POWER PLAYERS 005 - Monica Abbott

Players and coaches from 3 WNBA teams (LA Sparks, Dallas Wings, and Washington Mystics) discuss:

In a new, and different style podcast than what you're used to, the athletes listed below discuss:

1. Advantages/disadvantages of playing in the WNBA's 'Wubble' at IMG Academy in Florida
2. What activities unstructured time
3. The food
4. Must-Pack items
5. And so much more!

PLAYERS

Nneka Ogwumike

Seimone Augustus 

T’ea Cooper

Moriah Jefferson

Chelsea Gray

Nneka

Bella Alarie

Katie Lou Samuelson 

Brittney Sykes

Sydney Weise

Candace Parker

Satou Sabally

Megan Gustafson

Reshanda Gray

Alaina Coates 

COACHES

Brian Agler

Mike Thibault

“I didn’t want to be one of those people that hung around and tarnished what I had built in my career if I wasn’t all in it. I’m either 100% in or 100% out and, at that point, I knew I had to be out… because I wasn’t 100% in. 80% is not good enough.” - Miesha Tate

From cupcakes to the evolution of the female talent pool in MMA and from Tacoma to Singapore: Miesha Tate like you’ve never heard her before: open, honest, and vulnerable about life in and beyond the octagon.  

Miesha talks about character building in her high school wrestling career- on the mat and at home, her most poignant “pick-yourself-off-the-floor” moment, and if she saw her retirement from UFC coming. Tate takes the listener inside her inside-the-Octagon cognitive awareness and discusses moments of self-reflection after retirement.

There's also a Bathroom Birth: a play by play. For the FIRST time, Miesha Tate talks about how her son Daxton took stay-at-home orders to a new level…. By being born in her bathroom... followed by a deep discussion on life’s little surprises and on motherhood.

There’s a transparent dialogue about, of course, Ronda Rousey. 

•  Symbiotic relationship with Ronda Rousey: who benefitted more from it?
• After believing that she and Ronda would enter the HOF together, what did Miesha Tate think about Rousey’s induction speech?
• Was it real?
• Communication post-MMA career

Currently, what was item number one on VP Tate’s agenda for One Championship, what is the longterm scope of the league, and a discussion about how cultural norms and lifestyle compare the opportunity of female MMA fighters in Asian culture against that of Western female fighters.

LISTENER QUESTIONS:

• Kevin in NJ: Did you ever think about joining the WWE like Lesnar and Rousey?

• Mike from Queens: One Championship - What’s the biggest difference between being involved in a match in Asia vs USA?

“You’re always going to come across somebody, at some point in your career, that doesn’t really think you belong there [but] you’ll come across way more that think you do-which is the great part about where the sport is heading.” - Venessa Hutchinson

I talked with Venessa Hutchinson, the NFL’s Senior Manager of Football Development, about a wide-range of topics relating to the NFL's diversity in hiring practices, specific to women in football.  We discussed her career path- demanding respect from predominantly male coworkers and former players, learning the game of football so intricately without playing it so competitively, and the most rewarding part about being an integral piece of the NFL's league office.

Most importantly, we'll discuss the Annual Womens’ Careers in Football Forum:

• Qualifications to get accepted into the program
• About 100 participants from the Forum have been hired- a testament to the networking available at the Forum
• Ways to make yourself, a potential candidate, stand out to a team
• Which coaches absolutely jump at the opportunity to come to the Forum and cultivate a culture of tolerance for women in football?
• In which areas would you like to see the program grow?
• Women in media branch to it soon?

We'll also tackle:

• Scouting
• The eventuality of a woman making a team: and will it be Carli Lloyd?
• The viability of canceling the entire preseason schedule
• Roster repercussion concerns for an entirely scrapped preseason: bubble guys and rookie quarterbacks

• Will there, one day, be a “Rooney Rule” for women in football?

   

• What do head coaches like Ron Rivera and Mike Vrabel do to set up cultures of tolerance in their own locker rooms?

The 3 “arms” of NFL Football Operations

1. Player Safety: Potential adjustments to the draft and the scouting combine to make sure that all players, including those in COVID-affected collegiate programs
2. Officiating: My solution- is making officials full-time employees of the league an option?
3. Long-Term Success of the league: plan of action to include female fans

LISTENER QUESTIONS:

• Bill in Massachusetts: How far away are we from seeing a woman in the NFL as a player?
• Jay from New Jersey: Who of your peers, maybe even from the Women’s Careers in Football Forum, whose impact we need to know more about?
• Jim from Massachusetts: When do we see the first female offensive or defensive coordinator in the NFL?
• Bob from Nutley: Does the NFL really think it could keep all players, coaches, and staff COVID-free?

More info: https://operations.nfl.com/football-ops/economic-social-impact/womens-careers-in-football-forum/ 

“People like a comeback story.” - Denise White

A young girl and her twin sister overcome a rough childhood and the foster care system- one starts her own company and becomes the most powerful athlete crisis manager in the world.

It sounds like something out of a movie, right?

