12%, woof. Could have gotten a better deal from Lenny the Loan Shark.

12%, woof. Could have gotten a better deal from Lenny the Loan Shark.

in the normal range


SBA 7(a) loans Variable: 11.5% to 15%

Fixed: 13.50% to 16.50%

Rates vary depending on loan amounts and terms

https://www.lendingtree.com/business/rates/

At 12%, $1.5MM borrowed would require $15,000 a month just in interest payment. That's on top of guaranteed salaries, content production (podcasts and webcasts), website development, and marketing.

I bet they never took in more than $5,000 a month in total, and that's being generous.

Another reminder that just because you are very good at your chosen profession does not mean you are automatically good at the business aspects of your chosen profession. A tale as old as time.

I think this is supposed to read "Just being an owner does not make you personally liable on the company debt."

Yes…..thanks Isaac.

Hucksters, self promoters and wishful thinking.

After reading that Frontier story I am left with the feeling that this is the most OKC thing of all time (until the next one).

Koehler was day-to-day but there was a self-described investment manager (Michael Carnuccio) who was raising the capital and interfacing with the big money guys.

I've seen the proformas that were sent out to investors and the numbers are insane. Like projecting someone like Jeni Carlson could bring in a sponsor for $35,000/month for her podcast and videocast. Plus, tens of thousands more a month for web ads driven by her content. Similarly, completely outrageous numbers were given for all the content providers.

They were also paying most the writers a guaranteed salary which was more than any had been making previously, which is why some quit their jobs. And they were promised that pay for 3 years.

This is complete craziness. The market price for digital advertising is very easy to determine just by getting rate sheets from some of the more success businesses in the area. I've done it myself. And I can tell you those ad rates are 50x market and then they projected that for all 20 or so creators.

Also, how do you expect to pay salaries from the jump?? You have no revenue.


They took this big chunk of money (turned out to be a loan, not an investment) and then burned through most of it in only a couple of months. And if they generated more than a few thousand dollars in revenue I'd be very surprised vs. the $1.5MM+ they spent in this short time.

My impression that Koehler was going on the projections of others and was way out of his depth.


I have to say absolutely everyone involved looks pretty bad in this situation. Nobody did even a cursory due diligence and if they had they would have quickly realized none of this was remotely realistic. Somebody put ridiculous numbers into a Powerpoint, went out and got a high-interest loan, and then everyone just followed him over the cliff.

This is the most insane part of all of this.
https://awfulannouncing.com/ringer/the-ringer-podcast-ad-sales-outside-investment.html
"The Ringer charges between $25 and $50 for every 1,000 people who hear an ad on their podcasts."

Simmons is one of if not the largest sports podcaster.

Even if Sellout Crowd was valued as highly as The Ringer (they never would be), Jenni's show would need......1.4 MILLION people listening EACH episode for it to make sense on the ad buying side. Just spend the $35,000 on one of the largest podcasts in the world. And that's assuming Sellout could get the $25 per 1,000.

It's not an exact apples to apples comparison, but there weren't even in the same galaxy. Just insane.

in the normal range



https://www.lendingtree.com/business/rates/

I am in the wrong business lol

If anyone would like a nice 15% loan feel free to shoot me a pm :wink:

I am in the wrong business lol

If anyone would like a nice 15% loan feel free to shoot me a pm :wink:

it is why banks grow

These were the figures on the slide presentation.

Whereas they were projecting over $400,000 in MONTHLY revenue, an ambitious number based on reality would have been about $5K/month.

HTTP://www.okctalk.com/images/pete/sellout062724a.jpg

it is why banks growBeing a banker, I can say that 15% is not normal for a $1+ million commercial loan. Depending on what security was used for the loan, 7.5 - 10% or so is more likely, especially with Toby Keith's name anywhere near the entity borrowing the money.

EDIT: Shame on me for not reading the article first. 12% is fairly high for a commercial BANK loan, but not necessarily for a private money loan.

The Frontier has a good write-up on this mess.

https://www.readfrontier.org/stories/sold-out-the-rise-and-fall-of-americas-most-ambitious-sports-media-company/Sold out:

This is the crux of any litigation, although I don't know if the main people accused have any money:

I feel bad for Berry. He really should have known better, though. I personally have lost a lot of money by making a poor investment decision, but not to the point that it put my family's finances in jeopardy. The article did a nice job of giving the journalists' perspective (makes sense; written by a journalist). They were burned out, worried about layoffs, probably not paid very well for a high-pressure job, and the lure of something fun and new -- with the possibility to make more money -- is a pretty simple lure.

