Category Archives: Sports

Sep 06 2014
Leave a comment
Business, Sports

Fantasy Entrepreneur League

Jon Taves

Enrico Moretti, a professor of economics at the University of California-Berkeley, wrote a paper in 2011 reporting that cities in the United States were creating jobs at different rates. He argued that after the 2008 stock market crash the US job market rebooted. The cleanse dramatically changed the “geography of jobs” – with the majority of growth shifting to “knowledge hubs”.

Knowledge hubs are parts of the country that are heavily populated with skilled workers. From computer programmers to electricians, their workforces are full of individuals capable of performing in-demand jobs. These regions fared better after the recession because the influx of high-skill jobs also necessitates low-skill, service sector jobs to support them.

For those reading in Minnesota, we’ve been somewhat insulated from the lingering effects of the Great Recession. Minneapolis/St. Paul has been experiencing growth and, you guessed it, is one of Moretti’s ten knowledge hubs. The other nine cities on that list are:

  • San Francisco/San Jose, CA
  • Seattle, WA
  • Boston, MA
  • Washington, DC
  • New York, NY
  • Raleigh/Durham, NC
  • Austin, TX
  • Ann Arbor, MI
  • Chicago, IL

The fastest growing area in the country, at least in terms of venture capital raised, is Silicon Valley. Home to San Francisco and San Jose, that region of California houses the world’s most innovative companies. Old stalwarts like Apple have made room for companies like Google and Twitter, who are now watching the rise of Uber and Airbnb. The economy is back on its feet and no part of the US is more representative of this than Silicon Valley.

Over the Labor Day holiday weekend, many Americans held drafts for their fantasy football leagues. Fantasy sports – actually “fantasy entertainment” if one includes the plethora of Oscars, US Weekly, Bachelor, and other non-sport leagues – has swept the nation. According to NFL.com, approximately 30 million people will play fantasy football this year. In honor of the US’ most fertile economic region, I’m suggesting a new type of fantasy league: Fantasy Entrepreneur League.

Instead of starting seven offensive football players, one defensive unit, and a placekicker, why not select nine of your favorite entrepreneurs? I’m not exactly sure what the scoring metric would be: annual sales, gross margin, employees, venture capital raised. What I am sure of, however, is my starting nine. They are as follows:

QB – Paul Graham (Y Combinator)
QB – Mark Levin, Kevin Starr, & Robert Tepper (Third Rock Ventures)

Quarterback is the most important position in football. He touches the ball on every play and has enormous influence on whether his team wins or loses. He’s the field general; he reads the defense and reacts. No dominant football team is complete without him. Perhaps the same can be said about start-ups who don’t use incubators.

Y Combinator and Third Rock Ventures are the class of venture capital firms. With Y Combinator in the heart of Silicon Valley and Third Rock in Boston’s thriving biotech community, each work in different sectors, but they achieve similar outcomes. Y Combinator helped Dropbox and Airbnb rise to prominence. Third Rock guided Bluebird Bio to an IPO last year. Bluebird’s goal for 2015? Eradicating the spread of ALS. Unfortunately for them, the “Ice” nickname is already being used by an NFL QB.

RB – Elon Musk (Tesla Motors)

Perhaps my favorite entrepreneur of all, Elon Musk is a bastion of innovation. Responsible for Tesla Motors – not to mention PayPal, SpaceX, SolarCity, and the proposed Hyperloop – at 43 years of age, Musk has a remarkable list of achievements. Look for a mass-market version of his electric car marvel, the Model S, to hit the road by 2017. Currently priced at $70,000, Musk is targeting $35,000 for his next vehicle.

RB – Drew Houston & Arash Ferdowski (Dropbox)

It’s all about the cloud, baby. As more and more of the world reduces their offline activity, having somewhere to store their “lives” becomes more important. Not to mention the proliferation of Big Data, everything we do online is tracked. Before data scientists at Target can sift through all of our clicks and decide what toothbrush should be featured in their catalog, that data has to be stored somewhere. Dropbox launched as a personal file storage system, but they’ve done an excellent job in scaling their business quickly. Their size now allows them to offer products for companies, as well – a critical market for their long run success.

WR – Garrett Camp & Travis Kalanick (Uber)
WR – Brian Chesky, Joe Gebbia, & Nathan Blecharczyk (Airbnb)

The darlings of the “sharing economy”, Uber and Airbnb allow users to earn income off the assets they have already have. Perhaps someone doesn’t have the skills to be an engineer, but assuming they are honest and reliable human beings, these companies give them the opportunity to make extra money with their car and house.

