us why? Well, when I was metal a piece that

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Speaker 1: I married to my wife last week Santa for so,

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Speaker 1: I just we decided to go with her last name

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Speaker 1: and get my regional last name. So now it's medicine

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Speaker 1: before our test. Legally you got married four years ago.

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Speaker 1: I love that that's the way to do it. Does

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Speaker 1: she go by standing Ford our test as well? Yea,

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Speaker 1: she goes by singing the Fota test. So it's a

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Speaker 1: family last thing. Now, yeah, it is? It really is.

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Speaker 1: It truly is like a kind of collaboration. Well, you

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Speaker 1: have been doing a lot of great things and you're

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Speaker 1: really rocking it in the business world. You are planning

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Speaker 1: a new investment fund for the Artest Management Group. Can

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Speaker 1: you tell us about that? Yeah, you know, I started

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Speaker 1: at this management group three thousand and nine concept when

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Speaker 1: I met with my friend Marrion Jefferson. We met kind

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Speaker 1: of talked about business and I was like, you know,

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Speaker 1: I'm trying to get started, want to really do something different.

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Speaker 1: It's right before we want the championship. In two thousand

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Speaker 1: and fifteen, we incorporated it. We were going to just

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Speaker 1: launch a full on management company that's athlete management. Initially

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Speaker 1: it was movies. It was a little bit of everything

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Speaker 1: that what I realized was too much to handle launching

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Speaker 1: that those many verticals, so I decided to focus more

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Speaker 1: on just basketball. Uh. Then we launched Experts Exports Sea Corps.

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Speaker 1: So meanwhile, both the companies were Sea Corps, Artists Management

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Speaker 1: Group in Sea Corporate, Experts Exports Sea Corps, and um.

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Speaker 1: What we did was just focused there, focused on the

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Speaker 1: tech side, athletes, connecting athletes, building them together, and I

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Speaker 1: started to attract more business and the business I started

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Speaker 1: to attract with things I wanted to be involved in

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Speaker 1: to build up my portfolio. And meanwhile, you know, when

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Speaker 1: we launched Artiest management group. We launched Attend No Evaluation

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Speaker 1: out the back. And now when you fast forward, we

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Speaker 1: have health healthcare companies that's doing pretty well. You know.

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Speaker 1: It was I had an opportunity to be a part

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Speaker 1: of two companies that went public. We got some companies

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Speaker 1: that's going public in the pipeline, and we have opportunities

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Speaker 1: to engage in other real estate opportunities, professional sports opportunities.

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Speaker 1: When we when when I when I measured all that,

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Speaker 1: you know, I called my buddy Stefan Bonds, who I

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Speaker 1: know from Thesal Academy. He's on the boarder St. John's,

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Speaker 1: and you know, uh, I was like, hey, I'm thinking

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Speaker 1: about doing a few things here. My healthcare companies doing

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Speaker 1: you will it's quite easy killingly how's get company? And

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Speaker 1: I was, I was like, I think I'm gonna watching

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Speaker 1: fun that. He said, Hey, you gotta call my guy.

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Speaker 1: So I called up his his old boss, Jerry Bias,

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Speaker 1: and we talked and you talked, and then I asked

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Speaker 1: my team and said, hey, do you do you guys

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Speaker 1: just want to do you know a bigger fund versus

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Speaker 1: you know, a ten or fifty million dollar fund. He said, okay,

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Speaker 1: let's do it. And let's try. And we got a

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Speaker 1: nice response from the community, especially the big investors, and

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Speaker 1: now we're just taking more meetings and different things like that.

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Speaker 1: So you know, it's it's a it's an ambitious um,

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Speaker 1: but it's something that I wanted to do. Any former

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Speaker 1: athletes as well in the mix, Well, one of the

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Speaker 1: things that I don't like to do is come out

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Speaker 1: the gates talking to you trying to get capital from athletes.