Without naming names, the guy behind that must be a super shady person to mislead people who thought he was their friend in such a cold and calculating manner.

Berry and Jenny and the others should have seen the red flags, but it still sucks for them. Berry seems like a great guy although I don't know him well and sometimes get put off with his writing and pontificating.

Most those writers had already been laid off and I'm sure Tramel and Carlson were not getting increases and I know all the writers there had been forced into periodic unpaid furloughs.

Even if Tramel is on the line for the debt, he can file bankruptcy and move on.

Nobody else involved left a steady job, except... Jenni Carlson. Good luck finding another full-time writing gig when you already have 95% layoffs and all those people are taking peanuts just to have some income. Tramel hustled up and took the job at the World but you can bet that was at a significant salary reduction.

Most would be shocked to know how little freelance writers are paid these days. Most earn around $20-$50 per article.

Yeah I don't really understand all the scam comments. They had what seemed like a decent idea if done properly. They just probably didn't execute it all that well and didn't have enough of a runway from a financing standpoint for it gain the necessary traction to take off. It sounds like that combined with their limited funding drying up when Toby passed just put the the nail in the coffin.

Overall it's just disappointing that it failed. Similar to Prairie Surf (which is obviously starting to struggle as well), it's somewhat rare in Oklahoma for people to take big, outside the box (or outside of traditional OK industry) ideas and attempt to execute them. Really disappointing when they don't work out.

Read the Frontier piece. it's a total scam. The victims should have known better but they gotten taken for a ride by a guy issuing false promises, based on fraudulent information.

It was a scam to the extent that whoever put together their projections wasn't just a little off, they weren't in the same solar system as anything approaching reality.

If you use completely falsified projections to lure investors and employees, that is straight-up fraud.

And it's easy to prove because you have all these proformas that were sent to everyone who signed on, and then you have several months of actual revenue to compare. Also, it sounds like most were told they had $3 million in "investment capital" when in fact it was just a loan. That's also fraud.

These are similar issues to those that landed Elizabeth Holmes of Theranos in jail for over a decade.

Most those writers had already been laid off and I'm sure Tramel and Carlson were not getting increases and I know all the writers there had been forced into periodic unpaid furloughs.

Even if Tramel is on the line for the debt, he can file bankruptcy and move on.

Nobody else involved left a steady job, except... Jenni Carlson. Good luck finding another full-time writing gig when you already have 95% layoffs and all those people are taking peanuts just to have some income. Tramel hustled up and took the job at the World but you can bet that was at a significant salary reduction.

Most would be shocked to know how little freelance writers are paid these days. Most earn around $20-$50 per article.

We need media to have a functioning democracy. It's a real conundrum. Media enterprises were fat and happy and have continually failed to adjust. There has to be a way to make it work financially, but even the current pay wall thing is broken.

I don't understand why these former newspapers don't create a Spotify-type concept for local media organizations. Am I going to pay to subscribe to the Austin Statesman to read one article. No the hell not. But, what if I paid 10.99 a month to read content from any organization I want?

There has to be a way.

^

The problem is that people like the Gaylords and other monopolists took millions and millions out of their businesses, then when digital came along, their massive hubris led them to give away their content thinking that somehow it would all work out.

And after they had screwed things up beyond salvation and the free genie was out of the bottle, they cashed out instead of reinvesting some of those big piles of money.

It wasn't enough they ran their own business into the ground, they made sure the entire industry would never again have a workable business model.

The only savior is citizen journalism. For so long, the battle cry of the failing papers was something like, "We actually have people covering city council meetings and nobody else does or will". It was the 'public good' appeal after they were all on the brink of ruination, even though there is a very, very strong argument that says those big institutions were only lining the their own pockets and those of their cronies. And of course in OKC, we now have a bunch of independent outlets covering City Hall way better than the Oklahoman ever did, especially since the paper was/is in bed with the city and local power players.

If you use completely falsified projections to lure investors and employees, that is straight-up fraud.

And it's easy to prove because you have all these proformas that were sent to everyone who signed on, and then you have several months of actual revenue to compare. Also, it sounds like most were told they had $3 million in "investment capital" when in fact it was just a loan. That's also fraud.

Exactly. While it's true their chances of getting anything from a lawsuit are practically nil, there is good reason for them to pursue criminal charges.

There is now a civil lawsuit filed in this matter.

