Meet Brad Leggett! Brad has built multiple businesses, hosts his own podcast, and is a football fanatic. With years of experience connecting former NFL players to find stability in the chaos, Leggett is here and ready to chat with me and you about what YOU can do to be more prepared and connected.
Today I’m asking Brad some killer questions and you WON’T want to miss out on his answers. I asked him if NFL players are prepared for their post-athlete lives or if they too find themselves trying to escape the rat race, how he leverages networking, and what he wished he had known before he got into the NFL.
Learn through Brad’s experiences so you can work with what you’ve got and make it even better. And, as always, like and subscribe if you learn something from this episode!
Brad’s Links:
Email- brad@proplayersbusinessnetwork.com
Website- https://proplayersbusinessnetwork.com/
Take our passive income calculator: https://bit.ly/3xZOtuP
You can listen here or watch on YouTube!
TRANSCRIPTS
Speaker 1 (00:00):
That’s what you have over everybody else to get in that door. That’s why
Speaker 2 (00:04):
There’s players getting some pretty amazing results just with this kind of thing. Because really what you’re teaching is,
Speaker 1 (00:10):
It is unbelievable how unprepared or how naive you are or some people are when it comes to,
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Hello, my fellow Rippers. This is Chris Miles, your cashflow expert in anti Financianal advisor. We’re going to show that’s for you, that works so hard for your money and you’re now ready for your money to start working harder for you today. You want to become work optional where you work because you want to, not because you have to, and more than just about getting rich, it’s about living a rich life because as you are blessed financially, you now have a greater capacity to create a ripple effect and bless the lives of those around you. Thank you for tuning in today, guys. Appreciate you guys being a part of this show. Again, the fact that you guys have been binging on these episodes and sharing with others, and yes, I know now we’ve got two YouTube channels. We’ve got this Money Ripples podcast channel, and we’ve got the Money Ripples channel as well.
(01:14)
So be sure to subscribe and check those out today. Alright, so now I want to bring on guys I have here Brad Legget. Now Brad, if you guys know if you’re a football fan, you might know Brad, right? Especially if you’re a Saints fan. Brad actually played for the Saints back in the nineties as well as the Detroit Lions. And in fact, he was the first one to be the father and son combo to be playing in football at the same time on the same team. So kind of like what I said to him in the email, I was like, you’re like the king griffey of football apparently. So anyways, it’s really cool to have Brad here. What’s really cool about Brad is that with his story, since then, this guy has built multiple businesses. It’s become very successful in business affiliate marketing and nutrition company as well that he has ownership in. He even has his own podcast as well that we’ll talk about the Pro Players Business Network. Try to say that 10 times Fast, right? Pro Players Business Network podcast that you guys could definitely check out. Excited to have him on today. So Brad, welcome to our show.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
Hey, Chris, thank you so much for your time. And just to touch on something you just said, I’m a big believer in working smarter, not harder. So it falls right into everything you’re talking about. And to clarify one little thing, my father was one of the original saints back in 19 67, 68, and then I played in the nineties, so we didn’t play together, thank goodness we were 25 years apart, but we were the first in franchise history, which is a cool little tidbit.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
Gotcha. I mean he could have played, but it probably would’ve been pretty brutal on him, I’m sure.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Yeah, he was banged up from 12 years in the NFL and didn’t move very well.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
Yeah, bet. But he was coaching after that, is that correct?
Speaker 1 (02:53):
Yeah, my dad played 12 years in the NFL first round draft choice for the Chicago Bears in 1957 out of LSU, part of the original Monsters of the Midway. And then after 12 years playing, then he coached 25 years in the NFL. I missed his playing days, but I was around for his coaching days and would go to hang around training camp all the time when he was with the Raiders primarily and saw a big Raider fan.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Oh, I bet. Yeah. I’m sure there’s several people on here that are Raiders fans or hate Raiders fans. They’re probably one of the two. I’m sure
Speaker 1 (03:25):
That’s about right
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Now, I wasn’t planning on asking you this question, but what were some of the things that as you grew up, I mean you’re seeing your father coach, I mean, how did that influence you, not just as a player but as a person? What were the things that you picked up on early on that really influenced your life?