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Speaker 1: I don't really care how much money they have because

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Speaker 1: I was an athlete at one point and I'm a

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Speaker 1: little bit dun shot there. Um because you obviously, you know,

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Speaker 1: we hear a lot of stories of athletes going broke.

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Speaker 1: I want to make sure it's a no brainer and

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Speaker 1: a way to before I started going to athletes or now. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I will be attempting to go to athletes now that

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Speaker 1: we have this amazing team, but I was holding off

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Speaker 1: for a long long time. I didn't want to use

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Speaker 1: athlete capitol at startup capitol. That that is very good.

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Speaker 1: You said that because I think of you and I

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Speaker 1: and you remind me a lot of Indomican Sue who

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Speaker 1: used to play for the Detroit Lions. Both of you

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Speaker 1: guys on the court and on the field passionate players.

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Speaker 1: And then off the court you step off and you

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Speaker 1: guys are just clocking it. Man. When it comes to

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Speaker 1: the business acumen, what would you tell not just an athlete,

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Speaker 1: pro athlete, but even a college athlete trying to come

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Speaker 1: up through the ranks on how to manage their money?

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Speaker 1: And you know, I think just meet lots of people. UM.

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Speaker 1: I always tell people close family members, you want to

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Speaker 1: make sure they're learning, you know, and not just watching.

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Speaker 1: Because when you get older and you retired, you know,

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Speaker 1: you know, you know, you don't you don't want to

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Speaker 1: keep paine those large trees and different things like that.

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Speaker 1: You know, I launched my own in house family office

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Speaker 1: UM two six years ago. We actually have a couple

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Speaker 1: of athletes science us UM because it was once upon

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Speaker 1: a time when I was young where I was trying

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Speaker 1: of making mistakes and stuff. So you know, I said,

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Speaker 1: you know, I just wanted to get ahead of this thing.

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Speaker 1: And yeah, I would just say, you know what, people

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Speaker 1: you trust, make sure you bring up your family, make

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Speaker 1: sure they're learning and not watching. You said you're tired

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Speaker 1: of making mistakes. Can you share a mistake that you

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Speaker 1: made that informed the way you went about forming your

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Speaker 1: artest management group and how you went about building this fund. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: you know, when I was coming up, I was mostly

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Speaker 1: focused on basketball earlier on my career and defense versus

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Speaker 1: equity and cap tables and stuff like that as an

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Speaker 1: anyteen year o kid. Um. One of the deals that

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Speaker 1: I always I could talk about as the Vitamint water

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Speaker 1: deal when I was helping vitamin water in my community

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Speaker 1: when it was pushing carts, when the founders was pushing

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Speaker 1: carts a vitamin water, and then I decided to put

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Speaker 1: vitamin water on my jersey for like m on my

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Speaker 1: league inviting the water. After a couple of months, they

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Speaker 1: was like, hey, guys, thank you for that. They want

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Speaker 1: to bring you into the office and offer you something.

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Speaker 1: So they brought me into this office and offered me

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Speaker 1: equity in the company. And I would thinking I was

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Speaker 1: twenty five at that point and I didn't know what

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Speaker 1: equity was at that point. And then about three about

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Speaker 1: three months later I think, or maybe a couple of

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Speaker 1: months after, they sold it for billions and then everybody

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Speaker 1: made a lot of money. And at that point I'm like, Okay,

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Speaker 1: I gotta get on top of my game. And I

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Speaker 1: was actually frustrated at that time, but I did tell

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Speaker 1: myself it will come back around. But you know, I'm

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Speaker 1: a fairly simple guy, so I have a lot of patients.

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Speaker 1: I'm not really rushing um. But it didn't motivate me

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Speaker 1: to get on my a game in terms of business,

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Speaker 1: you know, cap tables, reading kind of tracks, getting your

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Speaker 1: right dails, uh, targeting companies. It made me more hongry

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Speaker 1: actually because of that missed opportunity to get equity from

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Speaker 1: vitamin water. It wasn't the missed opportunity, it was the

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Speaker 1: actual understanding the terminalogy of equity. You know, I really

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Speaker 1: didn't care about what that word meant, and it was

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Speaker 1: never serious to me. I wasn't really interested in those words.

