How a Sports Broadcasting Startup Earned a Partnership with ESPN

You would not have been watching that match in 23. So shout out those guys at like Wimbledon. Yeah, like Wimbledon. You guys went from like Zoom podcast recording to your chief podcast host interviewing Roger Federer. Consistency is key. 'cause it's easy to get fired up about something year over year where you start to see those returns.

What was the milestone where you were like, oh man, we have something legit here.

From South Bend to Evansville and everywhere in between. This is Get IN, the show focused on the Hoosier State and the incredible stories happening here today. I'm Nate Spangle, founder of Get Indiana, and I will be your host for today's conversation. getindiana.com is your one stop shop for everything Indiana.

From festival and event guides, to blog posts covering hidden gems, local businesses, small towns, and more. Check it out and learn something new about the Hoosier State at getindiana.com. And don't forget to subscribe to our weekly newsletter right there at the top. Dalton Thieneman is the founder and CEO of Cracked Media Ventures, a fast growing media company known for its podcast, digital coverage, and innovative approach to storytelling through sport.

He's a graduate of Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law. Dalton has turned his love of tennis into a platform that reaches fans worldwide, while still proudly calling Indiana home. We're gonna learn about how Cracked Racquets. Started back in 2017 and how it evolved into Cracked Media Ventures.

We're gonna learn about the global impact that you all are making in racquet sports and beyond, and what's coming up for Cracked Media Ventures. Dalton, welcome to the show. Yeah, Nate, thanks so much for having me. Um, and thanks for all you do for sharing Hoosier stories. Uh, we were talking right before this, and Hoosiers in the state are a little too humble, uh, on the national scale, so thanks for all you're doing for shed the light on that.

Uh, yeah, well, I mean, we'll get right into that. We're talking about how humble all of you listeners out there are and it's, it's good. It's good to be humble. We like that Hoosier humbleness, but there's a way that we can talk a little more proudly about our place. And so here's the example. Or if I say, man, that's a really nice hat, what are you gonna say?

I'm gonna say, um, yeah, it's a great hat. Uh, but it also has the state of Indiana on it as well. Yeah, yeah. And you're probably gonna say like, and I got it on sale at Goodwill for, for $2 a night. Like anytime you compliment a Hoosier, that's a nice shirt. Thanks. I got it For the biggest discount. 'cause it almost feels wrong that we have nice things.

Sure. You know what I'm like, it almost feels a little like. Foreign. Like, versus if you go to the coast and they're like, thanks I spent 10 bands on the watch. Right. Like, hey, my iced out chain was like six band, like whatever. Six racks. Yeah. Uh, so it's always interesting that Hoosiers are like the opposite.

Like I wanted, I want you to know that I have nice things, but I paid no money for them. Yeah. And it's, it's part of the flyover country kind of nature that we've grown up around. But also like, to your point, it's also, it's a thank you, but situation instead of just Thank you so much. Yeah. The hat's sweet.

I love this hat. Yeah. I'm really proud of this hat. It's a great hat. I love this thing, man. Like you should get one. Yeah. You know, you should. Yeah. We'll get you hat. I love the pick. Make me, make me go buy it though. Right. Gotta go support our crew up at the pick for shout out Drew Brees. Yeah. Yeah. That that, exactly.

Um, well man, let's talk about this. So we did talk about, we got a shout out. The guys we were talking about, um, Jake, and we're talking about, uh, oh my gosh. Dylan. Dylan. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Did anyone watch the Penn State Oregon game not too long ago? Dillon Thieneman, the Carmel guy. Oh, yeah, right. He's from he went to Guerin.

Yeah, so he went to Jake and, and, uh, Brennan, the two older brothers went to Garron. Dylan actually went to Westfield. Oh. And was a rockstar there. And then went on to Purdue, was an All American there, and then had the difficult situation of NIL and everything else, and ended up out at Oregon. And who, and just not figure, like, I mean, they are just not.

It's not, there wasn't necessarily a great program. Yeah. Coach Lanning has to come in and kinda brings in his own guys, you know? For sure. For sure. But he ends up getting the game winning interception against Penn State for Oregon. Oh yeah. And they said, that's Dillon Thieneman. And I was like, Hey, that's a Hoosier baby, let's go.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, I love it, man. Wills your first cousins. Yeah. Yeah. So it's, um, yeah, my uncle Ken and his kids, and they're all studs on that side of the family. Um, it was amazing seeing Dylan. So he's already on like mini draft boards, like second, third round pick, uh, getting that interception, the game winning interception against Penn State, like on the national, that was like prime time, Saturday night, like crush overtime game.

Huge for the game film, for the draft. I mean, he's gonna move up to round one for, and then an athletic play too. Oh yeah. Yeah. And he was like, he just started sprinting. I loved it. Yeah. Uh, and those guys were studs in the football field, but your journey was not necessarily through football, it was through tennis.

Yeah. So take us back to where, where tennis started to become a huge thing in your life. Why you would end up pursuing a company in the racquet sports space. Yeah. Yeah. Well you teed that up nicely. Um, but yeah, I'm the oldest of four boys. I grew up in Saltsburg. I went to our Lady Perpetual Help. Oh, down in New Albany.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Um, the rest of my brothers went to like Floyd Central's, uh, middle school field. Yeah. Highland Hills down there. Employees knobs. But yeah, so growing up, you know, an Indiana kid, uh, we're playing every sport in the book, like watching at the time, Reggie Miller and you know, those teams. Um, and then, yeah, Peyton Manning and the Colts kind of dominate.

So in the backyard it was a blast growing up with three younger brothers. Um, all the neighborhood kids were always over at our house, but we were a huge tennis family too. You know, all of us played tennis. Uh, my youngest brother Presley, was the stud of the family and ultimately was like top 10 in the country.

Ended up at Carmel, uh, was a two time state champion in singles, individually, you know, seeing him get recruited his junior senior year at Carmel. Um, as the oldest brother I was with my parents kind of going all over the country to some top schools. Um, you know, all the top schools that you can think of.

And we were pretty shocked that, um, all they had was a grainy stream for top 15, top 20 tennis. Um, so that was kind of the inspiration for Cracked Racquets at the time. Wow. So you were solving your own problem of not being able to like watch your brother as he traveled around the country. Who's he playing for?

So he was playing for, um, Carmel High School, but then he ultimately signed with Northwestern in the Big Ten. Yeah, I mean, this is Big Ten Tennis. Oh yeah. Northwestern there. I mean, I don't know, I don't know that much about Evanston, but I know there's a couple dollars up there. Oh yeah, just a little bit.

Yeah. If you've been up on that campus, there are plenty of dollars, uh, up there in the, you know, overseeing Lake Michigan Beau, beautiful campus. If you haven't been up there, go check it out. But, uh, but it was, this was, uh, an issue all across the board in college tennis. So yeah, my business partners and I got into kind of solving a problem.

None of us had media, uh, education. We didn't go to school for, for media at all. I was an attorney at the time. Um, my business partner was an aerospace engineer, practicing, and then our other business partner was in politics, uh, working for a congresswoman up in Michigan, but all just massive tennis fans.

How did you guys know each other? Um, so Daniel Westhoff, the aerospace engineer. Uh, we played high school tennis together, uh, and then went on to college, uh, at St. Louis University for undergrad. Uh, but then, uh, the, the third business partner, which he's kind of the, the third, uh, head to this, uh, three headed kind of monster that we have going on.

He dmd us in the early days of starting Cracked Racquets. And, um, he was sending over podcasts that he was recording at the time in his dorm room at, at Michigan. Um, and it was super outside the box. It was like. You know, for the big three at the time, which was, you know, Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, um, who would win in a 40 yard dash, who would have, you know, the lowest score on their ACT.

Uh, so it was the type of coverage that, you know, we were excited about and that wasn't out there at the time. Yeah. Um, so he came into the fold pretty quickly. As I mentioned, we, yeah, no education in media, uh, or, you know, broadcast journalism. Uh, none of us had, had been in the field, um, outside of college, so we kind of stitched it together.

