Femi Ayanbadejo | Super Bowl Champion and Founder and CEO of Digital Health Startup HealthReel

Greg Spillane: 0:01

What's up everyone and welcome to the athlete entrepreneur. I'm your host, Greg Spillane. My guest for this episode is an 11 year NFL veteran who won a Super Bowl ring with the Baltimore Ravens in the year 2000. Anybody who remembers that was an absolute beast of a football team, Ray Lewis in his prime anchoring one of the greatest defenses in the history of the NFL. That team had a number of future Hall of Famers. And we talked a little bit about the culture and what it was like for a young kid like me to come into a team like that, and earn the respect of his peers. Since retiring from the Professional Football League, Femi has been immersed in health technology. He was the co founder and operator of a private training facility prior to selling his equity in that company, and deciding to enroll into Johns Hopkins University, where he eventually earned his MBA. Femi is now the founder of health real, which came out of a partnership he built with NASA health real, truly an amazing concept. They use machine vision, AI algorithms provide a comprehensive health report based simply after uploading a 10 second video of yourself. They're in open beta. Anyone interested can download and try the app by going to Help real.com. This was a super high energy conversation, so many great stories. Femi is still the color commentator for the Baltimore Ravens. So we get to talk a lot about the culture of that team, and why they've been able to be so successful for so many years. That he's the kind of guy I would never bet against, because you're probably going to lose. So without further ado, here is Femi I engage Oh,

Femi Ayanbadejo: 1:48

yeah. So I don't think a lot of people recognize that. You know, I was a I was a 16 year old senior in high school. You know what I mean? I skipped a grade elementary school. And so when I graduated, and you remember, this was the early 90s. There's no internet, there's no finding players. And Bruce County, there's no you know, don't think you'd find in Santa Cruz County at that time was surfers and skaters and all that we had a pretty kind of under the radar like some really good athletes in Santa Cruz County in Santa Cruz, I'm in particular. And so in between my freshman year of junior college at Cabrillo in Santa Cruz County and my senior year in high school, I made what I thought was a pretty level headed decision as a 17 year old to get a job at a retirement home. I worked in the kitchen as a busboy and a waiter. And I got a gym membership at World gym in downtown, kind of like Midtown Santa Cruz, I'd get up at six in the morning, I'd ride the bus to work, I'd work from 7am to 2pm. I would get two meals there. I would walk or ride the bus to the gym, which was a couple miles away a good walk but an easy bus ride. I'd lift for an hour, hour and a half every day. And I would repeat that dude. And of course there were some in between fun. I had a girlfriend in high school at the time she lived in the mountains of Santa Cruz, like there was definitely some breakups in there. But dude, it's a 17 year old, I had a full time gig and I was going to the gym. And my goal was to get to Cabrillo and be a beast when I got there and I had no intention of playing football. No, I had a really kind of up and down experience quite good as a senior but didn't think I was utilized right by my coaches and in high school really, really, really loved baseball. My dream was to get a baseball scholarship to UC Santa Barbara. That's really what I wanted to do. So you know, I think as a as a 17 year old I made a level headed decision to get a job and get a gym membership. Like I knew that I wanted to gain some weight. I knew that I was at a disadvantage I'd been at a competitive disadvantage my whole life but physically I was as if I was as as good or better than most kids my age or even a little bit older. So I played above my age for sure. I definitely think I played above the talent level but probably not worthy of a division one scholarship as a 16 Turning 17 year old senior in high school. So I made the choice that if my dream is to be a division one athlete, I wasn't even thinking about professional sports. My dream was college degree division one athlete How do I do it? Baseball UC Santa Barbara that's my goal. I was first team all county in Santa Cruz. I was a first team all league in Santa Cruz as an outfielder in a pitcher. I think I was third in the county and hitting and like you know like third in the county and pitching in regard to era or my Santa Cruz high team went to the Central Coast section finals we lost to a school called Carlmont is the furthest that Santa Cruz had gone in baseball in years. So you know, I was thinking all baseball although I loved playing basketball had a good year. You know, football had a good year but as I said, my football coach in high school kind of left me a bit disillusioned. I really thought I should have been playing quarterback you know I pitched in baseball I played shortstop I did I played all these high pressure positions and in football he's like are you gonna play running back into play linebacker? I was like, Alright, I guess I guess you know better than me, Coach. So, you know, I took the This year off and got this job in this in this retirement home and as I said I rode the bus and went to the gym and I did this for a year. By the time the school year came around for Cabrillo Junior College in Santa Cruz County. I was so motivated dude. I was so motivated. I never loved school so much. I never appreciated the consistency and the predictability of the classroom. I was always a good student. And it was time to kick ass and take names and to be honest, I had no desire to play football at Cabrillo. But I met coach Cox who was the head coach of football Cabrillo at the time. And he said, Look, I know you I got a position for you. The kind of offense we run. You know, I grew up a thing grew up he actually went to college, which with Bill Walsh, he knew Bill Walsh and he knew the West Coast offense and he ran that at Cabrillo. It was very tight end and running back centric. And he said that he he had a role for me. I just had to prove to him that I could learn the playbook. And my freshman year of football started a little wobbly, but by the time we got to the third or fourth game, dude, they're playing me a tight end they're playing me running back they're playing me at fullback. They're playing me in the slot, you know at six to probably about 220 My freshman year. I'm probably legit running a four six I could pretty much play anywhere in a JC level. They could put me in linebacker if they wanted to. But I wanted the ball in my hand. Yeah. So So I ended up by the end of the year. You know, I think I ended up being like just a Swiss army knife. You know, I think we had one game that really got me on the map against one of our rivals Gavilan College and I think I had like seven catches for 160 yards and like one or two touchdowns and that's when I started getting recruited by Kansas and Louisville and in San Diego State and University of New Mexico and it was a dream come true dude, I remember like almost being brought to tears when I got my first letter my first recruitment letters all I ever wanted the crazy thing was was in football wasn't even in baseball baseball season hadn't even started yet. You know what I mean? So I went on the baseball field dude and I smashed I think I led the team in homeruns I hit around 370 So ended up being first team all ended up being I don't think I don't know if I was first team or second team in baseball my freshman year. But I was all conference in baseball and then my sophomore year football came around and I was like a blue chip all American tight in you know, I was first team all everything you know, all state honorable mention. And that's when I accepted basically my football scholarship to San Diego State at somewhere along the way. I transitioned from Baseball, baseball, baseball to Marshall Falk, Aztecs, black and red like to be an asset to be in San Diego. It seems so big to me coming from Santa Cruz. I took two trips. I went to New Mexico when I went to San Diego State coach toners like Look, dude, we want you coach craft wants you. If you leave here and don't commit, I can't guarantee you we you know he did pressure on me. I was like, I'm coming like, Don't worry, I'll be here in the spring. Because I was a qualifier. That's the thing that made me look kind of good for them was I could come in the springs. I already had the grades. So it was awesome to transfer into San Diego State. As a sophomore, I got to live in in the VAs right there on campus. Like to have that true big college experience. Dude, I was so honored. I was so humbled. I was blown away by the atmosphere. sannan San Diego was like a big ass Santa Cruz in a lot of ways. Yeah. Totally. Yeah. You know, yeah, and just the beach and, you know, being able to be with like, you know, just real division one athletes. I didn't know if I belong there, but quickly, you know, you fake it till you make it out here. If it's business or if it's athletics, dude, you act like you're like you're supposed to be and then eventually you figure the rest of it out, you know. So that's kind of what ended up happening with, you know, my kind of like my high school, the JC to San Diego State journey. And I was a initially a journalism major at SDSU. That was an impacted program. And you know, we were majoring in football. So I switched from journalism to psychology, which my dad had a PhD in psychology and once again at SDSU, I think I had a 3.2 GPA. I was never get in trouble and I never had bad grades. I had good grades. It was easy. And I loved it. I loved being on ink on campus. I never missed class. Didn't always study but didn't really need to have a pretty good memory could just digest information. And I enjoyed the whole experience dude from being a student to go into the parties to making friends you know, from, you know, think about this for a minute. I'm sure I'm sure you remember. Like, you know, we were friends with the with the girls soccer team, and we were friends with the girls softball team and the swim team and you know, men's basketball. It's like we had such a great camaraderie at SDSU. And you know, that kind of phrase, you know, you know, as tech for life. That's a real thing that we still say and I still appreciate the guys that I met. The teammates that I had I keep in touch with a ton of them. I made San Diego my home for over 20 years. I moved my mom from San Diego from Santa Cruz to San Diego. She lives in Encinitas. Now I lived in NCS for a long time had a brand new build house there at one point that I built from the ground up and so yeah, that's kind of the the college story brother Yeah, I want to give you a little time because if you let me do it, I'll just ask our long snapper.