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Speaker 1: I was more interested in just lock it up defense.

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Speaker 1: And at that point I said, you know, this is

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Speaker 1: a really interesting concept. So then I started to you know,

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Speaker 1: in towards learning, learning, learning, learning, learning, UM, and I

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Speaker 1: did a lot to get put myself in this position

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Speaker 1: where people are everybody that's involved has run billion dollar companies.

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Speaker 1: That doesn't sound like well I'm talking about now, yes,

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Speaker 1: But but before it what it was a mistake that

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Speaker 1: when you missed out on that type of you know,

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Speaker 1: when you have a two hundred three hundred thousand dollar

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Speaker 1: investment that can turn to forty million dollars. I can see,

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Speaker 1: I can see you know. You were ahead of the

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Speaker 1: curve though, because you had that, you wore it, and

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Speaker 1: you were best. When all of a sudden, all the

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Speaker 1: league started realizing, you know what, we put some sponsorship

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Speaker 1: on our jerseys. Uh, we can make some money out

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Speaker 1: of this. The sponsors are gonna like us. You were

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Speaker 1: ahead of the curve with that. Yeah, I think so. Well,

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Speaker 1: a lot of stuff like I definitely have a vision

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Speaker 1: and like the move. You know, even when I changed

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Speaker 1: my name or you know, if I do something on

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Speaker 1: came out. I was always kind of out there as

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Speaker 1: a player, even though once upon a time I start

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Speaker 1: or when you know when I when I when I

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Speaker 1: started to fall off, I started, and I always have

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Speaker 1: creativity to stay relevant. And you know, I kind of

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Speaker 1: wanted to have a little more patients of time because

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Speaker 1: I do see I do see things in the future.

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Speaker 1: All all the optimists and ambitious, but sometimes taking the

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Speaker 1: necessary steps right. So seeing the future book then just

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Speaker 1: taking your time right and get in there, and that's

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Speaker 1: game that I know I have because of how I

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Speaker 1: played the game right, So there's no rush, just keep

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Speaker 1: working and chip away at it and then things that happen.

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Speaker 1: Speaking of taking the time to kind of chip away things,

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Speaker 1: I know that you have a partnership with boost Mobile

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Speaker 1: where you work with students to navigate brand sponsorship. You

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Speaker 1: kind of serve as a mentor and a guide. Talk

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Speaker 1: a little bit about what that entails now when they

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Speaker 1: can get so much of that information online through TikTok videos,

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Speaker 1: through YouTube shorts. I mean they come in here with

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Speaker 1: a knowledge base that's different than perhaps you did at

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Speaker 1: that age. Yes, and boost Mobile was first in the

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Speaker 1: mail department when the n c A announced or when

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Speaker 1: they're ruling where athletes we are not able to get paid.

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Speaker 1: And I remember talking to Angia Henderson of boost and

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Speaker 1: also Steve Stocos, and they really said we should be

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Speaker 1: first and support the student athletes. They did, and the

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Speaker 1: student at it's are really brilliant these days. They know

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Speaker 1: their work, they know their value, and they deserve to

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Speaker 1: get paid. I remember when, you know, times in college

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Speaker 1: where I didn't have money, you know, and and and

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Speaker 1: I would make stupid decisions, you know, because I didn't

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Speaker 1: have money and different things like that. So I think,

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Speaker 1: you know, we boost mobile that the partnership, it made

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Speaker 1: a lot of sense being in my background and mental

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Speaker 1: health my background and give them back to the youth,

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Speaker 1: you know. And and always wanted to be a part

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Speaker 1: of things that has social impact. And there's not all

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Speaker 1: of It's not always about just making money, you know,

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Speaker 1: it's also about how are we going to help the

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Speaker 1: youth not only with mental health, but also financial literacy,

