:03 [Music] 0:25 welcome everybody this is Kyle Yates here the host today on the second shot Beyond The Ball series uh talking to a 0:33 lot of thought leaders in sports getting uh Beyond just the on court stuff today I got an awesome guest happy to chat 0:39 I've already been a big fan of the YouTube channel building pickle ball so we got the founder Brian Lim here today 0:46 Brian how you doing great man thanks for having me oh this is gonna be fun um so 0:52 tell us a little bit about yourself because I'm looking you ex Pro MMA fighter software developer and now 0:58 you're making pickle all YouTube videos what's going on yeah yeah I was never really good at focusing on 1:06 just one thing so I've had random careers was like the prma uxui designer 1:11 I was a pastry cook and now I feel like I found something that I actually enjoy that's like keeping my attention which 1:17 is pretty rare for me so I feel like I'm in a good spot man okay so man many talents what 1:24 what what did it all start with I mean what you what sports you grew up playing what what led you to pickle ball 1:29 eventually oh maybe the fact that I wasn't actually good at sports actually led me to pickle ball I never got into 1:35 sports growing up I was always in like weightlifting though um so I started that at like 15 years old um just had 1:41 like a really good high school gym coach and um and then after that you know like 1:47 so many random things like in college I majoring a bachelor majored with a Bachelor of Science in nutrition and 1:52 dietetics and then um once I gra graduated had no idea 1:57 what I wanted to do so I got into sales and recruiting um obviously was not the 2:02 greatest choice because I just kind of followed what everyone else kind of said to do and kind of um the the kind of 2:10 like standard uh for postgrads and then let's see MMA is probably that's 2:16 the one I picked up in college I picked up Jiu-Jitsu that was always like my first love it was Jiu-Jitsu first but always had the plan of becoming a 2:23 professional MMA fighter just watched UFC fights Pride fights with my brother growing up and 2:30 just thought it would be really cool just thought like uh it looked like a really good challenge look like you 2:36 could be held at such a like a high regard if you were a professional MMA fighter if you could go through that if 2:42 you you could endure the challenges of um developing the skills and also just I 2:49 mean how much tougher does it really get right it's like only three of you in the cage it's you your opponent and the ref 2:55 and only like one person's really walking out and did that for five years 3:00 and was like pretty lost for a little while but I was like a personal trainer as well and then moved to Austin right 3:07 when I retired I moved to Austin so I moved from Maryland to um Austin Texas 3:13 in 2018 kind of the same same same kind of idea just still lost so I was um doing 3:20 like tech support for flow Sports was a pastry cook and then became ux designer 3:28 jumped into like this boot camp course it's a 10e course and um was just interested in technology uh read Steve 3:34 Jobs's biography by Walter isacson just intrigued by how much change someone 3:42 could bring about or like what a piece of technology could do to facilitate change and I think 3:50 technology is one of the quickest ways to do it um um so I got into the tech 3:55 space and I realized I there's so many things that went through my head when I realized I didn't want to work for 4:00 anyone else anymore but I think two main things was one like didn't want to work 4:07 for anyone else like what would happen if I pursued this on my own and two was who would this force me to become if I became an entrepreneur I don't know if 4:14 being a YouTuber is technically an entrepreneur but I am trying to pursue that whole gamut of business through it 4:21 um sorry I've been rambling absolutely it is so you were a a MMA fighting pastry chef so what do you still do you 4:30 still fight and do you still cook No I gave it up uh I hung up the gloves in 4:35 2018 but I still trained jiujitsu every once in a while so I Gotta Give obviously a shout out and a lot of credit to my Jiu-Jitsu coach Greg saers 4:43 um because actually a lot of what this conversation is going to be about is mostly due to him uh yeah so much of is 4:51 so much of it is due to him just his mentorship the teaching 4:56 the uh the foundation he's building at stand jiujitsu so like I'm like 1% of 5:03 the knowledge that I'm going to share on this Greg is like miles above me he's 5:10 he's become a legitimate like thought leader in the space of Jiu-Jitsu he's changing the way people practice he's 5:16 changing the way people develop skill changing coaching changing gyms the 5:21 ideologies um changing the way people approach Jiu-Jitsu um so yeah so let's 5:27 see that and I pastri cook don't do it anymore every once in a while if it's if 5:32 I like you a lot then I'll make you something good but um I generally stay out of the kitchen now what's what's 5:39 what's if you got to fix one to impress somebody what's your go-to H something like crazy cake yeah 5:46 cake guy like I yeah cake I'll do like a cake it's like simple but you can make 5:51 it look look like it took a lot of time you know that's that's amazing all right 5:56 well going back to uh to your jiu-jitsu to coach cuz I know I've had some coaches in you across my sports career 6:03 that were super impactful and I know firsthand how important that is I've had some great coaches I've had some bad 6:09 coaches and just the the kind of thoughts that they can kind of put in your head and kind of feed right they 6:15 plant some seeds and that kind of evolves and gives you a different perspective of of what you're doing I 6:20 think that's that's really powerful and I think uh especially right now in my Sport with pickle ball you're getting a 6:25 lot of a lot of kids and and younger people younger athletes getting the pickle ball and and you can tell the 6:31 ones who have had really good coaching and mentoring and the ones that haven't uh in a lot of different ways not just 6:38 uh you know just behavior on court but just the way that they see the game and they play and practice and that's kind 6:43 