Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
YachtCon Day 14: Garth Lagerwey closes us out
70 Plays4 years ago
Two weeks of YachtCon: Back to School is now officially in the books. To help us close things out, Sounders GM Garth Lagerwey hung out, shared some insight into his philosophy, teased the hiring of a new sporting director, drank a couple beers and ate a bunch of spicy hot wings. A good time was had by all.
Recommended
Transcript
Yacht College's Genesis and Fundraising
00:00:26
Speaker
Welcome to Yacht College's GM442, How to Maintain a Dynasty, which is doubling as our commencement address. I am Jeremiah O'Shan, the self-appointed dean of Yacht College, and I think we're poised to finish off this two weeks of curriculum on a high note.
00:00:42
Speaker
Before we get started though, I wanted to share a few things. This has been a truly amazing experience for me and hopefully for anyone else who is engaged on any level with this project. Yacht College was conceived as a way to simply maintain the yacht contradiction, but it turned into something all its own. Our team of volunteers ended up producing more than 10 hours of programming and we've already raised well over $10,000 for the Seattle Children's Autism Center, our best ever fundraising total.
00:01:06
Speaker
Nearly 250 different people have registered for more than 500 classes and have racked up more than 2,000 YouTube views and more than 2,000 podcast downloads. I think we also got to know a bunch of sounders' personalities in new ways, learned some new skills, and hopefully had a ton of fun while raising money for an extremely worthy cause. As a reminder, the money we raise goes towards buying big red safety boxes for families with children at the Autism Center.
Commencement Address and Guest Speakers
00:01:30
Speaker
These funds are even more needed now than normal as the Autism Center has incurred added expenses due to needing to mail these out instead of being able to hand them out in person. I think we'll be ending on a high note too as my Yacht College colleagues, Aaron Campo and Lickett P. will be joining me today in navigating our commencement address. Welcome, Aaron and Lickett. You guys ready to eat some spicy wings and ask some spicy questions as we get going here? Let's do it.
00:01:57
Speaker
Of course, the main reason we're all here is to gather wisdom from today's guest speaker, Garth Lograway, who will be answering our spicy questions while we eat, said Spicy Wings. Welcome to Yacht College, Garth. Hey guys, how are you doing? Thanks for having me.
00:02:16
Speaker
Hey, so I suppose now that you're here, it's a good time to explain what I'm talking about with these spicy wings and spicy questions and all this kind of stuff. During our interview, we'll be pausing every 10 minutes or so to spin Lickett's Trusted Wheel-O-Spice.
00:02:32
Speaker
Many of you have purchased spots on the wheel that will not only require us to eat spicy wings, but also come with the opportunity to ask Garth a spicy question. The wings Lickett, Erin, and I will be eating will be at two different levels. One is a habaneros-fueled spice that comes in at around 350,000 scovilles and was made by a friend of mine at Solis Cosina.
00:02:51
Speaker
The other is some version of the Hot Ones Last Dab, which apparently clocks in at about a million Skollbills, which I understand is enough to burn off my face. We've supplied Garth with the cooler of these two sauces, and we're going to let him kind of choose what he wants to do. But Garth, are you, how are you with spicy, how are you with spice and with spicy questions? Those two things, I guess. Spicy questions, man. I certainly, I've had those before. I'll do my best with them, try to have some fun. Spicy wings.
00:03:20
Speaker
expected to be sweating profusely really from here and like here. There's this like a sort of like a, yeah, like a really disgusting sheen about me.
00:03:31
Speaker
Well, good. I'm glad you're game. And I appreciate you doing this with us and kind of humoring us, really, in this endeavor. And if anyone needs, I'll be sipping when I need it on this craft casual, which is, of course, the beer that was made for us by Fast Fashion and Stu Brewing. Garth has some too. Maybe we'll talk about beer.
Player Updates and Team Strategy
00:04:00
Speaker
You know, before we get started with the really heavy stuff, I wanted to open with the question that I'm sure a lot of our watchers and listeners are interested in. Is there anything you can tell us about, um, Raul Rui Diaz's status? I guess he's been in Peru. Yes, he has been in Peru. Um, the transition between administrations has led to some interesting situations on the green card front. Um, but long story short,
00:04:31
Speaker
Raul's been in the process of having his status resolved down in Peru. And we are, you know, we certainly don't know what's going to happen yet, but we're cautiously optimistic that it will be resolved positively and that he will be able to return to Seattle this week. And I guess the added benefit is that even though he's, I'm sure you would have liked to have had him here, but he'll come back and he presumably won't count as an international player anymore.
00:04:57
Speaker
If we get a successful adjudication, then yes, then that's correct. And he would be in green card, domestic player status would not count as a foreigner. And look, he's been in a good setup down there. He's been able to train at the National Team Center this whole time. And so, you know, he's
00:05:14
Speaker
He's a guy that doesn't get out of shape very much to be in with. Certainly it's an inconvenience and it's an inconvenience to Raul and he's been there much longer than he had hoped to or planned to. That's obviously upsetting and off-putting and we hope to get it figured out really quickly so he can come back home.
00:05:33
Speaker
And I guess the opposite side of that is Will Bruin and Freddie Monteiro have had a chance to work together quite a bit. What have you thought of Freddie so far in this early part of the preseason? Was that someone that you had expected to be bringing back this year?
00:05:49
Speaker
Um, you know, Freddie is, as always kept a good relationship with the club. I personally don't know Freddie, you know, that was before I became the general manager. Um, but obviously, you know, tons of connections with Adrian, with Brian, et cetera. Um, and it was, you know, honestly kind of a no brainer in the sense that we were looking at playing three, five, two, and Freddie had experience in that formation. He obviously had sense of experience with Seattle.
00:06:14
Speaker
He scored a bunch of goals with Vancouver. I mean, it's not like he's passed it or anything like that. So when we heard that he wanted to come, I think figuring it out was kind of a no brainer.
00:06:26
Speaker
Yeah, you know, it's funny, when I, when he, when I was first announced that he was gonna be coming back, I looked at some of his numbers and I was actually surprised the, a lot of the advanced metrics kind of like him, especially with his passing and some of the stuff that he does that's not just scoring goals, was when you're signing a player you're that familiar with from a like a playing standpoint, how much digging in do you do onto those like more advanced metrics and is that part of the consideration here?
00:06:56
Speaker
Um, we always follow our process, but honestly, in this one, Jeremiah, when you're talking about a guy who was willing to come on a team friendly deal, uh, and had scored some goals. Um, and you know, the, the further context I would see is we lost Jordan Morris, uh, very likely for the season. So, you know, we talked about advanced metrics and you know, I'm a big believer in those and we do deep dives at times, but sometimes you just kind of can look at the lineup and say, all right, well, who's going to score and how many are they going to score? And you know, you've just lost 10 goals out of the line, out of the team with Jordan.
00:07:26
Speaker
And hopefully you're able to put a lot of those goals back in with Freddie. And look, it depends who plays. It depends if Will wins the job. I mean, all those things are to be determined. But certainly we like the ability of Freddie to give us some goals in whatever role Coach Spencer and his staff find appropriate.
00:07:44
Speaker
So this offseason, I don't know, every offseason, I guess, is its own animal, right? But how would you compare this one to other ones? Does it feel just the idea that you might be switching to a 3-5-2 in itself feels like it makes it into a different sort of offseason? Yeah, look, I think we're sure about fewer things.
Pandemic Impact on Operations
00:08:07
Speaker
Obviously we couldn't predict Jordan's injury and when, you know, I guess, if there's any silver lining to that we've been through this already, you know, we've been in 2018 we went through this and he missed the whole season and we had to adjust how we played and now at least, you know, there's that we, we kind of know from the get go what we're going to have to
00:08:24
Speaker
to do, but I think it's to be determined, you know, what formation we're going to play in, what system we're going to play, how we're going to deploy our players. And so that's contributed honestly to a somewhat conservative posture with respect to signing players, you know, and throw on top of that then a pandemic and
00:08:41
Speaker
you know, the fact is, you know, you and I were joking before we went on camera here. Almost everybody we've signed has had, has either a former in the last 12 months since the pandemic started has been either a former sounder or someone with Seattle roots. So, and look, it's really not surprising in the context though, we can't scout. So, but I do expect that the market is going to lower back at some point. I mean, obviously none of us know what's going to happen with the virus, but if we can continue some of the positive trends when you get folks vaccinated,
00:09:10
Speaker
then hopefully the summer, the world is in a place where we're ready to, people are ready to come out of their houses and hopefully, you know, initially join us at 25% capacity at Newman Field, but you know, hopefully safe. We can push it past that number safely if we can keep bringing cases down and that's going to take the vigilance of all of us and again, everyone getting vaccinated, but hopefully that can come to pass.