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Speaker 1: you know, and knowing your worth, understanding your economics and

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Speaker 1: different things like that at an early age. Right, So

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Speaker 1: so we don't miss these ways, uh, such as such

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Speaker 1: as we missed being from Long Island City, how many

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Speaker 1: millionaires coming from Long Island City versus how many of

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Speaker 1: us are actually building the real estate and wrong islands, right,

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Speaker 1: not not having the real estate, lives literacy and different

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Speaker 1: things like that. So it's very important that we understand

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Speaker 1: how to navigate and you know and build these big projects,

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Speaker 1: you know, built these you know, hundred uh unit buildings

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Speaker 1: and different things like that, you know, uh, and being

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Speaker 1: ambitious uh and being aggressive and going towards those goals. Now,

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Speaker 1: it is hard, especially for youths today to navigate about

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Speaker 1: mental health because it's tough out there. Man, Yeah, yeah, Man,

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Speaker 1: I mean it's it's a lot because you know, obviously

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Speaker 1: everything is faster, uh, And the lifestyle that we that

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Speaker 1: that's something we gotta live. And there's a lot of

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Speaker 1: stress out there these days. So you know, we definitely

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Speaker 1: want to continue to support I recently joined the board

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Speaker 1: of the u c l A Psychiatric Ward and that

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Speaker 1: was one of my biggest accomplish mental my career because

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Speaker 1: just having the ability to work with such a big

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Speaker 1: you know institute, you know institution to give input from

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Speaker 1: my perspective being one of the leaders in the space,

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Speaker 1: you know, at an early time. So you know, we

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Speaker 1: still want to make sure that we're trying to be

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Speaker 1: responsible and send out good messaging. And then how can

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Speaker 1: we come up with to get solutions, solutions where you know,

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Speaker 1: people could have an outlet versus holding things in, bobbling

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Speaker 1: things up, become a stress, anxiety, depression, and how can

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Speaker 1: we create more happiness. You mentioned you're on the board.

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Speaker 1: What kind of input did you share that perhaps, um,

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Speaker 1: others on the board were not aware of giving your

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Speaker 1: personal experiences and what you've gone through professionally. Well, I

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Speaker 1: think my, I think my. You know, my initial board

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Speaker 1: meeting was just an introduction, and obviously we have more

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Speaker 1: meetings coming up in the future. But I think what

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Speaker 1: was inspiring, you know, to to the chair the board

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Speaker 1: was the work that I'm doing that I've done, you know,

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Speaker 1: in the past, I've done so much of mental health.

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Speaker 1: Uh not. I wasn't necessarily trying to be recognized for it.

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Speaker 1: I was just doing it. That's something I wanted to do,

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Speaker 1: you know. And now people are recognizing that, and we

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Speaker 1: got big plans, you know, not only down the poor,

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Speaker 1: but we've got big plans with different types of products

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Speaker 1: that we want to launch in the mental health space

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Speaker 1: along with our other healthcare stuff. You're also connected in

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Speaker 1: the n f T business with the Mena Panda Club.

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Speaker 1: Uh that is aimed at building the world's largest basketball community,

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Speaker 1: uniting pro players, basketball teams, leagues, and fans. So let's say,

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Speaker 1: for example, I've got my six dollars and twenty five cents,

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Speaker 1: and then Scarlett is gonna come in and say, Mike,

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Speaker 1: you're cheap and then, but I still want to get

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Speaker 1: in this n f T. How do I go about

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Speaker 1: doing it? That's a good thing. So, I mean it

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Speaker 1: was six dollars and twenty five cents. Um, it will

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Speaker 1: be hard for you to get into. It'll be the

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Speaker 1: bargain basement. But I could always drop you in n

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Speaker 1: f T if you're getting your wallet, you know, and

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Speaker 1: you know you can buy a coffee. Um. Yeah, but

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Speaker 1: I love the blockchain space I've been. My son is

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Speaker 1: a computer science major at USC. Graduated high school at

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Speaker 1: the age of fifteen, got a basketball scholarship to u

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Speaker 1: c i A, where he did not only basketball but

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Speaker 1: also the Treater Science Gaming. He transferred to USC so

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Speaker 1: the Matter school, which is only one of one of

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Speaker 1: forty students get in every year. Um. So we have

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Speaker 1: a background in technology. He's a world developer, launching his

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Speaker 1: own company and raising money. Actually, um but he's only

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Speaker 1: twenty one years old. He actually did some development work

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Speaker 1: for into It quick Books last year where they hired him.