Greg Spillane: 9:53

I love it man. I love it. And we were talking about it earlier dude. You you showed up representing you got the the old school SDSU T shirt on.

Femi Ayanbadejo: 10:01

I do 1995 people. This is from 1990. Yeah, this is my daughter calls this vintage. She steals it and goes, Dad, I want that vintage SDSU shirt you got I'm like, That's my shirt.

Greg Spillane: 10:13

But the thing is, it is vintage. I mean, think about how old it is, man. And we were talking a long time. 2026 years ago or whatever that is. Cool, man. were you living now? Where were you at?

Femi Ayanbadejo: 10:25

Yeah, yeah. So so I'm living back in Baltimore, America. Um, you know, most people, you know, not most but you know, I got I got signed as a free agent by the Minnesota Vikings out of SDSU. I was actually playing baseball at SDSU because I was actually better Baseball.

Greg Spillane: 10:40

Baseball team, Stan, you're too

Femi Ayanbadejo: 10:43

late. Yeah, I basically, I did. I waited for my senior year to end but I had two years of baseball eligibility and I still had a redshirt year. So I was gonna redshirt and just play baseball and play two years of baseball. Dude, I went out there. And I did well, you know, Billy Blanton was out there showing our quarterback, but he ended up giving it up and he wanted to go play football in Canada. And you know, he had his own dreams and wishes. But I stuck with it for a bit. And then one day coach toner called me into his office. He's like, Hey, um, there's a lot of NFL scouts. I want to know who number nine is with the visor. I don't if you remember, I work for my senior year. I feel like they're asking like who you are. And like, what's the deal with you? Are you going to be at the Pro Day and I'm telling them that you're playing baseball? Like, I know you love baseball. And I know you've told me this whole time you're better at baseball. But do you want to be a professional athlete, you might be able to make it in baseball, but that's a ball and double a ball and triple A ball. And who knows like either you make it in the league or you don't you can always come back here and play baseball. Coach toner just like manipulated my mind in like 15 seconds, dude. I was like, Alright, done. So I quit the baseball team. Dude went off to the Pro Day ran a four or five hit that bench. I don't know. 2528 times whatever. Had a nice little verse ran routes as a tight end from the backfield. I had a really good program. And from that Pro Day, the Rams work me out individually. The Vikings worked me out individually. There was a couple other teams but Coach Zahner from the Vikings. And Danny Green from Minnesota just really liked. Coach Greene coached at Stanford, rip to coach green. He coached at Stanford, his son played basketball at Santa Cruz. Hi, I think he had a soft spot for a mixed kid like me, who reminded me probably of his son who came up in Santa Cruz probably didn't get all the respect I deserve but had a chip on my shoulder. Hard worker, he met me and he's just like, Yeah, you know what, we like this kid, you know what I mean? So um, draft day came? No one called one team called they offered me $1,000 Was the Minnesota Vikings dude. So yeah, I took my bus, my bus pass my foot, my flight, my plane flight right? And went out to Minnesota summer of 97 Dude, and I immersed myself in a damn cauldron of just pressure and heat. And you got to think about like that team that team. Chris Carter, Jake Reed, Robert Smith, Leroy Ford, David Palmer, David Dixon. Do there's Hall of Famers on that team Robert Griffith from San Diego State you know, in 97 so I ended up getting cut and allocated to NFL Europe, which I played in 98. But I came back in 98 made the practice squad ended up making the roster that 98 team was Randy Moss his rookie year with 15 in one went to the NFC Championship game I played in my first game ever my first game ever I ever played that year was Guess what? Against Baltimore in Baltimore. My first game ever Little did I know that a year later, I would become a raven and the Raven being a raven is all I care about. As far as my focus, I don't play I played 11 years, but I'm a raven. I'm not a Viking. I'm not a cardinal amount of dolphin. I'm a raven. And that means something that's like saying, Aztecs for life play like a raven, it means something to me, I bleed purple dude. And when it comes to the league in the NFL, it is one of the most well respected organizations in sport. And had I not came up in the cauldron of Minnesota, I would not have been a good Raven and coach Billy, who was the coordinator in Minnesota left to Baltimore as a head coach, and took about eight of us with him. And we set the tempo in the tone for what was what has now become what the Baltimore Ravens is, which I was just talking to one of my former teammates Pete Versuch on his radio show yesterday, pure coincidence, and I said people don't know it. But But Dennis Green has had an effect on the Baltimore Ravens culture and what we are is ravens and no one knows it because it started with him. And then coach Billick brought it he talked to art modell about it. Art ngModel sold the team to Steve Ashanti who was the minority owner at that time, Steve Bushati loved a lot of what Brian's principles were and him and Ozzie wove that into what Ozzie believed were the right principles and that combination is the Ravens foundation and because of that the ravens are one of the most feared and respected teams in the league and we have a Never Say Die attitude. There's an expectation and character traits when it comes to being a raven. And dude, I love that I'm able to say that dude and I feel the same way about being an asset bro.

Greg Spillane: 14:49

Yeah, man. So I want to talk a little bit more about that. I mean, you weren't just on the Ravens you first of all you want to Super Bowl with the Ravens you got you got that chip, which is which is amazing. Second of all, you know, we're talking that 1000 ravens right? I mean, this is this is, you know, arguably the greatest defense in history, the NFL, I mean, right, right up there with the 85 Bears. Right, I think in those conversations, and, you know, you talk a little bit about that culture of the ravens, and I think it's still exists, right? I mean, you know, you know, you play the ravens, you're, you're, you're in for your, you're going to be sore the next morning, right? It's going to be physical, you're going to come up, you know that that's a team that's going to smack you in the mouth. They're not going to back down anybody. Like I love those like, Raven, Pittsburgh games, right? I mean, you just know they're going to be so so physical. And I'm assuming that's a little bit of that culture that you're talking about, like, how, you know, how was that bill? What was it like playing in that? And what was that expectation of a young kid like yourself?