Speaker 1 (03:41):
Well, I tell you what, that’s a real interesting story and that’s my why. So my why throughout my years has been based on my childhood. So my father when I was coming up was about 350 pounds. His knees were a train wreck, his shoulder, I mean he couldn’t do anything. So I knew when I was in my teens, I didn’t want to be like that. So fitness and training has always been a passion of mine. So that’s why I am part owner of a nutrition company. I’ve had nutrition businesses in the past, and the other why and that’s relevant to nowadays is I saw the struggles my father had. I saw it on the family side with my mother and my siblings. And then when I started to play football, I played at USC in the late eighties, in the early nineties for three years primarily with the Saints teammates and saw their struggles and things they go through.
(04:32)
So I’ve always been very passionate about helping former players, families, et cetera, and that’s why I started Pro Players Business Network to give guys an opportunity after their playing days. If you think about it, your life in the NFL is very short unless you’re a Tom Brady or somebody like that. And the people that came before this generation now, they didn’t make any money. And when football ends for you, it’s very rarely ends on your terms. You’re either hurt or you’re no longer of use to the team, then you got to figure out what the hell you want to do because your passion until then, and the only thing you ever want to do is play football. Now you got to figure out the rest of your life. And so a lot of guys struggle with that and I did as well. And you go through this initially when it ends for you, you go through, have a bitter taste in your mouth towards the NFL because of how it ends, and then you get over it and then you embrace it because you realize that that’s what you have over everybody else to get in that door.
(05:32)
That’s why fast forward now to Pro Players Business Network. That’s why I’ve had so much success helping former players monetize their contact because now they have a name, they can get that appointment, they can reach out to that contact and leverage it and get a commission or put a deal together.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
And they don’t all have to become financial advisors or insurance agents. Right?
Speaker 1 (05:57):
Exactly. Exactly. They always say that your Rolodexes or your contact list is your most important and valuable thing. You have that in your name.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
Absolutely. What’s one thing that you wish you knew as a player that now in hindsight,
Speaker 1 (06:15):
My father always told me that it was a business and when you’re playing it, you’re still thinking it’s a game. And that’s probably the biggest thing is how cutthroat it really is. And look, I’ve heard there’s horror stories about teams just getting somebody pushing ’em back off of injured reserve just to get ’em on film so they can cut ’em. And nowadays it’s a little different. Nowadays players are much more protected than back in the nineties and eighties and seventies.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
Yeah, definitely. That’s a good point. It really is a business in and of itself. I mean, did you watch a lot of players, even now I’m sure you’re probably even talking to players that are either currently in the NFL or even just retired recently, whether by forced retirement or by choice, how unprepared are they when they come out of the NFL?
Speaker 1 (07:06):
So currently through my business Pro Players business network, I reached 15,000 retired players through a monthly newsletter. And I push out opportunities never where people have to play part to be involved, just get involved and leverage your contacts. And I tell you, the amazing thing to me is one on LinkedIn that you don’t mention that you played in the NFL. That to me is just mind blowing that you wouldn’t put that in your, you can do a little subject line what you’re doing that you don’t embrace it, you don’t put that. And I tell you what I do a lot of Zoom calls and seeing guys on Zoom calls. They don’t have their name down, so you don’t know who the heck it is. Number one, they’re walking around or I got guys that take changing. It’s just the one professional, it just blows my mind. There was one business appointment, one of my partners went with them to it. They showed up in sweats to a business meeting. And so you hear this and you’re like, it is unbelievable how unprepared or how naive you are or some people are when it comes to business and how you present yourself.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
That’s really, you’re trying to train them almost like they’re coming out of high school.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
You know what? It’s unchartered waters for them. And look, I’m far from an expert. There’s just little certain things that I know are very effective and I try to help ’em with that. And look, everybody’s got their journey and it’s just a matter of being at the right time at the right place.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
I know a lot of people would probably look at these players and say, wow, what would it be like to have that kind of career? It paid so well, man, if my life were like, that’d be so great. Because we get people that are anywhere from business owners that are maybe small business owners trying to start out to anywhere. Maybe they’re more viable or scaling their business. They could be middle managers working as employees where they feel like they’re kind of capped what they can make. And a lot of the people watching this show, they’re kind of looking at this like, Hey, how do I escape that rat race? How do I get to the point where I don’t have to keep in their own way, destroying their own body or burning up all their time, their good years of their life, having to work hard so that they can maybe have some sort of retirement. Do you find that a lot of players are in their own rat race?