And from there, uh, Cracked Racquets was born. So, um, we started, uh, broadcasting the ITA Indoor National Championships in, I think it was 2019. With that, we, um, formed strategic partnerships with PlaySight, uh, and Track.Tennis, some of the, the streaming vendors in the space. Uh, we provided commentary, color analysis, customizable graphics, uh, and then live scoring integration, which it seems pretty straightforward now in 2025, but at the time.

We were kind of blowing people's minds 'cause they were used to that grainy stream. Yeah. I was talking about before, what was the first step? Like what, like, I feel like now it's like you're doing a lot of college tennis, you're doing a lot of like, big tennis events, but like, what was the first step that you had to, like, the first domino that had to fall?

I would say tennis, uh, as you can imagine, is a pretty buttoned up sport. Um, so before, that's why we never played. Yeah. I'm not, I was not born for the tennis court. Yeah. But you were a three sport athlete in high school, so we gotta we gotta point that out. Oh yeah. Come on. Let's not tennis though. Not golf, not tennis.

Yeah. Yeah, that's fair. Um, so it's very much like a, a country club. Um, that's, that's buttoned up and, and a little behind from a coverage perspective from the other, you know, big three, basketball, football, baseball. Um, and that kind of pissed us off, like we wanted to do something about it. Um, 'cause you know, meanwhile you're watching like the LeBron Jameses of the world, uh, get coverage from like seventh to eighth grade year.

You know what playlists they're watching, which, you know, Nikes they're rocking. Yeah. It was like a house of highlights. You remember like those back. Exactly, exactly. Yeah. Like that oog and that guy ended up getting hired by ESPN, I'm pretty sure. Oh yeah, yeah. But the, the OG guy who built the account, is it like Mike or something?

He built House of Highlights. It was all like what people actually wanted to see. And like Interesting. And now you see the Sports Center Instagram account like is pretty, has a lot of personality to it for sure. But it used to be terrible. Exactly, yeah. And tennis, I would, I would argue still has a long way to go.

Yeah. So we, like, the first domino to fall for us was starting a blog and then podcast to kind of counter the coverage that wasn't out there because at the time, um, you know, Taylor Fritz, Tommy Paul, Frances Tiafoe, Coco Gauff, all who were like. Top 10, top 15 in, you know, pro tennis right now. They were all not only, um, competing for junior slams, they were winning them.

And, you know, as big tennis fans, we were looking around the market and there was no coverage on these up and comers. So the first domino, what year, what year is this? So this is 20 17, 20 18. Yeah. Um, and so we started, you know, coverage that way and made a little noise. And I think, you know, the, the tennis powers at be are kind of like, who are these guys doing coverage out of their parents' basements?

Like what, what do you mean you were doing cov Like what? You were just like commenting on what they were doing. Like, um, so I, I, I think at that point, 2017, man, like starting a podcast was still kind of in the infancy stages. It wasn't like a Bill Simmons. You know, 20 10, 20 12 range. But it's still, uh, we were one of the first tennis podcasts out there.

Um, so to start two or three and to do daily coverage. Daily tennis podcast. Yeah. Oh yeah. How long? An hour to two hours a day. Holy Smoke. Um, and all three of us were still full-time at our, at our jobs and doing this just nights and weekends for the most part. All Was it remote or was it all All remote?

Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Remote podcast in 2017. Yeah. That is unique. Like, that was, that's like today everyone has their own remote podcasts. Sure. They're on Zoom with their Zoom button. Oh yeah. I'm like, okay. So this is 2017. And like, how did you start to get picked up? Like how did people find it? Tennis is so small, um, and people aren't really trying things.

Uh, they are more so today. But in 20 17, 20 18, um, any kind of new account that popped up, uh, people would at least come in and and check it out. So, you know, there were others, other competitors that had popped up around the same time but didn't have the sustainability. Like, you know, they either had their career, they got married, started having kids, and then, uh, it was too much of a distraction from their day job.

And, uh, the three of us were just so hellbent on making this thing work, that it was the consistency day after day that ultimately got tennis channel's attention. Um, and they asked us to join their podcast network for our three podcasts. Uh, and then you started seeing Cracked Racquets advertisements on Tennis Channel watching the Slam.

So that was kind of the, the first domino. Wait, what? Oh yeah. Oh. So you got, you had three separate podcasts? Yes. What were the three, what are the three pods? So The Mini-Break, uh, which is a daily kind of recap podcast, uh, cracked interviews, which is like bringing on players and, and coaches. And then, uh, the Great Shot Podcast, which is kind of like First Take A Banter is kind of back and forth podcast.

Yeah. And we still have all three of those shows today that are, and they're all daily. Uh, no. So The Mini-Break is, is the only daily show. Yeah. Yeah. So you had, you were doing these podcasts, was your original thoughts like, Hey, like I love tennis and I just want to get more exposure. Like if I just hosted this tennis podcast, this would be great.

It was like we did not set out for this to be a business by any means. Yeah. This was just a hobby, uh, that, like the genesis was, I was playing in a four or five old man's league here and we were complaining about the lack of coverage like I talked about earlier. Uh, and we finally decided to do something about it.

Yeah. Um, and, and Daniel Westhoff, my business partner, who's an engineer by, by trade, not media trained, but can just problem solve and figure it out. So he figured out, you know, the remote, uh, podcasting and editing and, and all of that. I love people like that. Right. Yeah. You guys start these pod, did you start three to start?

Oh yeah. So in the beginning you're like, Hey, we're gonna have three. That's like such a good, like, forward vision. You know, a lot of people would just like create one podcast and then like, creating one podcast is already hard enough. Sure. So to create three of 'em is really interesting. I would say, uh, you know, one of my strengths and weaknesses is.

Like, if we're gonna do something, let's jump in the deep end and, and do it, you know, the whole way. So we, yeah, we threw it all at the wall and, and those three definitely stuck. You start podcasting. How were, how were people discovering it before you got on the tennis? All, all, all social media. So you're just putting out social media Oh, yeah.

Content. Yeah. And because there was not that much, you kind of just like rose to the top. Like how quickly did you start to pick up listeners and, and followers? Yeah. I, it wasn't an overnight. I, I think like that's the biggest thing that people think happened overnight. Like it, this wasn't like a, you know, couple weeks or months.

It took, you know, 18 to 24 months before we amassed a following. Oh, yeah. Um, and to put it in perspective, like on Instagram now, Cracked Racquets, it's 104,000 followers. Sure. Like, that's not nothing. Yeah. You know, like, and you got featured, so the tennis channel ends up seeing your content and bringing you in their network and so you're watching.

The tennis channel and it's like an advertisement to listen to your podcast. And, and that was one of the things that, like I negotiated into the contract. I was like, we're not gonna give you, you know, free content here. 'cause that's kind of how they were looking at it. They had no podcasts at the time. Um, and us starting three podcasts inspired them to start their own.

So the, even the tennis channel who is, you know, the dominant tennis, you know, media player here in the States, didn't have a podcast at the time. Um, so we negotiated, you know, putting us on linear TV with commercials, um, a ad revenue split, so all of their sponsors on linear tv, uh, you ended up hearing them on our podcast popup, which gave us more credibility where you have like.

You know, red Bull and Target that are actually on the podcast are like, holy shit, these guys are are legit. That's which was a game changer's. Crazy. Yeah. What was the milestone where you were like, oh man, we have something legit here. Daniel Westhoff, uh, starts full time, end of 2018. I convinced him to quit his job in aerospace engineering in St.

Louis.

You're free. And And, move to Indianapolis. Like we had not enough revenue in the door. Uh, he took a gamble and moved in into 2018, but the real like time where we felt it was the broadcasting. That's pretty crazy. You convinced an aerospace engineer to quit their job. That I'm sure was very lucrative.

Sure. To

To go all in on Cracked Racquets.

