The Coaches Group Chat

E8: Car Shopping, Candy, Chad Returns From Poland, Jamie Davis, Adult Volleyball, Favorite Cultures

• Matthew Houlihan, Arielle Houlihan, Chad Gordon • Season 1 • Episode 8

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This is what ChatGPT says is todays episode description:

Ever found yourself laughing at the mishaps that come with tweeting idioms? Imagine my surprise when my own Twitter fiasco turned into a source of shared giggles. In this lively episode, we tackle everything from the quirky allure of holiday candies—team Easter or Halloween, pick your sugary fighter—to navigating the choppy waters of selling a used car. Stick around as we share our latest life updates; whether it's braving a new haircut, enduring car dealership haggling, or embracing the chill of an impromptu cold plunge, you're in for a mix of laughs and earnest life lessons, including the financial juggling act that comes with career transitions.

Now, let’s whisk your palate away to the hearty flavors of Polish cuisine, as we contrast the local dining gems with our stateside culinary experiences. During this gastronomic adventure, we’ll also spill the beans on a whirlwind trip to Los Angeles that almost wasn't, until spontaneity struck. Then we pivot to a more contemplative note, unraveling the intriguing circumstances surrounding Jamie Davis's departure from USA Volleyball. We toast to the organization's victories and ponder the power of transparency, considering a Freedom of Information Act request to unearth the intricacies of their NBC contract.

Wrapping up, we volley through discussions on the vibrant volleyball community, probing into the passionate, sometimes overly intense, world of local leagues and the need for a nurturing fan base to keep the sport alive in the public eye. From there, we salute the iconic team spirits of the Navy SEALs, New Zealand's All Blacks, and the memorable Chicago Bulls under Phil Jackson's wing. Finally, we plunge into a pool of nostalgia, reminiscing about summer swim meets that shaped our childhoods, inspired by legends like Katie Ledecky and Michael Phelps. Join us as we share these stories, connecting the dots of our diverse interests and experiences, leaving you with a splash of inspiration and a hearty dose of amusement.

Arielle Houlihan:

There's a Twitter account out there somewhere of Matt's messed up idioms Glass Boats, glass Boats, if anybody can find that. If you want to, look up.

Matt Houlihan:

It was basically like a Twitter account that Ariel started.

Chad Gordon:

Was it a? Thing?

Matt Houlihan:

She would tweet out my messed up idioms.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah.

Matt Houlihan:

The things I said.

Chad Gordon:

So if you want a good laugh, go on X.

Matt Houlihan:

How long ago was this Wait? You don't know.

Chad Gordon:

Oh this is long time ago.

Arielle Houlihan:

What's Twitter called now? X Okay, ready, welcome to at glass boats on Twitter. X On X Idioms for people who suck at idioms Six followers Kick names and take X. That's a good one. All of these are in quotes, so these are things that Matt has said. It's a team of two tails, okay. Next one is don't take things for granted.

Matt Houlihan:

Spelled G-R-A-N-I-T Like the rock.

Arielle Houlihan:

Next one is hang your heads high. That's a double entendre next one is burning the midnight foil. How do you have so many? Next one is beating up the wrong. Okay, this is the last one. This is the last one and this is how this was named. Glass People with glass houses shouldn't rock boats Sup. Are we recording?

Chad Gordon:

We're always recording.

Arielle Houlihan:

Okay, question Candy Favorite candy Christmas, easter, halloween.

Chad Gordon:

I think Easter does a nice job.

Arielle Houlihan:

I agree, you gotta be a marshmallow fan If you like Easter.

Chad Gordon:

I like. I enjoy a nice beef Me too, not a savage yeah.

Arielle Houlihan:

I think of Not a savage.

Matt Houlihan:

I think of like this. Like this is just a Reese's shaped as a bunny but I think of Reese's as a.

Arielle Houlihan:

Halloween candy, that's fine, you're entitled to your own incorrect opinions.

Chad Gordon:

I like where Chad stands on this, because why isn't that like a Christmas thing too Right?

Arielle Houlihan:

They have a tree.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, they have a tree, Exactly when you get a Reese's at Halloween. Is it shaped?

Chad Gordon:

like a jack-o'-lantern, or is it just a Reese's? Yeah, they have a pumpkin version of exactly what you just opened.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah.

Chad Gordon:

They come in little pumpkins, the same way that they have Reese's peanut butter eggs, right.

Matt Houlihan:

Interesting. I still think it's orange and black.

Arielle Houlihan:

Okay, let's get rid of peanut butter cups.

Chad Gordon:

Then why even talk about this? What are we doing?

Arielle Houlihan:

Let's get rid of peanut butter cups. What was I saying?

Chad Gordon:

You were talking about 50 First Dates, Reese's peanut butter cups. What was I?

Arielle Houlihan:

saying you were talking about 50 First Dates. Reese's Peanut Butter Cups Nice yeah, I relate to that movie a lot actually.