Femi Ayanbadejo: 15:43

Yeah, let me let me reverse engineer that for you. Because I think it's so relevant to talk about Lamar Jackson right now. And what he is, you know, he's the most talented football player on the planet right now. And this is a fact in my opinion, if you watch what he does on a week to week basis, there's nobody doing what Lamar Jackson does. To the ravens are doing it a bit differently. Now they have the number two rated offense in the NFL, the defense is kind of middle of the road, but still a very physical team. Preparing for the Ravens is like preparing for army or navy or Air Force. Yes, it's more than running, but they are they just do things differently from defense, exotic special teams will hit you in the mouth. Justin Tucker is the best kicker in the league. Greg Roman, the coordinator with the ravens and him and Lamar, the scheme that they run is just so hard to stop. And so this idea of Never Say Die, the Ravens have been down double digits four times this season. They're three and one. The rest of the NFL is eight in 93. Being down double digits, how do I know this? My side gig on the Ravens color analyst I do all the Ravens radio games, I travel with the team. I do all my stats stuff. You know, as you know, I'm in I'm in health care now on the digital health kind of health care side. And so data and statistics is a big part of what I do on a day to day basis. And to do it for football as a side gig. Dude, you know, I eat it up right? So I can give you almost every stat you want to backup what I'm saying. But all I'm saying is is that this is the 2021 version of the Ravens. It's still a Never Say Die attitude. It's still a go out on your field mentality. It's just a young guy leading the way now. Now playing with Ray Lewis. Ray was my peer and my teammate and you have to remember that knee and Ray are about the same age and when I came in from Minnesota, I felt like a veteran. I came here in 2000 I'm sorry, I came here in 99. I basically had about two plus years under my belt plus one year in NFL Europe I've been through do I've been through the damn you know, you name it. I've been through it right. And so when I got to Baltimore, a team that really wasn't that great in 1999 but found our way toward the end of that season. When 2000 came I was I was the starting fullback technically and everyone knows I'm not really a fullback but the goal here was to have a guy that could run block, pass block catch passes, run the football and could pass protect and I could do all that stuff. And so it was me and priest Holmes initially starting in the backfield and priest got got the job got taken over by Jamal Lewis. But President Jamal both carried the ball a ton that year. I was catching balls out of the backfield. You know we had Shannon Sharpe playing tight in Qadri Ismail at receiver Tony banks, Brandon Stokely but yes, our defense was no joke and playing against those guys every day Jamie sharper Ray Lewis Michael McCrary Tony Siragusa, Sam Adams. Rod Woodson. You know, I'm Chris McAllister. Dwayne Starks do the names just go on, bro. Like ridiculous, ridiculous competition. And if you thought our games were physical, you should have seen us at practice where there was no refs. It was straight mayhem. But we had respect for each other. We took we took care of each other, but steel sharpens steel. And every day it was a war. So the games are easy. I know. That's cliche. Oh, the game is easy. Your your MMA fighters all the fight was easy, because my camp was so good. You know? I mean, you hear that all the time. Right. But sometimes it's true. Sometimes. The game is easy, because practice is so hard. And the way do I even mentioned Jonathan odd another holler, that we have. Right.

Greg Spillane: 19:09

You know, I guess I guess the question I have is, obviously there's like a, there's a mindset there in Baltimore. And, you know, you talk a little bit about it. It's been there from the beginning. You know, Danny green potential, you know, you kind of mentioned that he was he was part of putting that in place, like, but it's continued on, right. I mean, it's still there. Sure. Like, yeah, I can tell you, I Yeah, that's what I want to know. So check it out. So I don't

Femi Ayanbadejo: 19:33

want people to get crazy when they hear me talk about Danny green because his influence is subtle and indirect, because it came through Brian, which then came through Ozzy, which then came through art and Steve Bugatti, but maybe almost unbeknownst to them, but I see it because I'm one of the only people that was there for all of you. And I mean, I have a very unique view and I'm still viewing it. And you have to remember to that my brother played for the Ravens right years word trivia question. Who were the only Brothers in ravens history to both have Super Bowl rings with ravens, Brendan pembiayaan. But he right he was there from 2008 to 2012. I was there from 2009 to 2001, both 1999 and 2001. We both happen to be there during Super Bowl runs, right. So, you know, I've had a bird's eye view. And another thing that I got to see that a lot people don't know is I got to be an intern number coach. When I retired in 2010, I had I had two dreams, one to either become a human performance expert, which is what I ended up doing or become an NFL coach. Now trust me, I tried to become an NFL coach. That's not as easy as it sounds, because truth be told, there's a lot of good, there's a lot of things that have to go your way to make that interesting, but I thought I had the right path to make that happen. I got to intern under Coach Harbaugh. Ultimately, it didn't happen. But I got to learn. And watch Coach Harbaugh I got to sit in in the meetings, those meetings where they talk about each player like each coach goes through and grades them each day, bro, that shit is rare. They're really talking about you that like the way you think they are they Yeah, like so and so had a real good day to day did a good job. Yeah, I had good balance. Yeah, you kept his hands inside on the block on He's good. He fell down. He has no balances at work to do I don't know if he's gonna make it I want to, they really taught me that way. You know, and I got to watch that. And what I appreciate about that, is that they allowed me to sit in, they have enough faith in me without even telling me like, Look, dude, we know your brothers on this team. But you can't like come out of this room and go share what we talked about. They never even told me not to do that. I knew. I just knew that I'm not spoken. You know what I mean? And I want to be a coach for the Ravens at some point. Obviously I couldn't I they had to be able to trust me. Now if you have to tell me that. If you want me to trust you, you can't do this, then obviously, I'm not the right guy for the job. Right, you know. So anyway, I got to see so many levels. It's almost funny as we talk and I think through the generation, the generations of ravens for me, there was a gap between my brother and I being Ravens. Then there was my brother and I was still playing in the NFL at that time. So I didn't give a damn about the Ravens for a while there. Then my brother became a raven. He was there for five years, I got to become a coaching intern, I moved back to Maryland did my MBA at Johns Hopkins. Obviously, there was a ton of things that happened in me building this new version of myself as a human performance expert, certified nutritionist, personal trainer, gym owner pivoting to AI and digital technology. I did all that through Hopkins. But while being at Hopkins, I got this real close view of the Ravens still because dig cast this go this is what's going to answer your question about why it's why it's maintained. Dick cast is the team president. He was brought in by Steve Bushati. Steve Bushati had an expectation and the type of guy he wanted that President Dick guest cast Who's an attorney fits that role. Ozzie has been here the whole time. Eric Decosta, who is the current GM was a scout when I played for the Ravens now he's the GM. Okay, there's a guy named Joe Douglas. He's the GM for the Jets now. Okay. So what I'm saying is, is that these guys that grew up here in Baltimore that were had these different positions, they're often being GMs. Now, some of them have already become head coaches, other places. You know, think about all the guys you know, Jack Del Rio, Greg Smith, I'm, I'm trying to remember, Marvin, Marvin, Marvin. Marvin Lewis, Martin Lewis was a defensive coordinator when I played these guys don't want to be head coaches, some of these guys have been out, they've moved on to TV and other things. Now, you and me, they're on they're on a football, some of them. But my point ultimately is, is that what made the Ravens the Ravens starting back to coach Billick is that a lot of those guys are still in the building. And those expectations through like the storytelling and through a cultural expectations, and, you know, being honest and upfront about what it means to be a raven and talking about the guys that came before them. And then there's a big ass sign in the Ravens locker room that says play like a raven. Like, I don't there's no other place that I can think of other than the Raiders. That says the Raiders theme is commitment to excellence, isn't it? I think it's excellent city only have a team that I know that has a motto other than the ravens, but fuck the Raiders, though, you know, saying and I don't I'm not saying that because of what's been happening lately, just in general. Just like I'm not, you know, I'm a raven. I don't get on here. Yeah, I'm saying it just that way because of not the Gruden in a situation where the rug situation. Those are sad, unfortunate things. And I hope those both those gentlemen have a second chance to rectify their lives for completely different reasons. But I digress. My point is ultimately, is that there's a lot of teams around the NFL that I could give a damn about. Now I respect every NFL player. I respect every athlete that goes out there involves but when you come when you're a raven and you put it out there as a raven on that field and you win games on that field under under the guise of what's expected in this culture, Dude, I got a lot of For those guys who are like my brothers just like aspects, you know, I mean, we have a thing, the way that we do things. So it's just, I can I know I'm being really effusive and super gushy about it. But, you know, now that I'm doing the Ravens radio broadcast, I'm part of this generation, you know, I mean, like, I'm still, I'm still involved, no matter how I try to get away, dude, they pulled me back in. That's right. Oh, they pulled me back into some role. When I when I moved back here to go to Johns Hopkins and do my MBA, I get it to reinvent myself to be taken seriously by going to one of the best universities on the planet. You know what I mean? I had one of the things that motivates me, Greg, is that when people tell me that I can't do something, I go fuck, you know what I mean? I literally love it. When people tell me I feed off of negative energy. I don't like it. I don't like toxicity. But I turned it into fuel turn. When someone tells me some shit that about me that goes, Oh, you're not smart enough to that you're not good enough. You'll never do that. I really, let me right. I'm taking names and quotes. Now I'm putting them in my figurative back pocket. You know what I mean? And so we're