This is a guy that I had known for 20 years. We were best friends in high school, played tennis together.

Um, I'd say, you know, him sitting in his cubicle at work, even though it sounds great, he, he actually. Was designing private jets, by the way. So it wasn't just an aerospace engineer, he was like, in what, you know, most would see as a really cool job.

Yeah. Um, he was kind of, um, in solitary confinement, like sitting at his desk doing this design work and with us, this kind of started filling up his cup from a problem solving perspective. Yeah. I love that. We were building shit, you know? Yeah. Okay. And so what, how quickly did you realize that being a media brand.

Like, you know, putting out content is a really good business. Hey, exhibit A, like, we have a lot of fun putting out content. Sure. You can make good money, you can do all this stuff. How, how quickly did you realize that hey, there might be a little bit deeper of a problem to solve here? I think it's when we went to the ITA Indoor National Championships up in Chicago in 2018.

And so, you know, we're about a year, a year and a half into starting the business. Uh, the podcasts are starting to gain traction, but we go to one of the biggest, you know, college tennis events in the country. Um, and we get there, uh, with our kind of janky podcasts equipment. We're excited to see, you know, fans, other sponsors, other media potentially there.

And we get there and there's 20 to 30 people there. Uh, in the audience and it's mostly parents of the players. My dad. Yeah. Which was, which, which was an aha moment for many reasons. You're expecting like a college game day set? 100%. Yeah. Like, and it's like, you know, a couple parents are like, who are these?

Who are these media boys? For sure. Because, 'cause you know,

I come from a big tennis family, big tennis fan, but I'm a Indiana sports fan through and through.

So like Rowdy Pacers games and Colts Games is how I grew up. So coming to this was, um, pretty mind blowing to say the least. 'cause I had never been to, I had been to dual matches for college tennis, which are a crazy, crazy atmosphere.

It's not your buttoned up Wimbledon match that you're probably thinking. So I was expecting a, pretty like, you know, crazy crowd. We get there. Uh, there's just parents in the crowd, no other media. We're the only media on site. Um, they're, they're covering, um, the matches just with streams, no commentary. Um, and my dad, who is a developer down in southern Indiana.

Uh, who I still go to for a lot of developer real estate or developer computers. Oh yeah, that's a, that's a, yeah. Good clarification. Yeah. Uh, real estate. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. On the residential side, you think like media, you think that, okay, sure. Yeah. Okay. Got you. So, I, I still go to him for a lot of guidance, uh, you know, on the business side.

And he,

I remember him saying, you know, we're on the way home from Chicago. I'm like, how can there be this few people, like, how we're the only media in the space? Uh, and he's like, you are either gonna go bankrupt in six months, or you just struck gold, uh, here. And I did at the time, I think I, you know, sped past that, that was a throwaway comment, but he couldn't have been more on it at that point.

I mean, absolutely it's something because you're realizing that there are other people that care about it as much as you do and are like, oh, I wish I could watch more. XI wish I watched more tennis for sure. You know, I wish I, there was, I wish it wasn't this grainy stream. You know, I wish there was something good from there.

You realize that the opportunity was deeper than just commentary, deeper than just like media. It was broadcasting. Yeah. So from there we kind of put our heads together, what do we need to do to fill the gaps on the broadcasting side? Um, because this grainy stream isn't gonna cut it for us, let alone the parents and alumni who are trying to follow their school.

We approach the ITA, which is the governing body of college tennis. We're like, Hey, we, we need to do something about this. And you fast forward a year. And we get in, we're covering, uh, the ITA Indoor National Championships. Daniel Westhoff, my business partner is a perfectionist. Uh, so if he were to go back to that, uh, stream, it would be pretty brutal.

And he'd, he would be, uh, you know, redlining the shit out of that. But, um, that was where it all started from a broadcasting component. So you get the rights, is that what it would be called? Like Yeah, so it was, we, we didn't have to purchase the rights. Uh, they hired us as a vendor to cover four days of action, both men's and women's tennis, uh, 12 hour days.

Mind you, so like any other sport, if it's 12 hours, you're, you have three or four different commentary crews. Right. Um, our two commentators, Alex Gruskin, be in the lead, did 12 hour days, four days in a row right out of the gate, bro. Yeah. Yeah. So it's, I mean, you're in the bunker. Yeah. What do you do for like bathroom breaks?

Yeah. Yeah. Well, so yeah, you have like a, a five minute break whenever the matches wrap up. And it's like going, yeah. Hitting the head and then also like grabbing a, you know, protein bar or whatever. Yeah. Literally. Yeah. So they did four 12 hour days. And that was the start of broadcasting for you guys? It was, yeah.

So, uh, literally with, um, I mean it was yeah, 12 hour days, like I mentioned, with that kind of portfolio of content. Uh, we reached out to the Big Ten at the time. Uh, 'cause the indoor national championships are actually at the beginning of the season. It's the kind of kickoff event. Um, that doesn't make any sense.

No, no, not at all. So it, it, it ends up, it culminates with the NCAA outdoor championships. Mm-hmm. So in tennis there are different surfaces. You've got grass, hardcore clay, et cetera. Um, indoor and outdoor are pretty different. Um, so from there we sell to the Big Ten and end up doing all the Big Ten conference play.

Uh, that year. And then now, yeah, we do ACC, SEC, big 10, big 12, and then NCAA D1, D2, and D3 Championships with commentators on all that. Yes. Yeah, dude. Um, that's pretty sick. And I'd say what kind of distinguishes us from traditional media is we have an NFL RedZone product called CrossCourt Cast.

So, uh, for, you know, big 10 S-C-C-ACC coverage we're covering up to 32 sites simultaneously, like NFL RedZone where, uh, you know, if you're in a tiebreaker, it's a third set, you know, the match is three all coming down to the end. We can pop over there and then, you know, coming to Lexington, uh, go down to Gainesville, uh, and pop around that way all around the country.

Oh yeah. Yeah. So like, but are there, if I just wanna watch my son. Do you like? Can I just go into his stream? So, so you still have that option? Yeah. Um, but it won't have, we'll have a commentator the whole time or No. You know, every kind of match is different. Yeah. We have featured match coverage where we'll cover like the first singles or one doubles or whatever.

Yeah. Uh, but most of the coverage is that NFL RedZone product. Yeah. I mean, it's pretty cool. Yeah. If you, this is for the, not necessarily the just single supporter of like, oh, I'm so-and-so's son, or so-and-so's dad. Sure. It's more like, oh, I just wanna watch what's going on in tennis. Yeah. I, dude, this would be a really good product for wrestling.

You think The biggest tournaments, there's the, the state tournament and HSAA Robert Falcons. This is for you. IHSAAA commissioner, uh, or one of, they like the commissioner over wrestling. Sure. There's four matches Rolling. At the same time, and it's hard to stay, like if I wanna pop into different pieces and see who's coming up.

Yeah. Or in particular, there's one tournament called the Iron Man, the Walsh Jesuit Iron Man. It's over in Ohio. Okay. And it has, I believe, 16 mats. And I'm trying to like spend my time on this, on flow. Sure. Hunting down like all the Indiana kids. Yeah. Because I'm like, oh, I wanna pop into there. I wanna, and it's like.

Dude, but then also like the number one kid in the nation wrestles, and I wanna pop into that. Yeah. And so having that red zone product, like find what you want to watch and pop and do 'em all. Yeah. Is incredible. Yeah. Like for tenants where there's what, for a normal team, there'd be one doubles, two doubles, or sorry, one doubles, two doubless, and then singles by three.

So it's, yeah. And that's why college tennis is unique. There are three doubles to start, so you're going after a doubles point. So whoever wins two of those three matches gets a point. And then you roll right into singles, which is six singles. So I Me, oh, there's six solo people. Oh yeah. Yeah. So you've got six, five.