Chad Gordon:

It's fantastic yeah.

Arielle Houlihan:

Get rid of peanut butter in general. Yeah, favorite.

Matt Houlihan:

What's your favorite candy yeah what's yours's yours favorite candy, not peanut butter cup for candy.

Chad Gordon:

Get rid of peanut butter no peanut butter in your candy, it's still halloween.

Matt Houlihan:

Why? Because I also like the like assortment assortment gummy yeah, like you're like dots, dots, dots are halloween.

Chad Gordon:

No, I like like a lappy, like lappy taffy and I like a, like a nerd's rope those are great options, dark horse, I think that's the problem, though.

Arielle Houlihan:

Like halloween is selfish, right, because like dots aren't inherently this is the best answer I've heard to this question, but like Easter, halloween's a narcissist.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, I mean, oh my gosh, I love this, but like you could eat dots any time of the year, they're not like Halloween dots, right? So why?

Arielle Houlihan:

But you don't eat dots on Easter and you don't eat dots on Christmas, but you definitely eat dots on Halloween. But I don't eat that much candy in general. I just eat more candy during Halloween. That's true.

Chad Gordon:

Which do you?

Arielle Houlihan:

consider York peppermint patties a Christmas candy just because they are peppermint Kind of I don't though I still consider them kind of Halloween.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, I consider it more Halloween. Yeah, I guess Halloween is just a little selfish, like every candy goes under Halloween.

Chad Gordon:

I mean, yeah, I think they just kind of bucket the rest Like Peeps.

Arielle Houlihan:

Okay, I'll give you Easter. Why do they not have Peeps on Halloween?

Chad Gordon:

I'm sure that they do. No, they don't. How many of you have?

Arielle Houlihan:

ever gotten Peeps on Halloween I would be so excited if I got Peeps on Halloween.

Matt Houlihan:

That seems like just a branding issue from Peeps.

Chad Gordon:

They only want your money half the year, oh, actually you might be right. They must have like a ghost.

Matt Houlihan:

There's orange and or like a pumpkin. You're right, you're right, you're right. They just change the shape.

Arielle Houlihan:

Why do they? Nobody buys them, though. It's because not very many people like them.

Chad Gordon:

Fewer people buy them.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, can I get in your cold plunge tomorrow? Yeah, should we do a cold plunge date?

Chad Gordon:

If you want to come over, I got to haircut at noon.

Arielle Houlihan:

I got to go over to the car dealerships.

Matt Houlihan:

Yes, you have car dealerships to do.

Chad Gordon:

What are you selling that Audi for?

Arielle Houlihan:

You want, it Are we?

Matt Houlihan:

selling it for $35,000.

Arielle Houlihan:

No, I'm out.

Matt Houlihan:

I think we're going to have to buy it for $35,000.

Chad Gordon:

I understand that.

Arielle Houlihan:

I was asking about the other part. I was giving you the family and friends discount $35,000?

Chad Gordon:

No.

Matt Houlihan:

I don't know. I got to see the details of what this thing will go for on a true car or whatever.

Arielle Houlihan:

How about we call it in? Are you in? How about we call it in you?

Matt Houlihan:

in the market for a Q7?. Possibly you in the market for a new car.

Chad Gordon:

I could be. Yeah, I mean my camera is. It's lovely and it's great.

Arielle Houlihan:

He's got that new CEO money. No, I make no money now.

Chad Gordon:

I took a 100% pay cut. The only money I have is when I get a check from your husband from Beach Club.

Arielle Houlihan:

So we'll throw in a car for $35,000 and call it a day we're going to start paying Chad for this podcast.

Chad Gordon:

I got free socks. I think I'm going to give you a gas card, just to stick it to John's.

Arielle Houlihan:

He's never going to work with me, ever again.

Matt Houlihan:

It's just going to be like $50, $70 gas card it's only going to work. A shell. $25 gift card yeah, no, literally, it's only going to work, it's a $25 gift card to a gas station.

Chad Gordon:

Just so you can tell them that you got one. Hey, podcasts are really taking off you know, we all got gas cards.

Matt Houlihan:

Whoa, that's super cool. Whoa, oh, my goodness, did you follow?

Arielle Houlihan:

him yes.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, Gary Vee talks about him all the time Wait what. Yeah, he's always like D-Rock, that's super cool.

Arielle Houlihan:

This guy just followed me on Instagram.

Chad Gordon:

I don't know who you're talking about.

Arielle Houlihan:

This guy does like.

Matt Houlihan:

He's Gary Vee's videographer.

Chad Gordon:

Oh.

Matt Houlihan:

That's wild.

Chad Gordon:

You're basically famous.

Matt Houlihan:

That's goals right there.

Chad Gordon:

Am I going to have to start my own podcast, with you guys branching off into your various no, that's a great way to start an episode.

Matt Houlihan:

Cheers for.

Arielle Houlihan:

Episode 8 or 7 or 9, we're not sure. Yes, chad was in the land of the poles.

