How Kenny Beecham Became the New Face of NBA Media

0:00Support comes from Amazon Business. Unlock smart business buying with fast, free delivery on millions of items and practical AI innovations that automate repetitive tasks so you can make smarter decisions faster. Learn more at AmazonBusiness.com. Bloomberg Audio Studios. Podcasts. Radio. News.

0:27Welcome back to The Deal. I'm Jason Kelly alongside Alex Rodriguez. And Alex, we're here in New York together. It's good to be like around the table chopping it up. So let's talk about what's going on in your world because there's a ton going on. Wolves, Lynx, you just came here to New York from Minnesota. Big celebration. This is a big moment in Wolves history, I dare say. Tell me about it. I think in the whole Minneapolis and Twin Cities, I mean, it was really bringing KG home after many years. Yeah, Kevin Garnett, who is like the Babe Ruth of the Minnesota Timberwolves. And it was such an emotional night for so many fans.

1:04I saw countless amount of fathers wearing 21 because that's who they came up watching. And the sons or the daughter wearing number five with Anthony Edwards. Oh, wow. Then both of them got to meet, KG and Ann got to meet right before tip-off, which was a great moment. and also like watching Kevin Garnett walk into Target last night on Sunday and saying hello to all the ushers. You're talking about Target Arena, not just a Target store. Right, right, Target Arena, correct, correct. It could have happened at Target. Could have happened at Target, and people would also be very excited there. But just like even some of our ushers, young folks in the parking lot, the valet, just the cooks, the chefs, everyone.

1:45It was like a big hug. It was a big homecoming, and it's like bringing Minneapolis' favorite son back home. It was really cool. I mean, you're exactly right. As a fan of the game, I mean, I can tell you that until Ant, with all due respect to every other player who's been with the Wolves, until Ant really leveled up and has delivered on being, I think, in many ways, the new face of the NBA, KG was the Wolves to me. I mean, he really was. You know, he was this transcendent player. I acquainted him with the team and the team with him. So it must have been really cool. It was really cool. And he was so gracious.

2:23And you can tell he had his heart into it. He has two beautiful daughters there. He had his partner's girlfriend there with him and some of his team members. And even though he left the Timberwolves to go to the Celtics where he won a championship, he is truly synonymous, Kevin Garnett, with the Minnesota Timberwolves. Yeah. And you need that energy. You need a lot of energy because you're headed into the playoffs. And guess what? The Nuggets. Good Lord. It's going to be an epic battle. Both teams have so much respect for each other. You know, very evenly matched two kind of generational players with the Jokic, which, you know, perennial MVP and Anthony Edwards.

3:03And both teams are playing well. But I'm also excited if you zoom out, the whole NBA is set up now, both Eastern and Western, for an epic playoff couple of months. Yeah, it's interesting. I did an event recently with Whit Grosbeck, who obviously you know well, the CEO and still a co-owner of the Celtics. And I mean, good Lord, the storyline around that team is unbelievable with Tatum coming back. My Atlanta Hawks still in the mix. And, you know, it feels like sometimes and we've seen this in baseball. We see it in basketball. We see it in other sports as well. But I feel like especially baseball and basketball, often there's like one or two storylines.

3:43It feels like there are 10. here. In both divisions, right? The Knicks are always interesting to see how they come up. Obviously, huge fan base. You mentioned the Celtics, but someone to watch very closely, a team to watch is the Charlotte Hornets. We recently played them and they are fierce. They play hard and they're well coached. Yeah. All right. So perfect timing for this week's episode, because we're going to be talking with Kenny Beachum. You know, this is a guy who you talk about NextGen. He is a real NextGen broadcaster, creator who has taken the NBA by storm. He really broke through because he was streaming NBA 2K games on Twitch back in 2011.

4:21So that's a minute ago, especially because he's quite a young guy. He's got his own media company called Enjoy Basketball. He started that about four years ago. But now he's done these big partnerships, one with NBC Sports, and just recently he announced a new deal with NBA TV. He's going to do a three-episode original series called Enjoy the NBA Trivia Show. He did an alt cast just recently of the Pistons-Hornets game. I loved our conversation with him because he's bringing the energy, and that's what the NBA wants and needs. Jace, no doubt about it. Look, this guy's a star. I still remember like it was yesterday when, of course, Joe Buck did his first World Series with the great Tim McCarver.