They get additional kudos for disrupting the traditional taxi and hotel marketplaces. Airbnb cites studies that argue they aren’t in a zero sum game with hotels, but instead, are attracting new customers from the pool of individuals that usually stay with relatives when they travel. Uber makes no such claims – their brash approach is perhaps why they’ve been met with such regulatory backlash. (I’m looking at you, Germany.)

TE – Alex Hawkinson (SmartThings)

Remember that Disney Channel movie from the late 90s? Smart House? SmartThings is starting to make that dream seem possible. (Well, most of it.) It’s an app that connects to the “smart” devices in your home so that you can control them remotely. Cool, huh? Maybe there isn’t much mainstream appeal right away because of its economics, but it’s the TE spot. You shouldn’t expect much production here anyway.

D/ST – Jack Dorsey & Jim McKelvey (Square)

If “defense wins championships”, businesses need payment processing services just as badly. What’s the point of creating a great product if no one can pay you for it? Square has the newest seat at the transaction table and is eager to prove they aren’t PayPal-lite. A partnership with Starbucks to handle all payments on their platform, if successfully launched, would go a long way to disprove that expectation. They’re off to a good start on their own, however, with $20 billion in payments already processed.

K – Yancey Strickler, Perry Chen, & Charles Adler (Kickstarter)

Obvious pun aside, Kickstarter deserves as much credit as Uber and Airbnb for the reach of the sharing economy. Its services allows entrepreneurs, big and small, to market and sell their ideas to the world – all without having to give up equity in their company. It allows everyone the chance to innovate; including copycat sites like IndieGoGo and FundAnything. Despite its mimics, Kickstarter is definitely worth more than a late round draft pick.

Jon Taves is a contributor to Common Knowledge Media and the editor of the economics and finance-based website, EFEssays.com.

Sep 04 2014
Leave a comment
Sports

TGIF (THANK GOD ITS FOOTBALL)

Luke Cutler

The NFL season is finally here, and while we have been tortured over the summer by sports news such as Mr. Manzel’s lifestyle choices, Lebron heading home, and baseball trades… it’s finally time to enjoy watching SportsCenter again.  This won’t be too long, but I wanted to get some of my playoff and Super Bowl predictions out there so I can rub it in everyone’s face when I’m right.  And heck, being able to brag about that, as well as winning “The League” fantasy football league, I don’t know how my head is going to fit through the door.  Oh, and did I mention I’m a Broncos fan… somebody stop me now #UnitedinOrange.  So, here we go:

AFC:  #1 Broncos (arguably the best team in football this year with the additions they made on defense, as well as Peyton in his 3rd year as a Bronco), #2 Colts (Luck has been crazy good his first 2 seasons, and this year he gets better; the running game will wake up too), #3 Patriots (Brady, Gronk, horrible division, nuf said), #4 Steelers (Big Ben had a solid year last season (28 TDs, 4300 yards), the running will be better than 28th, and the defense will hold true), #5 Bengals (they may not get past the wild card round, but Green will be awesome gain, and their RB, Gio, will have a breakout year) #6 Chargers (I would have them at #5, but their defense blows, and as much as I loathe Rivers, he will carry them to the playoffs) .

NFC: #1 Seahawks (defending champs, if Harvin stays healthy, and Wilson progresses like he should, scary good again), #2 Saints (Brees has thrown for 5,000 yds 5 TIMES, and they will finally have good running from Ingram and Thomas), #3 Packers (if Rogers stays on the field, he has great weapons; Jordy will be a top 5 receiver this year, and Lacy will rush for 1400 yds and 14 scores), #4 Eagles (offence will put up points and yards (1st in rushing last year), add Sproles to that mix and game over; secondary needs to improve), #5 Redskins (RG3 will bounce back, they have great WRs and RB, and defense will be good enough – and you couldn’t pay me to like the Cowboys or Giants… gross), #6 Bears (sorry Viking fans; if there was a #7 spot, It’d be yours.  Cutler will rack up TDs, yards,… and INTs… but they will score enough, it won’t matter, and Forte will remain elite).

table2

So, there you have it.  I’m not going to do scores, cause that annoys the piss outa me and makes me feel stupid, so HA.  My Broncos will redeem their Super Bowl loss a year ago and crush Rogers and the Pack.  Green bay will avenge a Week 1 loss to the Seahawks in the Conference Championship game (remember, SF was just a tipped-to-interception away from possibly doing that last year… you don’t think Rogers can complete that pass?) and reach the SB for the first time since 2010/11.