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Oh, absolutely. And look, it’s a big misconceptions when, oh, you made so much money, you never have to work again. That’s very rare. Now, nowadays, they get paid a lot more. So you go back to the nineties than before that all of those guys have to work unless they’re a Joe Montana or some national figure. The one thing that I’ve learned in my business, prop business network is, sure, I have some national guys in there that are nationally known, but primarily these guys are regionally known and regionally they’ve got a lot of juice. They can get into a door, they can set a meeting and so forth. So the one thing I always stress with people is take advantage of what you have and it’s all who, who you can get access to and having the right thing to bring to them.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
How do you help ’em decide which direction to go, for example? Because obviously they could do all kinds of things with that kind of Rolodex. I mean, what’s the way to help guide ’em along to find that thing, so to speak for them?
Speaker 1 (10:36):
Well, what I do in my newsletter is I push out different opportunities and my rules that I push out or I never want to touch money. You’re contracted up directly with the company, not with me. Never any pay to play opportunities. I don’t promote network marketing or multilevel marketing programs and things where it is nothing more than making a very warm introduction. You don’t need to, there’s an old analogy, some people want to know what time it is. Some people want to know how the clock is made. You don’t need to know how the clock is made. You just need to know enough to set an appointment and do what is required to do that. And so I don’t decide what anybody, where they go, what hole they fit in, or I just push out opportunities. And perfect example, this last month’s newsletter, I pushed out an opportunity in wound care. So if you knew people in the medical space, mobile wound care nurses, podiatrist, that kind of thing, reply to this also pushed out doctor’s offices if you know orthopedics or any kind of doctor’s office got something for them. And then the third thing I pushed out was if you wanted opportunities to be sent to you, right? Something as simple as that. So three different buckets and really both the doctors and the wound care feed the same thing. So those lists kind of overlap, but that’s what I pushed out last month
Speaker 2 (12:07):
And you were telling me before we went on the air, there’s some players getting some pretty amazing results just with this kind of thing. Because really what you’re teaching is something I’ve brought up on this podcast before, which is there’s a lot of people trying to put in labor like their human capital, but one forgotten type of capital that many people forget about is the relationship capital where it doesn’t require money to make money with that. And a lot of times there’s a lot about leverage that people overlook. And that’s exactly what you’re talking about here.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
That’s all it is, is who and who you can get access to. I always think that I’m about one person removed from anywhere I want to go, and everybody that’s listening, your most valuable thing is who you know and who they might know to get you to that next person. And so it’s just a matter of having some direction, finding the right thing that’s vetted that. One of the things I always do is I do a complete background check through the NFL, so make sure that whoever I do business with, there’s nothing in their background that’s shady. And then go through the check the boxes, make sure that I always try to find something proprietary, something that’s residual, and make sure that there’s always an incentive program where you’re incentivized to bring in others. Sure, you can bring in businesses direct and you’ll make more money, but also a lot of people. So you bring somebody else in, now you’re tapping into their network and you can monetize that as well. So those are the kind of things I try to focus on when I pick a program.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
And there are options for people where they say, Hey, I don’t, like you said they don’t want to see how the clock works. They just don’t want to know one know the time, but they’re just like, I’m just going to be a connector. I’m going to connect this person. I know this doctor to this person over here in this business and just be a connector. Is there that option too?
Speaker 1 (13:54):
Primarily, that’s all it is.
Speaker 2 (13:56):
Oh, okay. So they didn’t even have to again, become the expert in that arena. They’re just making introductions.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Well, with the latest program and the main focus I’m doing now on this wound care thing, it would take six months to a year to understand this, where you can talk about it. We don’t want that because of what I have access to. We were able to put a program together with the second largest skin graft company in the United States. And all we want is to make warm introductions a certain way. We have a system in place and then you can be on the calls or not. It’s up to you. But I try to make it very simple for these guys. But these guys also are not just former players, they’re also regular people. So I try to get everybody involved because everybody’s got contacts.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
So obviously you’re focused towards players is something that even other people can do outside of the profession.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Chris, I want you to do this. There we go. There we go. And look, so with the stuff I’m pushing out now, I tell you that the lowest hanging fruit is the podiatrist because podiatrist or dealing with diabetic foot ulcers, and that’s one person making the decision for a facility. And on that account alone, you could be making 25 grand a month. This is the most incredible thing I’ve ever seen.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
Wow. Tell us more. What exactly is it doing?
