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Lessons - Why Athletes Often Lose Their Wealth Too Soon | Marques Colston - NFL Veteran & Entrepreneur · Success Story with Scott Clary

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  In this lessons episode, examine the hidden risks athletes face when sudden
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  wealth and fame collide with inexperience. Learn why lack of financial literacy
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  causes many to squander multi-million dollar contracts. Discover how unvedited
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  advisors and exploitative relationships amplify vulnerabilities.
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  Understand how early self-awareness and proactive investment strategies
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  secure a resilient post-career foundation.
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  I mean, I've had this conversation with other athletes before, um, just about,
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  you know, the seasons of their career and how they set themselves up for success.
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  And you can correct me if I'm wrong, but I would assume if you are early,
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  if you're earlier in the draft, sometimes a little bit of ego creeps in.
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  And then I think, because you know, athletes blow through their money and they end up,
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  and there's some wild stats out there, but people that don't have post-professional, uh,
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  sport careers. And it's just kind of sad that they can take so much money and then, you know,
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  pardon the pun, they fumble it. They, they, they fuck it up. So when you look at some of the people
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  you played with, I'm sure that you see stories, not everybody's successful post-career. What happens
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  in this, in this situation where you're given sort of the world that's such a young age as an
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  athlete and it could be football. I mean, I have examples from hockey of people that screwed up
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  post-career and they're almost broke and whatnot. And I'm sure baseball, basketball, like everything,
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  there's always these examples. What happens to the athlete? Like walk me through that,
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  that mindset of a young athlete just handed so much money and fame and influence.
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  It's not too dissimilar from, from a lottery winner, right? Um, you know, you, you live your everyday
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  life. Um, and, you know, all of a sudden, there's this, there's this influx of cash, right? And,
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  um, you know, you get drafted and, and you kind of see it, you kind of see it coming. But your
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  life is not set up, you know, to receive that, that kind of notoriety is not set up to receive
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  that kind of income. And, and ultimately, more often not, um, you know, I, I speak for myself.
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  So I came from a situation where I didn't, I didn't have access to capital. I didn't have access
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  to entrepreneurship and, you know, high level business. And, um, most of the people that I knew
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  growing up in the families that I knew, you know, were more blue collar, right? So, um, I just
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  didn't have exposure to what that world looked like. And, you know, if you are 22 years old,
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  coming out of, coming out of college, um, you know, you give anybody this 22 year old,
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  22 years old, coming out of fresh out of college, you give them, you know, a couple of million
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  dollars, um, is no tell what might happen, right? Now, you, you take that same situation, you put
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  them under the limelight and you surround them with an ecosystem that, that is not necessarily set up
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  to, um, to really give a shit about your best interests. Um, your best interests are, are secured
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  once somebody else's best interests are, um, you know, it becomes a really nuanced situation,
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  right? So you got somebody that has not had exposure, um, typically your family and your
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  inner circle still has not had that same exposure. So now you've got to, you got to depend on
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  people from outside of your inner circle, um, you got a higher and agent, you got a higher financial
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  advisor and it really becomes this game of, do I feel like I can trust this person? Because at
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  22, I don't really know exactly what they do. Um, I don't really have the, the financial knowledge
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  and expertise to even check them if they are doing some fucked up. So you, you kind of get into
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  this place where you're, you're choosing people to play really pivotal roles in your career
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  and you don't really know how to evaluate and hire for a job, right? So it, it, it lends itself to,
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  um, you know, bad decisions that lends itself to, you know, making young people decisions,
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  but it also lends itself to being in a situation where you are more vulnerable than most because
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  you just don't have that, you don't have that expertise and that exposure to be able to hold
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  the people in your circle accountable. And the people that you trust the most, they don't have
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  the, they don't have the experience and the education to be able to do the same. So you kind of
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  find yourself as a captain of his ship, um, but you don't really know how to operate the ship.
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  And I mean, there's a lot of, I'm sure there's a lot of great good ethical people out there that
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  help athletes, but I think there's a lot of bullshit too. I mean, I've spoken to Chris Prager,
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  he's a good friend and he, he was like a very big hockey player. It's sort of like my reference
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  point. And he's, he's spoken about some of the people that have, not as agents throughout his
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  career were good, but like people that have solicited investments and then he's, he's had some that
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  were just absolute misses and everybody's asking for money because every, and also everybody sees
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  the contract sizes, but I've also seen, and I didn't even know this, he, Chris did a really good
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  job doing this and some other people on social do this. When you break down like all after tax,
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  after agent fees, after association fees, like it's still a lot of money. Don't get me wrong.
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  It's more money than most people make out whatever 22, but you end up spending a lot of it
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  before you actually have any in the bank. And I think that you also just completely don't have
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  the, the understanding of what money is at that point. And I think that's, that's really where
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  you screw up. And I mean, I don't even know if you know stats. Maybe you do because you were an
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  athlete, but I've heard some ridiculous stats about how many professional athletes with, you know,
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  seven figure, eight figure contracts are bankrupt and broke. And after they, after they finished
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  playing. So just sad. It's just very, very sad. Yeah. And it is, it is a nuanced conversation
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  again because, you know, I've seen this step for a decade and it's pissed me off every time I've
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  seen it. It talks about 70% of NFL players are within five years of retirement or financial distress.
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  Right. So yes, there are some of the horror stories. And I think by those stories becoming
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  more and more visible, you know, past generations, I think, I think this generation of future
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  generations are going to be able to learn from those, those challenges and those mistakes.