Well that's because it WILL be.  Three A-List celebrities were considered to play Denise White... and one chose her. This celebrity will not only be playing her in an upcoming movie, but has contracted a TV show, inspired by Denise's work, for her production company and Apple TV. The movie, preliminarily titled "The Fixer", is based on the life of Denise White, founder of EAG Sports Management (1996): an agency (the only one of its kind owned by a woman) that provides crisis management, philanthropic ventures, media engagements, etc. for world class athletes. 

We'll tackle:

• Athletes being "more than athletes" today... and how that coincides with 'using their platform' to initiate change.. while possibly creating divisiveness within their respective sports
• But what about those that use 'company time' to do so?
• How the advent of social media (and the 24-hour news cycle) has drastically changed her industry
• Denise takes us into the crisis management 24/7 playbook: jarring middle-of-the-night calls, evidence mounted against her clients, preventative measures, and cases she would NOT take on 
• Is "all publicity 'good publicity'"?
• Business morals and ethics
• Denise opens up about her propensity to want to "fix" these athletes
• Erin Brockovich advises the adviser
• Denise responds to some heartfelt compliments by some of her clients in the media over the years: Tyrann Mathieu, DeSean Jackson, and Ephraim Salaam.
• ...and SO much more!!

“Just thinking that I lost this love of my life was something that I was really having a hard time to come to terms with.” - Amanda Kessel

Olympic gold and silver medal winning professional hockey player Amanda Kessel and Danielle McCartan have an open conversation about Amanda’s concussion-related mental health struggles and discuss a pragmatic plan to grow the women’s game efficiently and effectively. What took the NHL so long to get involved? Furthermore, we’ll contrast the way of life of NHL players (of which Amanda has intimate knowledge: her brother Phil Kessel is alternate captain of the Arizona Coyotes AND she is a New York Rangers ambassador) to that of professional women’s league. Amanda outlines the impetus behind the 200+ player boycott of the NWHL and USA Hockey.

We'll also tackle:

• NHL’s return to play plan
• A deep dive into concussion-related depression
• Competitiveness in the Kessel household
• Playing on boys teams
• The manifestation of statistical growth in girls hockey by being a New York Rangers hockey ambassador
• Being part of NHL's All-Star weekend 2019
• What would a W-NHL look like?
• AK28 clothing line
• ...and SO much more!!

A listener question from Joe in Long Island: Would a 12 team women's league (2 six team divisions) and a 54 game schedule be plausible?

“What’s the alternative, I quit? … I can’t let them break me. No way.” - Kara Goucher

World Championship (now) silver medal winner and 2x Olympic distance runner Kara Goucher and Danielle discuss ethics at the highest level of sport. 

Against the background of ESPN’s newest 30 for 30: “Lance”, Kara shares her experience at the now infamous Nike Oregon Project. She defines, for the listening audience, popular doping practices (EPO, AndroGel, IV treatments) and their effects on the body and individual competition. She describes the institutional grooming process that athletes (including herself) are subjected to, and the David and Goliath lawsuit she is still fighting, against her former Nike Oregon Project head coach and father figure Alberto Salazaar. Kara exposes a dark side of Nike: these testosterone experiments were performed on the Nike campus, in their labs, and CEO Mark Parker know about them. 

For the baseball fan, we extrapolated her experiences in running to determine the psychology behind and monetary/popularity windfall following the HR chase between dirty Mark McGuire and dirty Sammy Sosa. Didn’t the dirty Nike Oregon Project achieve that same goal for USA running?

What is the difference between 'banned' and 'unethical'? Kara also opens up about how her former teammate and brother-in-law secretly developed a Nike shoe that single-handedly kept her from competing in her 3rd Olympic Games. 

We'll also tackle:

• 2020 NYC Marathon: will it still happen? What changes, from a runner’s perspective would she like to see implemented? What about a virtual marathon?
• Kara's tips for the avid runner... and the "Quarantine Runner", like myself
• The ramifications she felt (and still feels) about bringing the situation to light... and how she still feels 'unsafe' during a race.
• How, for her, a 3rd place finish turned into a silver medal after 12 years following a positive banned substance test
• A solution: who, ultimately, is in control of stopping the unethical behavior and doping: the corporations, the athletes, a governing body?

Listener questions from:

• Erin in Palisades Park, NJ: What is your favorite workout?
• Vanessa, a track and field coach from Florida: Kara's mentorship of younger women in the sport, in particular- Mary Cain

“Let me tell you about my daughters. I’ll start with the one that’s coaching for the Yankees.” - Rachel Balkovec channels her father.

Rachel and Danielle discuss surprisingly similar childhood aspirations, deliver a message to "old school" baseball fans, and compare and contrast the pitch sequencing and mechanics of the highest level of baseball and softball.

Two Master's degrees later, Rachel discusses her "baseball nerd" mentality, how it brought her to Amsterdam to study under the leading researchers in baseball analytics to Driveline, the most well-respected American advanced metrics company.

Now, as a hitting coach for the New York Yankees, Rachel reflects on a time where she had $0 in her bank account, pushed it "all on red", and took a gamble on herself.