of one of the things I wanted to get uh talking with you about because like I said I was a big fan with your YouTube 6:49 videos and uh you get a lot deeper into some of these some of these things you get to more of the cerebral side of 6:55 sports uh where you know a lot of people think you know they just train really hard and practice a bunch it's just automatically going to show itself and 7:02 that's not always the case I don't think people take into account how important the mental side of all sports really 7:07 really are and especially in a sport like pickleball uh you you come from MMA which seems a lot more it would seem a 7:13 lot more intense to me I've never been trapped in a cage with a guy I'm not really planning on doing it anytime soon 7:19 uh pickle wall seems a lot safer but very very mental um as much as is physical so uh that's that's what I 7:25 really want to get in with you today um one one of the video that I really liked from yours was about the theory of 7:32 reinvestment and in the video you state the definition of the theory of reinvestment was con conscious control 7:40 planning and executing a movement using deliberate mental effort and I wanted to talk about that because I feel like a 7:46 lot of people they go and practice things over and over and over again they get that mental uh that that muscle 7:52 memory but there are so many variables in sports that being able to identify 7:58 changes or things to do different that maybe is outside your comfort zone and be able to execute that properly but it 8:05 it does take a little bit of stepping outside of what you're comfortable with and that doesn't just apply to sports 8:11 but outside off the court as well I think sometimes people get stuck in in that day-to-day that that flow just 8:17 going through the motions sometimes sometimes life can just push you in a certain direction but being 8:23 able to to decide exactly the path you want to go down and make a conscious 8:28 deliberate mental effort to go down a c certain path or to recognize something in game this pattern isn't working I 8:35 need to try this instead is is that kind of along the lines of what what you were talking about I mean does that make 8:40 sense yeah yeah absolutely man you're like nailing it and you're 8:45 also speaking a lot to like the side of 8:50 skill development that uh that like the ecological 8:55 approach like uh is that's why the ecological approach has become very 9:01 popular and become a very like uh viable or popular option in skill development 9:07 because there's the two right there's like traditional approach which you you you're probably very familiar with both of them but the traditional approach is 9:13 rot repetition someone's gonna be like I been videos I studied this video but for the other listeners that maybe haven't 9:20 yet maybe quick quick de uh quick definition for them yeah yeah definitely um yeah you nailed everything but there 9:28 there's the two two I think most popular routes for skill development the first 9:33 is the traditional approach which is you're going to sit stand there with a coach the coach is going to demonstrate 9:39 a technique and then they're going to use a lot of internal focusing cues they're going to tell you like bend your 9:44 wrist this way bend your knees this way like 90 degrees turn your body this way and then they're going to have you repeat that over and over and over again 9:52 through Rope Rope memorization and it's usually just isolated this one practice 9:57 you're going to isolate this one movement for like an hour long and they're just going to feed you balls that's like one side of it the other 10:03 option um another route you can go is the ecological approach and yeah man 10:10 when you were talking about your game and your development I can't help but think of how crafty you are in your game 10:16 and what you've developed over time that I don't know what your practices look like but I am very curious but there is 10:22 like the ecological approach right so you present a problem and you allow that 10:27 person to self-organize around the problem themselves and you if you were to give them cues ideally you want to 10:32 give them external facing cues things where they are not so focused on their body per se but they're more focused on 10:39 the outcome or the effect that they want to produce and then um in the ecological approach they usually use like a game 10:46 based approach so everything is very much like game based or situational or 10:51 game based and um it's not to say that the two can't the two have to to live 11:00 exclusively uh or like uh the two can't be merged together they definitely can 11:05 be everyone learns differently right um but if we were 11:10 to um kind of connect this to the theory of reinvestment in the research that 11:16 was like written by Richard Masters he T and other researchers they talk about 11:23 how reinvestment generally occurs more frequently to those who 11:29 learned explicitly and explicit learning versus implicit learning so like explicit 11:35 learning is the traditional route right where someone told you how to position everything and like how to move your 11:41 body so that's as soon as like uh they might miss a shot through an unforced 11:46 error that's what they're thinking about they're thinking of like what did my coach tell me this way versus that way versus what you kind of touched on is 11:54 how do you become an adaptable Problem Solver how can you you were talking about a pattern you're like okay if this 11:59 pattern doesn't work what do I need to change that already says so much about 12:04 the way you developed your skill so like in a live real real time scenario how are you 12:11 going to solve that problem are you going to think back to how you were taught explicitly or how you learn something implicitly and then becoming 12:18 an adaptable Problem Solver like okay maybe I need to change like this or that so yeah it's kind of a ramble but yeah 12:24 yeah it makes perfect sense I I feel like there's a lot of that in pickleball especially in All Sport but for some 12:30 reason pickleball especially because there are a lot of different styles and strengths and weaknesses from players 12:35 and over the course of