Greg Spillane: 25:58

so taking a stand on where does that chip come from? You use that word earlier in the conversation kind of had a chip on your shoulder? You think Do you think it was just being so young growing up that you were always a little bit behind? And you had to try to catch up physically here?

Femi Ayanbadejo: 26:14

yet? I don't see. I don't think it's that I think that so if we go back a little further, and there's things here that you don't even know about me, like my father came to the US from Nigeria. You know what I mean? I'm half Nigerian, half Irish. My father came here isn't, you know what I mean. And he met my mom in Chicago, and they got married had my brother and I, we moved back to Nigeria, we live in a house with no electricity and no running water for a long time. This is Nigeria in the seventh row, third world country. And so my mom being the only white face for miles, right? She had to figure out how to survive in a place that was not normal for compared to what she's used to. She's from Chicago, Illinois, you know what I mean? Southside of Chicago, she, she grew up in an Irish Catholic environment that was very different than growing up in Lagos, Nigeria. And if my dad was more supportive, we probably would have stayed in Nigeria, but he wasn't very supportive. So eventually, under the guise of night, we snuck out of the country dude. And we left Nigeria left all our shit there just came back with like, whatever bag my mom had with our stuff in it and move back to Chicago. She's had an old time. I was three. My brother was one. Yeah, but I remember a lot of things for sure. Time, a lot of memories, you know. And the problem is, is that my mom came back to nothing. Her parents basically were had passed away prior to her leaving both of them and her parents were very supportive of my brother and I, there's not a lot of half Nigerian Irish kids in Chicago in the 70s. By the way, Chicago has a very racist history, dude. He does. And luckily for us, we live in the 2020s now, where things are much, much, much better, as a whole around the country, things are much better, but ultimately, I'm better not good enough, but better. Let me say that, um, but um, my mom ended up scrying in a crashing and in scratching and crawling her way through things. Eventually, you know, we were on welfare. We ended up moving into a housing project in Chicago called later ponies projects. But my mom found a way to get us into a Catholic school, we got offered a scholarship to the school, pure luck, Right Place Right Time, right family, got a scholarship to this Catholic school that was down the street. We didn't have to go to the public school that was in the housing project. So we got a great education. I ended up skipping fourth grade because I tested out of it due to this scholastic I would basic skills collect scholastic test that they had, like I was in third grade getting like crazy scores. So my mom thought, Oh, this is a, this is a great thing for my son to be this smart kid. But she didn't realize that it hurts me athletically. Now, nobody would know I was the youngest kid in that class, because I didn't look like it. And I didn't act like it. You know, I was a little bigger than then. I was bigger than kids my own age and probably more mature than kids my own age. But as you get older, those things start to become you know, when I'm 12 in Little League, and I'm smashing in Little League, but then I go and I'm an eighth grade playing basketball. I mean, that's not congruent. You know what I mean? You have kids that are got a little bass in their voice and little mustaches, and I'm still pre pubescent. You know what I mean? Like, it's just weird, right? Now, as time goes on, I close that gap a little bit. But I think he gave me that chip on my shoulder. It always made me feel like these like this. This kid is playing eighth grade basketball with me. He's supposed to be in ninth grade. I'm supposed to be in seventh grade. And he thinks it's cool that he just beat me. You know what I mean? Or he just got me somehow he doesn't realize I'm two years older or two years younger than him, you know, I mean, and I think that disadvantage that I had, I turned it into an advantage in my mind and that's why I think I feed off the negativity sometimes the doubt, and when I say negativity, like I don't like anything toxic. I don't want people saying and calling me things that they shouldn't I just mean that I like it when people doubt me. I like it when people underestimate motivator and I've turned into fuel so that that chip that I have goes all the way back probably to you know, living in Nigeria with fucking nothing dude. It kind of back to Chicago living in a housing project and being saved by a place like San Fran. here's where my stepdad basically was like, Look, we're all getting out of here. We're all going to Santa Cruz, and it's going to change all our lives. And guess what, dude, it completely did. So that's that's a quick summary on a lot of wild shit that happened. But that's that's the real Yeah,

Greg Spillane: 30:12

no, it's the reason I asked that in. And I love to ask that question because I, you know, I always feel like I have a little bit of a chip on my shoulder. Now, my background isn't as extreme as your background. But, you know, like my parents, my mom immigrated here my dad is as non college educated, drafted Vietnam that like, you know, blue collar type of upbringing ended up growing up in a nice suburb and those types of things. But, you know, there are a lot of people around me that have things that I didn't have. And, you know, I know what pushed me and I know, it's something that still drives me and I think similar to you, like, I'm motivated a lot by, by by kind of the same thing you said, like, I'm going to show you what I can do. And, and I think that's a theme that's coming out in a lot of these conversations I'm having and and you see it with, with with athletes see with entrepreneurs, you know, I think it's high high achievers in general. And, and, you know, I the conversation I have with, with with my wife about my kids, and I'd love to hear your thoughts, you know, with your kids as your kids are growing up with different backgrounds than we grew up with. Right? Like, I mean, you know, you said you were born in a situation you didn't have running water. Right. And I'm sure that you know, with your kids, it's it's a very different story. So yeah, and the same with mine. Right? And, you know, how do you have them have a little chip on their shoulder, right? You don't want life to be too comfortable? You need a little adversity, you know? So I don't know, have you? Have you ever put any thought that

