00:00I can remember in 1989 watching Michael Jordan versus Dominique Wood because that was the best
00:04dunk contest ever. When I entered the NBA, the dunk contest was still exciting. The Vince Carter
00:10dunk. For the past seven to ten years, it's been lackluster. But, you know, he talks about content,
00:16drops, commerce. There's a lot of dunkers. Not professional athletes that don't play in the NBA,
00:22they're not collegial athletes, but there's a lot of dunkers that have a lot of numbers. So,
00:25you know, Jamie, I, his son, Corey, my partners, we decided to start the dunk man league. So we
00:31want to bring 24 of the top dunkers, five continents, put them together, have dunk offs. The winner gets
00:37500,000. And with that content, with beautiful flowing dunking content, which would be way better
00:43than the NBA dunk contest by far. I thought it was a great move. Why do you think it's going
00:50to be
00:50better? Is that because maybe the competitors may be a little bit more hungry for it than, say,
00:54a professional NBA player? Unfortunately, for the past two years, the top players have not been
00:59in the dunk contest. Yeah. Well, that's because they don't want to get hurt, right? I mean... I don't
01:04know their reason, but if Michael Jordan and Dominique didn't make excuses, I don't want to
01:08hear your excuses. You got Michael Jordan, the GOAT of all time, in the dunk contest. Yeah. You got
01:13Dominique in the dunk contest. Yeah. You got Clyde Drexler in the dunk contest. So, you know,
01:18all-star game is, you know, supposed to be about the fans. You know, you want to excite the fans.
01:23And,
01:23you know, when I was playing, I tried my best to make that weekend a memorable weekend. And,
01:28you know, part of that was the dunk contest, three-point shootout, and then the all-star
01:32game on Sunday. So, we decided to, you know, start this dunk league. And we're starting this
01:36summer. And we just signed Mack McClung. Oh, really? Yeah. Yes. So, it's going to be very,
01:43very exciting. Obviously, you've been involved with authentic brands for a while. You know,
01:46just, I think it was last week, we interviewed one of your friends, Kevin Hart, who's also part of the
01:51platform as well. With regards to this model of getting sort of well-known people, like,
01:56by the way, I called him a celebrity. He got mad at me. He said, he's not a celebrity. He's
01:59a brand.
02:00But when you, you're dealing with a brand. He is. He got that from me. You're welcome, Kevin.
02:04Oh, he sold that from you. Of course. Okay. Well, he made a big sink about it. But to this
02:08point,
02:08he made a good point, too, about the idea of what, of how he invests in business. The idea he's
02:13not
02:13just lending his name to whatever. And this is something that I know Zach has talked about. And,
02:17obviously, I would assume, to make authentic brands authentic, you need that authenticity.
02:22A hundred percent. When we did the original deal, Shaq and I, you know, we said, Shaq,
02:26we're going to buy the business for so much money. And, you know, we're going to buy 51% of
02:30the
02:30business. And Shaq looks at me and he says, okay. And I shake his hand and he says, not so
02:35fast.
02:36And I said, what do you mean, Shaq? Not so fast. He says, I want one more thing. And I
02:41said,
02:41what do you want? He says, I want to take all the money you're going to give me and I
02:45want to
02:45reinvest it into authentic brands. So, he thought of it more than I thought of it. And I was like,
02:51oh, my God, if I screw up, not only will I screw up his brand, I'll screw up our business.
02:57No,
02:58Shaq, that's not a wise decision. He says, no, I'm letting you buy 50% of my brand.
03:07Guess what? You and I are getting married and we're staying married forever.
03:12And, you know, I can honestly say it was the best decision that we've ever made,
03:16but it's also the best decision he ever made, right? Like we made this together. So,
03:20we built this company from the ground up as true partners. And it wasn't about just the Shaq brand.
03:27It was about Reebok. It was about Juicy Couture. It's about guests. It's about champion. He wants to
03:33see the business excel in all areas. So, he's a real CEO, right? Like there's people that,
03:41that, that, you know, they just want the money. He didn't want the money. He wanted to build a real
03:47business. And sure enough, you know, here we are, okay. You know, 16 years later, we have a business
03:52that we own together. That's, you know, doing $38 billion in system-wide retail sales and has an
03:58enterprise value of over $30 billion. So, it's pretty cool. And I picked Jamie for one reason
04:03only. It's all over the place, just like me. He has some of the craziest ideas that he will fight
04:09you until the dreams come true. Is that what you look for? That's what I look for. Because when I
04:14got introduced to Authentic Brands, the idea was, I want to live forever. I saw 50 people walk past me
04:20with Elvis t-shirts. And I know Elvis has been passed away for a long time. I get upset. I
04:25want that.
04:25I want that. I want that. It's a crazy idea for, you know, a retired basketball player,
04:29washed up, gone. Yeah. You've never been washed up. I know, but that's how I like to think.
04:35And you're looking pretty good. I appreciate it. So, you know, he's like, he'll call me.
04:41I'll call him with ideas. I was like, Jamie, I want to do a gummy. What kind of gummy you
04:44want to do?
04:45I want to put my face on the gummies and call it Shackalicious. Oh my God, that's a beautiful idea.
04:50Let's do it. I'll call Hershey and we'll get it done. And that's how Shackalicious gummy started.
04:54Just like that. So what's the next crazy idea you have?
04:56So we, I don't know if I'm allowed to say this, but we're looking at three brands right now.
05:02Can't tell you anything more. And we're just going to continue to grow our business.
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