00:09:34
Speaker
So how much has the pandemic affected the way that you approach signings and how much is it like, I mean, can you decouple that from Chris Henderson leaving and how can you, like, how do you kind of balance those scales? Like, was a lot of this preordained or is this really just a, you're reacting to what's out on your realities?
00:09:57
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, look, it's it's a couple of things coming together, right? Like losing Chris is a big deal. You know, this is the guy who was maybe the premier talent evaluator in the major league soccer. So I'm really proud of him for getting the opportunity in Miami and, you know, watching him excitedly. And, you know, you know, he's obviously signed a couple of guys that used to play for us. So, you know, rooting for those guys as well, you know, to go there and do well. So, you know, it's kind of kind of a fun, almost parallel universe to kind of watch and
00:10:27
Speaker
You know, I have, you know, Javi Morales, a player who used to play for me at Salt Lake is down there on their staff and Jason Kreis is down there on their staff as well. So, you know, a lot of ties to Miami now for me and, and it's definitely a club that I'm going to enjoy following and watching. And, you know, you kind of need a team and the other conference to root for. So I'll probably, probably be picking them. But, but yeah, it's been, it's been a really, it's been a weird 12 months for everybody, right? I mean, nothing is normal, nothing is settled.
00:10:57
Speaker
And everybody, you know, we kind of do the best we can, you know, we have this new under 22 player initiative. I think we're going to wind up calling those guys youth player slots is my understanding. So we'll see.
00:11:12
Speaker
Again, we don't know what the market is going to look like and we're not sure what formation we're going to play. By the way, whenever we settle on, we might flip back once Jordan comes back next year. When you're talking about, in particular, OIPS signing, it's clearly a signing that's going to be made for more than one season or one window. There are some real challenges right now that we're working through.
00:11:33
Speaker
And look, we had a pretty good run. Hopefully we can keep it going. But it is going to be a different team this year. There's no two ways about that. So you brought up a couple of things I wanted to circle back on. One of them is Chris Henderson's replacement. How close are you to being able to announce that? And what was the philosophy going into finding that person?
00:11:59
Speaker
We had kind of three pillars that we looked at. We certainly wanted somebody who could help us replace what Chris was really, really good at picking players.
00:12:10
Speaker
uh, you know, finding players from all over the world and using them to build out, um, not just the sounders, but the defiance.
Youth Development and Player Sales
00:12:16
Speaker
Um, the second we wanted was somebody with, uh, some youth development experience or youth development background. Obviously we're, we're, we feel like we're in the midst of kind of the final push on that front, you know, where we've, we've signed some kids and we haven't gotten them through to the first team yet and just want somebody who can come in and advise us and help us and, and kind of try to get us over that last hurdle. Uh, and then third, we really wanted somebody who was,
00:12:40
Speaker
familiar, you know, with somebody who had some cultural ties, whether to the coaching staff or to Seattle, or, you know, just just to all of us, somebody that was known, I mean, you know, we feel like we've got a good coaching staff, we've got a good front office, we've got a good player development group, you know, we really didn't want someone to come in and reinvent the wheel, you know, we wanted somebody who, you know, we thought could come in and adapt.
00:13:03
Speaker
to a lot of what we're doing and certainly hopefully bring some outside ideas. It's always good to get a fresh set of eyes on your process and your program. And so anyway, trying to combine those things. And Jeremiah, I think we're going to have an announcement this week on that front. So it could be a good week, you know, if we get Raul back.
00:13:21
Speaker
Adam Owen's been stuck in a piece of purgatory as well. I'm hopeful that he's going to get resolved this week, so we could have Raul, we could have Adam, and completing our performance staff, and we could have a sporting director all within the next five days. Wow, that's pretty exciting stuff there. Some things going on. Yeah, we're working on it.
00:13:44
Speaker
So one of the other things that you brought up was this young player initiative or I don't know what we're young player slot, I guess, is what we're going to call it now. How, you know, is that something that you guys were able to hit the ground running on or did you sort of have to start from scratch in terms of identifying players that would fit into that sort of slot? Look, I mean, the obvious place to look, I think, based on how we were set up last year and the year before that was as a, you know, particularly when
00:14:14
Speaker
we decided to move on from Jovan was to look at right-winger candidates, right? And then Jordan got hurt. And so now, so do you want to go out and sign two wingers?
00:14:25
Speaker
Um, cause again, Jordan's going to come back in a year, so that doesn't make a lot of sense. And if you signed one winger, then you're still one short because Jordan's out this year. So, um, you know, again, I think it depends. We got to see how the coaching staff is going to play and we got to see how players do in the new system and the new roles and look on Tuesday, we have, you know, we'll get a little bit of a exhibition game thing going on. So.
00:14:49
Speaker
Hopefully, we'll get a little bit more information there, but it's a work in progress. Even the preseason is not normal. We are staying here in Seattle. It's the first time we've ever done that. We're able to bring some teams in to play us, but with COVID out there, that's a really real thing. We were not comfortable putting our group at risk, going on the road for weeks or months at a time as we've done in the past. We just got to be patient. We got to get through this.
00:15:19
Speaker
Again, I think we still have a lot of confidence in the spine of our team and in the core of our team. On paper, when you look at something like whether it's a 3-5-2 or a 4-4-2 or wherever you look at it, we do have the personnel to fit that. I do think we can hit the ground running in that respect. It's going to look different. There's no question about that.
00:15:43
Speaker
All right, well, it sounds like we're at our first stop here of the spicy wheel, the wheel of spice, whatever we're gonna call that. So we're gonna take a little break here. Lick it, how are we gonna, are you able to show that on the screen or what are you gonna do here? I'm sending it up right now. Hopefully it shows up in a second. I don't think we're getting your audio.
00:16:12
Speaker
My screen is not working. Okay, Devlin's question is, it's actually for Jeremiah. Taking into account where you were raised, how do you justify supporting the 49ers and the sounders, but not the earthquakes? Yeah, I grew up in the Bay Area. I grew up a 49ers man, an A's man, a Sharks man, a Warriors man.
00:16:32
Speaker
But I was never really, even though I was going to college, I was actually at San Jose State when the inaugural MLS game was played. And I don't know that I was even aware that the game was being played there. And it was down the street. And suffice it to say, I never saw a Clash game when I was in college. I went to a few Earthquakes games after college, but I certainly was never a fan. One of the few games I went to though,
00:17:02
Speaker
was the Earthquakes game against the Sounders in 2009, which I don't know that you'll know this, Garth, but it was a 4-0 Earthquakes win. And what I came away impressed by, though, was the traveling support that the Sounders had. They had a couple hundred fans there. And I was kind of blown away by that. As it happened, I was getting ready to move to Seattle anyway. And shortly after moving to Seattle, I kind of fell in love with the Sounders
00:17:31
Speaker
It was so much fun to watch them play. They were in the middle of an open cup run. I was going down to the Georgian dragon and watching games there. Georgian dragon, by the way, I don't know if it's there anymore, which is very concerning. It looks like that property has been redeveloped and I'm very worried about it. But anyway, that's my story. So I just never, I never really got into the earthquakes when I was in the bay area.
00:18:00
Speaker
That's the answer. Garth, what was your soccer team growing up? Anyway, who were you rooting for? The first big pro game I remember going to was with my dad going to the Chicago Sting when they played for the soccer bowl. I think it was either 1980 or 1980. I never remember the year, 80 or 82, I think. It may have been 84 even.