my career especially back in the day where there were less tennis players there were so 12:40 many different styles different grips weird shots and you had to be unpredictable nowadays the game's 12:47 evolved a little bit now where people are are still fairly predictable but they execute it at such a high level 12:52 it's hard to stop anyways uh but being a guy who I'm not the biggest strongest 12:58 guy in the world I certainly wasn't the best tennis player on the court when I'm playing pickle ball against players who I felt like were actually inherently 13:04 better than me you've got to get a little bit crafty to be able to pull off the win so I do feel like I've been able 13:09 to beat opponents that were better than me simply by just trying to finesse and outsmart and and play as tactical as 13:16 possible and and that was kind of one of the things that I loved about pickle ball so much was the strategy aspect of 13:22 it the creativity and I I think and I'm not surprised that you've kind of gotten 13:28 attracted to pickall as well and you probably think in a silver mindset because someone who maybe grew up playing a lot of different sports doing 13:34 a lot of different things like like you mentioned I think having that creativity in your brain really helps in a sport 13:40 like pickle ball where a lot of the points tend to look the same but you do have to throw in a little bit of your own style and and think think on your 13:47 feet a little bit um I mean I'm sure that's the same in a lot of sports Jujitsu I'm sure it's the same way 13:53 you've got to make decisions quickly um and and you've got to adapt so I I did want to uh touch a little bit too 13:59 on uh one of your videos you talked about uh choking why players choke and 14:06 man I've seen that so much uh I can't say that I know from firsthand 14:11 experience what that's like thank goodness um I've certainly have had times where I felt tight in matches uh 14:19 and I I want to say that the only times that I've ever been nervous or didn't perform my best or and didn't was afraid 14:26 to play was after a period of time where maybe I wasn't training and playing as 14:31 much as I'm used to or maybe I hadn't practiced a ton or let's say I didn't really work on my serve before tournament or I didn't really work on my 14:37 backhand drop before tournament and then all a sudden I get into a big point and I forget how to do it all of a sudden or 14:43 I start overthinking it and I try to I try to force it to go where it needs to go and it's hard sometimes as an athlete 14:50 you get in that flow state where everything is just you don't have to think you're just hitting all the shots making all the right decisions and 14:55 everything's going great and then all of a sudden something happens you start start thinking like oh I need to roll 15:01 that ball a little more on the next one I need to you start like micromanaging and analyzing 15:06 everything way too much and I mean what what is that like in our psychology that happens because you you had a great 15:12 video on it I really agreed but just foren listening uh I mean what is it that causes us to get the The Yips or to 15:19 choke or to overthink in these big big moments dude you uh that is a great way to put it um micromanaging yourself like 15:28 yeah they say a lot of things they say like the reward of sport um can cause choking 15:35 so if there's a huge prize if even the the um even if you're in a PO on the 15:40 line yeah something on the line yeah um the rewards of sport if your coach 15:46 believes that you choke in performance then that will have a negative effect on you and cause a like sudden and 15:53 significant decline in performance so even that could cause it I think something I didn't look to enough was 16:00 probably just social physical anxiety um and like 16:06 confidence and yeah it's very interesting they they looked at um two 16:13 different cultures there wasn't the research isn't heavily developed in this but they did mention in one of the studies so you look at Western culture 16:20 and they said like Americans tend to choke um when they're spoken to 16:26 negatively if they use negative selft talk they don't perform very very well they don't respond to that well and then they looked at Eastern cultures like 16:32 primarily Asians and then they found that negative selft talk actually helped them to perform better I myself could 16:39 probably like totally see where that comes from so like I'm like okay that kind of doesn't make sense just like 16:46 through the parenting and the culture of like uh Asian culture but I could completely see that 16:52 um yeah just I think and another thing again is going back to that implicit 16:59 explicit knowledge in learning uh is if you're looking at if you like cause an 17:05 unforced error and you're like man maybe I need to move my wrist a little bit more that in itself is just going to 17:11 cause choking so as Oppo opposed to just instead 17:16 of thinking internally about like your body movement and like uh yeah how you 17:24 want to position your body think externally think of the outcome that you want or the effect or the desired effect 17:31 that you want so that's that external focus of attention which um so yeah sure 17:37 and and especially for a lot of really good players I mean I've seen professional players struggle with this and it's totally totally in their head 17:43 because they've executed the shot a million times and I've had him over the course of in the middle of a match where 17:48 I was hitting one shot very well for maybe the first half of the match went a little while without hitting that shot 17:54 at all and then now it's 99 in the third and I had that same shot again and I don't hit it the same way I did the 18:00 whole match and in my head maybe you just put a little bit more thought into that one one poter you separate that 18:07 shot and and put it on a pedestal above all the other ones say oh this one's the important one and then you treat it 18:13 differently and I I and for me personally I felt that is taking the the 18:19 consequence out of the equation really helped so a lot of times you're you miss or you overthink it because you're so 18:25 afraid to make that error but for me I just when