Happy Football Season boys and girls.  Go Broncos!

Sep 04 2014
Leave a comment
Sports

Casey and Tim’s NFL dennanannannna Live picks Week 1

Aug 22 2014
1 Comment
Sports

Sports Stocks: Where Would You Invest?

allfour

Luke Cutler

Getting married was, and forever will be, the biggest decision I make in my life.  There are so many exciting things that happen when you decide to pop the question.  You get to call your family and friends to share the news of your recent engagement; you get to pick out the venues for the rehearsal dinner, the service, and the reception; Chose cake or cupcakes (OK, may not seem awesome at first, but do you know how many samples you get to try??  Uh… yes please).  One issue that is kind of a hot and touchy topic after marriage, and even during the engagement, is money.  What loans/debt do WE have?  What should OUR monthly budget look like?  Where should WE invest?

The last question is one that really intrigues me, and prompted me to play out a little scenario: If sports were like a company or a stock you could invest in, what would be the biggest ROI (or for you slow ones out there, return on investment …) ten years from now?  The measuring stick here is overall popularity of the sport in the US of A.  So for example, the NFL right now is a stock that is very high.  It may have reached its ceiling (I think Mark Cuban is just a little jealous), but it’s a pretty safe bet, or shall I say… investment, that probably it won’t lose popularity in the next 10 years.  I’m going to give my opinion on which sports will have a steep climb to popularity by 2024.

Thinking of the 4 major sports in the US (NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL), I think the NHL will have the greatest ROI in the next 10 years.  The first reason is really just comparing it to the other sports.  The NBA and NFL are already very popular with their superstars, off season drama (don’t know how many times Lebron and Melo were talked about on SC this summer), young talent, and recognizable players.  The MLB blows, and I don’t expect it to get any better.  With the fast paced world we now live in, no one wants to watch 1853167 games a year.  WHO CARES!!!  Each game during the season becomes less and less meaningful.  When Mo’ne Davis and the LLWS gets 17x the ratings as an MLB game (one was on ESPN, the other on ESPN 2) on a Wednesday night, something is wrong.  Especially when you had the MLB’s best team playing the defending World Series champions.  Just hilarious.

The second reason is that I don’t think the NHL can get much lower on the popularity scale.  I don’t have exact ratings and number of viewers to back my opinion; all I know is that this past season, when I wanted to watch the Stanley Cup Finals between……. Anyone…… The…… Mighty Ducks???  Nope, the Kings and Rangers, the game wasn’t even on TV.  Not a major network.  Nowhere to be found.  I almost gave up on actually becoming a fan of this sport (thank you Torey Prahl, and NHL ’12).  It was finally found on NBC Sports Network.  Is that even a thing?  It reminds me of the NFL Network that .016 of people in America have.  Baseball hasn’t even dropped that low.  There is nowhere to go but up.

In terms of a positive thing that the NHL has going for them, I love the outdoor games.  This is something to break up the season, provide a fun event for fans to go to, and very entertaining to watch (in Chicago last year, the snow was going crazy.  Pretty cool).  I also believe a solid rivalry is building between the LA Kings (defending champs in case you missed it) and the Chicago Blackhawks.  They are both very young teams, and are from 2 of the biggest sports markets in the US.  Between them, they own 4 of the last 5 Cups.

What is your stock of choice?

Tagged , , , , , ,
Aug 11 2014
2 Comments
Sports

Preseason Perspective

Casey Johnson

Fear not American men. You can get up out of the fetal position, dry your tear-soaked faces, and change out of your favorite baseball team’s apparel. No longer do you have to pretend to be interested in the World Cup or baseball. The American sports equivalent of electricity is back. Awaken from the dark months, rub your weary eyes, re-acclimate yourselves to the light, turn on your televisions, stock your mini-fridges, and plug in your crock pots because football is back baby.

Sure the first preseason game was about a week ago, but as I am a Vikings fan, the NFL season essentially started on Friday night at TCF Bank Stadium with the Vikings winning a 10-6 barnburner (sarcasm) over the hated Raiders (And try to think of the word Raiders like Chris Berman was saying it, “Raidas.” Isn’t that more enjoyable?). It was a beautiful night at The Bank, which served quite nicely as the Vikings home stadium for preseason game #1 (at least from a fan’s perspective). And although my crew and I missed the first two possessions of the game, including Minnesota’s lone touchdown drive, as we navigated the oft-praised light rail to a game for the first time, we still proceeded to have a good time at the game.