Chad Gordon:

I was.

Arielle Houlihan:

How was?

Chad Gordon:

that it was great. I think it was a little spontaneous. I basically told him I was coming a week before I showed up Nice.

Arielle Houlihan:

Love that.

Chad Gordon:

Good, don't let him prepare.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, keep on the toes.

Chad Gordon:

And no, I mean it was. It was really loosely structured. I mean I think we were talking about it earlier Just like I was trying to go see Taylor play in a couple of matches and they were home in Warsaw, so that was super easy. And then we ended up, you know, sitting down in their offices for four, six, eight hours a day, Got some of the paperwork all lined up, and it's much easier to do all that stuff when you're live in person.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah.

Chad Gordon:

You know, got a lawyer, power of attorney, you open a bank account. Like all of these, all these like actual business things.

Matt Houlihan:

I'm like I'm texting, I'm texting andrew, I'm just like this is like an actual thing, like we're actually doing things like what is happening here am I doing something wrong?

Chad Gordon:

yeah, probably, but yeah, I don't. I don't know who. Nobody says no yeah when you're supposed to like start a company or something.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, totally, it's just a real feeling well, we'll see how it goes. Yeah, I remember those days of beta bay yeah, like starting things and like getting things opened up and yeah yeah, we uh.

Matt Houlihan:

Can I tell you a funny story when we first took over beta bay?

Arielle Houlihan:

yes, um, this is a good story we, so we take over beta bay.

Matt Houlihan:

We're going through the process of like getting everything up and run, like up and started, and we're like, okay, talk to bonnie berry, here's the things we need to do checklist, get trials together, get all the stuff together, get uniforms together and we contact the distributor that does nike. We're like we want to switch, we'll make a splash. We were on quicksilver before. Quicksilver just stopped making their team year, so we had to do something new.

Arielle Houlihan:

Julia was like you have to do something new. Quicksilver is done. We're like you have to do something. So we were like we're going to contact Nike. And it was Nike back then. It was not BSN, yeah that's what it turned into.

Matt Houlihan:

So it was.

Arielle Houlihan:

Nike and they had like their representative from this area.

Matt Houlihan:

LJ and met us at Starbucks in downtown Campbell.

Arielle Houlihan:

We had a meeting about like, what do you do when, like, you can't fill orders or whatever, you don't have stock, and like asked all the questions that my parents told me to ask and whatever. And we were like okay, awesome, like we're ready, we have to order this stuff now because we're going to be like really quick, we want to be ready to go, and LJ gets it all together.

Matt Houlihan:

We have this big order for, at the time, 10 teams. He's like, okay, it's going to be about $70,000, $80,000. We're like great, we're like yeah awesome, here's our debit card and he's like huh, he's like you know, debit cards have maximum transaction amounts. Right, we're like. What do you mean? He's like you can't charge more than $5,000 a day on a debit card you're like. He's like do you have a credit card?

Arielle Houlihan:

we're like well, we know no credit card like and even we had a credit.

Matt Houlihan:

We have no credit we're.

Arielle Houlihan:

I just graduated from college they're gonna give us a thousand dollar credit.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, I'll be able to give you less money per day. So first time through, he goes and he's like all right, I'll run it. I'll run your debit card each day for the next whatever eight days. Oh my god, for 5k a day. And that's how we did uniforms the first time and I go into our bank.

Matt Houlihan:

He said well, he was like you should do a charge card, wait he's like no, he's like go talk to your bank and see what you can do for a business card. I walk into chase and the guy chase is like yeah, dude, you need to build up your credit number one yeah we were like get a card, but he's like, if you for your business, just go get it.

Matt Houlihan:

he it I'm not supposed to tell you this but go get an Amex. It's just a charge card which is like a debit card, but you have to pay it off in full every month. And I was like oh, that sounds good. And so ever since then we've been Amex members.

Chad Gordon:

Big American Express crowd.

Arielle Houlihan:

We do not have that anymore. We have a normal credit card now with a great credit limit, but we were like we have the money, the money is sitting here, we are ready to use it. How do we do this?

Chad Gordon:

Let us pay. You Take my money.

Arielle Houlihan:

I don't even know how to do it. My parents were like, yeah, we have not run into that issue.

Chad Gordon:

Not in the last 40 years probably. It was such a funny 21 and 22-year-old issue to run into owning a business funny 21 and 22 year old issue to run into owning a business and like yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I mean it's, it's, it's just different, right? I mean, I think it's it's probably very similar to going from like an assistant coach to a head coach, kind of thing of just like, oh, this is fun, and like I, I help out. And now it's like where are we going?

Arielle Houlihan:

no wonder we played.