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Speaker 1: He's down working for d C. We love technology. He

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Speaker 1: focused on blockchain technology and in a CTO space. That's

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Speaker 1: his goal to be a CTO And I'm in the

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Speaker 1: space as a CDEO project manager. UM, I do work

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Speaker 1: with tons of developers Web three, Web two, so I

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Speaker 1: understand what's possible, and that's why I love the space.

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Speaker 1: Versus going through middlement of third parties and just being

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Speaker 1: on the consumer face side. We're on the backing side,

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Speaker 1: so we actually have different deals with Web three developers

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Speaker 1: where we'll be able to launch multiple products. I've really

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Speaker 1: loved the webty space. Um It's definitely something that our

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Speaker 1: portfolio is gonna focus on being that in the position

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Speaker 1: that we're in, being able to work with the devs

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Speaker 1: and then also work with the athletes so we'll be

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Speaker 1: able to get products out there quick. We lost a

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Speaker 1: few days ago, probably one of the greatest defensive players,

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Speaker 1: Bill Russell, played for many years for the Boston Celtics,

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Speaker 1: and it was a player coach also. Uh, without guys

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Speaker 1: like Bill Russell, it would be pretty hard for guys

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Speaker 1: like you and many others in the league to be

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Speaker 1: as successful as you are today. UM. I mean, I

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Speaker 1: love Bill Russell. When I got my It's the player

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Speaker 1: of the year he was there. Um So alright, Peter

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Speaker 1: Bill Russell, I agree. He definitely set the tone back

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Speaker 1: in the days I heard a lot of stories about

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Speaker 1: the race, the racial incidences that he uh had to

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Speaker 1: absorb and endure, and he still came out as a

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Speaker 1: classic guy. You know. On the other side, I'm very inspiring.

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Speaker 1: I got him number one, my number one player of

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Speaker 1: all time because of his eleven range and he started

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Speaker 1: each year and those were his teams. He also has

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Speaker 1: a ring as a champion. I'm sorry as a coach

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Speaker 1: and a player. So until someone can beat that record,

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Speaker 1: Bill Russell was the greatest ever. And I'm curious what takeaways,

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Speaker 1: um you have from his coaching career, given that you

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Speaker 1: know you're thinking ahead and how you might want to

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Speaker 1: one day be a coach in the NBA as well. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I think it's great. Love. I think I coached now right,

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Speaker 1: So even in my last two years with the Lakers,

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Speaker 1: I was coaching the past. I would say to high

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Speaker 1: school girls as an assistant coach for coach Torino Johnson,

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Speaker 1: I'm coaching right now cow State Girls Division through Basketball

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Speaker 1: for coach Torino Johnson. I also coached at Beverly Hills

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Speaker 1: High School for a little bit. I coached the boys

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Speaker 1: that Palley. I got ten teams around Los Angeles, right now,

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Speaker 1: I do a lot of coaching right now. I'm just

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Speaker 1: prepping for my time. So when I do get into coaching,

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Speaker 1: you know, it'll be great. And my team is such

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Speaker 1: an a one team in terms. But the fund, I'll

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Speaker 1: be able to coach while the business is still being ranking,

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Speaker 1: you know, excellently. So with that being said, now I'm

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Speaker 1: even more aggressive towards going to coaching because of what

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Speaker 1: I could the foundation l A. You had mentioned at

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Speaker 1: one point that you were interested in being the Knicks

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Speaker 1: head coach, and that was before Tom Thibodeau got hired.