I'm playing obviously there's some points that that end up being more 18:31 important than others by sheer momentum as you know there could be a big point at a certain time where the players are 18:37 really stressed and could be a really long rally and you might get very unlucky and it just saps all that energy out of you but for the most part every 18:44 Point throughout the entire course of a whole match they all count for one point they're all the same I'm one of those 18:50 people I have to stay positive I could go downhill really fast and I'm working on it trying to get better at it but for 18:56 me it's lately it hasn't been so much dwelling on just a certain key points 19:01 but just treating them all equally and saying hey the fifth point of the match counts the same amount of points as the 19:06 you know the last point of the match but I just think the moment gets to some people they they all of a sudden put too 19:11 much emphasis on a certain point or a certain shot and I think the best players those those Roger feder types 19:18 the Kobe Bryants uh I mean Ben JNS does it really well in pickle ball where they just treat every Point like it's 19:24 important but not the end of the world so they they you know obviously important their focus but it's okay to 19:31 miss sometimes as long as it's a calculated risk and those are the players that I think are the just the 19:36 the toughest to be the robots that just are just so steady they don't they don't get up and down they don't get hyped and 19:43 and streak and and get hot and then you know cool off and start playing bad they keep their attention span really level 19:51 um and yeah I I don't know how they do it because I'm I'm a pretty emotional person especially when I'm playing um 19:57 but I'm working on it but I you think I mean you think that's probably a factor they just put too much too much 20:03 importance on a certain couple points and and or a certain couple shots dude 100% um so like I I can't remember the 20:11 coach's name but the way he summarized it is exactly what you're saying so he said instead of thinking about like 20:17 winning the game he said make every Point perfect so instead of like looking 20:22 like thinking of this Mass making the idea of the game and the match so big in your head like shrink it down and make 20:29 every Point perfect it's exactly what you're saying um and yeah like nerves 20:34 and anxiety and just people's personalities I'm a very emotional person too man and it definitely shows 20:41 on the court and then you look at some of the great some of the people who Excel really well and you already 20:47 mentioned it Ben right he for the most part like himim and Colin are very like levelheaded and very like throughout the 20:53 entire thing they're just very Baseline they don't go too high don't go too low if if you hit a net court on Colin he 21:00 will definitely freak out but um who does it who doesn't get upset by 21:05 that I understand completely yeah but yeah you just look 21:10 at the levelhead of people like even edite ettis another person that comes to mind like she's very just solid mentally 21:17 rock yeah I I've had the I've had some talks recently and I I had to explain 21:23 too cuz sometimes talking about it with others helps me uh cuz I I recognize it 21:28 offc court and then I get In the Heat of the Moment and it still kind of trickles in uh but there was you know a match I was playing recently and it was really 21:35 tight it was like 99 and the other team gets like two net tippers at the very end and and wins and in my head I'm like 21:41 oh I got so unlucky and I'm dwelling for hours afterwards how unlucky it was that I got two net tippers at the worst time 21:47 in the whole match and you know I dwell that for a while and then and then I realized well I did have a few of those 21:53 on my end earlier in the match and so I think sometimes people again for me is 21:58 just those last two points were the most important but at the same time for the course of the whole match if I would have just been a little bit uh more 22:06 consistent throughout the course of the match maybe I wouldn't have just maybe it wouldn't have been tied 99 maybe I could have had a bigger lead and give 22:11 myself a little bit more margin some some wiggle room there at the end for for some of those so then F finding a 22:17 way to recover from those I mean it's it's tough uh but in a sport any sports 22:23 and it's a game of inches so that's going to happen but the last thing you can do is is sit there and dwell and oh 22:29 whoo was me I got unlucky on a two points you know the match is like 11 n 22:34 1210 or something and it's like you're worri about two points it's like so the 22:39 last thing I want to talk with you because you mentioned that you don't drill anymore and you had a great video on that and I feel like it it ties in a 22:46 little bit here on on why you don't drill anymore do you still uh have that 22:51 same sentiment or or do you are you are you out drilling some more nowadays yeah I mean that's a great great question it 22:58 depends on who I'm practicing with there are people who subscribe to that mentality and that approach to training 23:06 for me myself if I already put out those videos I have to like embrace it 100 per. absolutely you can't flipflop on us 23:14 yeah but it's not just because I want to be like stubborn or prove a point it's also just like okay what do I actually 23:20 genuinely believe to be better or to be yeah I think it's more effective 23:26 there isn't like my coach Greg has said there isn't a right or wrong way not there isn't only a way it's just 23:34 different options right so yeah right now I just use game based approaches anytime I can control the practice I 23:40 only use game based approaches um or constraints they also the technical term is constraint blit approach that's 23:47 another um I guess approach to practice under that whole umbrella of the ecological 23:53 approach this would be just simulated Point structures how does that work what 23:58 a practice session for you look like yeah so like right now something that's 24:03 super important to me is just working on hands and working on attacking anytime someone attacks me in the chicken wing