00:18:24
Speaker
They won it in one of those years and we went to, I'm pretty sure, to Wrigley Field to watch the final. It was Potomar Heddick and Carl Heinz Granica.
00:18:36
Speaker
Brett Hall, who later coached me, was one of the American players on that team. It was one of those things. I went with my dad and it was like, okay, soccer is my thing now. It was just super cool and it was the first championship that I remember. I may have been aware of some others or something, but that's the one that I was present for and went from there. Well, this actually takes us into a direction I was already planning on going.
00:19:06
Speaker
but I think it's a good segue. Americans have made a lot of inroads in Europe. It feels like all of a sudden in the last couple of years, it went from being like, oh my gosh, are Americans gonna be playing in Europe at all to now it's like they can fill the whole national team of young Americans that are playing overseas. What's your perspective on that?
00:19:32
Speaker
on that trend? Is that a good trend for MLS? Is it a good trend for American soccer? Are those two things in conflict or are they related? I think it's all part of building a virtuous cycle. And what I mean by that is that if we're developing better players here, you know, I think we want part of our strategy to be that we're selling players, right? We've seen all over MLS now that that team is, you know, it used to be, hey,
00:19:56
Speaker
Well, if you're developing players, you can't win, right? But then the Philadelphia Union won the supporter shield. So it's tough to make that argument. And then they sold a couple of guys for a lot of money, right? And I think the sign, it's kind of simultaneous to that, right? And, you know, RSL has been doing this and Dallas has been doing it in Philadelphia, New York Red Bull, you know,
00:20:18
Speaker
We've had a bunch, you know, a bunch of teams do it and do it pretty well now. And if you even look at LAFC and how they built their team, you know, they have a very, they have a young team that's kind of full of assets. And that was one of the focuses that they made in their build. And, you know, Atlanta's done some things right with Almoron, with Barco, you know, some other stuff. So it's been, it's been fun to watch the league evolve that way. And I think simultaneously, Greg Berhalter,
00:20:44
Speaker
started playing young players with the national team. And so all of which to say, I think we're taking a step forward as a country and we're, I think the rest of the world is starting to figure out that there are good players here and we're given more opportunities to young players. And again, hopefully then if we're able to generate revenue off of that eventually and these guys competitively go over there and they get better and better, then it's good for everybody. Why don't we eat another wing? Sure. I'll have another wing. You can't go wrong.
00:21:14
Speaker
Garth, I got to tell you, I was very impressed. I asked you what kind of wings you wanted, and you were very specific. You wanted flats. What do you like about flats versus drumsticks? You know, I was literally just thinking of how I could make less of a fool of myself. And I feel like the drumstick, you have to, like, gnaw sometimes, like, you know, to separate it. Whereas, you know, if you got a flat, at least you go one pull, and for better or worse, you get what you get. And, you know, there's kind of no second guessing yourself. See, I actually was thinking the other way.
00:21:44
Speaker
which was a drumstick, you just kind of bite into it. And with flats, you got to have like a system. Well, I've eaten more wings in my life than you have, Jeremiah. You probably have. You're probably a little bit, I have not had a lot of experience. Certainly, I don't have like my own system yet for winging, but. I like what you did there, winging it. Yeah, there you go.
00:22:15
Speaker
So, Zogar, you know, we see American players making inroads into Europe. How close do you think we are of talent evaluators and people like yourself getting into the European, moving over to Europe and seeing more coaches and that side of things? Well, we've seen a couple, right? I mean, it took forever for somebody to break through. And Bob Bradley made it, you know, for a couple of weeks with Swansea and then
00:22:43
Speaker
You see now Jesse Marsh obviously going over and doing well. Now that's part of the Red Bull umbrella, but I think you're going to see more and more of those kind of multinational setups and just as MLS players get more exposed to the world, I have no doubt you'll see more and more coaches and executives get exposed and go over. It's all about the respect level that MLS has earned abroad.
00:23:08
Speaker
And, you know, again, as we move players, I think I use the phrase virtual cycle, I think, you know, it's going to increase the respect level for MLS. And I think we'll probably you'll see more and more of those transactions both on and off the field. And so do you get the sense that
00:23:25
Speaker
that American players are actually getting better or is it just that the way they're being evaluated, like European talent evaluators are just trusting the American player more and it just sort of like is part of that virtuous cycle?
00:23:41
Speaker
Look, I think it's a little bit of both. Shoot, we're spending millions of dollars a year on player development, so I hope we're getting better at it. If we're not, then we've been pretty negligent. So yes, I do think the level is improving. Surely we have a lot more tools than we ever have. And with MLS Next, where MLS as a league has even recognized that we're going to need to be active in this space and drive the space forward and continue to do that.
00:24:10
Speaker
you know, as we move from, you know, we're at 27 teams this year, we're going to, it sounds like we're going to move eventually to 32. Um, you know, that's going to cover virtually the whole country. You know, I think you'll have fewer and fewer guys that slip through the cracks in a 32 team league. Um, and that's exciting. And I think we'll keep doing that. And likewise, when the, you know, when the national team coach takes a shot on five or six young guys and a whole bunch of them pop at the same time, then
00:24:38
Speaker
you're going to get what you've seen, which is players getting opportunities and a real increase in interest in American players because American players are still cheaper than a lot of their counterparts are, because it is a market that doesn't have the long track record of success in terms of players moving to Europe. Now, as you see guys who go over there and do well, every one of these players that gets sold, all of us in MLS are rooting for. It doesn't matter if they came from Dallas or Philly or
00:25:05
Speaker
New York, if they do well, they're going to prop up the market for everybody else. What do you see as the Sounders role in that space? Is it imperative that the Sounders start selling players to Europe? Is it always about winning and development on that level takes a second step? Or how do you balance those differing needs?
00:25:34
Speaker
Yeah. You know, the one thing I feel pretty strongly about Jeremiah is I really don't think it's an either or, you know, I think that that's a, that's the wrong question. You know, it's, you know, cause it, if, if it's, you know, are you committed to winning? Well, I mean, we've been before the last five MLS Cup finals. It seems objectively, you know, certifiable that we're, we're trying to win. Um, uh, so that's, you know, that I think goes without saying, and
00:25:56
Speaker
Um, you know, we, we have, you know, once we get fans back in the building, I hope 40,000 people are still showing up every day and they're show every game. And, you know, we, we're always going to owe it to those folks to, uh, to do our best to win every game. Uh, and we're going to do that, but I don't think it is mutually exclusive that you can also develop players. You know, again, Philadelphia union won the supporter shield. So I think, I think that argument is a little, I mean, I thought it was antiquated before. I think it's, you know, particularly so now, um, you know, there are big clubs all over the world that
00:26:26
Speaker
Um, play, you know, one or two young guys at a time. And I think that's really the key to it, right? As no one this year is seeking to reinvent the wheel and say, all of a sudden we're going to play. Um, we're going to go to Columbus on the road and start five teenagers. You know, like that's not a recipe for success, but, um, if you can introduce one young player into the team in most games, um, you know, whether that's in a reserve role or a starting role.
00:26:50
Speaker
we have a number of young players that are knocking on the door. I think that's the way to approach it successfully, to have young players playing next to experienced veteran players and then maintaining the standard. Really, what you're doing by doing that is you're investing in yourself. As we've seen, we got to a salary cap situation, but when you go on these long championship runs,
00:27:12
Speaker
you know you everybody in every sport at least in North America with a salary cap you hit the wall and you have to then offload a bunch of veterans and so we've known that this day was coming and you know we put all our chips in you know last two years to try to to try and win and you know now we are at the stage where you know that hopefully some of that investment in the young players starts paying off.
00:27:33
Speaker
and we're able to as I said to break through and get them on the field and then increase over time the upside of the whole group because that's the great thing about young players is they may be a little bit up and down but again if you put them in the right structure and the right system and you coach them up then you know they're going to get better they're really only going to get better so you know your starting point this is just that it's a starting point and that means your team's going to improve over the course of the season.
00:27:59
Speaker
And so it was, I don't know, Jordan's situation was maybe a little different in that he was already an established player, but was that...
