Riccardo Stewart: Hey, I wanna welcome you guys back to another
episode of the A-W-M-N-F-L podcast.
My name is Ricardo Stewart.
They call me the coach, and I'm joined with my friend Sam Acho, the
mayor, the professor Jeff Locke.
And lastly, my man, Zach Miller.
The truth.
Guys, want to, we, we talk about the NFL athlete because we're all passionate
about serving him and and his family.
But you know what I get?
I, I, I'm talking to people around like, listen, I'm
working with some amazing guys.
We got over 20 years of NFL experience, and we don't really get a chance
to hear from you guys in particular of not only just your careers,
but why you do what you do now.
And so, all I wanna do now is just be able to ask you guys some questions.
I obviously, you're my friends and say you wanna say about essentially why you
guys got into the profession that you're in and, and what does it mean to you.
To be able to be a part of a family office that serves the NFL athlete.
And so let me start first with you, Zach.
I mean, one, just tell us a little bit about your, your background and
essentially your why, and I'm gonna ask you some questions off of that.
Zach Miller: Yeah,
Jeff Locke: Yeah.
My biggest why is
Zach Miller: wanted to be the change, that I
Jeff Locke: that I think is
Zach Miller: possible, like going back, getting my finance
Jeff Locke: finance.
Zach Miller: seeing how.
Good financial
Jeff Locke: Financial,
Zach Miller: be and seeing what, you know, what I got
Jeff Locke: I got everything
Zach Miller: PA is like, Hey, get an
Jeff Locke: advisor,
Zach Miller: one of the Big Wall Street firms, a separate CPA, and so you know
how much more I paid in taxes than I should have, how much opportunity costs
by being too conservative and by owning too many bonds, like we're talking
Jeff Locke: millions of.
Zach Miller: that I wanted that to change.
And so the only way I
Jeff Locke: Only way I can think of doing that was actually
be an advisor and directly with the guys,
Zach Miller: that, that was me, you know, at the
Jeff Locke: you know,
the highest paying
Zach Miller: made a bunch of money
Jeff Locke: money
and that
opportunity so short, you have
Zach Miller: that little bit of time to maximize it.
So
Jeff Locke: it.
So
that's the biggest reason I that change.
because
Zach Miller: because looking
Jeff Locke: looking around even now, advisor, how
bad.
Zach Miller: Advisors are that work
Jeff Locke: are that guys?
Zach Miller: guys, they're just straight up.
They're not good, they're
Jeff Locke: They're
Zach Miller: elite.
And you and NFL players should
Jeff Locke: deserve the best deserve.
Zach Miller: that actually want to make a huge impact in, it's
not easy, but there is a ton of opportunity out there for NFL players
and there's just such weak advisors that are working in the NFL world.
Riccardo Stewart: Listen, Zach is not like holding anything back.
I mean, weak.
Sorry, bad.
So there as former as athletes wanna stay around the game.
What I've seen is either you try to become a coach, maybe you go
become an agent, very few, but you, you're seeing it more and more.
They become an advisor.
Jeff, I know you a little bit to go, like there was a point in your career
or at least your education where maybe engineering, I know your dad's a pilot.
Like how did you, and why do you do what you do now?
Jeff Locke: Yeah, it was kind of a, it wasn't a straight
line, like you said, right?
I wanted to be an engineer in college first.
Um, slowly realized, uh, you can't do engineering labs when you have
football practice in the afternoons.
So next best thing was economics.
Just fell in love with that.
And some of you guys might not even know this, but I was part
of the National College Players Association back in college.
I was one of a few guys around the country that were like an intern for
the NCPA for three years in college.
So my first taste of helping players was actually trying to get bills
pushed through, um, California state legislature to try and get
guys more protections in college.
So we tried to get back Then you didn't have full scholarship checks, right?
So like.
Helping guys try to get more for their meal money, helping guys get
bigger medical protections right from the schools, stuff like that.
So that was the first taste.
And then I was helping guys budget their scholarship checks.
So they were asking their families for less money in addition to their
checks, just to get by in college.
So that really kicked it all off for me, was just helping my teammates.
'cause I knew they were struggling back in college.
Right then I had the crazy fortunate experience.
After my second year in the NFL I interned at an investment company
and my project there was to figure out why NFL guys go broke.
This was literally after the broke documentary came out.
All this, all these headlines, everyone just crapping on guys for
thinking every NFL guy goes broke.
'cause that was the headline and that pissed me off.
I was like, no, I know NFL guys don't all go broke.
And I wanted to figure out the reasons why guys actually went broke.
So.
After all that experience, I also learned what real advisors do by
working at that investment company, and I literally fired my advisor within
like a couple months of working there.
Because they weren't like one of the real ones delivering real
advice on that side of the business.
So really just like
Zach came at it from one angle, my angle is like, I'm sick of dudes
getting scammed, getting ripped off, and getting terrible advice.
It's very similar to Zach's angle, but um, I'm like, you
gotta just, you gotta go do it.
You gotta go deliver the advice, you know, the guy should get, um,
and change it from the inside.