Oh, that's way bigger than I thought. High school. Yeah. So it's, it is different than high school. Wow. Oh yeah. That's so much tennis being played. It is. Yeah. So yeah, not only can we cover up the 32 sites, uh, but you've got, you know, up to six simultaneous feeds going on in one single chat. The six box, yeah.

What is it, Scott Hanson, as he talks like, we're going to the Octobox. Uh, okay. So things were rolling for you guys. Yeah. Well, on the wrestling side, like, I'm down. Let's do it. Yeah. Oh, dude, I would love Robert, whoever the commissioner like, hit us up. Let's do it. Hey, Mr. Falcons, let's make this happen for the IHSAA state finals.

That would be electric. Yeah. Friday night. Okay. So I, this is, this is a true statement. I've seen a lot of sports in the state of Indiana. Friday night of the wrestling state finals is crazy, but the, the state championship wrestling match like the Saturday. It's 14 weight glasses. So 28 kids square off for 14 state championships.

It is the most electric sporting event in the state of Indiana. Bar like hands down. Well then we have to be involved. Oh yeah, dude. It's crazy. Cool. So is is Flow providing commentators on every, it's actually, I think it's on the IHS eight Champions network. I, I gotcha. For that. Okay. So that'd be easy.

Yeah. Relatively like getting plugged into that. Sure. You know, let's make it happen, dude. Yeah, let's do it. Um, so talk to me though, so things start growing the broadcasting side. Are you still, you're still doing the podcast as well? So we have, I think it's eight total podcasts now. We like, are starting new podcasts and different verticals every day.

But those three podcasts from the beginning are still around, uh, our top 15 in the world in tennis, uh, on Apple charts and have, have won a ton of awards. No way. Uh, it's been pretty cool as a flagship brand to, you know, still have those in the mix. But yeah, we have other, we have a, a pickleball podcast. We have a law enforcement podcast.

We have a reality TV podcast, a law enforcement podcast. Oh, yeah. What, what does this have anything to do with, and actually, so, uh, the, the host of this podcast is actually the former police chief of Lafayette Police Department. This is within Cracked Media Ventures, and that's why we, to your point, we had to rebrand from Cracked Racquets to Cracked Media Ventures because we're kind of encompassing.

But why, why start the, why start the law enforcement one? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I represent the police, uh, on the legal political side. So, um, there was a huge void in that area. Uh, chief Flannel from Lafayette is huge into health and wellness and pushing the law enforcement profession forward. Um, and so we started a podcast called The Optimizer.

Yeah, the Optimizer. Oh yeah, dude, that's wild. Uh, okay, so you have. Three tennis podcasts. Yeah. A law enforcement podcast. Mm-hmm. A what other, what were the ones? Uh, reality tv. Yeah. So Cracked Reality TV. It's a big brother and survivor podcast. Do people just come up and they're like, Hey, will you help me start a podcast?

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's certainly part of it. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. And like, are, do people listen to those? Yeah. The, the The Optimizer podcast actually has a pretty good follow. I think there's like 10,000 followers on the, the newsletter. Um, and then we've got, yeah, a couple thousand listeners on that one as well.

Yeah, because it's hard, it's hard to grow a podcast for sure. It takes forever these days. It, the, the market is so saturated. Everybody's got a podcast and No, this is to any of them. No, no. Yeah. It's all about the clips on social. Oh, yeah. So, so how did you, like, what advice would you have for people on growing podcasts?

You know, when we started 20 17, 20 18 looks a lot different today. 'cause to your point, there's like, everyone has a podcast. Any, any area that you wanna, you know, listen to. There's a hundred different podcasts. But, um, the, like, having a good social media clipper, um, is the biggest part of growing the podcast.

Yeah. Oh my gosh, dude. Yeah. Yeah. You need three or four viral moments per podcast and, and bro com optimizer. Patrick Flannel Lee. There we go. What a guy Indiana represent. Yeah, that's hilarious. I love it. That's awesome. Um, yeah, it's all about getting very viral clips for sure and still that I think that people think it's just like, oh yeah, no, you get one clip to do a couple hundred thousand and it's like everyone listens to your podcasts.

No way. Good luck. Yeah. Well, and, and we started, 'cause you know, it was a pretty natural transition for us into racquet sports. So we we're covering, uh, pickleball on the broadcasting side as well, both collegiate and professional. Um, and we started a podcast called Crack Paddles. Um, so there's a reoccurring theme with the correct branding there, obviously.

Yeah. Um, in May. And we've had, I think we've done 10 million views on social for that podcast specifically. 'cause there've been a, 'cause tennis players and the tennis community hate pickleball players, so it's been pretty easy to kinda, uh, yeah. Clash them against each other. Yeah. Uh, but it doesn't convert to listeners to your point.

It's, it's definitely a. Oh dude. Wow. So you've grown those media properties, you've grown the broadcasting side. Sure. And then that brought you to this summer. You guys did this. I, I would say like a, you know, future casting of like, hey, what kind of, what do we wanna be when we grow up? For sure. So do we want to be just a tennis, live livestream commentary platform and media brand?

Or is there, is there a bigger fish to fry? Yeah. And it turns out there were bigger fish to fry. Yeah. So talk to me about what the new, the platform, like everything that you guys are putting out there and how you switched from Cracked Racquets into Cracked Media Ventures. I'm 34 years old and I have no idea.

So. Amen. Dude. Uh, yeah, I'm, I'm a yes man. Anything that's interested or like people that are, are fun and doing cool stuff I wanna be involved with. Yeah. And that's why we've kind of been. All across the board. This has kind of been, um, you know, sitting around, uh, for a couple years where we started covering pickleball and volleyball the last two years.

Um, you know, with the Cracked Racquets branding, it didn't make much sense from a coverage perspective on, you know, social accounts, even emails like reaching out. Um, so we started covering IU Indy volleyball, uh, their women's team last year. Um, and so that's when, uh, we really shout out Luke Bosso. Yeah. And yeah, Basos the one that, uh, got us the plug there, so shout out twice one guy.

So with that, um, we, you know, started kind of, um, you know, mulling around different names, ended up on Cracked Media Ventures. Um, each, you know, sport or silo is gonna have the cracked branding. Uh, but we are now covering all Olympic sports, um, because it, you know, it just makes sense from. The foundation that we have and the infrastructure.

Um, and, and you know, most of our competitors in, in the other Olympic sports, they, they do the broadcasting. They have a podcast or they're covering on social. We have all three prongs. Yeah. Yeah. What is the hardest sport to cover college tennis, believe it or not, out of all of them. Which is, which is what we started, yeah.

Because of, we touched on it earlier, the three doubles courts. The six singles courts, and then the number of matches that are going on across the country, like for a volleyball match. It like our producers have had aha moments, the last, you know, year and a half to two years covering it because they're like, holy cow, we just have, you know, two camera feeds on one court and this is all we have to do, as opposed to, you know, nine cameras plus for one single match.

Yeah. Um, give people a perspective for the impact you guys have made since 2017. From, whether it's terms of, you know, games broadcasted or views received follower, like, give us a perspective for how big Cracked Media Ventures is that? 2019 ITA indoor championships, I think had a thousand viewers over the course of the weekend.

And that's not unique eyeballs. That's just a thousand views over four days. Dude, that's brutal. For four 12 hour days. Yeah, four 12 hour days. We're covering like Ohio State and Texas and Florida, like the best college tennis programs in the country on the men's and women's side. And that's all we got. Uh, but we kept pushing, um, we covered, um, the NCAA D1 championships in Waco in May.

Uh, of this year we had 500,000 unique eyeballs. It's, it was a 10 day event. So it's, it's different, but it just shows if, you know, you cover the sport, uh, on a consistent basis, the audience that you know was perceived to not be there. In 2019 and before that, um, they're there as long as you provide the coverage.

This episode of Get IN is brought to you by Indie Grills and Outdoor Living. The team that turns boring backyards into Hangout Heaven, they design and build custom patios, outdoor kitchens and fireplaces made for real life, from quiet family nights to hosting the whole neighborhood. What I love about them is they're local Hoosiers and not a national chain.