00:28:09
Speaker
The desire to be part of that system, did that play into letting Jordan go and do the loan? Obviously, it didn't quite work out how everyone wanted, but if you can go back to the decision-making process of doing that, or was Jordan just completely a separate category because of everything that he had done in the organization and whatnot?
00:28:31
Speaker
Yeah, I wouldn't personally tie those two together. I mean, obviously look, the only person who can truly answer that is Jordan himself, right? But, you know, at the end of the day, you know, we had, you know, it's all, this is all public, right? I mean, Jordan, when Jordan left Stanford, he had a bunch of opportunities. He chose to sign for the Sounders. You know, I obviously, I think that was a great decision. Hopefully Jordan thinks it was a great decision. I think he does.
00:28:53
Speaker
But with that came the, we're not going to be absolutist here. If you sign to the Sounders, we're not saying this is forever and we'll never let you go. That was part of it. If you're going to be willing to give us a chance and pass on the Bundesliga and sign with us.
00:29:10
Speaker
then if you come to us one day and say, hey, I want to give it a shot, then we're going to help. It was as simple as that. I sense that some people think that's cheesy or naive or that's not really what happened, but it honestly wasn't that complicated. When Jordan came to us and said there was something we really wanted to do, we said, okay, this is what we had talked about.
00:29:31
Speaker
Um, you know, we gotta be, we gotta live up to our end of the bargain now too, and, and trying to facilitate in the best way possible for the club. And you know, look, he, he gets hurt in the non-contact injury. So, you know, it wasn't because of fixture congestion or, or cumulative fatigue or, you know, some of these things that can happen on loans. Um, you know, you got hurt in space and it's the same way you got hurt, uh, three years prior when he was playing the Champions League. So, um, stuff happens and it's a bummer and it's mostly it's a bummer for Jordan. So.
00:30:05
Speaker
and hopefully at the end of all this, it'll be a sounder for a long time. So does the calculus change at all when it's a younger player who maybe hasn't had a chance really to break in? I mean, is there a pressure to
00:30:20
Speaker
to sell a player early if you're getting those offers at the very beginning of their career?
Career Reflections and Club Evolution
00:30:27
Speaker
Or is that something where you want to, is there some imperative for the first team to get some playing out of these guys before you are willing to sell them?
00:30:36
Speaker
Um, you know, some of the metrics that we use, um, you know, when the, when the kids play their market value tends to go up pretty dramatically. Um, when the kids play in world cups, um, you know, we were tied for, uh, with NYCFC having the most kids in the last under 17 world cup team.
00:30:51
Speaker
And look, because you played a World Cup doesn't mean you're going to make it either, right? So if they come in the first team and they do well, there's no question that playing them meaningful minutes will drive their value. As to what you do with that player, I think it's always a case by case and it's complex. Is this a guy that you see is going to be your starter for the next three, four, five years? Is it a player that you, do you really believe in them or not? Some of what you're selling when you're selling
00:31:20
Speaker
17, 19-year-old player, so you can't sell before they turn 18, but is potential. We know the player better than anybody and there is a price at which it probably makes sense and there's probably a price at which it doesn't. That's what you have to examine, I think. The big thing for us, Jeremiah, is we got to be in the game. We have to come up now with some solutions. We can't just
00:31:46
Speaker
roll out. And this is one where we've made the playoffs 12 years in a row and had nothing but success. And it can be really challenging to evolve because we've been to four of the last five cup finals. And so to agree internally that, hey, this has worked really, really well, but we're going to try this new thing. And again, it's not an either or. It's not a black and white. It's not a binary choice.
00:32:11
Speaker
But I do think that the way the world's moving with these youth player slots coming in, I do think that it's a space that we have to be in. And in that sense, we have to evolve as a club. And again, it's not a radical sea change. Let's win every game and let's try to do it while we're developing some players too.
00:32:30
Speaker
All right, so we're gonna do another break and ask a question from the wheel. This one apparently is from Matt Clevenger and I'm gonna go and let Aaron ask the question. This is actually a pretty spicy question. What job or opportunity would make you leave the Sounders? It doesn't have to be limited to the world of MLS or soccer. Are we the wing first? Oh yeah, we gotta do the wing first.
00:33:01
Speaker
I'm doing the ghost pepper one this time, so. Oh, God. All right. I'll do that one too, because I'm a sucker. All right. So now my palate is apparently a little more prepared for this. That is still quite spicy. Wow.
00:33:30
Speaker
Let's not get a bus. No. Oh, no. Very bad idea. Oh, well. So you guys are struggling to watch the hot ones, which is this YouTube show that we stole this idea from. What's up? I'm asking Garth if he's ever watched our hot ones. They have not seen hot ones. All right, well.
00:34:01
Speaker
After this, you'll maybe get some new appreciation for it. But I do. I'll give you the 10,000, the elevator pitch is an interview show where they eat rapidly escalating levels of spice wings. And at the end of it, they're eating the stuff that I am apparently eating with almost every wing because I am apparently a glutton for punishment. And I think that's what the people want.
00:34:34
Speaker
It's definitely what people were. It's definitely what people were. Can you guys hear me again? Yeah. Cool. All right. So Garth, we left off, we were talking about development. Where do you think the, like, where would you? Oh, you haven't done the question. Thank you. Oh, wait, you did the question. He hasn't answered it yet. Yeah, he hasn't answered it yet. Oh, that's right. We're on a fire today.
00:35:05
Speaker
I think those spices are getting to your brain, Jeremiah. They are. Um, I have tried, I was just, I did one of my, my three stars. So, so far, so good on my end. No, I don't, I don't even put any ghost, anything on anything, let alone, I'll try this. I'm a narrow stuff next. Um, but look, my job, you know, the next, uh, kind of invocation point for the job is, uh, you guys all vote on me, right? So.
00:35:33
Speaker
We'll see what happens with that in 2022 and you know we can go from there. I mean it's obviously a really fun job and you know getting to work with the Sounders is a privilege and to do so as the general manager is a particular privilege as a steward of the club and to be part of an organization that's had so much success before me and hopefully during my tenure and
00:36:00
Speaker
no doubt will continue to be successful long after I'm gone. It's kind of hard to answer that question or imagine it. The thing that would be tempting, and Jeremiah, you and I have talked about this before, is if there's a CEO role at some point where you were running an entire club,
00:36:21
Speaker
And again, there are folks that have done that in the last couple of years that have said, hey, that's a really bad idea. It's a structure that as a league, the league is moving away from. But it's always about, can I keep learning? Can I keep getting better? Can I keep meeting new folks and doing new things and being challenged and just enjoy work the same as anybody else in any other job?
00:36:46
Speaker
Would you say that Seattle has met your expectations in terms of when you, when you made this move in 2015, Sounders were coming off a supporter shield. You were coming into an established team that was still looking to get to the next level. I don't know how much you knew about the exact situation, but would you say it's, it's, it's like, how would you assess all that in over six years?
00:37:11
Speaker
Um, you know, I guess I feel like it's gone pretty well, right? I mean, the results on the field would speak to that. You know, we've talked tonight a little bit about, you know, can we become kind of the complete club, you know, where we're able to continue to compete for titles and develop players. And, you know, that's, that's a fun challenge. You know, it's just that can you balance those things out and.
00:37:29
Speaker
Um, you know, uh, I'm interested in the strategy of it, you know, because in order to develop players, it's literally a years long process that you invest in and staff and players and scouting and infrastructure and data analysis. And, um, you know, we're constantly trying to get smarter and, um, learn from our missteps and, and, uh, hopefully, uh, push forward our successes. So, um, you know, that's been part of it and it's been, uh, for the most part, it's been fun.
00:37:55
Speaker
ups and downs as there are with any job. Again, it's been a privilege. The fans are still the thing that make this different. There's only one other city in America that you can go to where the club is relevant, even on a somewhat comparable scale. If you think about Atlanta, even massive clubs like LAFC and
00:38:21
Speaker
like Galaxy and the other big brands around MLS. I don't know that they're as relevant in their local marketplace as the Sounders are in Seattle. That's fun and that's neat. Again, that presents some challenges, but it's something that I know we value. For our family, this is culturally the kind of place that we like living. I think overall, it's been a
00:38:51
Speaker
a relatively good fit. That's good to hear. I know I've enjoyed the time that you had here.