5:03Rest in peace. And he was 26 years old when he did the first World Series for Fox. Joe was. Joe was. And of course, his father, legendary Hall of Fame Jack Buck, will see you tomorrow night, the original. A home run by the wizard. But I think this young man reminds me of the new era of Disruptors. I mean, this is how probably the new Joe Bucks are going to look like. So look for him in for many, many years to come to be breaking a lot of news and creating a lot of great content. Yeah. Tons of content coming from Kenny Beecham and we get into it. So coming up, Kenny Beecham.

5:49Welcome back to the deal. I'm Jason Kelly alongside Alex Rodriguez. So psyched to have with us, Kenny Beecham. You know, this is a voice, Alex, that is so important to growing the game of basketball, something you and I think about all the time. Kenny, you're joining us from Chicago. Great to be with you. Yeah, I appreciate that. Growing the game is something that's been on my mind for, I don't know, as long as I've been doing content. So I'm happy that you said that because that's one of my main goals as a creator. So let's talk about that. How do you get into this? Do I have it right? You were literally like working at a vitamin store and, you know, just making ends meet, doing your thing, but also dabbling on YouTube.

6:25But give us the origin story. Give us the Kenny origin story here. Yeah, so it actually starts way before that. I was 13 years old and I asked my dad for this thing called the Dazzle. And as someone that grew up watching a bunch of other content creators, the Dazzle is the thing that you hook into your Xbox on one end, the TV on the other end, and then your computer. And that's how you record a gameplay back in the day. And I just saw other YouTubers that were really cool and I was like, oh, I can replicate that. And I did it for a very long time. Obviously not as a job. I'm 13 and I'm just doing it for fun.

6:54And eventually you have to start thinking about jobs and stuff. So once I left high school and started college, I was still doing YouTube. It was doing OK, but didn't even have a paycheck at that point. So if you think about I'm doing YouTube for like four years just for the love of the game. And I'm at the vitamin shop. You know, I'm going through all of this training in the back of my mind. And every shift, I'm like, what type of content can I create when I get home? So I'm kind of doing like this dual, you know, eight hours here and then eight hours at home on the content. And then there was one time where I got a check from YouTube, which is like a monthly check.

7:26That was the exact same amount of money as the amount of money I was making at the vitamin shop. And for me, it wasn't a ton of money. Right. Because I'm still a college student. But I'm like, OK, this is the start of something. And my dad had one rule. As long as I lived with him, it was like, if you live in here, you're going to stay in school. It's in community college. Cool. And I sat him down once and like put together a full PowerPoint presentation. Because one thing my dad has drilled into the brains of me and all my siblings is that, you know, hard work and school are the two things that matter the most to him.

7:54So I had to present to him why I want to quit my vitamin shop job in order to create content full time. And he was very skeptical. He's like, it's really just one paycheck. Your month paycheck from YouTube is equivalent to your two-week check here. So really, the math is not math. You know what I'm saying? But eventually, he agreed completely. I always say that the timing is the most important part of my ascension. I had to be ready for that timing and then take advantage of that timing. But it was basically right when the boom happened, the ad boom and YouTube and the... So what year is this?

8:26Pardon me. Tell me what year is this. This has to be 2017. This is 2017. And it started to take off. By that second YouTube check, I'm now tripling what I was making at the vitamin shop. So the timing was just perfect. And, you know, I kept my word to my dad. I finished with my associate's degree in community college, but I did not go back to finish that bachelor's. YouTube stuff was doing so well that I was like, I'm going to take a semester off, which is something a lot of college kids tell themselves. And I'm one of those college kids that said that and then never really went back because the YouTube thing was becoming a full time gig.