Chad Gordon:

Someone makes a decision and and that's, I think that's, that's the biggest, totally biggest piece, for sure best meal you had in poland oh, the food. Every everything I eat in poland is so good it's so much better than the us. It's, it's all just fresh. It's real like real food somehow every little like, because all of the little cafes are all little restaurants, they're not like built for you know, 200 people or whatever, like a lot of these things, but yet somehow they all have the best produce the best, so yeah but no, we'd, we'd hit a little cafe in the morning.

Chad Gordon:

I get a little croque, madame, and it's got this like beautiful sourdough. Uh, you know they, they crack an egg over the top. All the cheese you could want, it's just not healthy, but it's so good. We've been domestic, but yes, I should have just waited for you guys in LA.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, I know I was about to text you and be like why don't you just go to UCLA?

Chad Gordon:

I didn't look at it because I was planning like I was going to fly Heathrow, chicago, chicago back here, and then something opened up to LAX and I was like whatever. I could do that and like I had joked with Brad because you know I hung out with him for an hour or whatever coming back from Long Beach and I was like, oh yeah, man, we gotta do this more often. I was like great, by the way we're going to do this more often.

Chad Gordon:

Has it been 30 days? Because I'm actually coming in three days. Can I crash with you and then watch practice? Then I'll fly back.

Arielle Houlihan:

He stayed in the guest room.

Matt Houlihan:

Finally, we've been in the guest room.

Chad Gordon:

What's on our docket today?

Matt Houlihan:

Number one thing that's happened since our last moment was Jamie Davis Out After this quad, out as the ceo of usa.

Matt Houlihan:

Well, axed yeah, let's, can I? Let's just dive into this real quick here. This is the most interesting press release wording I've ever heard. I'm gonna read it real quick and I'll come back to you guys here. Usa volleyball president and chief executive officer, jamie davis, will not renew his contract with the national government body when it expires at the end of the year, culminating an eight-year run. After being hired in 2017 as the first outside leader of the organization, what ceo gets to choose their renewal? That's not how this works. You guys ever watch?

Chad Gordon:

Archer.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah.

Chad Gordon:

When they just yell like phrasing.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah.

Chad Gordon:

Like, yeah, that's, that's all I can hear.

Matt Houlihan:

This just reads like there was 19 revisions back and forth between Jamie Davis and USA Volleyball's board, being like how about this? No, how about this. And they just negotiated these words, this wording.

Arielle Houlihan:

Unreal.

Matt Houlihan:

Will not renew his contract.

Chad Gordon:

Phrasing is right, saves a little face for Jamie, I guess, I don't know.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah.

Chad Gordon:

I mean. It sounds like he didn't pick up his own player option.

Arielle Houlihan:

Can't buy it, Okay so let's talk about the good things that Jamie Davis has done since taking over as CEO from Doug Beal. The good things that have happened to the USA volleyball. Okay, the women's team won gold.

Matt Houlihan:

Women's indoor, women's beach and women's sitting All won gold under his reign. Under his reign, yes.

Arielle Houlihan:

Under his tenure. Amazing what else.

Matt Houlihan:

What else?

Arielle Houlihan:

COVID. I mean else COVID.

Matt Houlihan:

I mean he had COVID COVID. Sure I wouldn't say I'm not saying it's a good thing, I'm just saying things that have happened under these eight years.

Arielle Houlihan:

The reign of Mr Davis. The reign Okay.

Matt Houlihan:

Are we biased?

Arielle Houlihan:

No, I'm just trying to like preface this all by like Sure, these are the good things that have happened. Big NBC contract signed Got to have like preface this all by like sure, these are the good things that have happened. Uh, big nbc contract signed. Got to have been a lot of money, right.

Matt Houlihan:

I don't know.

Chad Gordon:

Cannot speak off.

Arielle Houlihan:

I don't think that anybody can speak about how much money that was. There's a very, very select few people know how much money was made.

Matt Houlihan:

I mean they're a nonprofit. Should we do a Freedom of Information Act request on that contract?

Arielle Houlihan:

I would love that. All right Freedom of Information Act request.

Matt Houlihan:

I'll do an FOI.

Arielle Houlihan:

Okay, great. So the NBC contract was signed, which meant Sport Engine, which meant that every single club in the country had to use Sport Engine for their member management system. Yes, so that was, I'm sure, a plus on dollar sign right.

Matt Houlihan:

Yes A very, very difficult thing for everybody Positives for USA Volleyball in his tenure has been USA Volleyball is in a very stable financial state as of right now. Great, it's amazing yeah they went from being like less than to about a million dollars in revenue per year. Covid was they actually did decent like, went lower than average but like not in the red.

Arielle Houlihan:

If you want to look at financials, you can go to Matt's Instagram and you can look at Matt's post on. That's a plug for your social media. That was nice of you. That's so kind of you. Yeah, thank you.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, 1090s, a little 1090 review you guys have all made. The last one that was reported, or the last one that's up on ProPublica, is 2021 and they made $7 million, and so they're making a good amount of money in terms of.

Chad Gordon:

Do you know what the change was between those In the revenue?

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, Entry fees were up.