00:38:58
Speaker
And I'm hoping it keeps going. So I'm glad to hear that. But you know, along those lines, we've been talking, we were talking before the show started, you asked about the purple haze kit or the Jimi Hendrix kit and what we thought of it. And it started an interesting conversation in the Center at Heart community where we were wondering if this might actually herald
00:39:22
Speaker
kind of a mindset change of the organization where they've always aimed to be a global brand, but I wonder if there's maybe this, and especially over the last year as there's been even more Seattle influence into both the technical and the player side, is there a sense that you can lean into the community even more than you have in the past?
00:39:51
Speaker
You know, it's interesting that you phrased that way, Jeremiah. And, you know, you and I were talking about before we went live here. I mean, I think everybody we signed or almost everybody we signed, Spencer Ritchie, Freddie Monteiro, Kellen Rowe, going back last year, Brad Smith, Roman Torres. I mean, the pandemic has really pushed us in this direction and we've embraced it and leaned into it.
00:40:17
Speaker
But from an outside look, I still consider myself, like I'm not born in Seattle, you know, and like, there's still like a, I don't know if you feel it at all Jeremiah, but you know, there's still like a, a level of like, you know, you're here, but you know, you weren't here back when kind of stuff. And look, I mean, that that's, that our organization on this core is, is very Seattle centric. You know, you know, we have, you know, the senior leadership team, at least three or four people that
00:40:43
Speaker
were literally born and raised and have lived most of their adult lives in Seattle. So, you know, I've always felt that we were, we were very Seattle focused and Seattle centric, very community based. And certainly when we went to the, when we, when the ownership group evolved from just Joe Roth to the families, again, almost all those families are Seattle families. Now I'm not exclusively, but the great majority of them are. And, you know, Peter Tomizawa came aboard and was working
00:41:13
Speaker
you know, with us on a day-to-day basis. And that's been a lot of fun. And, you know, he's an adoptive Seattleite now himself. So I think, yes, that's the answer to your question. I think very much, I think we are very much interested in and focused on Seattle, our community, our fan base on social justice here in this community. And, you know, I think all of these elements contributed
00:41:41
Speaker
to focus us in that direction. So I think one of the funny things about that is when you first came here in 2015,
00:41:50
Speaker
there was this, I think, assumption that you were gonna eventually get around to sort of cleaning house and rebuilding the organization with your people. Essentially, it hasn't really worked out that way. I mean, you ended up signing Brian as your first head coach hire. You know, you now have just hired Wade Weber as your defiance coach, who I realize you know him very well, but.
00:42:18
Speaker
He's a Seattle guy, and you look up and down the organization, and it actually seems like you've leaned into the advantages that were already here. Was that something you came into thinking might be the case, or did your mind get changed once you got here? Look, I like to think I came at it with humility, not thinking that I knew everything, not thinking that I had to do it my way and there was no other way to accomplish it.
00:42:47
Speaker
certainly wanted to learn from what had worked here. And, you know, again, an organization that had a ton of success, you know, we've, we've drove from the past, you know, I, I'm the dummy, right. I'm the one who's like, uh, after the winning the open cup and the supporter show, I'm like, Oh yeah, I'll come in. I'll come in. I'll make them better. Um, yeah, it was a, you know, a pretty big risk. And, uh, you know, fortunately it's worked out and we had a couple of stars in the Jersey now and you know, that's forever. And that feels pretty cool. And, um, you know, in terms of,
00:43:15
Speaker
Changing things, this goes back to the story of the off-season that was not dominated, but a common thread was, were we going to retain Brian Schmetzer and stuff like that?
00:43:30
Speaker
Internally, that was just a total non-story at all times. I think what folks don't realize is Adrian and Brian have been together for 20 years. And so that's not changing. They've had only success. They've made the class literally all but one year and 20. It's just not a space where a GM is going to have a lot of influence. So did I know that? I definitely didn't know that.
00:43:59
Speaker
coming in. Brian wasn't a coach then, so I didn't know Brian. So that's definitely been new, and that's changed. But I've done my best to adapt to that, and certainly I've enjoyed working with Brian, and we've had some success together, and hopefully that'll continue.
00:44:16
Speaker
All right, well, it sounds like another good time to do a wheel spin. Lickett, why don't you spin that wheel again? I just did. I don't know who this person is, and you probably don't know who this is, but it's Marnie O'Shan. Oh, no. Oh, no. Garth, you've been generous with your time every year as part of Yacht-Con. Clearly, the audience appreciates it, and you must enjoy connecting with Sounders fans this way. How much does it pain you that it involves more interaction with Jeremiah?
00:44:48
Speaker
I will tell it. Jeremiah, should I assume that marketing is your wife? Is that is that accurate or your daughter? She's my sister, though. The sister. OK, all right. Well, Marty, thank you very much for the question. I'd love to do it justice. I am married to a woman who keeps me keeps me humble most of the time. So it's a familiar question. Will mock both myself and Jeremiah for a second and say that
00:45:16
Speaker
Jeremiah is the only person that came to my office wanting to conduct an interview. And we were both so full of ourselves that we wound up talking politics for over an hour and never wound up going on the record with the topic that we had intended to cover on the day.
00:45:32
Speaker
Um, you know, certainly, uh, Jeremiah is somebody that I feel, look, we've got to spend a lot of time together this point, right Jeremiah? I mean, I think we've, we've kind of grown up with the Sounders almost a little bit. You knew, you definitely knew a lot more than I did when I came, but, um, you know, it's been, it's been fun, man. It's been fun. And to have this community here at Sounder at Heart is, it's part of what makes the Sounders really special. And it is fun to interact with everybody and, um,
00:45:56
Speaker
you know, it's again, if you can enjoy the kind of quirkiness of playing D&D and watching Wade Webber playing a guitar and strumming along, you know, like
00:46:06
Speaker
you're not enjoying life. You're not doing it the right way. So a hat tip to everybody. And the cause here to raise some money for Seattle Children's and for autism is near and dear to my heart. It personally impacts our family. And so, again, really, really happy and feel lucky to be included on something like this. So thank you.
00:46:28
Speaker
Well, and I guess I didn't mention it early on, but the whole wing concept came out of the idea that people were, we encouraged people to donate to our charity.
00:46:42
Speaker
And in exchange, we would eat hot wings and ask the questions that they wanted to ask. So this is, in fact, we're not just doing it for the silliness of it. There was a fundraising element of it. And in case you missed it, we're at something around $12,000 right now raised entirely. And I don't know, we've set a soft goal. Like, hey, let's get to 15. Why not? And we'll see if we get there.
00:47:12
Speaker
I really think Garth still owes us a wing too, by the way. Oh yeah, that's right. Let me keep working. I gotta tell you though, this turmeric sauce that we have, there's a turmeric sauce that's habanero. I gotta tell you, it seems downright mild after you've been doing the
00:47:34
Speaker
the hot ones, last dab sausage I've been doing a couple times. And it's like a nice refreshing break. It's out of this world. That sauce is one of the better hot sauces I've had in a long time. Yeah, it's a turmeric and carrot sauce that randomly a friend of mine from high school started doing
00:47:55
Speaker
hot sauces and yeah, his name's Anthony Solis and it's Solis Cosina is the name that he's given the sauce and he started bottling it and anyway, plug, plug, plug. There, yep. And that's the other one, the pineapple
Spicy Wing Challenge and Personal Interests
00:48:13
Speaker
one. That one's also very good, but the turmeric is, it's very unique. So how are you handling these, Garth?
00:48:23
Speaker
I just tried my first habanero tumeric. And it looks like you're handling fine. So far, so good. I can feel the sweat beginning. There you go. The external system that immediately overheats. And again, it's outwardly not pretty. I'm not going to lie. Yeah, you know, nothing on this show is really pretty, I think.
00:48:47
Speaker
We can say that. Honestly, it tastes good, Jeremiah. Honestly, I'm pleasantly surprised. I was apprehensive if I'm honest. Hey, I don't blame you for being apprehensive.