I 24:09 happen to like end up punching it this way as punching it as opposed to like 24:14 fading over sliding using my forehand I tend to use a chicken wing punch a lot is a really bad habit so I'm like okay 24:21 how do we get out of this um so one game 24:27 that I started to try to do is just uh we're on both sides 24:33 of the kitchen one person that's assigned as attacker one person is assigned as um just like the counter so 24:40 like only one person can initiate the attack okay that's one constraint that's still pretty open so then I like drill 24:47 down even more okay whoever is attacking has to hit 90% of the balls to my 24:53 forehand other 10% can go to my backand because I you don't want the counter to 24:59 just be sitting on a forehand the entire time right you have to add this like key principle of the ecological approach of 25:05 the idea of variability you need that that will help with uh the skill 25:10 development so then we choose like one side then we'll choose the other side and then maybe want to add another constraint that hey you can only attack 25:17 off volleys or you can only attack off the bounce so you can use that those are 25:24 constraints as far as like the execution of the movement but like you said like you had mentioned you can also add 25:31 constraints in scoring as well some people do like the 7-Eleven game that's a obviously like a very popular game um 25:39 so yeah there's different ways you can constrain things it could be the posi position of the player or the performer 25:45 uh yeah whether it's indoors or Outdoors a certain ball you could use a certain paddle um so yeah there's different 25:52 areas there sure I'm I'm a big fan of scenario based drills so really just 25:59 putting yourself in a real situation that you get on court because I do see a lot of people that go out and practice and they drill and that's kind of why I 26:05 want to touch on this because I agree with you and people go out and drill and hit a certain shot over and over and 26:10 over and over again and get really comfortable with that then they get put in a game and the shot doesn't quite look the same you know the return the 26:17 returns coming differently with a different spin or a different spot on the court they might hit a little bit different different situations and it's 26:23 like you just practice something for so long and then you're in a game you don't really execute it the same way and so 26:29 adding those variables in practice even is is huge so when I go out on drill let's say I really want to work on on my 26:34 backhand dinks well yeah I might sit there for a half hour or so just grinding back in dinks Cross Court being 26:40 consistent but at some point I do want to go one against two and have different 26:45 angles to move that ball around I don't want to just go cross cour the whole time maybe I want to speed up and and start attacking some balls well I want 26:52 to attack in spots that I would normally attack in a match so I I see people doing a lot of drills and Al although 26:58 getting the touches is great it's hard to really put it in a real specific 27:04 realistic situation unless what I love just on V2 practices one-on-one practice 27:10 just doesn't get give me the full effect like I'm getting picked on at a game uh so that's so when you said you mentioned 27:15 you don't do drilling anymore I I I kind of had a feeling that that's what you meant where as long as you're doing 27:22 Drilling in specific ways that is actually helpful instead of just getting repetitions on something that you might 27:27 not need to be that dialed in for is huge and and that's come from someone who's been playing for 10 years but I 27:34 think most newer players I think would agree uh that just I love playing like 27:40 skinny singles for example but also there are some constraints that I don't like uh that don't that aren't really 27:45 realistic in a real game so for me it's just I I want to be put in a real situation not just boring it's like 27:52 going to the gym and just curling all day it's like yeah my bicep might get strong but there's so many different 27:58 ligaments and stuff around I need different exercises I need to go out and actually lift real things just doing 28:04 just the basic exercise and workouts doesn't really give you the full effect uh in my opinion I mean I assume you'd 28:12 agree yeah man when is your next uh when's the next Kyle yakes pickleball Camp 28:17 man that all that stuff you described I like I can't imagine I've never heard anything about like your uh your 28:24 teaching or anything or your lessons but I imagine they solid man that's dope uh 28:30 we get into some stuff that's for sure we we dive into that's that's why I was really excited to talk to you because I 28:36 I know you think of sports on that other level too uh you really get into it I there's it's a lot more than just 28:42 hitting balls that I one of my coaches back in the day said that um he said pigle well is 95% cerebral and once you 28:50 understand that you you'll be a better player that you could be in as physical shape as you want to be and you could be as athletic as you want but most of the 28:57 game is played up here whether that's even just your brain sending signals to your muscles to do what they need to do but also the 29:04 strategy and and the mental stuff and emotion everything on the court I mean it's all it's all in your head that's 29:09 Sports and I think that's what really separates some of those top players is to be able to separate themselves on that other level that that uh that Focus 29:18 um level and the ability to adapt and there's there's so much to it and we don't have time to get into it today but 29:23 I'd love to talk to you more about all that stuff but for you I mean what um I mean software designer for big company I 29:31 might add Chef MMA fighter now pickleball YouTuber I mean what is with 29:37 your background how has that really influenced your approach to media and 29:43 sports and because obviously you you must think really deep into these other topics too and obviously shaking and 29:49 fighting and in software computer work I mean that's they seem so different how does that influence you and how you 29:57 think on everything