Chad Gordon:

You're coming out of.

Matt Houlihan:

COVID.

Arielle Houlihan:

Membership's got fees were up.

Chad Gordon:

You're coming out of COVID. Membership was up. If you exclude the COVID stuff, how do you go from one to seven In?

Matt Houlihan:

2019, they were at seven million. Covid 2021, they climbed back up. I guess it was 2022 was the last one that was posted. They're back up to 7 million, so they're back to pre-COVID levels.

Arielle Houlihan:

I'm sure they're much higher now. Women's team won Membership.

Matt Houlihan:

Numbers are crazy exploding, so he took over in 2017, when for them I think numbers were they're still making money In terms of NGBs. A lot of NGBs are like loss propositions and they just get supported USA. Volleyball is actually a viable business. Increase the bottom line for sure in his tenure.

Arielle Houlihan:

Okay, what are the bad things that have happened since 2017? What is the worst thing that has happened?

Matt Houlihan:

I mean going through COVID obviously is a huge challenge for any sports organization that led I think COVID led to more, more girls and boys teams at the club level looking for alternative options. You just have all took a pretty, they took a pretty drastic stance on COVID. They pulled all insurance. They stopped all their events.

Arielle Houlihan:

And I can't compare what they did compared to what other MGBs did.

Matt Houlihan:

No, so I'm not sure on that, but we can compare it to what AAU did, which is the alternative, and what JVA did Correct. They kicked it back to the clubs and said you're in charge. We're not pulling your insurance. Depending on where you're at in the country and what you're able to do with your local authorities, it's up to you. But that's not on us. We will continue our insurance coverage. You must abide by your local authorities' laws.

Arielle Houlihan:

And let me disclaimer all of this by saying this is a pro-JVA and AAU podcast and anti-USA volleyball podcast. That's not where we're at. We are just a pro-boys volleyball podcast and pro-volleyball podcast.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, we want volleyball to succeed. Like we're saying, I don't think everything Jamie and I've talked to a number of people who have said I have no problems with Jamie and I'm not saying I have problems with Jamie. I've only had minimal conversation with him over a number of Zooms.

Arielle Houlihan:

I have major, major problems.

Matt Houlihan:

Here's what I would say in our dealings with Jamie is that boys volleyball was never really a priority for him ever. So that's like that's the problem. It wasn't a priority for him and he was doing, you know, his own initiatives within the organization. With that being said, because of that, boys volleyball was one of the main things that was lost. For them.

Arielle Houlihan:

It was, it was a big part of the sport that was lost for them, I would say revenue wise. When you have a sect of the sport that is not bringing in the revenue that like, you look at these line items and you're like where do we not really show the care for Boys volleyball? I get it. It's maybe 10% of your revenue that you're bringing in. It's not a major thing whatsoever. So I understand that part of it. But, that being said, boys volleyball is good for girls volleyball and there is no reason that that USA volleyball should have lost boys volleyball.

Arielle Houlihan:

They had complete and total control over the entire thing.

Matt Houlihan:

It was, it was certainly, it was certainly a fumble in terms of what they had.

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah, it's devastating for our national team to not have the support of USA that pipeline of USA Volleyball. It's hurt for sure it's got to have hurt our NTDP on that Like just.

Arielle Houlihan:

I would say I wouldn't say that it would hurt. It hurts our where, like we fall nationally or not nationally, worldwide, like where we are. I do think that it is. It's difficult for the pipeline to be this like huge conglomerate of, like a feeder into yes, the best players are going to go play for the top groups and like we're going to get the best athletes, but like I do think that there should be strength in the pipeline and it was years and years of having to rebuild it everything's, everything's a reaction, right, it's cause and effect.

Matt Houlihan:

And so the big cause was there was a kind of a hands-off approach of we're we're not doing this, we're not dealing with this or there's nothing we can do to deal with it and you guys are on your own. And so people like boys volleyball really across the country, had no reason to leave USA Volleyball until they were given a reason. There's obviously complaints amongst regions and different things like that.

Arielle Houlihan:

There's going to be complaints with everything you do.

Matt Houlihan:

But when all of a sudden you're forced to now look for an alternative. But when all of a sudden you're forced to now look for an alternative, that alternative then gets a chance to prove itself. And AAU, SoCal Cup, JVA, different tournaments and stuff that popped up across the country to support were able to pull it off and were seen as viable options that were also had some secondary benefits, that were way more flexible. And so I mean that's what happens is when you lose your footing and slip, someone takes ground, and that's what AAU did. They took ground, but I don't think anyone would have predicted AAU to take literally the whole hill. They took the hill and they're holding it.

Matt Houlihan:

Not just the hill, but they've grown the hill and the hill is expanding hill is growing for sure, and they sit atop it, and they are the ones that are now in the pole position for it.

Arielle Houlihan:

So what's the real reason that Jamie Davis is out?