00:49:04
Speaker
Getting back to the idea of this Seattle community aspect of the signing, how aware are you that almost every year, I think every year but one since you've been here, you've brought back a former player? What do you think that says about the organization that not only that you're willing to bring back players, but that players apparently want to keep coming back?
00:49:29
Speaker
Look, we try to, you know, a little cliche that we impute here is we try to treat people better on the way out than on the way in. And that was you on the way in. We try to make them feel very welcome and welcome families and welcome people to new culture, et cetera. So, you know, we try to do the same. You know, we're not a team that takes hard lines or gets upset with people if contracts don't work out or, you know, we try to treat everybody well and hopefully while they're with us, we try to treat them well as well.
00:49:58
Speaker
It's something that I, I've always found worked out pretty well. Um, it's a value I shared with the folks that were here already, you know, with Adrian, with Brian. Um, and it's, so it's not, it's not real difficult, you know, and oftentimes when you have a player like say, uh, Kellen Rowe, like, you know, we weren't sure honestly. Um, and initially when we just ran data on, on Kellen and.
00:50:20
Speaker
He hasn't played as much in the last couple of years as he would have liked, I'm sure. And we got on the phone with Kellan and he talked to, he did a call with Chris, who was still with us at the time. And he talked to me, Chris and Brian, and we all hung up the phone. We're like, yeah, we got to sign him. So this is a, you know, it's just, it's, you know, like, again, like I think it's going on. There's some stuff that we do that is highly technical and very complicated. And, you know, we dive in.
00:50:48
Speaker
Sometimes if you have people that really want to play for you and are willing to do so on reasonable financial terms, if you can get a couple of those, those are always wins. Those are always good things for the club.
00:51:02
Speaker
You know, I suppose you could, you could get to a point where maybe there are too many of them, but again, I don't, you know, we're not there yet. And, you know, we're really lucky to have a guy like Kellen who really wants to be here. And, you know, I think players like him and like Freddie Monteiro, those guys are going to give their heart and soul for the club, you know, and, and, uh, you know, I wouldn't be shocked if, you know, again, I, I've never had this conversation with DeAndre, but, you know, I would think at some point someday,
00:51:27
Speaker
DeAndre maybe makes his way back here as well, just based on the relationship again that he has with the club. And that one sounds more complicated than the others because there's allocation considerations and some other things that would have to come and play. You have some things that would have to line up, but I think
00:51:45
Speaker
you know, a lot of guys have had a lot of success. And again, it's, it's the fans. I mean, again, I'd love to tell you it's because we have the best looking general manager in the league. I think that's probably objectively, you guys are, you guys politely turned my camera off earlier in this interview. So I know how you feel about that. You know, it's the fans, man. Like you go, you pay, do you want to come play in front of 40 felt like who's going to say no to that? Like in the team, uh, again, that same fan base,
00:52:11
Speaker
drives buckets of revenue into our coffers and that allows us to continue to reinvest in the team and be successful. It's a really good relationship that way. You mentioned this, but do you have to be aware of it not letting it become a sentimental decision? Is there ever a point where you have to like, wait a minute, are we signing Freddie because he wants to be here or are we signing him because we think he can score goals? Is that how serious of those conversations get?
00:52:42
Speaker
I mean, look, I mean, if I'm a sentimental, I lose my job, right? That's pretty straightforward. You know, you guys will vote on me and be like, Hey, that was really nice that you brought Freddie back, but he didn't play well and neither did Brad and neither did Kellan. And therefore, you know, you don't work here anymore.
00:52:57
Speaker
So it's pretty black and white that way. And that's my job in general, right? A general manager is not a position you should adopt if you want to be loved. It is a difficult position in the sense of you have to say no and you have to say no often. And you have to make cold-hearted evaluations and objective evaluations. Hopefully they're not, in fact, cold-hearted because you're not doing it, whether because you like someone or you don't like someone. It's based on evidence. That's what we try to make our decisions on.
00:53:27
Speaker
Um, you know, what you're doing too is as a GM that's, that's, you know, separately, like I maintain them virtually anybody can be a scout. Now being a good scout is a completely different thing, but being a scout in the sense that we can all watch a basketball game or a football game or baseball and be like, Hey, that's the best player.
00:53:44
Speaker
And you'll find almost always that that best player is often the highest paid. The skill of a GM comes in, in trying to find value at every single price point at every single position. And the benefit of us having good relationships with players and ex-players is a lot of times these guys will come back and they'll say, hey, I am willing to do this with my contract structure. I am willing to forego that bonus, or I am willing to fit under the salary cap in this way or that way.
00:54:13
Speaker
When you have that flexibility that allows you to continually pick players at the right value and if you do that enough times and the collective should benefit from that and Hopefully you're feeling good teams Well, I'm going to ask you one more question then we're gonna do do another wing but
00:54:30
Speaker
So we've seen the Sounders sustain a level of success that's literally unprecedented in MLS, but just as impressive when looked at through the prism of North American soccer. What we haven't seen though is the Sounders have the type of regular season that, I don't know, like a Toronto FC or an LA FC or even in Atlanta has had in recent years. And I'm just wondering, is there something about the way the Sounders are structured that
00:54:55
Speaker
promotes long-term success maybe at the cost of not reaching the extreme heights of a 75-point season or whatever it might be? Or is that just kind of a luck of the way it's worked out? I definitely think some of the strategic choices we make play in. We look at DP signings. Again, the guys you pay for are match winners. You want to give the money to the guys that make the difference in the big games.
00:55:24
Speaker
Ladero and Rui Diaz in particular, I think have done a pretty good job of that. And we signed them when they were available. And in both those cases, that was in the summer.
00:55:35
Speaker
and we were willing to wait to get that right. That's 16 and 18 right there, that's two seasons where we felt like we could make more impact. The other thing that gets reported less is there are significant cap benefits to signing players in the summer.
00:55:56
Speaker
Again, if you're looking at a pot of money and you can buy a player now and then buy another player in the summer by waiting on that DP or waiting on that Tam guy, then you literally have more good players on your team. So we found that to be an effective strategy for us year over year over year. And look, if we were consistently mediocre and not
00:56:21
Speaker
making deep runs in the playoffs, then I think you could go back and, you know, all right, are we putting enough weight and attention in the beginning of the season, into the regular season, et cetera. Those would be fair questions. But, you know, we've never finished lower than fourth. You know, we finished second in the West last year. I think there's an argument we could have or maybe even should have won the regular season in the West. And, you know, that didn't work out for a lot of reasons. And so a bunch of things we can't control, like the crazy international window that
00:56:49
Speaker
the way it went down in October, November and the knock out effects of that. But it's, you know, the other thing is that, you know, this is no doubt going to get me in trouble with some elements of the Sounder at Heart fan base. But, you know, a supporter shield is a, it's always going to be a good measure of who the best team is, right? But if you look at the traditional supporter shields, those are games being played home and away in a regular cadence where you play everybody in the league.
00:57:13
Speaker
And, you know, last year we didn't play anybody in the East, like we just played the West. And this year, you know, if you look at our schedule, you know, we haven't moved to a division format, but this is a division schedule. That's what this is. We're playing, we're playing everybody in the West Coast three times. We're playing the rest of the West twice. And we only play in two East Coast games. So, you know, the idea that the supporters show, even to a purist, that that would be somehow embody the best team automatically over
00:57:40
Speaker
34 games. I do intellectually struggle with that when you're only playing one half of the league, really, and you're playing them an unbalanced number of times. And even within the three within the division.
00:57:52
Speaker
If we get LAFC in the galaxy in Portland twice away, that's a tougher schedule than if we get them all at home. There's just a lot of things like that where, look, you're always going to try to do the best you can in the regular season because you want to get a high seed. If you get a high seed, you get playoff games at home, you get playoff games at home, you get lots of revenue, you get to invest that in the team, again, virtuous cycle.
00:58:16
Speaker
It's probably more information than he wanted, but hopefully that answered the question. There's never too much information. All right. Let's do that final wheel spin. All righty. Kristin Sario. Oh. Are we hearing Aaron? Aaron, you might be on mute. I was. What's the hottest thing you've ever eaten, is the question.