Just people who care about great design quality work and helping you love being outside. Again, if your backyard's been stuck in someday, head to indie girls.com and make it happen today. Six years. Mm-hmm. Like that's six years of grind. Yeah. Like I think people think, oh, I'm gonna, you know, and like you'll get one, like you'll get a clip to pop for a million views.

Yeah. Like yeah, for sure. That will not equate to a million podcast listeners. Yeah, it takes time. Yeah. And consistency and building trust for sure. Like, I dunno, when people think about like how many episodes Joe Rogan has. He's like pushing 3000 episodes. Yeah. Yeah. It's like we're right around like 200 episodes, which is really good in two years, by the way.

Yeah. I mean we are cranking, yeah. We are cranking so much content and we are not a 10th of Joe Bogan. Yeah, that's nuts. Like it's, it's, but it's consistency is key. Yeah. Um, in anything you do. 'cause it's easy to get fired up about something, uh, be excited about, you know, whatever you're doing. But it's. Year over year, uh, where you start to see those returns.

Yes. Yeah, absolutely. And it's like, and just keep growing like, and just keep innovating on your content. Like I'm sure segments that you had in your podcasts in 2017 have evolved and probably shifted a little bit. Yeah. In 2025, uh, the biggest reason is I'm not hosting anymore. 'cause I used to like host or co-host all of our podcasts.

Yeah. And I told you early on, my business partner Alex Gruskin, dmd us from his dorm room at, at Michigan. And thankfully I was actually at IU McKinney School of Law here in Indianapolis. Uh, I think it was like a Wills, Trusts, and Estates class. And he dms me and he's like, Hey, you have time for a call. And at the halfway point of the lecture, I, I leave, I'm thinking this is gonna be a five minute call.

It was an hour and a half of a pitch that he had been working on for weeks. To convince me to not only like bring him into the fold, uh, as a journalist, uh, you know, a content creator, whatever, uh, but to hand him the keys to the podcast. 'cause he's like, with all due respect, I know exactly what vision you have here.

I'm all for it. Tennis needs this, but you are terrible at hosting this podcast. And most people in my position were like, come on. Like, what are you talking about? I was like, maybe he's onto something here. You know? Wow. Yeah. And now he is like, you know, I told you about Waco, uh, in 25 and still water in 24, which is where NCAAs were back then.

Um, he had a fan come up and, and give him a custom bobblehead of Alex Gruskin. It had the crack racket shirt, it like, had all the, you know, things of his podcast studio. Um, so he's like kind of a cult, you know, figure within the college tennis and tennis community. Uh, but it's funny enough, full circle moment.

He just went out to Laver Cup, uh, I think it was two weekends ago out in San Francisco and interviewed Roger Federer, which is like another big milestone that we've unlocked here recently, dude. Yeah. You guys went from like Zoom podcast recording, like part-time for fun to your chief podcast host interviewing Roger Federer.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Who is? The greatest tennis player of all time. Well, yeah. You're gonna, you're like getting the aggregators going here. Yeah. The Reddit feed's gonna be going insane. Mm-hmm. But no, yeah, it's, yeah, one of, and, and one of the most like, recognized I, he's my GOAT for sure. Um, but he's like one of the most recognizable athletes on planet Earth for sure.

Yeah, dude. Absolute GOAT. Yeah. I mean, and you got, I mean, you got a doll and you got Djokovic joke. Yeah. Did joke. Serena, whatever. Oh yeah. You can't forget that either. Yeah, yeah. Damn. But it was, it was like top five. Top five. Come on. Yeah, for sure. Let's go. But it was definitely like a, a full circle moment where.

Um, you know, he was putting out podcasts about the, the 40 yard dash for Federer, Djokovic Nadal, and now he's interviewing him at the Laver Cup out there. So did he say that? He's like, Hey, one of my first ever podcasts I talked about what your 40 yard dash, you want to, you want to get clock up? He may have said that off lot.

He did cover that in the podcast. Unfortunately, he should have. He should. That's incredible. Yeah. Holy smokes. Okay, so, but I, but I also wanna touch on, so you, you asked like, what are some like data metrics or like Yeah. How big are you guys? Um, so I, I touched on kind of the numbers of, of the audience, but also we do 500 plus, um, events a year on ESPN+ predominantly, which is where we we're streaming most of our college tennis coverage.

Uh, but we also are up to 30 to 40 million views a month on social across our channels, which is like a big deal for us. Oh, dude, that's huge. Yeah. We're pushing in on 10 million views a month, and then we're like over the freaking moon about it. Yeah, it's like, as you should be. That's huge. Yeah. It's, it's insane.

Yeah. And like to be at 30 to 40. Yeah. That's freaking fire. Yeah. Yeah. We're like, what are the best performing things for you all? Yeah, so you mentioned the, the Instagram feed, that's definitely like our number one platform. Um, TikTok is pretty good. Um, but yeah, Instagram and then Twitter. Sound like what kind of content are you putting out?

That like people that get people fired up? Yeah, some of the clips from the podcasts. Um, and then we also just struck a deal with the ATP, uh, where we have access to their highlights dating back to the early nineties. Uh, so the, yeah. Professional men circuit, so we, that's been a game changer. Oh yeah. We can just pull something from the archives, like, for sure.

Remember this crazy between the leg shot, then the doll pulled off? Yeah, let's go. Oh, yeah. Yeah. That's like the only tennis highlight I could think of off the time. He would always hit those. Well, that's, I mean, a lot of them, like where they hit the, like between their legs going backwards and I'm like, dude, tweeter down the line.

Yeah. Yeah. Tweeter down the line. Tennis words. Come on. Yeah. There we go. Um, okay. You're getting it. So when we're talking though, you, you expand to a lot more Olympic sports. To all of them. Yes. Yes. So, so like where, where do you go? Like what's the first deal you get IU in d volleyball? Do you start to pick up some other brands to do their Olympic sports?

Yeah, so, uh, so Luke Baso, uh, got the athletic director position at IU Indy whenever he was at Franklin. I think he was teaching back in like, as an adjunct professor in 2001, 2002. He had like, had me on for a guest lecture to talk about, correct track. 2021. 2021. 20. Not 2001. I think he would've been like, oh yeah, 2001 would've been, yeah.

Space Odyssey. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I don't know if he's that old. He's, he might be, he's like, he's like the youngest D1 athletic director, but he's not that old, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So 20, so 2021, he brings me in, uh, guest lecture. Um, so I, I hit him back up too, like right whenever he got it. Congrats. Um, he had remembered what we did on the streaming side, and he was interested in covering, I think, uh, their women's team was only getting like 40, 50% of their matches covered.

And we filled up the rest. Heck yeah. So from there, um, yeah, we've struck a deal with the Horizon League, uh, in volleyball. Shout out to Julie, let's go. Yeah, they rock. We love the Horizon League for sure. Yeah. Represent, yeah. They're here in Indianapolis. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Um, so just like in college tennis, I think, you know, you need one or two kind of anchor clients from a credibility standpoint.

Show what you can do and then build from there. So we're planning to do a lot more coverage in volleyball, you know, in 2026 and beyond. But then baseball and softball is kind of that next territory for us. So some of the, uh, conferences that we have relationships with on the tennis side, we've worked with them to get in on baseball and softball.

I mean, like getting some stuff up at Grand Park going, that'd be pretty cool. Like there's some Yeah, that's, that's a good idea. There's some sick prospects that come through here. Is there stream set up out at Grand Park? No idea. Yeah. Couldn't tell you. That's, yeah, that's a good idea though. Hey, grand Park.

Hey, bullpen tournaments. I love that. Yeah. Let's talk. So things keep advancing, you're doing more sports. What's your dream sport like, if you could cover anything? I mean, being an Indiana guy, basketball is like the number one, uh, for us. And I, I think there's a huge void in the market from an AAU perspective.