Femi Ayanbadejo: 31:38

my kids can't even imagine me? Like spending a food stamp? They can't imagine me. Like when I tell them I never had more than $5 in my pocket until I was a teenager. They can't even envision that. You know, like my son just from his birthday and his his his graduation from eighth grade. He's got like, $1,200 in the bank account, dude, but it's insane. Yeah, I mean, like, I just I look at him and then and then he calls me and asked me to order an Uber Eats so Micra, you got $1,200 in your bank account, and you want me to order your Uber Eats and what do I do? I ordered an Uber Eats, right? I know what an asshole I am. I teach them how to be tough enough, right. But what I do honestly, though, and what I think is super helpful. So I have a 16 year old daughter who's just about to turn 17 She's actually in LA and a modeling shoot right now she works with a piece on a contract with La models two days ago, dude, which, yeah, she's flying around the country supervised My brother lives in LA, as you know, he went to UCLA. So luckily, I have him there and his wife to watch over her while she's working in LA. His niece is the same age as my daughter. So they're super, super close. They've been approached since they were babies. I'm so lucky to have the family that I have. Now, my brother's story is very similar to mine. Right? I mean, UCLA Cabrillo 10 years in the NFL ring with the ravens, etc. Three, he has three kids, I have three kids. And we both talk all the time about how lucky our kids have it. But we've we know that it's not their fault that we were born into poverty, and they were born into upper middle class or more environment, that's not their fault. So it's really unfair for us to use our disadvantages as something that we hang over their heads. I don't like to do that. But I'd like to do is do an apples to apples comparison for them and say, like, Look, dude, what do you think you need to do to reach this goal, because I can't go out there and shoot that ball for you. I can't go out there and catch it for you. But what I can do is teach you in a way that a lot of dads, moms, coaches, these are the people that helped me, my parents were always around to help me but a lot of people invested in me. And I got lucky. And those people were as close to being a parent as they could have been because what they were giving me was as good as they could give as if I was their own child. So I'm lucky enough to be able to give it to my kids. And what I try to do is never give them anything, just for the sake of giving it to them. I try to apply some critical thinking and get them to think their way through the process on what the right way is to go about it. And I would say from especially with my son who's a super athlete, you know, I coached his flag football teams, no joke, I would not let him play tackle we played tackle this year, really his first year playing as a freshman. Not that great right now really good athlete but doesn't know how to hit this know how to take a hit. He's figuring it out. But I had to figure it out. I didn't have a dad to show me how to do that. So I 100% believe that he'll figure it out because he has no choice. You know what I mean? I figured it out. He'll be able to figure it out. So there's some there's some calmness in this because I know I had much less and I figured it out. So what I try to do is tell him about my stories and that he'll learn and he'll figure it out. But he's got to put the time in. Instead of playing Playstation, and all this other stuff that you do. You should be out on the basketball court. Mom has a 10 foot hoop in front of the house that I paid for the blacktop right there. You can be out there shooting, I'll throw you routes, we'll run routes. We'll talk about different route combinations. I'll show I'll put you through the whole route tree which I do all the time. Like I said I coached this flag spring and fall dude for like five years he played like 10 years of flag Football, you know what I mean? even have my daughter out there. So those are the times where I can just coach. And I'm dad still, but when I'm coaching, I'm just coaching. So a lot of those things that I was taught, I get to kind of indirectly, indirectly passive aggressively drop on them. You know what I mean? Like, hey, I'm not Dad, I'm just coach right now. Yeah, I mean, I'm coaching all the kids the same way. So, you know, I think that it's important for me that they, what they get, and they understand that there is investment that has to be paid to get a return. And that return is success, making the team becoming a starter, but that investment is all that time that no one sees that you've got to put in. And I think that's where the disconnect is with a lot of kids right now is they watch NBA the NBA, they watch Steph Curry, they watched Lamar, you know, they, they watch, you know, I'm a big Giants fan. They watch Brandon Crawford play shortstop for the Giants, they just think, oh, this, these guys are the best. And it's easy. No, it's not easy. There's 1000s and 1000s of hours that went into them crafting their game, and you're not going to get better playing Playstation. And what I'll say is this, our kids are, in my opinion are way smarter than us book smarter than us because like, I think my son was taking algebra two in eighth grade, I took Algebra Two in high school, and I was a good student, you and I mean, my daughter is taking pre calc as a junior, like, that's insane. I think I took pre calc as a senior, we weren't even sure if I took it to be honest like, and once again, I was a good student, the what this what the the education system, especially when you go to a private school, like my kids go to, it is off the chart expectations. And guess what they're thriving, what I worry about is what COVID did, from a social learning perspective. And everything can't be a text message. It can't be a hand gesture, or gesture or an emoji. It can't be can't be an email, like sometimes you got to talk to somebody face to face, you've got to pick up the phone and have a real conversation. That's where my concern really is for our kids. It's not their intelligence, it's not their self awareness. It's not their inability to speak out, they can do all that shit, brother, they have no problem with that. For me, it's the interpersonal people skills, the empathy, they have empathy, but there's a certain disconnect on what can be real communication. And for me, that's the thing that I that I harp on the most. And that's what I think as a parent, I go in trying to, if I can impart anything that from that I think we did better as kids, it's that kind of like in face in person kicking in hanging out together. Not everything is through some virtual platform where were all 10 of us in a thread and doing these disconnected things. It was in person together. So I kind of focus more on that, because, like I said, to tie knot around this, me thinking that my childhood and the struggles that I went through aren't relevant to them at all other than a good story, I think is futile.

Greg Spillane: 37:54

Yeah, no, I agree. And I think that's one of the reasons, you know, you talk a little bit about the social side of it. It's just so obvious, right? I mean, everything's digital. I have a friend I was talking to the other day and it's his kids aren't really athletes. And he was he was saying that they get home from school, and that they are social. But even with the neighbor's kids, they all go up into their rooms, and then they just connect on like digital, right?

Femi Ayanbadejo: 38:20

Exactly crazy on ps4, ps4, where we're if

Greg Spillane: 38:23

you play a sport, you know, my daughter's play softball, I play volleyball, you know, whatever it is, that can't be done digitally. It's like the one thing that it's like, she shows up for practice. And she is around a bunch of real people and she's forced to interact and, and and I think that is important, you know, and I think I think sports kinda helps bring people together.

Femi Ayanbadejo: 38:41

So Greg, I think you're hitting on a real like something I want to bring real explicit attention to sports still bring people together. Sports still is something that you cannot replicate. It has to be done in person and has to be real. And I'll tell you this, my 15 year old son, his name is Femi. He's a freshman in high school. I've been talking about him this whole time. I'm so impressed with how he has kind of rethought his priorities on where he needs to spend his time. I didn't need to tell him. I didn't need to ask him. He realized on his own, that he loves going to MMA practice. He's been doing that for two years. He does jiu jitsu and Muay Thai, he loves it. He played football for the first time. After the first week of training camp, he wanted to quit. And I said, Dude, if you quit, you're going to go turn in your pads. You're going to tell your coach thanks for the opportunity. You're going to tell him why you're quitting. Do you have an answer for that? Sorta, I want to go back to MMA. MMA is not going anywhere. And yeah, you could be an MMA fighter too. Like I'm not worried about that. But but do you really want to give up on football now and it's not because I played I just know how good it is to go through that grueling process. Once you go through camp dude, it's Cakewalk and your freshman year. There's nothing harder than your freshman year of high school football, your first training camp and they don't do double days. They definitely have pads Once a day, and then they have like a walkthrough, which I'm all for, I'm all for player safety. I'm all for player safety more than I am for good tackling, I really am like, oh, they don't tackle they don't hit. That's another story for another day. But my point ultimately is, is that I still think that there are some core interpersonal communication learnings that you can apply through life, just from surviving a training camp for a month with other kids, like you're going to fight with other kids, you're going to argue you're going to hate it, but you're going to get through it and you're going to be better for it. I don't I didn't phrase that all I

Greg Spillane: 40:31

did. And I don't want to speak for you. But I've had this conversation with other people on the show. And I think it's an important component of what this is all about. You know, I mean, look, you you are an undrafted, free agent, you're at camp. It's like Welcome to the NFL. You're surrounded by people that you've been watching on TV since you were a little kid, future Hall of Famers. It's a job. It's a business. You know, you're fighting for your livelihood. Like you talk about pressure, like that's pressure, right? Like, that's, that's stress. I'm sure you know, and we'll get into your I want to get into health real a little bit later. Like you got an investor meeting or you have a potential partnership meeting like, Yeah, you're a little nervous. And yeah, you want to do well. But I mean, after the the pressure and the stress that you've lived through your life through athletics, right, all that stuff kind of seems a little bit easy, right? I mean, yeah,