00:58:46
Speaker
Oh, well, I can, I'll, I'll start and then I'll let, well, I guess I should eat the wing first. Right. That's how we're doing it. We're eating the wing and then we're gonna, I know the, I know this answer actually doing the dab. Yeah. Oh, there you go. Yeah.
00:59:15
Speaker
That got you on the tongue. With the rope. Yeah. All right. So Garth, I'll answer first and I'll let you give some thoughts of this. The hottest thing I ever ate, I was in LA shortly before the pandemic started actually. I went to a taco rio. They had something on the menu called a chili taco that was just grilled
00:59:46
Speaker
chilies with some cheese on it. And I thought, sure, why not? And I took one bite of that. And I realized that was not fit for human consumption. And I was hiccuping and dying for probably the next 10 or 15 minutes, which is starting to hit me now on this one. But yeah, that was probably the hottest thing I ever ate.
01:00:14
Speaker
I do not have a good answer here. I do not have a memory of just that I sweat out of the sides of my face, like from below my eyeballs and like below my ears and it rolls down my face. And so I think at a young age, I was like, yeah, my people aren't adapted for this stuff. This is not going to be an area of strength.
01:00:39
Speaker
I was making chili once and thought I was using smoked paprika, but I was actually using cayenne. And so it wasn't intended to be that spicy, but it was definitely the spiciest thing I've ever done. It was probably like four or five tablespoons of cayenne, which is a lot of cayenne. Yeah, I did something similar to that once. The first time I ever made chili verde,
01:01:08
Speaker
I thought I was, I got two different kinds of peppers mixed up. I was, I think I was supposed to be using serranos and I used like these little green peppers and it made like nuclear level spice to this that was almost unedible, inedible. But anyway, we'll finish this up on a high note, I promise. Uh, Garth, how you doing?
01:01:37
Speaker
Doing all right, man. Hang in there. I got one bucket of wings down, and I got two more, and we're dabbling, and I haven't put the habanero together yet with the three-star wing. That's the mountain I have left to climb, but I've mixed everything else so far. All right. Braver or stupider? One of the two.
01:02:03
Speaker
Well, are you able to hang out for a little bit longer? I know we're pushing past the time we said we were going to keep you till. Well, we're all good. So far, none of my children have come into the office. So I'm just assuming that they're asleep. That's why it usually works at your house, right, Jeremiah? Oh, that is 100% how it works in my house. Yeah, yeah. My wife hasn't even texted me. Yeah, you're golden then. Yeah, we eat. The thing that happens at our house is, so my wife, I don't know if you, this is too much information, probably, but my wife is a big fan of the TV show Supernatural.
01:02:34
Speaker
which has been an amazing experience for the pandemic because it's 15 seasons of like 23 episodes each season. And we're gonna, we're getting close to getting to the end here, but it's not the most appropriate thing for your kids to walk in on. It's like a, kind of like a, it's a pretty scary show for a kid to witness. We've had that happen a few times, but anyway.
01:02:58
Speaker
We got through Star Wars in our house in the pandemic. That was a matter of some debate. But we got some lightsaber injuries that are maybe a little much.
01:03:08
Speaker
We pushed through it. That's what happens when you have boys, right? I have three boys, yeah. Yeah, we're toughening them up, I guess. Or scarring them forever, one of the two. So does that mean you made it through all 11 episodes of Star Wars? We did, yeah. I'm not saying we did it in a day, Jeremiah. Right, very, very day. Did you guys get to Mandalorian 2?
01:03:30
Speaker
We we have not yet secured the resources to subscribe to Disney Plus. So it's it's odd. It's one of my it's one of my boys have asked for it for their birthday. So it's one of those we probably shouldn't. Hopefully he doesn't watch this. But we're thinking about maybe going that direction. And he has it in his head that he's going to watch. He's going to watch the Mandalorian like that is, you know, for his birthday. That's that's going to be his thing. So I'm actually pretty pumped about it. Like we're going to we're going to drop it out of that and and
01:03:59
Speaker
Hopefully be a lot of fun. I like that the Logaway household is withholding Disney Plus from their children because they don't have the resources for it.
01:04:12
Speaker
I like that story that you've told your kids. We're on screens a lot as part of remote school. So I think those parents can attest that more screens is maybe not the best approach right now. The Disney allocation money is hard to come by. Right. It is. No, look, I mean, I'm a huge Marvel nerd as well, as Jeremiah knows. So I'm ready. We just got to ration it out in the right way. But I can't wait to watch WandaVision.
01:04:42
Speaker
whatever else is coming that way. And I still haven't seen Hamilton. I mean, these are gaps in my pop culture knowledge here that, you know, in between watching Brazilian players and Ecuadoran players and Argentinian players and whoever our new sporting director likes, that's gonna be an interesting process. We're gonna have to match their taste with ours and there'll be some working together on that, I'm sure.
01:05:10
Speaker
Well, this feels like a good transition into this area of inquiry. During the D&D episode, which apparently you may have watched, it sounds like. I did. Yeah. Oh, I saw it. I wouldn't have missed that for the world. Hat tip to Dave Clark. Did you stick around for all three hours of it? I did. I broke it up, Jeremiah. I couldn't just go coast to coast on that. I was able to kind of watch it here and there and have it on the background.
01:05:37
Speaker
I did get to see them beat the Green Dragon. Again, as a father, I'm really impressed with Dave Clark because the amount of work that goes into laying that out and running that, I've thought about, could I do this with my kids? It's really time intensive to do what Dave does and it's really impressive how he set it up.
01:06:00
Speaker
Well, I think you just made Dave's year. So congratulations on that. Um, but I, I, the reason I brought it up was so we learned that your, that your character apparently was, was someone named, I hope I'm getting this right. Rodious pig popper. Is that, is that accurate? Rodious was the first name. Um, and that was a Dutch lawmaker.
01:06:25
Speaker
He's one of the first experts in kind of the progenitor of Naval law. And so again, being a nerd, I thought I might go, this is one, because Wade and I played together when we were teammates on the then Dallas Byrne, now FC Dallas. And so I figured I wanted to go to law school at some point. And so I was very interested in those kind of figures and
01:06:53
Speaker
My heritage is Dutch, you know, my ancestors came over 100 years ago through Ellis Island from Holland and so Grodeus was the name and then the last part was just silliness was, you know, just kind of find something, you know, idiotic, silly, whatever, whatever went through my 25 year old brain at that point, you know, something that could be
01:07:18
Speaker
laughed about for years afterwards. Well, I appreciate you coming up with that name because it made for a good discussion. But what do you think your experience as a D&D player says about your, what about that character spoke to like the way you are a GM and the way that you kind of executed your career from then forward? You know,
01:07:47
Speaker
I don't know. I look, I would love for there to be some insight here, Jeremiah, but I suspect it was just, I was in my twenties. I was a goalkeeper. I was, I was a meathead. Um, I had some funky haircuts. Um, I was very into expressing myself and, you know, if I got to carry a big sword and be a big strong guy in the game and, uh, chops on people's heads often, you know, that, that felt pretty fun at that point. And, uh, you know, I wasn't, wasn't married at
01:08:15
Speaker
you know, I was one of these guys that always said, ah, you know, I'm never, never going to get married. That's for, that's for the week. Uh, and, uh, you know, life, you know, life, it's funny, life always catches up with you, right? I think it's changed and your perspective changes and you evolve. I love that word. The, we spent a bunch of time watching the, the Lincoln special on CNN, the six part installment. And, and, uh, you know, one of the words of was to watch, uh, Lincoln's evolution on, on the issues of the day. So,
01:08:42
Speaker
and the issues of our day. So I think it's a really important quality as a person. If you can evolve along the way, then hopefully that means that you're remaining curious about the world around you and you're trying to learn from it and you're trying to get better. And I like to think that I did some of that.