So we've actually had, we have proposals out right now with Nike and then the New Balance, uh, circuits for AAU. Um, and 'cause right now all they have is that grainy stream that we had for college tennis back in the day. So I think, so you're just looking through live streams and being like, yeah, we can do better.

We can do, well people now are, are sent, like, we're fortunate enough that people are like DMing us. Like, hey, uh, you know, we have travel hockey, like all we have is a grainy stream. We'd love for you guys to cover this sport. Same thing with AAU basketball. What's the secret? Like what makes, what's the reason that you guys are able to.

Figure out how to promote this and make the economics of it work. Yeah. Yeah. Well, so the, the remote component is the biggest thing. So from an affordability standpoint, our competitors that are more like traditional legacy media that are on site are 10 times as much as as our costs. So we can beat them every single day from that standpoint.

Um, and then I think the, the biggest, so you don't need anyone out on site? No. So how do they set up the cameras, uh, fixed cameras or go mobiles that they can set up on the back of the court or field? Yeah. And then you have that fed to probably like a subcontractor commentator to like watch the stream and be like, or do, do all of them have commentators or no?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, typically we have just one play-by-play commentator. Uh, for bigger events we'll have a play-by-play commentator and a color analyst. Um, but yeah, it, it's not like anything earth shattering. We're not reinventing the wheel with like, commentary and, you know, graphics. Uh, but what we've found in some of these non-revenue generating sports or emerging sports, uh, just having graphics on the screen, having live scoring and commentary, um, is a game changer because they're just used to just like a stream has been a godsend for them for the most part.

Um, but then I, you know, you asked about the secret sauce, it's none of that. I mean, the affordability is, is a big deal. Um, and that all comes 'cause we're remote. Um, but it's the like identifying people that are fanatical about these sports. Um, so Alex Gruskin, like I touched on in tennis, he was not out when he was a junior senior in college out at the bars or like doing what I was doing whenever I was in college.

He was watching, you know, a TP Challenger feeds. He was watching that grainy, you know, live stream in college tennis. And, and this guy, whether like we brought him in the fold or if he was working with crack racks with us, he would be watching tennis six, eight hours a day anyway. Um, so copy and pasting that.

It's not easy to do, but finding people that are fanatically passionate about their sport is the secret sauce. 'cause we come in and we cover volleyball and we have found somebody that loves, loves volleyball, and we're planning to do that in every single sport. Alright, here's a joint venture for us to work on.

Let's do it. This is why I came. Yeah, let's go. Here's a joint venture that I wanna do next year. We should figure out how to do. High school football, red zone where we could just sit in here, have like all the streams up and just watch touchdowns from across the state of Indiana. Sure. Like even if it was like, let's say 16 games.

Yeah. And we're watching 16 games go on and we're like just, you know, hanging out, having fun, talking high school. I think you would get a lot of high school athlete fanatics for football. For sure. Yeah. Well, and, and I would say, like you mentioned it earlier, huddle, like they already have the stream set up.

It's just a matter of, 'cause we have the software to input those streams. Yeah. And, and um, it also kind of pops up like, hey, it's fourth quarter, it's, you know, Shitar versus whoever. Yeah. Like, we need to get over there asap. They're on the five yard line. Yeah. So we have the software to identify that. Like a imagine just, it would be amazing.

We get some just diehard guys to hang out. Yeah. Or gals. Anyone's welcome. Yeah. You know, and we're just sitting here watching high school football from around the state. Friday night on Friday night night section. Yeah. Oh, oh yeah. Let's see. Like Friday. Friday Cracked Lights or something like that. Like we can work, we'll workshop the name.

Yeah, we'll workshop the name. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That could be pretty fun. Yeah, that would be electric. Yeah. Because there are sometimes where I'm like, I want to like tune in and I wanna know what's going on at different places across the state. It's like, oh, let's check in on how dude like Knox, I've been talking about this kid.

Miles McLaughlin is the nation's leading rusher. Yeah. Last Friday night, I couldn't figure out a watch it. I don't couldn't see it. Sure. Dude, he rushed for, he rushed for five, four hundred and thirty seven yards and seven touchdowns. Yeah. Yeah. This guy, it's like NCAA football back in the then dude's video game like, and everyone's like, everyone's willing, they're one a football, blah, blah.

And I'm like, I don't care what level of like, I. Put any high school football player out, like no one's been doing this before. Yeah. Like no one's been, no one's rushed for this many yards. It's crazy. Well, it kind of reminds me like, did you see the Derrick Henry highlights back in the day, like when he was in high school and he is like six three, like, you know, robo just a man.

Yeah. Doing his thing. Just a man. 400 yards, seven touchdowns. Joke. Well, okay that, that's my vision cast of what I wanna do in the future. What, say tomorrow still? Where are you guys doing, like where is Cracked Media Ventures going? Yeah, we have three full-time employees and 30 plus contractors right now.

Most of which are here in Indiana with the new NIL House settlement world and collegiate athletics. I think it's gonna force. A lot of the universities will start acting like businesses. Uh, and it's gonna be all about the bottom line. So we want to like dominate kind of the lower, lower level of D1 athletics and then get into D2, D3.

And then as we talked about right before we got on here, high school sports. So this, yeah. Friday night lights, red zone sounds amazing. We gotta make it happen. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. That would be so much fun. I love that. I think that's really cool. Especially like I'm a Depaw grad. Sure. So like watching, you know, DePaul football at times, like sometimes they have like really good streams and other, and the commentators and other times if they're on the road maybe somewhere doesn't have like a media department or whatever, it can be tough.

So. Sure. That would be interesting. I think that that's super, super cool. 'cause a lot of times, even now high school streams, one of their, it's a cam within a cam and they have it just like pointed at the scoreboard. Yeah. You know what I'm talking about. Well, and and the reason for that is a lot of those high school streams that don't have like a fixed huddle cam are literally parents that have like tripods that have set 'em up, like for the lower like tiered schools.

Like that's what they're doing. Yeah. Yeah. Wild. All right. Yeah. We're here for this. There's something here. Yeah, we're here for this. I'd watch it If you're, if you are in athletics across the state of Indiana and you want to do something interested in media, like you gotta hit 'em up. Yeah. Let's do, you gotta talk about getting these cameras put in so that you can get, uh, and you could even have students broadcasting students games.

For sure. For sure. That would be, oh my gosh. There's a big IHSAAA should, should do something. Yeah. Well, and, and I'll say this, um, so we have been, I mentioned the cross court cast product, the NFL RedZone kind of product that we've been working on within the college tennis ranks. Um, so that proprietary software is gonna be ready to deploy to anyone, uh, in Q2 of 2026.

So, um, yeah, high schools here in Indiana could, you know, okay. Put this on your list. The, we host a really big wrestling tournament, the Al Smith in Mishawaka, and I believe they run eight or 12 mats. Okay. And that's one where the best wrestler, it's like the state tournament Before the state tournament.

Yeah. The best wrestlers across the state come to the Al Smith. And I've always wanted, but it's so hard to track down and follow all the guys you wanna watch. Sure. Having something that picked up the big matches with some fanatical wrestling people, like, oh my gosh, that would be awesome. It would be amazing.

Yeah. Yeah. And if there's like, and there's already the cameras like, 'cause flow does a lot, like with those little cameras on there, are they Mevo cameras? Do you know? I don't know. I'm sure it does. It, it doesn't, as long as there is a stream already in place, we can kind of enhance it with the customizable graphics and the live scoring and, and everything else.

Yeah. So, yeah. I love it, man. Yeah. Okay. Um, let's talk through some of this, the peak moments. Is there a specific moment that you remember that you guys were broadcasting that just sticks with you to today? The biggest was actually this summer at Wimbledon. Um, so we weren't broadcasting Wimbledon, but one of the players, Ethan Quinn, who was an NCAA champion at Georgia two years ago, um, he had a huge upset, uh, at Wimbledon, was up on the booth post match with John McEnroe and Patrick McEnroe.