Femi Ayanbadejo: 41:21

no, you're right. I think that I'm competing at a high level, competing as a division one athlete competing as a professional athlete, dude. Like, I am so loose and chill when I meet people like, and we'll get like he said, we're getting to health real but like, I have I have conversations, I sat down with people at Apple. I have buddies that work at Google, you know, I have a contract and MOU and MOU. It's not signed yet. But with Fitbit, I have an MOU with a company called melodic these are some of the best tech companies in the world, dude. And I have 00 stress over having the the real business conversation because I'm prepared about what things what needs to happen, like no one's gonna punch me, no one's gonna hit me. You're not gonna get tired. You know what I mean? Like, I'm not my life's not at risk for you know, per se. Um, so, absolutely. I think that being being an athlete and competing in the physicality of football and the cerebral pneus of digesting a playbook and understanding all the things that it takes the preparation, the training, the dude dude getting up at whatever time we used to run during the spring at like, what six in the morning to do gassers and ship because we were in Tijuana the night before. Remember, we need to do those Wednesday morning runs and we go to TJ like Tuesday, like Tuesday night, but just you know, but that was all camaraderie that was all part of learning. So you know, I think that I think that for me, and you you bring up like real fear. Yeah, my first day of practice dude was wild in Minnesota and John Randall, who is a Hall of Famer, he was an undrafted, free agent, Minnesota Vikings Hall of Famer, my very, very, very first day of practice. I get on the field when we you gotta remember it's cold in Minnesota at this time of year. During our first mini camp, I want to say it was like April, maybe it was maybe I want to say it was April then at that time, because I think the draft was a little bit earlier. And I remember we were at Winter Park in Prairie which is right outside of Minnesota, but that's where the home base is for the Vikings or was at the time. It's somewhere else now. But I got out there early as my coach told me to I will do I had the cleanest white. Like cleats on. I had my number ugly ass 49 jersey on cuz that's all they had left for me. And I'm doing my lap around the field and I hear this dude, like running really hard. And I'm not going to look behind me because I don't know why I'm not gonna I'm just not going to look behind me carrying a football. And this dude comes up from behind me just strips the football and then proceeds to cussed me out and rook you better hold on to that football rook. You think of the thing that's a loaf of bread. This isn't San Diego State. Like he already knew who I was and everything. He's like, I'm gonna be touching you all day and I better not see you carrying that ball at that again. I'm gonna do the exact same shit all day to you. You know, that was my first fricking lap around Winter Park. John Randall. That was his way of introducing me to the league. But he What's so funny is I became very close with John Randall over the years and I learned I earned his respect over time. And to this day, we talk on LinkedIn. I went back to Minneapolis the only other the only other time I've gone to a non Raven event was the 1998 20 year reunion. I went back there and there was like 35 of us that showed up for that which was amazing at the new stadium in Minneapolis and John was there. We smoke cigars. We drink whiskey. We talked about all the old school stuff that we used to do. We do we sit out after games. I mean, I earned so much respect for him used to bring me out with him sometimes after games. And one of the other things that was super cool. And the only reason why I'm remembering all this is because I was on that call yesterday with Pete Versuch who's a former Viking who I played with as well. And he's like, What was that nickname they used to call you? In Minnesota. I'm like All the reps today yo cuz I Youngbae Dado, they do all the reps, you know, because on Friday, before Sunday game, I was the only run young running back that probably wasn't going to suit up. So I would do all the reps and I loved it. If I didn't have all those reps dude, I would not have played one year, let alone 11 years in the league, they let me go. And I did everything against the ones with the ones and the coaches trusted me and their running backs trusted me and then that nickname stuck all the reps the day yo. So they would come in on Friday, I'd have to bring in their food. And they'd be like, we know who we know who got all the reps today, yo. That was like an ongoing joke. And it's stuck. And it's kind of funny how these little things that I almost forget sometimes, but those guys that were around, remember, and they have to remind me like what I did or like how they remembered me or, you know, we all have a little bit of a different memory of people from our little different angle. And I was sharing with Pete like my memory of him. And he was one of the first players. He was a linebacker drafted in the seventh round out of Notre Dame in 1994. And he was the first guy that ever pulled me aside and said, Yo, you got to slow your ass down. Like, we're playing Sunday. You got all the reps today, yo, but you're going too fast. Like you need to chill out. You know what I mean? And I remembered that, and I never forgot that. And I reminded him of that. He's like, I don't remember even saying that to you. He's like, always had respect for how hard you work like, oh, but yeah, but this particular day, you were pissed. He's like, Yeah, doesn't surprise me. That's typical stuff. That's the least what was his

Greg Spillane: 46:23

perspective that you need to slow down because we all have to play and like, you know, you're like, you can't like put us in a bad situation. That type of thing. Yeah, yeah.

Femi Ayanbadejo: 46:33

Yeah, exactly. It was like, hey, there's only 53 of us and only 47 of us are going to suit up and like we need every one of us and we get that this is your game. But like we're practicing and we don't mind you going 100 Because we're not like Fridays remember, you know we're shells I don't even patches the shells and helmets, right the soft shells. And so but I would go hard dude. Like every week you know, I would you know I if I was playing like I'll stop because you know remember Tampa and in the Raven, Tampa in the Vikings had a real big rivalry back then. I would be Mike Hallstatt some weeks I remember Mike Allsop would play tailback and yeah, right with work done. Wasn't Yeah, it was work done. And so one back would play like David Palmer would be worked on, I'd be like, all stop. So I get a ton of reps. So you know, I'd be juiced up all week just ready to give my look. And then when Friday would come it would be more about like the offense doing the offense and I would get those reps to like they would trip I would do that the look team and then I would do our offense, it would be awesome. And I loved it. That was like literally like my time to shine. And I think those reps in front of those coaches against our defense, like those guys all remembered me later because of that, you know, I'm saying so it was awesome. I

Greg Spillane: 47:39

love to try, man. And that's that's how you that's how you end up making a team as an undrafted, free agent and how you ended up playing, you know, 11 years of professional football, right? Yep. So I want to talk quickly about your MBA, I get something similar. You know, probably about the same age, I decided to go back I felt like there were a couple gaps in you know, my knowledge base that I wanted to fill. You go to USC, I went through the USC program.

Femi Ayanbadejo: 48:06

Yeah, I remember when you were I feel like I remember you going through it. And I think we talked briefly like kind of at that time, and I remember being so proud of you do because I remember thinking like that's a smart ass dude.

Greg Spillane: 48:16

Yeah, I appreciate that. Man. I felt the same way when I was you know, tracking your your journey going through Johns Hopkins. So what what was that decision process like?