else I mean in Life or in sports that's a great question uh 30:02 like the first thing that comes to mind is it just told me everything that I knew I didn't want to do um so but like 30:09 being a uxui designer of course for sales sorry go 30:19 ahead yeah like you that I did I promise yeah it's all in in many ways all three 30:26 of those things are very creative too um they have some creativity aspect aspect to it um being a uxui designer helped me 30:34 become more comfortable with technology and using apps using applications and programs um pastry cook I don't know 30:42 that just told me like two things one I I didn't want to wake up at 400 am to get into the kitchen at 5: Am 30:49 anymore and two I didn't want to be paid below minimum wage anymore um so those are like those are two things I realized 30:55 I didn't want to do um guys have hobbies especially hobbies that involve cake 31:02 yeah eating um yeah an MMA fighter 31:08 uh yeah I guess during my MMA career I social media wasn't that big then as far 31:15 as being like an influencer right for like from around like 2015 it was like 31:20 very difficult to get traction to get a following to get sponsorships so I did 31:27 try I did try many ways to get creative there and that helped me get into where I am now as far as media just becoming 31:34 more comfortable with it but um guess from my approach to social 31:41 media man just trying to I think it all starts like what 31:47 problem are you trying to solve that's how like that's how my podcast started no one was talking about the stories of 31:55 founders of like why they started the business what is it like being an entrepreneur which actually now that I 32:00 look back on it I actually asked these questions selfishly it was because I was becoming an entrepreneur and I didn't I 32:06 didn't know these things so I started asking them it and then of course once I got the players on again selfishly 32:12 asking stuff about um their career and like how they learn what how do they 32:18 process tournament losses what does practice look like what were they doing before and it made me become more 32:24 comfortable with the journey that I'm on now um but yeah sure well there's I mean things 32:31 change right things evolve like how much pickle balls going over the years so I mean back when you were you in MMA and 32:37 maybe the YouTube game was kind of still pretty new and that was back kind of when I was mostly playing doing my 32:44 pickle ball stuff getting into it it was like 2017 2018 there's some YouTube videos of some matches but it was really 32:50 hard to get traction uh the fan base didn't really have social media accounts certainly not Instagram and they didn't 32:56 really watch YouTube much so this the climate of the sport was so different uh and so and sounds like similar with MMA 33:03 where now it's now it's gotten pretty big do you do you still watch M MMA at all do you watch any the UFC fights ever 33:08 yeah yeah keep up a little bit I'll watch those like clips that the like someone in Russia had like illegally 33:14 posts on Instagram and they'll like clip the entire fight it's like a highlight but yeah I'll still watch it every now 33:19 and then I haven't ordered a fight in a while but what about you uh it's I watched a little bit just for fun I mean 33:25 the porier um Maka fight the other day was pretty good yeah so it's okay yeah I 33:30 like to follow some but I would never I would never get in the cage with it I just like to enjoy it from from the TV 33:35 but no it's it's again with the the sport changing right pickleball grown so much I mean you look at some of the technology with the paddles it's 33:42 improving and for me it's you know I've been playing for about 10 years now but also I feel like I'm still so new to the 33:49 game because of how quickly it's it's evolving I'm constantly having to add new shots work on new things to keep up 33:54 so many new younger players coming in and so which just that that uh concept is you know people we 34:03 get on this path and we get stuck on doing something for so long and then creating that having that deliberate 34:08 mental effort to focus and try to do something new so with the game evolving so much it it does take quite a bit of 34:17 deliberate mental effort like we talked about earlier to to adapt to analyze what's going on figure out what needs 34:23 improving what problems to solve and then make that effort to kind of go down 34:28 that path so you saw a need for some YouTube content in pickle ball you know 34:34 and I love your videos I think they're probably the best on YouTube right now about pickleball if you want to learn a 34:42 little bit more about your game and and how to improve awesome and you actually had 34:47 some great interviews with some of the pros uh with with Ben John's and Colin John Simon I what was it like getting to 34:54 pick some of those Pro players brains about some of these things I mean kind of on the same level as you absolutely 35:00 nerve-wracking dude like oh come on they're just kids yeah I knew about the event like a 35:07 month ahead and all I could think about was like what would I ask these people mostly because they've already done a lot of interviews right so it's like 35:14 what can I ask them that they haven't talked about already so fortunate enough for me they like the John's Brothers had 35:21 their loss against decu and cardio so that's always that's a great thing to 35:27 talk about and then they have the paddles Which made it easy and Simone hers was really interesting I actually 35:32 really enjoyed her conversation because I feel like it's she said things about like age and acclimating her training 35:39 and adapting her training based on how she feels like that's gonna that's a 35:45 point that we're all going to meet at at at some time right so like how do we 35:50 change the way we play pickle ball based on our age and our uh constraints 35:55 awesome yeah it's Simone is a perf perfect example so I'm glad you got to interview her because she from what 36:00 we've talked about so far it would be a fantastic person to to to brainstorm with because she again being 20 36:08 something years older than most of the players she's been against and still competing and