So like the McEnroe at Wimbledon is the biggest stage in tennis. And, um, I remember Johnny Mack is like, Hey Ethan, you know, uh, I remember, you know, watching the coverage from, uh, you know, your championship down at, in Orlando in 23, and Ethan in that moment, didn't have to think of us, but shouts out Cracked Racquets.

And he's like, he's like, without Cracked Racquets. And Alex Gruskin, my business partner who runs the commentary. He's like, you would not have been watching that match in 23. So shout out those guys. And it was, you know, one of those viral moments. Like I, you know, my phone is blowing up with hundreds of texts.

Uh, we ended up, you know, clipping that and putting it on social and it blew up everywhere. But that was a huge kind of like Wimbledon. Yeah, like Wimbledon. This is Wimbledon. Um, so that was, that was a big deal. Yeah. That's literally the biggest stage in tennis. Yeah. Yeah. Holy smokes. So that, yeah, that, that was a big deal.

Obviously Alex interviewing Roger Federer a couple weekends ago was a huge deal. Um, so we've had, yeah, this year's been really good to us. For sure. What's something that, that you want to accomplish? Like, I mean, you, you know, you're getting the shout out at Wimbledon. You got Alex interviewing Roger Federer.

Like, what's something else that's like big and kind of crazy and a little scary to say out loud that you're like, you know, it would be really, really cool if we did this. I would love to cover Grand Slams one day, man. Like deploying that CrossCourt Cast RedZone product at the US Open. Uh, we are in the process of solidifying a strategic partnership with the USTA, which is like the, you know, tennis Federation here in the states.

The US Open currently doesn't have this kind of coverage. They do one match coverage. They may go to a dual screen set up. Uh, but you have, you know, the first week of the open there's, you know, 32 plus matches that are going on simultaneously. I'd love to do that one day. That seems crazy that they haven't figured that out yet.

Yeah. Well, and you saw it with the Olympics here, uh, was it in 24 where they had that kind of red zone option and you're going like, within each sport? I think it's just where, like the future of sports media is going. 'cause I will ask you this, Nate. When you watch, you know, NFL Sunday, how many screens do you have up when you're watching two or three?

I I count your phone, tablet, multiple TVs. Yeah, laptop. Phone, or sorry, laptop TVs. Yeah, laptop and two TVs. Because, and I, and I, the reason I bring it up, I think like our generation lower, like they're not sitting there just watching a single tv like, you know, our parents did before. Well, okay, so I'm a Lions fan, so I'll watch the Lions game.

So my in-laws are from a suburb north of Detroit. Yeah. There we go. There we go. Uh, so I'll watch their game and their game only, but then if it's anything else, I have like multiple, I wanna see all the touchdowns. Sure. I wanna see all the things going on, which makes sense. I'd say like, 'cause yeah, I'm a big Colts fan.

Big Pacers fan. Like I have that up, but I'm checking Twitter the whole time. I'm like getting a secondary like, oh, like what's, you know, this commentator side? Yeah. I'm on ES esp N probably too sure I'm on social. Like seeing what I'm missing. You, you're not like locked in for three and a half hours watching anything.

I would imagine. Oh, prob that like so bad. Our intention, our attention spans are so short. Yeah. Uh, how much of it from like a red zone type product? Is having a Scott Hanson, like how important is, like how much of it is the software that puts out and can switch? And how much of it is the, the human capital of having a person who can, you know, be a good commentator.

Yeah, yeah. Over all those things. Yeah, it's, it's a great, I've never gotten this question, but I would say, and you see it with RedZone, with Scott Hanson right now. Like, I, I think it's, you know, probably 25% the software, uh, 'cause it's a big deal. But yeah, it's, it's the human capital and that like, he's so, yeah.

He's so built for this and it's just Alex Gruskin for our cross court casting. College tennis is built to do this. Um, he's a human library of. College tennis knowledge dating back 20, 25 years. Yeah. Having somebody like that, you cannot replace that with technology. Ai like any of that stuff, you cannot replace that.

Yeah. We we're gonna need a high school football quant. Yes. Like we're gonna need someone who's like a he or she is out there. For sure. Yeah. We're gonna need an almanac. Yeah, for sure. And we'll, yeah, we've come towards the end of the show where we're gonna talk all things Indiana. First question, this is brought to you reference at JC Hart.

They're a leader in creating enjoyable living experiences at apartment communities all across Indiana and beyond. Check them out at home is jc hart.com. My question for you, Johnny Hart's a good buddy of mine too, really plays. He's a hell of a golfer up Chad. Oh man. Represent he really big in country club sports.

I see. Yeah. Do you also, do you also play, what's the, uh. You also play bocce ball? Are you bocce ball? Are you, do you also I I don't What's the horse? What's the horse one? You also play Polo. Polo. Yeah. I, I haven't done polo. I could get into it. That's crack stables if it's good for the brand. Yeah. Crack stables.

Let's do it. Yeah. Yeah. Crack stables there. We got 20, 26. Here we go. There we go. Friday night lights, crack stables. We gotta cook in here. Let's go, let's go. I'm trying to think of a better name than Friday. It's like, you gotta be Friday night something. We'll, we'll get a good name there, but the question for you is, why do you call Indiana home?

I was born here, uh, first and foremost, and then I have been here my entire life other than four years of undergrad at slu. I love it here, man. My wife and I. Um, met here back in 2015. Growing up in southern Indiana was just, yeah, there was nothing like it. It's God's country down there. Uh, but we'll, yeah, we're never leaving like we've had, um, both my wife and I have had job offers in DC, New York.

Um, otherwise, uh, there's nothing like Indiana. Uh, and, and we, I, I should have started the podcast with this, but I'm a new dad, uh, so our daughter is six months old. Um, and there's nowhere else we would raise our family than Indiana. high school coaches get in line. Future tennis star right here for sure.

2043. Or Polo. Yeah. Or Polo or Bocci Ball, apparently, right. Uh, are you or are you not? Pro pickleball. I have been anti, or I was a, tennis traditionalist. I still am. Um, and both personally playing pickleball, uh, whenever it had the boom in 2020. And from a business perspective, people were like, you gotta try pickleball, you gotta try pickleball.

And you also have to start getting into pickleball on the coverage side. I pushed back for three years. Um, now I hate to even admit this. I play as much pickleball as I do tennis and we're covering it. Yeah. So I'm in, I'm the, founder of Cracked Racquets loves pickleball. You'll never believe it.

Your fans, the aggregators online are gonna go berserk. They're gonna be they're purists Yeah. What are you, come on. I'm just kidding. I love it. I love pickleball and shout out to Yeah, The Picklr. So Aaron Scholl and Nicole Scholl up in Noblesville and Drew Brees who like came back and invested in that, uh, venue.

It's great. Heck yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think it's fun, especially, I suck at tennis. Yeah. But I can, I can be manageable in pickleball. Yeah. Which I think like, I think it's take like there's a lot of people that would never play tennis that are getting in a pickleball. It's basically like a glorified ping pong, I'd say.

Uh, you can, Hey man, you put some respect. I love ping pong. You put some respect on my DUPR score. Come on. Yeah. Oh, that's a good, yeah. Good shout out there. Dude. You either did your research or you're like playing. No, dude. I mean, I don't have a, I don't know. I don't, but I know what they are. I, I have this like, gift to know, just a little bit dangerous, like a thousand million things.

Yeah. That's like, I could see you being dangerous that way. Uh, yeah. You know, I can just like pull one thing to get people like the high school mascots. Yeah. It's like, oh, I can just pull out. And I remembered in the beginning I said Indian Creek, it's Silver Creek. Silver Creek. That's what I thought. The dragons.

Yeah. Yeah, the drag. Yeah. Silverburg. Yeah. Yeah. So they were, that's like 10 minutes from the house that I grew up in. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, okay. So you are pro pickleball. That's what we're getting here. Yeah. Who is the greatest tennis player of all time? I have to go with Novak Djokovic. Yeah. Um, 24 Slams. Just how long he's been around.