Speaker 1 (15:26):
Well, let me take a step back. So eight years ago I started Pro Players Business Network. And I started this because two of my teammates from USC Committed Suicide Hall of Famer, junior Stout, and Scott Ross, they unfortunately had some head trauma issues and things didn’t work out, didn’t work out for them. About the same time the NFL concussion litigation was just starting up. One of the law firms reaches out to me, I’ve always been a connector, and they asked me if I could help get them clients. I was able to get ’em 1500 clients thinking that they was going to help. So many people, lawyers are who primarily made the money. But I built an email list of about 6,000 former players at the time, and as I’m talking to guys, just like I’m talking to you, oh, you do this. Oh, you should talk to such and such.
(16:10)
They do something similar. You might have some synergy between you guys. And I found myself doing that over and over again and I reached out to the NFL alumni and said, Hey, you guys should do a business networking site because I’m connecting guys here that are doing business, then I think there’s something here. And they never got back to me after three emails. So that’s when I started Pro Players Business Network. And so that was eight years ago. And so now I reach about 15,000 former players and a lot of just regular people through my newsletter. I forgot what your question was.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
I got sidetrack. You kind of said it right there because I was talking about even people outside the network, outside the profession. And you were saying that obviously there’s people that follow your newsletter. So is that the best way for people to follow you if they want to learn what kind of opportunities there are like this?
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Yeah, absolutely. And we could drop my email into your feed or something and have people email me direct if they want to learn about this. And I tell you what, if you have relationships that are doctors, we got opportunities that are vetted background check through the NFL security that are real. And like I said, you’ll be papered up directly with the companies, not with me. And you don’t have to go to medical school to learn how to talk about it. It’s really something how this has grown and it blows my mind every day
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Pretty much the qualification is if you know people, this is like a no brainer is what
Speaker 1 (17:38):
You’re saying. No-brainer. No-brainer. Giving you an opportunity to leverage what you have, which is your contacts
Speaker 2 (17:46):
Again, that forgotten capital. So many people forget about most people the show, they think about the financial capital, like how I take my savings, turn it to passive incomes through real estate or wherever it might be. But you’re saying, Hey, come on, we got relationships. You don’t even have to be the one doing the work. This is in a lot of ways I would call this more residual income in a lot of ways rather than passive, but it’s similar
Speaker 1 (18:07):
A hundred percent. And that’s one of the criteria when I push stuff out is making sure it’s a residual. So once it’s set, it’s kind of set it and forget it.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
And how long can that relationship go for?
Speaker 1 (18:20):
We’re rolling out some stuff on the medical side. Sure. We’re starting with wound care, but we’re about to start getting into biologics, which is exosomes and different things like that, which is an offshoot of stem cells, but that’s going to go on for years.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Wow. And you said you got guys in, the former players are making a hundred thousand plus a month just doing this kind of word
Speaker 1 (18:41):
I
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Being a connector.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
Yes. When I was pushing out ERC employee retention credit program, that was hot and heavy a year or so ago, I had guys making a hundred grand a year. Yeah. Or excuse me, a month.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
That’s incredible.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
Well, that’s awesome. And all they were doing is making introductions.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
Awesome. Well, if you want to email you, reach out. What’s the best way to do that?
Speaker 1 (19:05):
The easiest way is Brad, BRED at Pro Players Business Network all one word.com. And that’s also my website, pro players business network.com.
Speaker 2 (19:18):
Awesome. We’ll put it on the show notes, of course, just so people can follow you. Any last piece of advice you would give? Any big things that you’ve learned? Now you’ve been out of the league and now you’ve built this network. What’s one last piece of advice you’d give people?
Speaker 1 (19:33):
Well, I tell you what, Chris, just listening to you in our pre-call in this man, what you’re doing is so valuable and so important with the way the economy is right now. We have to do stuff things on the side and we have to do other things to create wealth. And so to your point, the last thing we think about is our contacts. And that’s the first thing I always think about, who I can get access to and bring something of value to them. So the one thing I would say to people that are listening is your contacts and your name are the most important thing you got so true. And you can always leverage that.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
Great advice, Brad. Appreciate it. Well, everybody, again, we’ll put that in the show notes there. You can email, Brad, go visit his website. Hey, if this is something that spoke to you, you’re saying, you know what? This is something that’s untapped potential in me and my situation that maybe I haven’t even considered or looked into yet. Or maybe you haven’t considering it. Go reach out to Brad and see how you can best create value for him. Well, not even just for him, but for yourself too. So guys, the challenge is this, is that you can be a hear of the word or you can be a doer as well. Doer is the ones that get it done. Go and make it a wonderful prosperous week. We’ll see you later.
Speaker 3 (20:58):
Thank you. Yes. Hey,
Speaker 4 (21:07):
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