winning and grinding and 36:14 the the the struggles that she has to deal with I mean with with injur she's had injuries and all sorts of things so 36:20 she has different struggles and challenges in a lot of these other newer players but the way that she's been able 36:26 to adapt her game and and grind and she is so crafty such a smart player and so 36:31 mentally solid I mean if there's there's anyone you want on your side of the court dinking at 1010 in the third game 36:38 it's Simon I mean I I I'm so I'm so happy I was able to play as much as I 36:44 did with her because I learned so much from her just how to present yourself on the court and how to deal with adversity 36:50 and and bad calls and again I'm still trying to get better at it but uh usually when I'm court with her she is 36:56 just so business but also such a joy to play with and that's kind of how I 37:03 wanted I want to model my personality core after that is you know we're here to win we're here to mean business but 37:08 also I we're playing pickle ball okay so we're going to do whatever we can to win 37:13 but all at the end of the day we're playing pickle ball okay so you know we don't need to get so upset over little 37:20 things uh but the way that she's been able to adapt and especially with a lot of the the new paddles now people are 37:26 hitting so much Hardley game's getting more athletic uh so for her to still still be hanging on as impressive but 37:32 there's been a lot of issues with that very topic with the new paddles nowadays and and because of that technology 37:39 increasing I mean what do you see happening with the sport do you think you think pickall is just going to keep 37:45 keep accelerating or is there going to be someone putting the breaks on here pretty soon on on some of this technological advancement some of the 37:51 growth all these companies I mean it's kind of the Wild Wild West right now where do you see it see it going from 37:57 here that's a good question and somewhat terrifying because you're like the PPA 38:02 has become a monopoly of some sort and I don't say that in like a I guess 38:08 Monopoly does have a negative connotation so hopefully they aren't watching this but they're watching 38:15 everything like it's just it's out there right they bought pickall Central they bought the pickall brackets and 38:21 tournaments and that's great because they have funding now and they can probably accelerate the growth of some 38:26 of those like um businesses in a positive way but I think where you draw the line is testing like testing can't 38:35 be from what I've heard is they're partnering or planning on partnering with the organization that would be 38:41 responsible for testing and that just I I don't know how to articulate 38:46 that but any better than just saying like that just can't happen that's not in the players best interest in the 38:53 businesses like at some point you then like how much will they control of the businesses that are approved on that 39:00 list the businesses that sponsor the PPA or become sponsors of the PPA um I get 39:07 it they have a lot of they have a lot of cash and they want 39:12 to grow the sport and they're probably in a very difficult position I don't understand I don't know what those 39:18 decisions are like right but um they're just trying to find ways to grow the 39:24 sport so I don't know monopolies generally never really good but in life right now we have monopolies on phones 39:31 and technology with apple Google and there's generally some type of governing 39:37 body but the governing body has to be completely separated but I could go on a 39:42 ramp about this for God knows how long but I think even governing bodies can be corrupted as well so yeah it's it's very 39:51 it's very tough all right fair enough what do you think man 39:57 you're you're an OG of the sport dude I've I've given my opinion plenty of times if people know where to look uh 40:04 but I I think I think uh some of these governing bodies now that there's really 40:10 two official ones USA pickle ball and UPA uh but I I do feel like the PPA has 40:15 done a lot of positive things for the sport I know as uh when I was younger and I was just getting to pick a ball 40:21 the opportunity to play professional pickleball was what I thought was would be Beyond reach and and the fact that 40:28 it's gotten there and and kids nowadays are getting college scholarships to compete and there's a lot more 40:33 opportunities it's very exciting it's very exciting but also I feel like at the same time uh you almost feel like 40:41 you're climbing up an iceberg and you're afraid that if you get too much weight on top it might start tilting and then 40:48 and flip right it might capsize so I'm I'm really nervous because it is such a unique Sport and and that's one of the 40:55 reasons why I loved it but it's it's getting so mainstream now uh I'm I'm 41:00 curious where it's going to go but with the whole paddle debacle lately it's it's just a mess I've been trying to 41:05 stay out of it um I've been getting away from professional tournaments uh teaching a lot more and but you know I 41:12 do miss competing so I might jump out there with a better attitude and go compete and just enjoy it uh but it's 41:18 it's wild to see where it's going but you know sometimes you work on something for so long and you have a path and you 41:25 have to diverge whether whether you want to or not but I think having the ability to to figure out what exactly you want 41:32 and and to be able to work any environment especially one like pickleball that's the Wild Wild West right now it takes a special skill uh it 41:39 takes a little bit of luck um finding your niche in this crazy Community uh so 41:45 I'm I'm happy for you you find that Niche I'm sure you're still evolving as you know as a content creator and as a 41:52 person and athlete uh there's a lot more to do but it's it's cra crazy it's hard 41:57 to keep up with come back to competing man teach these teach these kids what the Yates is man where came from dude 42:05 Grandpa we'll see we'll see um last little thing you were down um you were 42:10 down at the Dallas Dallas pbaa right uh last week how was that how was that experience have you been to a few of 42:16 