He's like a, a Tom Brady, um, of sorts where he, just, the longevity of greatness, even with Rafa and Fed. Um, and Serena's right there too, but I, it, that's hard for me to say. 'cause I'm a huge Fed guy. Huge. I had his rackets growing up. Um, loved him. You, but yeah, you heard it here first. That's, that's a polarizing statement to you by the way.

You're like dipping in the controversy. Left and right away, the founder of Cracked Racquets likes pickleball and thinks that Novak Djokovic is the GOAT. Yeah. Interesting. You're well, and, and he's, it's crazy. Like he was like such a, uh, Disney villain for most of his career. Like hate everybody hated him.

He leaned into that, uh, with the crowds, booing him. He would like lean into that in his post match interviews. Um, and now in the older later stages of his career, the older he's gotten. Uh, people have started to love him now. It's interesting. Yeah. Yeah. They're like rooting for him at the opening. If you could take the 16th hole of the Waste Management Open and put it at any tennis event, where would you put it at?

This isn't gonna be a popular answer for my pro tennis fans, but I would do it at the NCAA Championships for D1 Men's and Women's Tennis, and I would do it in Athens, Georgia, uh, because they have the greatest college tennis set up and it would be, they have the space to do it. Georgia has the donors and the money to, to put this in.

Um, it would be crazy on site at Athens. Wow. Yeah, in Athens you have the 16th hole, the waste, the wasted management open. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. That would be electric. So I, and I would say like a, a like flow second would be Indian Wells on the pro side. 'cause it's out in Palm Springs, California, where Coachella is.

It's also, it's already kind of like a party vibe out there, so that would be like one A, one B, if you will. Those are, those are good. I, I was hoping for like a, the Wimbledon championship we're just out there. It would be impossible. Yeah. Wimbledon Village, they're not making it happen. No, they're they're not, they're not pumped up about that.

Who's like the greatest high school tennis team in Indiana? Yeah, so for a long time there was a rivalry between North Central and Carmel. On the boys side. On the boys side, I would say the same for the girls. Um, you know, castle, um, is pretty solid. Um, there, there are others, but I, it's predominantly both.

But yeah, guys and girls been Carmel North Central, but as of late it's been like Carmel's dominated the rivalry. I feel like North Central had a good run in tennis there for, for a while. Yeah, I'd say like when we were in high school there for like 10, 15 years, they had like a lot of D1 uh, D3 tennis players that came through there.

Who's the greatest tennis player from the state of Indiana. Todd Witsken was like top 50. Unbelievable. Uh, but I also have to give a shout out to Rajeev Ram who went to Carmel. They just named, uh, the court after him there and did the whole dedication ceremony. Um, he's a, uh, multiple time grand Slam champion, but he also has won Olympic gold.

What, how old? I think he's 42, 43. Still touring. Hey.

Yeah. Tom Brady of sorts. Yeah. I said Novak was, he's still out there. Domino.

I love it, man. All right. We've come down to our final three questions of the day. This is where we learn more about, I dunno, what you love about Indiana. So, first question, as you've been around helping broadcast tennis everywhere, there's tons of things you've picked up about, you know, the world, tennis, all these fun things.

But what's something that the world needs to know about Indiana? There's no better place to raise a family. And also the people here are. Yeah. The best people in the country. I, I, I've been all over the world, both like as a fan of tennis and, and fan of sports, traveling, whatever, and all over the country.

And, and I keep coming back here every time. It's like, I'm so glad to be back in Indiana. There we back home again. Yeah. Cost of living. We can talk about affordability. No traffic safe. I, it's, I just love it here. There's nothing like it. Yeah. Heck yeah. Yeah. All right. This is your chance to shine some light on a part of Indiana that more people need to know about.

What is a hidden gem in Indiana Fair Oaks Farms. Fair Oaks Farms for Spring Break, baby, let's go. As a family vacation. The milkshakes, the food there is unbelievable. They've got a lot of activities for kids in the back. Yeah. What do you like about it? Um, mostly the milkshakes, if I was being honest. Oh, the Fair Oaks Farms milkshakes.

Yeah. Let's go. All right. That, that may be a crazy answer. I would say like on the national scale, like everyone has to experience the 500. Nothing like the speedway. I love it. I totally, not necessarily the hidden gem of the world, but Oh yeah, there we go. But it is, it is fire. You ha It changes your life.

Yeah. If you've never been to the 500, going will change your life. For sure. Yeah. You'll be a different person walking outta there than when you walked in. Oh yeah. And you have an appreciate 300,000 people in one area. It's crazy. It's crazy to say that. And then when you go in and experience 300,000 people, it is like nothing like it.

So not hidden gem. But yeah, you could, you could take 100 people and plant them at different places across the Indianapolis 500 and they would, they could all have such vastly different experiences and they all would if you asked. Yeah. 10 people even like if you took four people, actually eight people, I'd say that.

Yeah. And you put eight people inside turns. 1, 2, 3, and four. Outside turns. 1, 2, 3, and four. They would have vastly different experiences for sure. Yeah. Joey Molinaro. Yeah. And you need to do a segment on that next year. Hey, they, I love that we just like plant people out and then we have them come back and like tell tales of the Speedway.

Yeah. Sponsored by Happy Dad, Water, whatever. There we go. Come on dad. Water. Come on Bryce. Let's go. Yeah. Uh, finally, this is where we get recommendations for future podcast guests and just learn about Hoosiers that are doing amazing things. Who's a Hoosier? We need to keep on our radar. Someone who's doing big things.

Yeah. Have you had Jennifer Magley on the show yet? Not yet, no. Oh my, you have to have her own. She has some energy. Yeah, energy. She's got the chop. She's on this, uh, pat McAfee quest if you have it since Yes. She and she is relentless about it, which I love every day for like 250 or 250. Yeah. Maybe 300 days.

And I just, I love somebody that's like willing to shoot their shop publicly and consistent about it. Yeah. And she's bringing, I, I think she's gonna end up on the McAfee show in second. Dude. Has, has anyone from their show acknowledged? Oh yeah. She had a, a, like, she was down with them, I think it was during the Pacers playoff run.

Uh, she was down there with them. Um, I don't know the, the full extent of the exchange, but it was like about like potentially coming on the show, so. Wow. There you go. So yeah, if Pat or any, she, his boys like, watch the show. Oh yeah. He's an avid listener to show. He definitely is Des He he's gotten in on Get IN, come on, let's go.

Uh, Dalton man, this is a pleasure to have you on. It's crazy. You guys went from 1000 total visitors over four days. Yeah. To 500,000 unique visitors broadcasting the sport that you love tennis. That's incredible, man. Thank you. You've done some amazing things. You've stayed persistent since 2017 building this Cracked Media Ventures brand.

I'm so excited to follow along and I can't wait till I, I'm like watching one of these Olympic sports and I accidentally just pop in and I'm like, oh man, this is a Cracked stream. That's crazy. And it might, might be the Friday night football concept that's gonna happen. We'll see you all. We'll see you all the next and we'll have the name figured out.

It's gonna happen. Yeah, it's gonna be electric and we're gonna be getting. Oh, we'll get our boy, my, my, my boy dom in here. Oh yeah. And we'll just be watching football talking and it's like if we, you know, do it here, you know, hanging out. Yeah. Or bring some food in. It'll be really, really fun. Say less. I'm here for that dude.

Yeah. Hey, keep up the great work and we'll talk to you soon. Yeah. Thanks so much for having me, Nate. Appreciate it. This show is made possible by our friends up at Sweetwater. Whether you're looking to start a podcast or take your content to the next level, click the link in the description to see all my gear recommendations at Sweetwater.

If you want a behind the scenes look at everything we're doing across the state. Make sure you follow me on Instagram and TikTok at Nate Spangle. Thank you so much for listening and being a part of what makes the Hoosier State great. We'll see you next time here on Get IN.