9:00So it's been truly a blessing. It's been a lot of a lot of work. But like I wouldn't want any other job, any other profession. And this is exactly where I want to be in life. So, Kenny, when you think about you're born and raised in Chicago, I'm sure your pops, Bulls fan like you, probably love Michael Jordan and that team. OK, as you think about the trajectory of your career starting when you were 13, who were some of your role models that you said one day I want to be like X? So I fell in love with basketball in like 2002, 2003. At that point, I'm seven, eight years old. And everybody wants to be an athlete when they grow up.

9:35Right. You know, you play. baseball, football, basketball. That was my main three. I want to grow up and I want to be like Allen Iverson. Obviously that didn't materialize, but he was definitely the athlete icon that I had. And I got to give a lot of praise to my dad, honestly. Like my dad was a truck driver for, if I'm 29, he's a truck driver for 28 years. The moment he found out my mom was pregnant, he said, Hey, I need a real profession. So I watched him leave for work at midnight and come home after I did from school, just from truck driving and was present all the time as a parent, never missed a ball game, never missed a basketball game.

10:11So he was really my true icon, right? I wanted to work as hard as my dad and I want to make him happy. And I mean, he texts me almost on a daily how happy he is of me. So I think I think I'm winning. I think I'm winning on that. Yeah. Yeah. And so let's talk about AI for a second. So I had the good fortune of going to Georgetown same time Alan was there. Cool. Here we go. And I have to say, I mean, that's a flex in a way. I mean, I don't know. I just happened to be there. And then he showed up and obviously becomes an iconic force. But I think what strikes me as so interesting about you choosing him is he changed the culture of basketball.

10:50And, like, he changed the culture of what it meant to be a professional athlete, especially in the NBA. And I think there's a real argument that the culture of basketball today, even the way that a lot of players, whether it is LeBron, whether it was Kobe, whether it is Anthony Edwards, to use an example very close to home for Alex, like they all are standing on the shoulders of AI. Do you agree with that? And what is it about basketball culture that sort of allows you to create the sorts of shows that you're creating? Because it feels like that's very much the conversation you're in. Yeah, 100 percent.

11:27I think the Allen Iverson thing for me was he looked like me. And I think that mattered a lot. Obviously, a lot of the league looks like me. But the way he was dressing back then, you know, that was what I looked out the window and saw here in Chicago. So I'm like, oh, my God, he's he's from, you know, the inner city and he can raise the MVP trophy one day. And like that really resonated with me. And he really did. like you said, change the culture of basketball. And one thing that we're trying to do with our company is do something very similar, maybe not to the same extent as Alan Iverson, right?

11:55Because we're talking about when it comes to true culture changes in basketball, we're trying to change the culture around the way it's viewed from the fan base. I felt like growing up, I didn't see a ton of negativity around the sport, around our stars and things like that. And when we came up with the idea of Enjoy Basketball as a company, we wanted to change the culture. We wanted to look at our star players. And obviously, you know, athletes are going to make mistakes and you have to point out those mistakes when necessary. But at the end of the day, it's a kid's game that we all really love.

12:26And I just wanted to try to use my audience to push that on a daily to nightly basis. So, like, we have games where sometimes our star players don't have the greatest shooting night. But, like, I did watch what he did on the defensive side of the ball. And I think we should praise those type of things. So we're just trying to be forefront and changing the way we think and all of those things and appreciating the players.

13:10to make smarter decisions. Empower your team to buy with confidence. Learn more at amazonbusiness.com.

13:23So Kenny, for our audience who's a very smart, sophisticated business audience, really high level, what is it exactly that you do on YouTube? And the second question is, as you see it, what is the value proposition to not only the viewer, but the customer? So on YouTube, I do a bunch of different things. I think it started off as a gaming thing and I still do some of the gaming stuff, but I try to look at what I'm producing on YouTube or the shows that were NBC as I am a, what I would say, average NBA fan that cares a ton, right? So when you turn on these different places with the ESPNs of the world, the Fox Sports of the world, a lot of those people are either former players or people that are journalists So I went to school for broadcasting and I kind of just look at myself as, hey, I'm just a guy.

14:13Like, if you look at the office that I watch my games in, you would see I'm just a guy with three monitors that care about basketball. And I think I've got a point in the market where, you know, there is a world where, of course, you want to hear what Shaquille O 'Neal is saying. You want to hear what the Nick Wrights of the world are saying. But sometimes you kind of want to hear what the kid from Chicago is saying about your favorite player. And that is a value that I feel like I bring. a lot of times I kind of explain it the voice of the casual fan, even if I like maybe watch the game more than a casual fan.