01:09:02
Speaker
You say you were a meathead, and you say all these kind of self-deprecating things, but you pick kind of a clever name in Rodious, and you're playing D&D, which is not exactly a meathead game to get into. I mean, there must be something about your interest in a turn-based strategy game that
01:09:26
Speaker
like translated into, you know, maybe not at the time you knew it, but it seems like it at least laid some foundation for moving on into the, you know, player personnel field. I mean, look, in the sense of, you know, you're adventuring with a group of people, right, and Wade referenced this as well, but one of the other party members is now a judge, a federal judge,
01:09:51
Speaker
Um, and, uh, you know, it was a better lawyer than I was. And, uh, you know, the other guys, a government contractor who's smarter than both of us. So, um, it was definitely some intellectual firepower. And, um, at that time at least I didn't find Dallas, Texas to be the most, uh, intellectually stimulating place, at least not within a pro soccer player locker room. Um, I remember.
01:10:14
Speaker
And look, it's all changed now, right? I mean, most of the kids nowadays don't go to college at all. But back then, we still had teams that had college guys. And we had, I don't know, between four or five, six, something like that, guys that had gone to college on the team in Dallas. And
01:10:33
Speaker
know, I was a backup goalkeeper. So no matter how delusional I got, I probably wasn't so delusional that I thought I was going to make a living at this. I mean, the most money I ever made as a pro goalkeeper was $40,000. And all in one year, that's a lot. So we called ourselves professional. And it was obvious you had to have a backup plan. And again, I figured I wanted to go into law. And look, I got cut four times in five years.
01:11:02
Speaker
So it wasn't exactly a secure way to make the living. It was a lot of fun, wouldn't change it for the world. But you need to have something else. And so I think that, again, if we're able to peel it back at all, I was a history and public policy major in college. I was always interested in the world and studied abroad in Florence, studied abroad in Freiburg, Germany. I was interested in the kind of multicultural aspects of life and
01:11:29
Speaker
So probably I'll wrap that into, I would love to hang out with these smart people and do this strategy-based thing. And that is one thing that I think is different. As opposed to playing a video game where you're holding a controller and shooting something in front of you, D&D does allow you to have...
01:11:46
Speaker
you know, maybe it's just over a couple of hours, but to have a strategy and to go on a campaign and to have a broader big picture. And certainly that very much informs how I think, you know, I think you asked me about signing, you know, we talked a little bit in terms of signing people in the summer, but you know, there's always a strategy, man. You have to get the strategy, you have to set that, and then you have to work back from there. And as long as you're true to that framework, no matter how good your process, you're always going to screw up decisions along the way. But
01:12:14
Speaker
if you get most of them right, and you follow the overall strategy, you got a decent chance of being successful, or at least that's what's worked for me. And I'm sure I've worked with people who think I'm tough to work with, because I'm concerned about things that are going to happen six months from now, 12 months from now. And I always kind of keep that in mind. And I'm not reactionary. And I don't particularly care what other people think or say. And I don't swing the pressure
01:12:41
Speaker
a whole lot. So I suppose that could be obstinate or stubborn. But again, it's the idea of setting a strategy and following it and, you know, then sticking to it. Well, I don't know, do we have another, I was going to say that's a good place to end, but I also feel like if we can do one more wing, do we want to do that?
01:13:02
Speaker
We have another spoon in us? Sure. I got it. I'll go all in here. I'll go with your special hot sauce and my three stars and we'll- There we go. That's what we were here for. See, that's what I was just playing it into. What do we got? Spinning. It's taking its time. It knows we're into it. Tim Hamm.
01:13:30
Speaker
All right, so Jeff Bezos calls you and offers you a Brewster's Million deal with $1 billion, but you must spend it all in 30 days and retain no assets. What do you do? Wow. Ain't no assets. So basically you have to blow a billion dollars on the experience.
01:14:02
Speaker
I would imagine you try to do something cool like fly to Mars or something like that. Although the older I get, the less I personally want to be in space. I do feel like it's a cool thing to do like for civilization and I'd love to do like, I love to watch other people go deep under the sea and out in the space and try to find extraterrestrial life and all kinds of fun things like that. But I don't know the whole being apart from your family forever and
01:14:32
Speaker
not really living in a glass dome somewhere. At least we're not there yet. Hopefully we can improve our climate here and save our planet and not have to do that. But intellectually, I always read science fiction stuff and loved Isaac Asimov's foundation. And I think that'd be fun.
01:14:54
Speaker
Well, that's a good note, I think, to end on. Garth, I appreciate you doing this so much. You're a good sport, obviously, as always. We threw some curve balls at you, not the least of which was on the technical side. So hopefully that was fun for everyone to see us sweat both for freaking out.
01:15:18
Speaker
about this, but also sweat, because I am still feeling the residual of that hot sauce quite intensely. But anyway, Garth, I really do appreciate you doing this. Before we sign off, though, I did want to thank some people, and I wanted to kind of close out kind of our little commencement address here. But we could not have done this without full pool wines, the doctor's office, and the masonry.
01:15:48
Speaker
They were the food-related businesses that donated supplies and whose owners were sharing their expertise and served as our faculty. Stu Brewing also partnered with Fast Fashion Brewing to make our signature beer craft casual, which I believe you can still find at various establishments around Seattle.
01:16:05
Speaker
The people that made this thing happen were the volunteers, and there were a lot of volunteers that put in a kind of ungodly amount of hours. MLS Watercolor shared their creative talents and taught their first ever course. Once again, Emily Cummings worked countless hours behind the scenes to help produce and make this event happen.
01:16:24
Speaker
Dave Clark volunteered tons of time helping out and served as the dungeon master of our D&D course. My nosadietes partners, Aaron Campbell and Lickit P, once again, did a lot of the heavy lifting that wasn't necessarily in front of the camera. Two old friends of mine from college, Colin Steiner and James Morgan, also did a lot of the behind the scenes work. Colin designed our poster while James produced many of the classes and did a ton of the behind the scenes work that made this whole thing happen.
01:16:52
Speaker
Finally, Beth Mantel, Susie Rants, Tim Foss, Steve Boat, and Jacob Cristobal have donated a dime as moderators, hosts, and or behind-the-scenes helpers. As usual, this has been a true team effort and would have been literally impossible if not for the volunteer hours that they all put in. I also owe a huge debt of gratitude to the Sounders and Rain who helped us find guest students, Brian Spencer, Kellen Rojo, Spencer Ritchie, David Estrada, Wade Weber, Lamar Nagel, Lauren Barnes, Danny Weatherholt,
01:17:21
Speaker
Madison Hammond, and of course, Garth Longaway. All of them were enthusiastic participants and they made this feel like an entirely pure and really just kind of fun event from my perspective at least. Hopefully you share the same. I'll finally close Yacht College by saying thank you to everyone who registered, watched, and especially those who
Yacht College Conclusion and Graduation Certification
01:17:42
Speaker
donated. This has been one of the most gratifying projects I've ever contributed to and I'm blown away
01:17:48
Speaker
by what we accomplished and what you guys allowed to happen. I would urge everyone to continue watching the courses if they missed any of them. And hopefully next year, we won't have to be yachting alone. I'm Jeremiah O'Shan, signing off for Yacht College. And hopefully, we'll see you in person next year. Wait, we need Garth to certify our course. Oh, that's right. I forgot. Garth, we wanted to, we had an element for you here.
01:18:19
Speaker
Where do we have that we give that to them? Oh, yeah, we're okay. I got to find that. Oh, no, where was it? Okay, sorry. Oh, no, where is it? I cannot find it.
01:18:44
Speaker
Okay, this is some good behind the scenes stuff here. I forgot I had to do this thing that you guys would, so you can actually turn this into your diploma.
01:18:55
Speaker
Sounds very exciting. Yes, okay. Garth, as president of soccer, we need to ask you one more thing. All of the Yacht-Con students watching live and who have taken courses over the past two weeks, as well as those watching on demand later, have worked hard to complete the official Yacht-Con back-to-school curriculum. Can you now certify that they are eligible to graduate from Yacht College? Absolutely. Oh, good. All right.
01:19:23
Speaker
Well, with all that said, and all the technical difficulties, I need to go recover. And thanks, everyone. Bye. Thanks for having me, guys. Thank you, Gar.