Riccardo Stewart: Man, I didn't know that about you, Jeff.
This is, you know, we gotta do more podcasts that I can ask you more
questions so that I can find out more things about your personal life.
I mean, forget working together.
There's, I'm, I'm like in this fortunate POS like position for me.
One, what I do as a hobby is I coach high school football and I'm literally
coaching with like four former NFL guys.
I mean, Larry Fitzgerald's around, Donna McNabb's around.
It's like, man, there's NFL guys here.
And then what I do for work is I'm around you guys and I'm
around guys who've been in it.
And not just like taste it a little bit, five years, nine
years, eight years career.
Sam, why does it matter that you are a former player when
it comes to what you do now?
Sam Acho: Yeah.
The reason why it matters that I'm a former player when it comes
to what I do now is that as a former player, I've lived it.
So Jeff talked about that.
Broke documentary about how all these athletes go broke.
Well, not only was I a former player in my second year in the NFLI got elected by my
teammates of the Arizona Cardinals to be the player representative of the NFL pa.
So when it came to any voting decisions for our Cardinals team, I was the
one voting, but also showed up to the Board of Representatives meetings when
they're sharing all this information about athletes and athletes going broke
and being depressed and divorced and bankrupt within a few years after playing.
And I remember being a rookie second year player thinking.
It was my dream at a time to make it to the NFL, though I've
accomplished that dream, it looks like failure's coming down the line.
It just became very clear.
And so the reason why it matters, the reason that it matters that I'm a
former player, is that not only have I seen the inside, whether it's from
the NFL PA perspective, from playing for nine years on different teams and
experienced it, but I've also seen what happens to other guys, former
teammates who have made a ton of money.
and they thought they were going to achieve generational
wealth and generational success and they actually don't.
so for me, it's this mission of saying, okay, how do I help empower
players to realize that, hey, just 'cause you signed that big
contract doesn't guarantee success.
In fact, most times you won't get that success.
I think it's 1 out of 10.
will pass down that wealth to the third generation.
So if we got to here, that's not actually success.
I, I, and as a former player, not only have I lived it, but I've seen it and
so I'm trying to help guys bridge the gap to, okay, this is what you did.
You say you wanna get here the last 15, 20 years with the kind
of advice we've been getting.
It's not gonna get you there.
It point blank period.
There has to be a different way.
so I have a different perspective on how to get there.
Riccardo Stewart: Yeah.
know, there, my sophomore year in college, I had probably one of my
best years at Arizona Estate, and I tell people like, man, what happened?
Were you just, did you train differently?
And I said, no, no, no.
There was a guy that played in front of me by the name of Terrell Suggs.
Okay.
And this dude was amazing.
So when you're a safety paying, playing behind a defensive end like that,
you're gonna have more interceptions, you're gonna have more opportunities.
'cause guess what?
Nobody's thinking about you.
You know what I mean?
And there is about, what you do is who you're around.
And so when I came to do this job, it was like, okay, you're
gonna work with Zach Miller.
You're gonna work with Sam Acho.
And then Jeff came along.
Now it's a lot easier for me as a safety back there, making sure when
things are in the air, I can just pick them off because I already know
what's happening in front of me.
I mean, it really does.
It matters.
Now I wanna ask you three, what are the hurdles and not necessarily, what's
the difficulties of being a part of a family office serving NFL athletes?
What are the hurdles for the athlete to see exactly what they need?
How does that make you feel and what are the challenges?
You get what I'm saying?
Like what are the things that you go, man, I wish they only knew.
Fill in the blank.
Jeff, I'm gonna start with you.
Jeff Locke: I wish they only knew how the sausage is made behind
the scenes at most advisory firms.
Right.
It's not pretty.
Right.
It's, uh, it's unfortunately all about just.
Who's my next client gonna be and how do I get as much money from them as possible
into the accounts that I manage, so that I can make as much money as I can?
That's point blank how most of our industry operates.
Um, when I was interviewing other firms, that was some of the stuff
I was hearing in the interviews was essentially, Hey, how much can you
bring in from guys you know, in the NFL and how fast can you bring it in?
That's all they cared about.
Some of the other firms that I.
Thought I might go to before I knew what I knew about the industry.
So there are some people out there that care, some advisors that care, other,
other companies kind of built like we're built, built by former athletes.
But it's hard to find them, right?
Most are just part of this bigger machine, right?
Serving mom and pop and then they think it's the coolest thing in the world
when they get an athlete client, they can brag about to all their friends.
But they're not actually giving you the service that you deserve.
They don't have the experience and the expertise to do it.
something I wish I knew, I didn't find out till too late.
Again, I fired one advisor and then another advisor took me a while.
Um, I hate to say it, but you're kind of a trophy to be honest, at most firms, right?
You're the, you're the cool get that the advisor gets to tell
all his other buddies about.
Versus like actually being built to serve a client like you.
Riccardo Stewart: I like that.
I like that.
Sam, what would you add to that from your perspective?