Femi Ayanbadejo: 48:26

Yeah, you know, I think and you I will speak for you on this. But I got sick of being like the shiny object in the room. You know, he played with me. Yeah, I caught a touchdown pass for a minute. Cool. You played with with Randy Moss? Yeah, you play with Lebron James. Yeah. Man. You play. You have a super Yeah, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. But I'm not here to talk about that. I'm here to talk about business. I'm here to talk about how I can help your company. Okay, well, what's your degree in psychology? What? What have you done with that? Um, I played 11 years in the NFL. Okay. Well, that's why we're talking about the NFL, because there's not really a role for you. Yeah. And I mean, that's like little that's a that's a very short cut version of the conversation. You know what I mean? I thought the way that I looked at it, I never wanted to be handed anything. But I felt like I'm smart. I'm a hard worker, I'll learn things. And if you just give me a chance and bring me into your organization, whether it was real estate, or, you know, retail, or there were so many different things I was willing to try. But nobody really wanted to give me a chance. So I just thought, you know what, I love exercise. I love fitness. I'm, you know, I, I'm passionate about nutrition, sleep hygiene, Eastern philosophy, medicine, and I just had an epiphany, like, it makes sense for me to go down this this fitness and wellness path because it's up to me as an entrepreneur, I can do that. And so, um, when I officially retired in 2010, I opened up a training facility in La Jolla because I've been basically living in San Diego from 95 all the way up until 2014. When I left, and I had a great relationship with the community. People trusted me people knew me And, to this day, anyone knows that anything I do, I'm not going to have stepper bullshit my way through it. If I don't know, I'm not going to say anything, I'm going to learn it and then I'm going to talk about it. So a couple of partners, my personal trainer, his wife, who was also a personal trainer, they all trained at the Astec recreation center where I worked out all the way through my NFL career, basically, we decided to lease a spot in downtown La Jolla, we hired a contractor, dude, we did it from soup to nuts, bro, we, we did the demo, hired someone to do the demo, bought all the equipment, hire trainers. So I went through basically like a crash course. A crash course in business, and business development and strategy and scaling, like literally in like a six month window, you know, like, and I was like, enjoying it, you know. And so, in my mind, I had what I had all that was required to be a good personal trainer, but I needed to get my credential, which I got, eventually my certification, and I hit the ground running dude, I started making probably like, you know, two or three grand a month, and before I knew it, I was making like 1415 grand a month personal training. You know, I mean, I was training kids speed and agility camps, boot camps, I would be in at 6am doing a boot camp, I would leave at 6pm. Or I would leave at 8pm or 7pm, after doing a 6pm boot camp. And I would have you know, 789 clients, I was giving other trainers clients, I was I was using other trainers from other facilities in the jolla bringing them to our gym. So we were rocking and rolling. And then I had an epiphany. I got a Fitbit. And I was like, this is cool. I'm still rocking a Fitbit. Now actually, I got a Fitbit. And I was like, what like, what is this going to do for people like when it comes to like a cognitive behavioral stuff like is this going to actually motivate somebody to do something differently, like counting steps, because the early model Fitbits didn't really do much. It was like steps in distance, there was no heart rate, there was no active metabolic rate. There was no adding nutrition or any of that stuff. But it was pretty cool, though still. So eventually, I was like, why would I work with 100 people or 300 people when I could work with 100,000 or 300,000, I started seeing what applications could become. And I saw it really early. And it was very clear in my head when I needed to do so that right around 2011 is when all this stuff really started getting into my head in 2012. I ended up doing a entrepreneurial one week immersion program at Stanford through the NFL, they do it at a business school every year happened to be at Stanford this particular year, when you go to Stanford Business School, one of the best in the world, how can you not leave there feeling like I want to get my MBA, and our keynote speaker dude, which is wild as hell was Condoleezza Rice, sick. Monalisa rice. Yeah, right. Condoleezza Rice, and I talked for an hour afterward. And she's like, you know, just getting to the like, the thick of the conversation. She's like, why are you here? Like, what do you want to do? And I'm like, I think I think I want to go back to school, I think I want to get into the digital side of this kind of healthcare stuff that's happening. And she started picking my brain and, and before you knew it, dude, like to make a long story short with her, and I, we talked for, like I said, about an hour. And she's like, it sounds like you need to go to grad school. Sounds like you want. It sounds like you want to come here. And I was like, absolutely. But I had two kids at that point, you know, going to Stanford would have been selfish. So the first thing I had to do was unwind myself from my business in lawyer, I had to tell my trainers, I had to tell my clients to tell my partners, and I said, I'm going to give it a year, I'm going to unwind myself in a year in a very transparent, kind way, I'll sell my ownership and equity piece to somebody else, one of my buddies ended up buying it from me. And in 2013, I enrolled back at SDSU. And I studied microeconomics dude. And I started looking at business schools. And when these business schools saw that I had preemptively enrolled back in school to like, make sure I was ready. They love to talk to Georgetown, University of Maryland. And the reason why I chose a school in Maryland is because my old my kids were here. Had I gone to Stanford, or UCLA or back to SDSU. How does that help my kids? I wanted to be around my kids more. So that's why I chose Hopkins and to be honest, other than Stanford, none of these other schools had a bigger name than Hopkins, as far as I'm concerned. Did you know like, when I talk about Hopkins, everyone's eyes light up like and guess what, of course, would they say you're not getting into Hopkins? Bro, I was like, watching. Okay, let it watch me. So, in 2014, I got into Hopkins jumped into a full time Executive MBA program, there was 25 of us in my cohort 10 Fucking doctors bro. 10 doctors, like eight VPs of BD and like me. I'm saying I'm like the I'm like the black sheep literally literally and figuratively. Like, you know, I mean, like, it's funny because no one else had my background. You know what I mean? But dude, I went toe to toe like we would have massive crazy debates and it was awesome. It was 1010 it was like 10 seconds on campus. For seven days or eight days in a row, and then the rest of it was kind of like asynchronous group work. And then we had one out of the country trip we had to do and solve some, like problem in another country, somewhere I went to Ecuador, actually, I'm making, I'm not making it sound very glamorous, or very great, but it was amazing. But um, that was the program, it was a 20 month full time program. And yeah, and I use that time to flesh out the concept for health real. And really, what I really wanted for health real was a program that took some of what we get as professional athletes, which is that detailed analysis of our body composition, and our nutrition, and our exercise, and our sleep, hygiene and our mental health. And I know that all these things weren't big buzzwords when you and I were in college, but indirectly, we all kind of knew that all these things played a part. But as I got into the NFL, these things became really big gut health and Metabolic Typing. I had a PhD in this stuff, because if you mentioned anything that gave me an advantage, I was studying it, I was trying it like all day long, you know, supplementation. And as I mentioned, you know, the gut health stuff, and the food sensitivity stuff I was so big on and it was so important to me. And I got really good at really understanding what foods worked for me. And I believed that I could build a platform that I could give everybody that advantage that I had. And that was really the kind of Bud concept for health real. And I use Johns Hopkins as a safe space in that bubble to flesh out all my concepts and all my ideas. Some of them are really shitty, but guess what, I got A's failing, that makes sense. And what I mean by that is that the some of the business concepts were failures, but I got great grades, making my business case or, you know, better understanding, and a, you know, better understanding the coursework and excelling at the coursework. Although maybe my idea wasn't that great. But by the time I left, I had a really good proof of concept. I knew what direction I wanted to go in. And one of the best things that happened in my last quarter at Hopkins was I got introduced to NASA. There's a NASA lab right here in Greenbelt, Maryland, called NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. And I'm the first athlete in history retired or active to ever sign an exclusive licensing agreement to license an algorithm from NASA. And I embedded it into my health real platform. And once again, the platform's not done yet, we're still in beta, we've done plenty of fundraising, we have an active beta right now that's free, covers a ton of different biometric data gives some really good recommendations right now, from mental health to body fat percentage to ideal healthy body weight to macronutrient. splits to are you in the green or the red on depression, anxiety and stress, like, my goal is to have a one stop shop platform that on one side is is direct to consumer. And on the other, we have a b2b b2c platform. So think of the Uber app, right? I think reads even where on one side, you have the driver, and on the other side, you have the passenger? Well, guess what you have lines to where you don't need a driver, you just get a line and you hop on a line and you and you can just go do your own thing. Well, that's what health really is, we have a version that's direct to consumer, you don't need to have a trainer or anyone help you. And then we have another one where we're actually supporting the trainers and their clients. We're allowing the trainers to get some advantage over the competition by doing all the heavy lifting in regard to the biometrics for their clients, and really allowing them to have a platform like how you and I are talking, they can do the exact same thing with the assessment and the data right on screen. I know I'm glossing over it a little bit. But that's really the foundation of what health really is going to be. And one of the things one other cool thing I want to tell you is right now we're working on using AI and a neural network to project a one C. And for those that don't know, a one C is kind of the biomarker that they use in blood glucose to detect type two diabetes, we might be able to do it with a video from a user. We're working on that right now with University of North Carolina. Yeah, dude. So we're doing some dope, crazy cutting edge stuff. So