Matt Houlihan:

We'll need to get members of the board on the podcast to truly understand. From reading that announcement, it is so clear that there's obviously something else there, but it will never be unearthed to the public in a way that is like. This is what happened. There's so much politics in that press release.

Arielle Houlihan:

I've heard rumors.

Chad Gordon:

I've heard rumors as well. I don't swim in these circles. I was in Poland Plausible. No more't swim in these circles.

Arielle Houlihan:

I was in Poland. Plausible, no more rumors in Poland.

Chad Gordon:

No, I did break the news to them.

Arielle Houlihan:

About USA Volleyball. I don't know if it takes an extra day.

Chad Gordon:

No, they were like oh, that's cool, it's not the biggest rock on their plate.

Matt Houlihan:

It's cute when they have 70,000 people yeah, that championship match is real cute. When they have 70,000 people, yeah, that championship match is real cute.

Chad Gordon:

I think they know that the US market is important for volleyball and for the volleyball station guys specifically, but I don't know that they have a strong opinion of who runs USA Volleyball one way or the other.

Arielle Houlihan:

Hey, fine, I won't spread rumors either, matt.

Matt Houlihan:

She's not going to stoke any flames. I could stoke some flames. The next thing up, and this is an Ariel exclusive.

Arielle Houlihan:

Wait, what did I say?

Matt Houlihan:

I can't remember why is adult volleyball the worst?

Arielle Houlihan:

Yeah adult volleyball is the worst, I agree.

Matt Houlihan:

I agree, you're agreeing with yourself, you're right.

Arielle Houlihan:

Okay, adult volleyball is the worst. I think I'm gonna have to go and fight chad on this one you go he is an adult that plays volleyball. You don't play indoor, though. Adult beach volleyball is fine. Adult grass volleyball is also fine. I don't know, there's something about it that I just can't get behind. It's like people who think that they know. They know what I don't know, I just don't like it.

Matt Houlihan:

Bear with me for a second.

Chad Gordon:

I was just going to let her ramble for a minute because I wanted to see where she would kind of end up.

Matt Houlihan:

Can you define adult volleyball? It's very broad to go. Anyone older than 26 that plays indoor volleyball. No, like, no like adult nationals no, I like adult nationals yeah, I love heavily adult nationals no, that's the best.

Arielle Houlihan:

That's fun, that's a different. That's a different thing because that's a real event, but most adult events you're talking like, like, like.

Matt Houlihan:

What about thursday ivls?

Arielle Houlihan:

no way zero percent. I'm out, I am so out.

Chad Gordon:

I get what you're saying on something about the culture.

Chad Gordon:

I've subbed into random leagues, some like reverse co-ed stuff, and there are. I get where you're coming from, that there are a handful of people who just take it way too seriously. They'll come out here and they'll start talking shit and they'll hit the little jump serve and they're playing against people who have nine to five jobs and haven't played at a super high level and they're just trying to have a good time Totally, and some dude's kind of being a little macho and for me I'm just like it's just not.

Arielle Houlihan:

It's not worth it.

Matt Houlihan:

Yeah, I've had to, but you can put them in their place, because you actually are good. Yeah, but like Good volleyball players are different.

Arielle Houlihan:

I'm not talking about good volleyball.

Chad Gordon:

But that's like that's what I think is shitty about it. It's like I don't want to be involved, like whatever this dynamic is. I don't want to be involved, like whatever this dynamic is. I don't like this.

Chad Gordon:

I don't need to engage, I'm here to like I'm here to like have a couple of beers in the parking lot with my buddies and then like kind of lazily side out Like I'm not, I don't really want to have to go back and like start jump serving or something Like I just I'm not interested in that at 9 30 PM on a Wednesday. That's problem hearing you talk about it. I don't think your issue is with adult volleyball. I think it's with people who try too hard, like in moments where it's like why, why is this? Like the national championship for you? Like?

Chad Gordon:

just like, just like can't read the room right like sure, okay, like when you think about what volleyball needs is.

Matt Houlihan:

You need support, like there needs to be a base of support for women's volleyball and men's volleyball to be watchable and to be enjoyed and having people who play continuously is a big part of that like it's a big part of the of the culture and, yes, there are certainly people like that in whatever competition it's a it's a bell curve.

Chad Gordon:

There are going to be people on both ends.

Matt Houlihan:

Exactly. I want to go off-docket here for a quick question for the panel, if you would. You said you like to dive into different cultures. Can you give us your favorite culture that you've ever seen or been a part?

Arielle Houlihan:

of Ever been in. I think seen, no seen.

Chad Gordon:

Just something that you've seen. I'll let.

Matt Houlihan:

Chad think about that as well. That's a tough question.

Arielle Houlihan:

It's like the all-time question for me. That's like my favorite question I've ever been asked.

Chad Gordon:

You're welcome, do you have an answer. Does it have to be something you've been a part of? Yeah, you have to answer both.