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  But also baked in those numbers is, is the guy that, that played two years and made league,
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  league minimum. Right. So what is your definition of financial distress? Because at the end of
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  the day, you look at, you look at a salary cap and you look at a roster, you know, the bulk of,
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  the money being paid out, it is going to the top five or six players. And then you've got 40,
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  40 some odd people, you know, kind of splitting up the, the rest of the pie. And yes, you,
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  again, you see the horror stories. And we have seen the horror stories over the years. But that
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  number is, is, I would say that number is not, it's, it's a little bit more misleading than people
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  realize because you, you have guys that are that have not been invested and they have not reached
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  the, the status where they've getting, getting benefits. You got guys that played one, two, three
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  years that yes, it's, it's really good money. But it's not, you know, kick my feet up and,
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  and retire for the rest of my life money. So, you know, the numbers are the numbers and,
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  and you know, we know there's still work to be done, but it's, it's, it's a little bit more
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  than what meets the surface. Even in your career, you were forward thinking, I think is the best
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  way to, to put it. So even walk me through your mindset when you get drafted, you weren't just
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  waiting for your career to end to start building. So what was the thing that made you realize,
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  like light bulb moment, maybe it was getting drafted at a higher number or whatnot. But what was
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  it that made you realize, okay, so I want to set myself up for a success post career because
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  I think some of your investments were made while you were still playing from not mistaken,
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  correct? Yeah, I got started pretty, pretty early on in my career. So I created that to,
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  I had two financial buyers that were former players themselves, who saw something in me and,
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  and you just kind of pushed me to get out of the box. And for me, I've always kind of been a
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  tinker. I've always been somebody who's been, you know, interested in technology, interested in,
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  and more so electronics than anything else. And I've also known that, you know, football is the
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  thing that I'm, I think that I do that I'm really good at, but it doesn't define who I am as a person.
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  So I think the, the combination of me just kind of having some self awareness and then having
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  those two advisors that really pushed me out of my comfort zone and pushed me out of that box.
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  I was able to get started early and just again, some of it just, just being fortunate enough
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  to stay healthy enough to play 10 years. I like to say I was able over that 10-year run,
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  I was able to give myself a long enough runway to make some mistakes,
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  getting into some situations that I loved, getting into some situations that I, you know,
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  later realized that I hated and didn't ever want to do again. But, you know, over the course of
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  my playing career, when I was kind of at the top, the top of my game from a brand perspective,
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  I was able to get in and get some really, really boots on the ground of business experience
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  that has kind of driven me, you know, in, in return. And the first, I mean, you, you said,
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  just so you had these, these, sort of like these two financial advisors, these peers, like
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  players themselves, they knew the game and knew what you were going to have to deal with when
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  you did retire. What was, so what was the, what was the, the first version of, of you investing,
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  of you raising money of, because you didn't come from an operator background, it's not like you
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  had built a business and then you exited that and then you started investing in something you knew.
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  So now it's like every opportunity to invest is available, but you still lack a lot of operational
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  experience in doing the thing. So how do you bridge that gap? And I'm sure you had, listen,
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  I'm sure you had some, some losses and some, and some things didn't work out so well as well
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  with the, with the investments. But, uh, talking through like just as, as a player turning investor,
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  what was the first version of that? So really, really early on, um, we was just kind of
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  angel investing. Um, I tried to stay in, in a, in a space where I at least knew one part of
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  the business, which was sports. So I, I got started at the intersection of sports and technology.
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  Um, so, so a lot of those early investments were kind of co-investments with other athletes and
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  it was, it was more just deploy the capital and kind of see what happens. Um, but I'd say the,
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  the first investment that, that really, you know, was, was the first time that I rolled my sleeves
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  up and got really engaged with the company. Um, I invested in the indoor football team back in my
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  hometown. And, uh, I want to say 20, 2010. And, you know, for me, it was an opportunity to,
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  to kind of learn the, the, the, the, the, the business side of the sport that I was playing. Um,
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  and it was also, it was in my hometown. So it was a really good platform for me to do some
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  community outreach at scale. That, that's kind of how I viewed it. And, you know, I got in,
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  I made the investment the first year. I was, I was a passive investor. I just kind of watched
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  the owner kind of, kind of shadowed him and, and just watched what it looked like to, to, to,
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  to run a team, to operate team from soup to nuts. And in watching him for a year, I just, I got
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  that itch. And, um, after the first year, I ended up buying my partner out, taking over the team,
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  100, uh, so ownership of the team. And I assumed the role of president and general manager. And
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  my role was literally everything in the organization at that time. You know, we had a small team.
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  So I was doing everything from, you know, selling sponsorships to, um, putting together,
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  you know, ticket sales and marketing packages. Um, I was actually running the game operations.
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  I had the little headset on. I was directing the game. Then okay. So you dove into this. That's,
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  that's how you figured it out. Yeah. That's how you figured out work. You just do everything.
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  That's good. That's good. Yes. Yeah. So I know. And, uh, you know, it was, it was one of those
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  experiences. It was probably the toughest thing in my life at that point just because everything was
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  new and I was drinking from the firehomes. But at the same time, I was right at home because,
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  as an athlete, you'd kind of make a living, finding discomfort and pushing through this comfort
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  just to get to a place where you find more discomfort. So that, that connection was, was, was
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  really, uh, it was really, you know, top of mind for me. So it was, it was, it was, it was difficult.
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  It was challenging and fun at the same time. And that's, that's kind of what it was.
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