We'll also tackle:

• Fulfilling the American Dream
• Putting on the iconic pinstripes every day for work
• Girl Dads
• Practicing advanced metrics techniques... before it was "a thing"
• Level of vulnerability needed to be each other's "Rosetta Stone": when working through a language barrier with players in the Dominican Republic
• From a coaching perspective: practice philosophy, player acclimation (to a female coach), and how to create a healthy tension in coach/player relationships to elicit the best from the athletes.
• The return of baseball in 2020?
• and how a Marcus Aurelius quote applies to today's COVID world.

A listener question from Kevin in Camden, NJ: Who has been your biggest career influence so far?

“Hang in there, you’re not going to believe how good it’s about to get for you.” - Laura Okmin

Laura goes "5 levels deep" into conversation with Danielle about feelings of her loneliness on the road, family planning sacrifices due to her profession, and the personal and professional impact of losing her mother to cancer at a young age (for both of them). During her third decade in the field, Laura also opens up about the impact of saying "no", how her perspective of "The Top" changed, and why, a ceiling crasher, she turned down the position of first 'female NFL insider'.

We'll also tackle:

• The lesson that Michael Jordan personally taught her, as a young reporter
• In-depth thoughts and analysis on ESPN's The Last Dance after winning an Emmy for her coverage of her hometown Bulls during their run to greatness.
• Genesis for developing GALvanize, a media bootcamp for NFL rookies and female reporters- and why her mother would be surprised
• Friendship with the late Stuart Scott
• Coaching the coaches: being a personal media coach to many NFL head coaches: philosophy, most difficult encounters
• What she hopes, for the sports world, will come out of the time in 2020 when the world stopped

A discussion with an Olympic Athlete about the delay, staying prepared, advice to young softball players, and about the radioactivity in Japan ahead of the games.

We need to take care of the world first: the Olympics is the world’s game”. 

-Monica Abbott

Softball, after a 12 year hiatus, is again recognized as an olympic sport... but we have to wait one more year to watch Team USA pitcher Monica Abbott and company potentially win gold in Japan. Abbott and fellow pitcher Kat Osterman are the only two players to bridge the gap between the 2008 silver medal winning team and on the upcoming olympic team.

Abbott and I talk about:

• The emotions when USA Softball was informed of the Olympic delay on a team phone call
• “Life put on hold another year”: A world-class female athlete's perspective on sacrifices
• “We had a big talk about that”: Thoughts on the possibility of playing in front of not one, single fan 
• Amidst the pandemic, additional significance in wearing "USA" in these upcoming Olympic Games
• As players, we always replay the plays that we could have changed. What is one play from the 2008 loss in the Gold Medal game that Abbott would change the outcome of? 
• An Olympic delay: staying motivated physically and mentally
• Pushing the naysaying thoughts from out of your mind
• A unique perspective on the impact of COVID-19 on those athletes that have lost a season of ball
• How could the players work to overcome the “lost time” from COVID-19

AT HOME WORK FOR PLAYERS OF ALL AGES:

• Abbott's conditioning and skill work (with minimal equipment) recommendations
• How to refocus after a stray thought pops into your mind while playing- examples she’s experienced
• 2021 OLYMPICS
• Leveraging experience of playing professionally in Japan to benefit 2021 Team USA softball
• Has the US Olympic committee debriefed the athletes about the radioactivity in Fukushima?
• Is Abbott worried?

MY FORMER PLAYER'S QUESTIONS:

• Anna from NJ: What are your thoughts on the mound during an Olympic game?
• Jenna from NJ: What is your favorite pitch? Why is it so effective? Favorite part about being a pitcher?

LISTENER QUESTIONS:

• John from Long Island
• Josh from Connecticut
• Mike from New Jersey

For more information about the Abbott Academy, visit: www.monicaabbott.com

“It’s not about survival of the fittest, it is: survival of the ‘most adaptive’" - Courtney Banghart channels Charles Darwin.

After having accumulated, in her twelve years as head coach of Princeton University's women's basketball program, seven Ivy League titles, eight NCAA Tournament births, and a Naismith National Coach of the Year award, Courtney Banghart packed up her family and headed south on I-95 to Chapel Hill. After inking that chapter in the story of her life, Banghart, a year ago, began to write a new one as head coach of the University of North Carolina's women's basketball team. We'll discuss the build-up to that difficult decision and her professional growth because of it.

Through a coach's lens, we discuss the impact of COVID-19 on collegiate and professional basketball.

COLLEGIATE:

• How are off-season programs, with gyms closed, affected?
• What is it's the impact on scouting and recruiting?
• NCAA's decision to cancel March Madness
• 5th year of eligibility?

PROFESSIONAL:

• Effect on WNBA's scheduling, draft, and overseas players
• AND, if she were to be stuck in quarantine with any living athlete, who would it be?

We'll also tackle: 

• Has she met Michael Jordan yet?!
• Advice to former Princeton Tiger Bella Alarie as she gets set to have her name called on draft night.
• Why does Becky Hammon keep getting passed over in Gregg Popovich's absence?
• 1/3 of all NBA teams employ a woman on their coaching staffs
• Does she have professional coaching aspirations?