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Speaker 1: I didn't know anything about that until I saw that

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Speaker 1: out there. Well, I I love coaching. I try to

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Speaker 1: do what I love. I don't want let anyone's job.

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Speaker 1: I always wait until I hear some on ESPN, so

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Speaker 1: I'm not in the back end where people are actively

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Speaker 1: trying to get metal up he said, coaching job or

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Speaker 1: even if I have opportunities, I just wait out to

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Speaker 1: hear something on TV. If I had something on TV,

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Speaker 1: I will then go try to get that job. But

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Speaker 1: after that job is secured, I then stepped back away.

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Speaker 1: I support the New York Knicks. I loved the mix.

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Speaker 1: I loved coach Thibodeaux. I'm I'm rooting for him to

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Speaker 1: bring a title to New York City, and I want

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Speaker 1: to be as supportive as possible. Um, I want to

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Speaker 1: be as supportive as possible. Uh, you know to coach Tibordeaux. Uh.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, absolutely. When I got drafted in nine nine,

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Speaker 1: I had a Nick jersey under my suit. I thought

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Speaker 1: I was on to the next I was about to

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Speaker 1: take it off and different things like that. You know.

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Speaker 1: I I got a great love for the Knicks, and

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Speaker 1: I mean everybody would love to be a head coach

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Speaker 1: and bring a title to New York City, you know. Um,

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Speaker 1: you know, but you know, with that being said, it's

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Speaker 1: just it's just it's just a kid dreaming. You know.

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Speaker 1: It's a kid dreaming from Queen's Ridge only on the

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Speaker 1: city that used to look at the buildings from across

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Speaker 1: the water. And that's said. You know, I'm going to

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Speaker 1: continue to dream, you know, I'll continue to be ambitious

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Speaker 1: and optimistic and all this stuff, but not at the

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Speaker 1: cost of anyone else. You know, I do not want

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Speaker 1: to be that person that's actively trying to get someone's

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Speaker 1: job or or whatever the case. Maybe I'm not saying

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Speaker 1: I'm not I can't even do that. I'm just saying

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Speaker 1: I'm not even putting myself in that position. But anytime

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Speaker 1: something comes up, I would love to just say I

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Speaker 1: would love for them to be like, hey, not you're

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Speaker 1: the head coach and I said, hey, guys, good, I

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Speaker 1: don't need anything from you. I got it all here

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Speaker 1: and you're just go on vacation. General managers, president's owners

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Speaker 1: go on vacation for two years. I got it. That's

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Speaker 1: but you know what, It's just I'm a character. I

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Speaker 1: love to have fun, you know, and you know sometimes

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Speaker 1: you know, I don't want it to come across the

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Speaker 1: wrong way. I do love to have fun. I like

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Speaker 1: to have a cup of coffee with it, because you're

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Speaker 1: my kind of guy. I like that. It's you know that.

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Speaker 1: See And I want to follow mena Santa for it

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Speaker 1: our test example, because I am Michael freel Bar and

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Speaker 1: that's that is. My wife's name was freel before. So

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Speaker 1: I'm following that for a while. Man, Metta, you are,

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Speaker 1: you are brilliant and you have a kind heart. Thank

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Speaker 1: you so much for joining us. Absolutely, thank you for

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Speaker 1: having me. Thank you. Meta is a pleasure talking to you.

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Speaker 1: This is the Bloomberg Business of Sports podcast. I'm Michael

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Speaker 1: Friel Bar along with Scarlet Food. Catch us here each

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Speaker 1: and every Monday, Wednesday and Thursday exploring the world of

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Speaker 1: money in sports. And catch me on Twitter with Dick

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Speaker 1: bar Sports. I'm Scarlett f You can catch me at

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Speaker 1: Scarlett fill on Twitter. You're listening to Bloomberg Business of

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Speaker 1: Sports on Bloomberg Radio around the world.