Sam Acho: Yeah, I would say that I, I wish I knew, I wish
I knew how the system worked.
what I mean by that is, you may have an advisor and you think, man, this
advisor has my best interest in mind without realizing that some of the
things that you're being, um, offered, I'll use the word, uh, offered.
Aren't necessarily in your best interest, but they're in
your advisor's best interest.
Let's say something like, oh, I think I, uh, life insurance.
Oh yeah, I'm gonna get life insurance.
But the same guy who's managing my money is also going to
sell me this life insurance.
And he is not telling me how much he's making from the life insurance.
Oh.
When it comes to different, uh, investment opportunities.
Oh, telling me that.
Well, the investments that they're offering are, are, are only a part of
their company per se, and there's better investments out there, but they're
not gonna make money off of those.
They won't tell me about though, like I had no idea about any of that.
Even when it comes to different types of retirement accounts.
Like I, I'm, I'm trying to, I'm kind of getting in the weeds a little bit, but
some of this is like, it's just so you talk about the passion or excitement or
whatever, it's like, I didn't know any of this and I played nine years in the
NFL and I was one of the, I was voted as the top 20 smartest athletes in sports.
I was a player representative.
I, I was in the N-F-L-P-A and none of this was talked about.
so I just wish that players really knew.
I wish players really knew how the system worked when it came to their
money, their wealth, and how people around them are actually not only getting
paid, but also incentivized to get paid.
Riccardo Stewart: Yeah.
Yeah.
And Zach, I'd love to hear from you.
Zach Miller: Yeah, the, I mean, I think it, it comes down to I
wish guys understood what a real family office is, and not all the
pretenders that are out there.
There's just a lot.
And whether they're life insurance salesmen, selling whole life, not good
for players, point blank, shouldn't be.
No one should be buying whole life policies when you're
21, 20 2-year-old in the NFL.
Like there's a million better investments in that.
no, I mean, people just don't know what a family office is.
I didn't know what one was.
These companies, now these Wall Street firms are, are claiming to offer wall or
they're offering family office services and you, there's no, there's nothing.
There's no family office services.
You're either a family office or you're not.
You either are doing what's best for your players or you're
doing what's best for yourself.
You can't have it both ways.
And so to understand like how much taxes matter.
I mean, we've personally experienced, I've personally experienced it, how
much taxes matter, how much things like venture capital, private equity,
the right way, because most of private equity, those kind of fun or cool or
you know, private investment world, if you pick the wrong ones, you just
get very boring market like returns.
And so things
Jeff Locke: Things like that
matters.
Generational actually
Zach Miller: once you start splitting money.
You know, two ways, four ways, eight ways, 16 ways.
All that
Jeff Locke: that.
Zach Miller: matter.
And so it actually, people say they want generational wealth, then
they don't pick a family office.
Like there's just a lot of things that players need to know, and it's
so hard to know when you're 20.
It's so hard to know when you're so young.
But if you do want those things, you gotta learn quick.
Riccardo Stewart: Love it.
I love it.
Wanna put you guys on the spot?
If I were talking to somebody and an athlete and saying, Hey, you're
gonna choose to work with a WM, you get a chance to work with Sam Macho.
You get a chance to work with Jeff Locke.
Zach Miller.
If I had to give him one sentence, you had to say, Hey, working with
me, you will experience this.
guys get one sentence working with me, you will experience this.
I'm gonna start first with you, Sam, with Sam Macho.
You will get or experience.
Sam Acho: Working with Sam Macho, you'll get an experience, someone
who not just cares about you, like to the day that you die.
'cause it's more than just about that.
Not just who has your best interest in mind, but who has actually lived it, who
has made the mistakes that you probably have made or maybe that you may be going
to make, and who's gonna do his best to help empower you not to make those same
mistakes, that not only he made, but also a bunch of guys who he's been around
who's made a lot of money, and they've lost a lot of money they've made as well.
Riccardo Stewart: Working with Jeff Locke, you will experience this.
Jeff Locke: You will experience an actual expert trying to level
up his game in his next career.
That's gonna give you the real talk, not the BS that you want to
hear, but what you need to hear to achieve what you want to achieve.
Riccardo Stewart: Working with Zach Miller, the Truth, will experience this.
Zach Miller: Yeah, working with Zach Miller, you're as
hard as you work on the field.
I will work off the field to make sure your money investments, financial planning
is the best you could possibly get.
That's just the, the way I am.
I'm built like that.
Riccardo Stewart: Love it.
I love it.
I'm gonna end with this one.
You know, I had an older sister and I was a loud mouth, always getting in trouble.
Guys would wanna fight me and as soon as my sister would show up with all of her
friends, they kind of just faded away.
That's how I feel working here.
There's a lot of people out there.
There's a lot of imposters.
A lot of phonies.
I really do think that a WM is the best when my crew, Sam, Jeff, and
Zach show up when it comes to serving you, the imposters, fade, the black.
Listen, if you have any questions about any of these guys, anything
we do here at a WM, if you want some resources, we'd love to get that in
your hand, so please give us a call.
Our cell is 6 0 2 9 8 9 5 0 2 2.