14:42But I like to think that I look at the game that way where it's consumable for everybody. Whether you're a guy that loves great X's and O's, I can provide some of that. Or if you're a guy that doesn't watch basketball, but want to keep up with the sport, I'm a guy that could provide the type of content for you as well. So I like to think that I'm kind of like a, I'm like the Jaden McDaniels of covering all of the different things for the NBA. I like it. I like it. I like that a lot. So the player's voice versus the casual fan's voice, I really like that. How does that play into the shows you're developing?

15:12Take us inside that process. Yeah, absolutely. When we started Enjoy, what turned into Enjoy, I was, again, just a YouTuber. And something had happened in the YouTube space called the Adpocalypse, where one of the biggest YouTubers on the platform did some less than ideal things. And a bunch of big brands turned away from advertising on YouTube. So I would get, let's say, the same amount of views as I did the previous month and the paycheck would be one third of it. And I was like, oh, my God, that's that's a little rough. I just moved out. So I got to try to diversify my portfolio and not just be a YouTuber.

15:44And the way I thought about it is I still want to play in this world of basketball. So what's next outside of just creating individual content? What if I created a podcast? Yeah, we have a group chat, me and the guys that I went to school with. We all love the game equally. What if we just put some microphones in front of each other and just riffed about the sport? And that turned into the inception of Enjoy Basketball for me, Mike, Derek and Pierre on, I guess at this point, because of our new partnership five times a week are talking about the games that we just watched the previous night. So originally, I just wanted to make sure that if this adpocalypse thing was real, I had a backup plan.

16:19Right. That was the whole thing. And then eventually the ads came back. And now I got two things in my portfolio. That's pretty interesting. And I partnered up with Cody and Cole Hawk, who are the duo behind Up No for Management. I was looking for a management group. The YouTube channel had taken off from 100 ,000 subscribers to 800 ,000 subscribers in a couple months. I'm getting emails from brands, from people that want to partner. I have no idea what I'm doing here. And I took so many different interviews to try to figure out who I want to partner with. And the thing that made them different than some of the other people that I interview is that they had a full five-year plan about this is what we can do now.

16:55which is just accept some ad money to do some deals here, but we want to do something bigger. And that bigger is enjoy basketball, right? It started off, again, just a single show and a newsletter. Then it turned into merch. Then it turned into a podcast network where we have four shows under. Then it turned into social media where now we have two social media shows. So again, the right place, right time plays a big part, but teaming up with the right people plays an equal part, in my opinion. I love what you said here. I wrote it down. The voice of the casual fan. Right. I love that. And you're right.

17:27People do want to know with a young, smart kid from the inner city of Chicago. What is he talking about? Because ultimately, that's what AI was. You talked about culture and I love that. But let's just say hypothetically play along here. If I made you chief content officer or chief marketing officer for the Timberwolves and the Lynx, what are some of the handful of things you'll be thinking about to create value for both teams? Start maybe with the Lynx and then go to the Wolves. Yeah, I mean, I think that the city in itself has two of the biggest stars in each of the leagues, right? And I think that's where we start off with.

17:59Between Nafisa Collier and Anthony Edwards, you have, like, legit two MVP candidates in the city of Minnesota. And I would try to leverage that as much as possible, right? Anthony Edwards is amazing in front of the camera. That's one of the reasons why he is a fan favorite. And Nafisa has been a voice of the people. If you think about, you know, the finals from a few years ago, she wasn't afraid to kind of say the things that she believed in. And even on a smaller scale, as someone that has talked to a guy like Nas Reed, there's so much personality within that locker room. And I think the way you can bring value is to have the casual fan recognize that personality.