those before yeah yeah that's a good question man I've only been to like a handful not not a whole lot like the 42:21 local ones here um yeah I haven't been to too many of them but you're in Texas 42:26 right yeah yeah yeah to Austin yeah it's cool 42:32 man John huh oh yeah yeah see that orange Tesla rolling around so you you 42:38 were down at the the Dallas PPA tournament watching the pros have you have you been a few those tournaments what what what what is that experience 42:44 like getting to watch some of those Pros down there yeah yeah it's cool man I've only been to the ones where like mostly 42:49 where my friends are at like pick wall Studio pickleball will and Braden and Chris and all them but uh the pro out 42:56 pickleball will and BR yeah um yeah it's been great man the PPA 43:01 has been super kind and generous as far as like letting me take photos and videos which is awesome um so I yeah 43:08 hats off to them for just like being very generous in that regard it's super cool like yeah the employees they seem 43:15 like very happy and cool um and as far as like the games it's great because 43:21 watching it in person is completely different from watching it online and watching the streams and of course like the streams 43:27 that's a whole another side tangent but the streams aren't the greatest either but watching it in person like the ball 43:33 completely looks completely different the people's movements like this past one like Federico statured and mixed 43:41 against the Johnson's is crazy how little that guy moves and just like 43:47 every ball is perfect and something that the Casual viewer doesn't see is how close the net is here each ball is like 43:55 right here like that ball is bar getting over you're just like how do they do this like Time After Time After Time 44:01 it's so hard to fully appreciate it if you're not there live it's a different 44:07 it's it's a different animal like being courtside at an NBA game you just don't realize how how fast that balls moving 44:13 how you know how quick those players are and the how accurate they are and it's it's amazing it's fun to watch I've been 44:20 doing this a long time and it it's it's just every tournament I'm impressed because people just keep getting better and better do you compete I mean do you 44:28 do you play tournaments at all what's what's your game like yeah yeah I compete probably at like uh the four 44:33 five level I'm I'm I'm like a low tier four five like uh so I do like local 44:39 tournaments I want to do more PPA so if anyone's looking for a men's or mixed partner four five uh yeah so trying to 44:47 do more competing um I just there's no like Financial motivation or anything or 44:55 prize it's just like we just love competing right like you wouldn't have been doing this for 10 years if you just didn't love competing that's all it's 45:02 about I back uh back in my day uh we would travel across the country and compete for no prize money it was it was 45:09 literally just for bragging rights and practice because you needed to travel to find other good players to compete 45:15 against so we would travel we would travel every weekend pay our way win a 45:21 tournament for a little plastic gold medal and uh and and and then we would just play r games all after afternoon 45:27 after the tournament was over so uh nowadays I'm hoping that the the money and everything doesn't spoil it I think the amateur experience is still great 45:34 it's fun to just go see everybody and compete and have a good time and that's that's really what it's about so 45:39 nowadays with you know the level that I have to compete at it's just so so serious and and it's a career it's a job 45:46 for a lot of these players uh for someone who really just kind of wants to go out and enjoy themselves it's a lot of work for me I'm I'm hoping my my 45:53 rating my rating goes down low enough I can start playing amateur events it's a lot more fun less stressful uh 46:01 but we we try to have a good time anyway but for someone like because you didn't really play racket Sports growing up did 46:07 you I mean did you play little tennis ping pong anything before pickle ball that resembles pickle ball in any way shape or form no my parents tried to get 46:14 me into that stuff like we had a ping pong table at the in the basement of the house my brother was actually the tennis 46:19 player I couldn't get into either them I was sound just like Ben Johns from 46:24 Maryland I had a ping pong table in the basement my older brother was the tennis player like dude 46:31 you that's hilarious so there's potential for you you following his footsteps you'll be all right yeah I 46:37 just need to yeah I got it I got it down I love it I love it especially pickleball too you get these people who 46:42 have these these crazy careers these awesome stories these these interesting backgrounds they eventually find pickle 46:48 ball and it totally changes their lives and it just consumes you you know these pickle ball these Pall people when 46:55 they're not playing pickleball they're talking about it and when they're not talking about it they're probably eating something pickleball related you know uh 47:01 so I love it I love meeting some of these people uh you're awesome I love picking your brain we'll definitely chat 47:06 more about some of these things it's just fun meeting some of these people with these awesome backgrounds MMA 47:11 fighter Chef software designer now pickle ball addict I love it thanks for 47:17 spending some time with us Brian it was great getting to know you dude thank you man and uh just want to say how lucky I 47:23 am that Kyle Yates finally gave me a follow on Instagram today right before right before this I 47:30 gotta look up who this guy was a I'm just teasing thanks much man oh you're 47:36 great yeah if you guys want to check out the building pickle ball on YouTube is there anywhere else uh you you want to 47:42 plug before we go YouTube man that's it shout out to my sponsor viori and uh 47:47 yeah YouTube all day YouTube and Instagram just put in building pickle ball and uh don't forget to go to Kyle 47:52 yates. PB to give him a follow go go check out his camps yeah yeah yeah all 47:58 right thanks Brian thanks everybody [Music]