Arielle Houlihan:

It could be outside perspective it could be like a favorite culture you've ever been a part of in your life. That could be anything it could be third grade math class. It could be a church. It could be church. It could be any team that you've ever been a part of, any class, anything, any job, any. Yeah, All right, I'll kick off.

Matt Houlihan:

Obviously, I have not been a part of this culture. It's an outsider's perspective, well-documented, well-written about televised, so on and so forth.

Chad Gordon:

It's the All.

Matt Houlihan:

Blacks. It's not the All Blacks that might be one of mine.

Arielle Houlihan:

He probably forgot to think about that. That was my number two. All Blacks might be one of mine.

Matt Houlihan:

Shout out to John Castillo. We did a whole film review during leadership development, during COVID, about the All Blacks. It was awesome, but it is the Navy SEALs, sure. So, as an elite organization that is, in terms of training, in terms of commitment, in terms of dedication, in terms of just all around gnarly, but it just produces the most gnarly of gnarly human beings that are just people you would never want to mess with and that are ready to do whatever it takes for the person next to them.

Matt Houlihan:

The Navy seals is one of the craziest cultures that I look at. I'm like, wow, that's. That's a whole nother level of dedication that they get out of people.

Arielle Houlihan:

I am not as fascinated by that culture, because it's not a culture that I want to be a part of.

Matt Houlihan:

It's fair.

Arielle Houlihan:

So every culture that I have been drawn to is a culture that I am like. I wish I could do that with them.

Arielle Houlihan:

Even if I am not the right gender to be in that culture, or if I'm not allowed to be in that culture or I'm not the right race to be in that culture, I am drawn to it and I kind of wish that I was in that culture. Or I'm not the right race to be in that culture, like I like, am drawn to it and I kind of wish that I was in that culture.

Arielle Houlihan:

And the Navy SEALs are like I don't want to do that, like that's nothing that I am drawn to. Yes, the idea of it is very cool and like really well done. Yeah, but like there's not something that I'm into.

Matt Houlihan:

There are certainly aspects of it where I'm like I want nothing Like I'm not, I don't want to be beaten.

Arielle Houlihan:

I'm not trying, I'm not trying to get.

Matt Houlihan:

I'm not trying to like ship out to fricking the middle of nowhere country and go kill someone. That's not what I'm looking to do. But in terms of like the actually I.

Arielle Houlihan:

It's really like the wake up and go sit in the ocean for 17 hours and just sit there.

Chad Gordon:

Killing people, no problem. God, that alarm clock is murdering me, Whose car are we taking?

Matt Houlihan:

I'll kill him right now. The discipline side of it the discipline, the intensity and dedication to a goal and task I think is really cool and can be put into a lot of different a lot of different ways of life and a lot of different cultures in life. Can can borrow from that? I agree it's not. It's not something where you're like this is what I want to be a part of, but it's something that you can learn from and steal from chad. Do you have one steal?

Chad Gordon:

from chad. Do you have one? I'm not, I'm not sure, I mean I you know I read. I read a legacy, right. So I mean I I really enjoyed the all black stuff. Yep, I mean, even within the past seven days. You know, I gave the um, what is it? It's like the sweet potato doesn't have to tell you. It's sweet thing, right is that part?

Chad Gordon:

of. That's a quote from the book. Oh yeah, it's like I didn't read the book, but we were. We were talking about a player that I had coached in the last few years and it was just like, hey, man, like, if you're really that good, like, you probably don't need to like keep reminding people that you are like maybe you just are.

Chad Gordon:

Yeah, people will know it'll be fine, but um, I don't know. One of the things that first came to mind was like watching the last dance and like phil jackson and all of that of dealing with a bunch of personalities where people had various varying levels of kind of commitment to the higher goal and their ability to kind of get everybody maybe not at the same velocity, but everybody was at least moving in the right direction. And so even when it was like hey look, rodman needs to go do whatever, yeah, for three days in Vegas.

Chad Gordon:

It's like, hey, man, actually like that serves our higher goal, even though, like this week, dude, what the hell but, like for this year. That actually, yeah, is is in service of what we're trying to get to um. So I just I don't know, I don't know that that's healthy.

Arielle Houlihan:

I just thought it was interesting favorite one that I've been a part of is Montgomery County Youth Swim Team.

Matt Houlihan:

Yes, I have heard stories.

Chad Gordon:

I haven't heard stories. Share with the class.

Arielle Houlihan:

Montgomery County Swim Team. For some reason, I guess, it doesn't happen out here like it does in, I guess, Maryland. I don't even know if this is normal for all over the Eastern Seaboard, but swim teams in the Montgomery County the county that I grew up in, right outside of Washington DC.

Arielle Houlihan:

Uh, every neighborhood, like you've got, like a it's not even every city, like every neighborhood has in in this County has a swim, a pool, a neighborhood pool, like the neighborhood right here, um, and it would probably cover a little bit more than just our. If we had a Olympic size swimming pool that had lanes, um, it would probably cover our neighborhood a mile mile radius a mile around and, like Damascus, had some team and there were like little neighborhoods that you like whatever and you like, from the age of 5 until 18 years old.