18:31Because we all can see stats. We know that Anthony Aarons is averaging 27.5 points per game. That's cool. But Anthony Aarons, the person, is where you fall in love with him as a player. Same thing with Allen Iverson. I knew he was averaging whatever many points. But it's when we got to the interviews. The on-court swag. And I think that is where you start. And you bridge off of that. I don't. So I would just leverage the personalities first and see what happens after that. And so it's interesting to Kenny sort of building on some of the things you're saying. And and as you describe sort of the broad portfolio of enjoy basketball, you know, obviously a key moment comes when you do this partnership.

19:08And this was just late last year with NBC. And so I think what's so fascinating, and Alex and I talk about this on the show so much, is this sort of soup of media brands and sort of distribution that we're all living in, whether it's even, you know, for us on this show, we think about, you know, all the different platforms. You know, you're thinking about YouTube. You're thinking about NBC. You're thinking about social media. Walk us through the NBC deal. I know you've been doing some work with ESPN. How does this all come about, and how does it take shape? Yeah. So I want to give a lot of love to the team over at House of Highlights because they were the ones that really took a chance on me and the rest of the guys.

19:49I sent the code email, something I don't know if I've done since then, to the general manager of House of Highlights. I had heard on a podcast Omar Rajah, who was the creator of House of Highlights, went on to JJ Reddick's podcast actually and said, hey, we're about to branch into YouTube. And at that point, they were just a social media platform. And I said, hey, I'm a YouTuber with so-and-so amount of subscribers. We have a show. and they gave us a small deal to kind of figure some things out. And we were able to build off that to go to Omaha Productions slash ESPN, where we had a show two times a week.

20:17And then we branched off to go to NBC. And though I have so much love for our previous partners, the NBC one is the one that feels so much like home. Because again, growing up, NBC is the place for basketball, right? Between, you know, the theme songs and all the graphics packages. I mean, this is exactly where I wanted to be, right? So we took every interview we could get when our contract was up with Omaha. Crazy story. I fly into Connecticut to meet with the team over at NBC. As nervous as can be. I'm not a sweaty guy, but that day, the sweatiest day of my life. Right. So I'm getting there and I'm like, OK.

20:52And I thought things went great. So I'm like, OK, quick turnaround. My flight is in a few hours. I get to the airport. My flight is completely canceled. And now I have to stay in New York City for an extra day. And they couldn't get me on another flight for four days. Now I have a wife and two kids at home, so I can't stay in New York for an extra four days. So I rent a car and I drive from New York City to Chicago. And when I get that rental car, I text my manager, say, this is going to be one hell of a story once we sign with NBC. And the entire time I'm driving the 11 hours home, I'm just thinking about all the things that I can do if this partnership worked.

21:26And so far through, let's see, six months of working together, some of those things I was thinking about in that car ride home has come to fruition. Right. I now have my own individual show on the network along with the show that I thought they were initially interested in. So the one thing that I really appreciated from it, because this is their first year having rights back, is it was a blank slate. When we were with ESPN, it was amazing. But you know the pecking order in ESPN. You know who the top dogs are. In order to get up there, it's going to be really tough. But with NBC, they were like, hey, man, we value you as a creator.

21:59We value you as a voice. And you're kind of like a rocket ship. It doesn't we don't have to stop anywhere just because we have so and so else on the roster. So they've been perfect. And, yeah, we're just trying to fulfill our duties and make sure that they're getting the value that they initially thought. And hopefully that is the case and we can keep going for forever, honestly. I mean, it is interesting that moment when we all heard, you know, like, I mean, it's like, you know, world with the new Arkani. But like for us, like that was such a major moment in our, I think, almost like parasocial relationship with the NBA because part of it obviously was Michael and Barkley and everybody else who was playing in those moments and obviously later AI and LeBron and others.

22:49But like that, the sort of cultural context of NBC sort of coming back in, but coming back in, as you say, in a way where it's like, all right, it's a different world. And obviously getting into business with you is a big moment. You know, I'm not glazing you. I'm more just saying like this idea of – did you see that I used that correctly, Alex? Do you like that? I'm watching it. All right, next. I mean, my 20-something-year-old boys are going to be so impressed that I just used that. And then they're going to be cringing that I then bragged about using it correctly. But, you know, it's fine. But, you know, this idea that it was an interesting reset for them and then to take advantage of the fact that there are creators out there who are doing this.