After the game, I found myself digging for conclusions that could be drawn and searching for intelligent, original analysis to unearth. Indeed, I believe that this is a common feeling for most fans. Our society’s football appetite, as a whole, is so insatiable that our desire to “analyze” even preseason games is astronomical.

But let’s face it, your average fan has very little idea of how to analyze a professional football game, let alone a preseason game. We aren’t equipped to judge how well a rookie offensive or defensive lineman is playing. Nor can we tell you much about how good the starters are when they only really played one series together and some of the best players didn’t even play at all. We are, at best, capable of noticing glaring successes and mistakes at skilled positions such as running back, wide receiver, and quarterback. Sure, we can tell you if a running back is playing badly if he has problems holding onto the ball, we can tell you if a receiver is playing poorly if he continuously drops passes, and we can tell you when a quarterback is having a bad game if he’s missing open receivers or turning the ball over. For defensive players, we can really only say if they have a good or bad game based on very tangible, quantifiable statistics that we look up after the fact, unless they force a turnover or make several plays in the backfield or miss some tackles that we notice/remember. For the most part, we rely on announcers, analysts, and radio personalities to tell us who is playing well and who is playing poorly. That’s because the vast, vast majority of NFL fans never played football after high school, and a significant percentage probably never even played in high school (including yours truly).

So let’s admit that we don’t know people.   Don’t be ashamed to not take big, bold stances. Don’t be afraid to keep your opinions and predictions reserved until seeing meaningful, regular season games played (and even then, the world would probably be ok with you keeping them to yourself).

You don’t have to be the idiot behind me at the game on Friday who yelled, “You suck Musgrave. Let Bridgewater throw the ball.” And if you don’t know why that is an absurd thing to yell at a Vikings game, you probably should feel free to be one of those people that keeps their Vikings opinions muted. That is, of course, an absurd thing to yell at a Vikings game now because Bill Musgrave was replaced as offensive coordinator by Norv Turner, who was hired by new head coach Mike Zimmer.

And to all of those who are so delusional about the preseason that you think you can predict MVP candidates, rookies of the year, and Super Bowl winners, please consider this article to be your wet blanket. In truth, your opinions are likely just regurgitated, second-hand commentary that you pilfered from some football analyst or sports talk radio host somewhere (which is why I try to write most of my Vikings articles immediately following games before I am exposed to outside opinion). And don’t be offended by this observation. These words are also meant to serve as a reminder to myself that opinions are just opinions. We tend to forget the ones that we have that don’t work out and cling to the ones that do. And in all honesty, there are very few original opinions to be had anyway.

Which brings me to a rhetorical question. What, if any, acceptable opinions/conclusions can we draw from preseason football games then?

The answer: virtually none.

At least none that don’t come directly from the mouth of a knowledgeable football analyst or coach, and even theirs will likely miss the mark more often than not.

So here’s what I can feel comfortable telling you after one Vikings preseason game:  it was a gorgeous night at TCF Bank Stadium (The Bank), which I’m confident will serve as a suitable home for the Vikings over the next two seasons.

Aside from fewer seats, a lackluster speaker system/audio experience, bleacher seating in parts of the stadium (including our seats), and the stupid drunk guy yelling about Bill Musgrave, the stadium is a better venue for taking in a game than the Dome. The Bank’s jumbotrons (without pathetic yellow nodes/display), concourses, overall architecture, and urinals (yes urinals, not troughs guys) are all vastly superior to what the Dome used to offer. And don’t forget the authentic, outdoor football experience (not that I’m complaining that the new stadium will be enclosed, though).

If the Vikings can manage to win some football games early in the season and remain relevant, this could be one of the most fun and special falls in recent memory. The circumstances of playing in a temporary, outdoor home stadium could potentially reinvigorate fans and provide some positive, nostalgic “I remember when the Vikings played at The Bank during the 2014 season” memories.

Of course, that is entirely dependent upon how well the team plays, and I’m hoping that the memories created don’t just turn into one big, white, foggy flashback of Vikings fans freezing in the stands come late December while the Vikes get toasted by another opponent in another meaningless game.

I guess that, for now, we should probably just be happy that football is back.

Tagged ,
Newer posts →