Arielle Houlihan:

Like there's 8 and unders, 9, 10s, 11, 12s, 13, 14s and then 18 and under, I believe, or something like that. That was the age groups that you were in these swim teams. You would drop your kit off, you'd sign up for a swim team. In the summer, you would swim every single morning, monday through Friday. You'd get to the pool at I want to say, like 7 am practices were and we would stay at the pool all day long. Like practices would be done at like 9, but the pool would open at 9.30. And so then, like, you're at the pool for the rest of the day hanging out with your friends, and so, like in the summers, when we were little kids, we would go to the pool every single day. Parents drop us off at the pool 7 am. Like everybody is swimming.

Chad Gordon:

Is this the Outrigger Canoe Club? Literally.

Arielle Houlihan:

Of every and like whoever was involved. Katie Ledecky of every and like whoever was involved with some katie ledecky, michael phelps yes, like montgomery county, like all, michael phelps is not montgomery county.

Chad Gordon:

Ledecky was montgomery county, but same area phelps is in baltimore yeah, but like dmv I've got to say it was the same thing um the culture of being a little kid and growing up, the relay teams and the like.

Arielle Houlihan:

These relay teams you would have an eight and under, a 9, 10 and 11, 12, a like every age group and it'd be a relay of like. You'd have an 18 year old on emma sense was on my relay team when I was oh, you'd have a, you'd have.

Matt Houlihan:

Emma sense was an 18 year old.

Arielle Houlihan:

When I was an 18-year-old and I was an eight-year-old and like these are people that like are family friends of ours, that I've been in my life forever and like it was the most impactful thing on me as a child, growing up in this like and also like there are so many things about this. Every meet that you had Saturday mornings with the meats and it would be get up super early and go to whatever neighborhood and like meets, whatever, and every single meet there was a dress-up theme, like a full-on mission impossible is our dress-up theme for this, for this thing, and it was such a big deal the parents were drunk for sure, parents were probably I have pictures of my mom like in.

Arielle Houlihan:

I mean, we dressed up for the I okay, so I swam for the one the one pool that pulled kids from all over the county, which is totally. I don't even know how that's possible on brand upper county upper county dolphins the miami football. Miami football yes it was in the 90s, so, like we, we were at that pool. But we play, we swam against damascus and we damascus is in the farmland.

Arielle Houlihan:

Whatever we dressed up like hicks for the and my mom, like in overalls with straw coming out of her and like they stole some cows in the middle of it, like out of control stuff that was going, and like walking into those pools dressed up as your whatever and like hiding in the slides with squirt guns as mission impossible and getting the other team, and like like outrageous stuff and the amount of cheering that goes on at swim meets of like these, like full on, like you're standing there screaming with kids that are double your size and then lifting kids up.

Arielle Houlihan:

I mean there's a lot of correlations with Bay to Bay volleyball that I have taken from when I was an eight year old on swim team because the culture was so like.

Arielle Houlihan:

It was like a Lord of the flies with kids at a pool and my kids are just running amok like getting into who knows what, but all with like this, like we swim and we're really good 100 but like very, it was like high level swimming but like as a little little kid and like obviously we were like we were fast swimmers and so we we got attention from our coaches and our like the older kids because we were good at swimming but like it was the coolest culture to be a part of. And it was like donuts on Fridays and you had to bring a can for a donut and it was like all the whole culture was just like the coolest thing to be and everybody did it in the donut and it was like all the whole culture was just like the coolest thing to be and everybody did it in the summer and it was this outdoor pool life that you lived do we need to run a grass tournament fours where you have an 18 year old, a 16 year old, a 14 year old?

Arielle Houlihan:

and a 12 year old. It's such a good idea. It's such a good idea.

Matt Houlihan:

Someone's going to get hurt. Can you imagine?

Chad Gordon:

It's like swimming you don't tackle anybody in the pool. You don't tackle anybody 18 year old moshing balls against a 12 year old.

Matt Houlihan:

I think Nikolai can handle it. I do too.

Chad Gordon:

You need more than one, that's a good idea, could be fun.

Arielle Houlihan:

I actually do have a car for you. It's a good idea, could be fun. I actually do have a car for you. It's a green Lexus.

Chad Gordon:

Already had one of those. Already crashed it.

Arielle Houlihan:

That's true. Yeah, Chad flipped his on the 101. You definitely can have the green Lexus.

Matt Houlihan:

I'm okay thank you, you sure I'm all right. Yeah, his car's better than the green Lexus. I like my camera.

Chad Gordon:

I'll pay you to take it. No, price is too high Money's no object?

Arielle Houlihan:

No, I'll give you the Q7 and the Lexus.

Matt Houlihan:

Okay, I'll get rid of the Lexus if you give me the Audi, pick and pull will come to you.