Greg Spillane: 59:03

yeah, the technology looks amazing. And I'm so excited for the product. And for people who don't know, I mean, a lot of this is done through video, right? I mean, you you open up the app. Yeah, take what the 10 second video of yourself. Yeah. And then using different AI and different algorithms, you're able to, you know, provide provide this kind of data. Are you you know, you talked a little bit about Fitbit earlier is that plans for it to to be able to take sort of like real time biometric data as well as feed that into the algorithm.

Femi Ayanbadejo: 59:33

What we do basically, is we, we gather some demographic data on the user, we gather some self reported data on the user and we have them upload a video and then we're able to produce like a 20 point assessment with current health states and then recommendations on health healthy health states. I won't go down a rabbit hole explaining that But anybody can go to health real calm, and if you have an iPhone You have to download testflight the apple property to do that, but you can use it for free. If you have an Android, you can just go right to the Google Play Store or my website and download it. That way, it's free. No code needed, you know, no TP nothing, you just literally use it, no problem free. Um, so once we gather all this data, you know, the goal here is to share stuff with with the users. So they have some idea on, you know, what a caloric deficit looks like, which is how you lose weight, understanding how unhealthy they might be, and how being overweight or obese leads to type two diabetes, which then leads to kind of, you know, a quality of life reduction, and then also a life expectancy reduction over time. I mean, that's just a fact. And so what we try to do is in Greg, the trick is, and I know, you know, this from business school, the trick is, is is not to, like, I know, I have something that has utility, I know I have something that is valuable, does the customer or the user know that? And what do I need to tell them or show them in a very intelligent, thoughtful, empathetic way that gets them to use it and buy into it and see the value that I know exists, right, other than having a doctor or a trainer, tell them I know, the doctor trainer route, which is the b2b to see route, I'm very confident about that. But I really want to do is build a community of early adopters or just people that see value. And these people are connected psychographically, not demographically. What I mean by that is, whether you're a type two diabetic, a pregnant mother to be a weekend warrior, or a professional athlete, there's something about health real that you find intrinsically valuable. And you may not look anything like the person who uses it. But for you, because there's something in it that you love, you will choose to use it. And that's a psychographic connection, not a demographic connection, you know what I mean? And that's really the goal. And I think I have a pretty good marketing idea. And I have some really good incentivization ideas on how to scale this. I'll save all that for another discussion if you want to hear about that. But ultimately, I think that the fact that we're able to aggregate mental health, emotional health, physical health, nutrition incentivization, along with asynchronous exercise programs, this is all going to be in one app, as opposed to some like, bifurcated, you know, multi prong thing where you need seven apps, the goal was to have this all in one. And I think that's our advantage, along with our IP, in the way that we built this, I think those are all our advantages. And when it comes to like Fitbit, and Apple and all these other companies, I think they all see the value in having something like this. It's just that no one's really done it, the closest thing to it is Amazon's Halo, if you ever get a chance, you can look up Amazon Halo, they are doing some of the stuff that we're doing. But between you and I, and I guess whoever watches this podcast, we created and filed our patents around health real way before Amazon Halo came out. So that's to be determined on what that all means, you know, that's going to be handled later. I'm not worried about it. Because I do believe that one restaurant in a outdoor mall, one, one restaurant in an outdoor mall is not an outdoor mall, you need a network effect of restaurants to bring people to a place. And I think that between Amazon Halo and health real and maybe that these new burgeoning companies, we can create some type of network effect, but I believe that we'll have the best product because I'm, I'm the one behind my product. I'm not Mark Zuckerberg, who stumbled on someone else's idea and fucking co opted. But good luck for a good job for him. He's he's gonna be a trillionaire. But at the end of the day, this concept is mine. Like I live it and I breathe it. I do it like I live it. You know, I'm not just somebody who tells you one thing and then I'm fucking eating a bunch of Doritos and shit on the side. Don't get me wrong. I like to have some Doritos once in a while. But it doesn't make up the bulk of my diet. You know, I'm saying like, I live it. And if you look at my Instagram page, you'll see I drink I have fun. But I also have a six pack. And I'm not trying to brag. I'm just saying that like, I take this shit seriously, but I'm not going to do all this and not have a good time. Like my girlfriend and I just went wine tasting in the Hamptons bro. And we drank a lot of wine and we drank a lot of tequila and we ate a lot of shit but guess what? I plan that I earned that and my goal is to get people to to adopt a lifestyle where they live healthy but they earn their fun that's really the goal.

Greg Spillane: 1:04:29

Absolutely. Man I wish I would have a bet against you. What what's next so you're you're an open beta. You're you're you're testing when when when do you hope to sort of get this thing out in the market and really get going on it.

Femi Ayanbadejo: 1:04:44

So dude, I wish Andrew was on here Klein, because he could probably fucking tell some horror stories or tell some real good stories about how he's probably helped some folks in his in his world but I've been trying to close out my series a dude for a while and It's a big chunk of money on a really nice valuation on my company. And as soon as we get that closed, it's going to be jet fuel. We're going to build everything that we're going to build. I have all the stakeholders, I have all the engineers, I have all the marketing folks just lined up waiting. As long as they don't bail on me, which if they did, I could just replacing them. I mean, I'm the architect, it's my design, you know what I mean? My team isn't going anywhere, like my close, like engineers and coders aren't going anywhere. But as long as we can close our Series A before the end of the year, my guess is by end of q2 and 2022, early q3 of 22. This will be rocking and rolling, dude. And we'll be out there marketing. We'll be out there selling and doing all

Greg Spillane: 1:05:43

potential investors out there. How much are you looking to raise and what valuation?

Femi Ayanbadejo: 1:05:46

Yeah, so the series A was completely bought out by one company $5 million. And, you know, due diligence is done. We're just trying to get a closed date right now. COVID is definitely affected it. The LPs are our foreign LPs, but everything is clean. They do have an office in Silicon Valley. I don't want to say more than that right now, just because, you know, we're not done yet. Have we closed I tell you the valuation, you know, the amount of the company they captured, you know, I tell you everything, um, and, and later when we get done with this, I'll tell you everything anyway, but the amount that we're raising is five mil and everything is you know, we were at the very very if this was a 10 mile race we're at. We're at mile 9.75 You know what I mean?

Greg Spillane: 1:06:28

Awesome, so Well, I really appreciate you, you coming on and talking a little bit about this. I know we had some technical difficulties along the way so well, we'll we'll see what what to redo down the road but I really appreciate it man. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the athlete entrepreneur. As always, the show notes will be available at athlete entrepreneurship.com You can follow me in the show there or on Twitter at Greg underscore Spillane. If you liked the show, please don't forget to leave a review. Thank you so much for listening. Have a great day.