Big Dog Media LLC (the estate of Toby Keith, Bob Stoops, and Switzer son-in-law Hunter Miller) are suing 4 people from Sellout Crowd who all signed separate personal guarantees for an unpaid loan balance of over $600K:

Berry Tramel (sportswriter)
Mike Koehler (former Oklahoman employee and partner in Smirk Media)
Mike Sherman (former Oklahoman)
Kris Murray (partner at Spark Creative and son of long-time sports broadcaster Ed Murray)

The last 3 guys were pretty much running Sellout.


This suit does not include the many employees of Sellout who are owed tens of thousands of dollars by the guys running the show. They may never file because this loan debt will come first and I suspect all four defendants will file bankruptcy.

There is still the possibility of criminal charges over what is alleged to be numerous outrageously fraudulent assertions by the owners.

So, to summarize:

Koehler, Sherman and Murray launched Sellout Crowd with little to no investment and instead took out a 12% $1.5 million line of credit from Keith, Stoops, and Miller.

They recruited Tramel and a host of other local sportswriters by promising big money, including base salaries for the first three years plus a percentage of advertising revenue.

The owners made outrageous projections about advertising income that were easily 100x anything remotely feasible.

The writers claim they were told that the start-up had $1.5 million in investment, when in fact it was all borrowed money.

Almost from the launch in September of 2023, Sellout started missing payments to the writers under contract.

Sellout never seemed to sell any advertising of value.

A few months later, they stopped making payment on the loan.

Mike Koehler was forced out, they laid off most of their writers.

A couple months later, the whole thing collapsed.

So, to summarize:

Koehler, Sherman and Murray launched Sellout Crowd with little to no investment and instead took out a 12% $1.5 million line of credit from Keith, Stoops, and Miller.

They recruited Tramel and a host of other local sportswriters by promising big money, including base salaries for the first three years plus a percentage of advertising revenue.

The owners made outrageous projections about advertising income that were easily 100x anything remotely feasible.

The writers claim they were told that the start-up had $1.5 million in investment, when in fact it was all borrowed money.

Almost from the launch in September of 2023, Sellout started missing payments to the writers under contract.

Sellout never seemed to sell any advertising of value.

A few months later, they stopped making payment on the loan.

Mike Koehler was forced out, they laid off most of their writers.

A couple months later, the whole thing collapsed.

seems from interviews the Tram didn't understand what he signed .. which if true .. is so so irresponsible of him

seems from interviews the Tram didn't understand what he signed .. which if true .. is so so irresponsible of him

The lawsuit includes the guarantee that Tramel and the others signed.

It's very plain and cut-and-dry. I understand Tramel may have been misled with words, but he signed this document:

HTTP://www.okctalk.com/images/pete/sellout073124a.jpg

That guarantee was signed 9/5/23, which was a few days after Sellout was launched.

Tramel is now claiming duress; that he found out they had no money and was more or less backed into a corner:

From that Frontier article:


“I’ve often wondered what I would have done had I known that (the company was primarily funded by a loan,)” Tramel said. “But what was I supposed to do? I’d already signed a contract with these crooks and quit my job of 32 years. And now I’m working for a company that has no money except a $1.5-million line of credit.”

Outstanding reporting Pete . . .

Berry Tramel recently filed for bankruptcy, which should discharge the debt associated with his signed personal guarantee.

It looks like three others, Mike Koehler, Mike Sherman, and Kris Murray, also signed personal guarantees. I suspect they may end up filing BK as well.

Damn I'd hate to go through something like that especially at his age/point in career. If something seems to good to be true it almost certainly always is.

I feel for him, but he could have hired literally any accountant or attorney to advise him and the first thing they would have told him is to never sign a contract in which you personally guarantee the liabilities of a business.

Don't wish the guy any ill will but what an incredibly stupid thing to have done, can't believe the decisions some people make.

Don't wish the guy any ill will but what an incredibly stupid thing to have done, can't believe the decisions some people make.

A lot of people don't like him because of his sometimes odd sports takes, which is pretty silly. The real tragedy here is that he's a really nice man and I think he trusted some very, very shady people way too readily. It's an awful situation, and I think a lot of people got thoroughly shafted personally and professionally.

The whole thing was an incredible mess.

Lots of blame to go around. In the end, it looks like Stoops and the estate of Toby Keith will just have to eat the $800K they put up as a loan. They should have known better as well and even the personal guarantees will only force the parties to file BK, so they won't recover any money and the guarantors have to live with a bankruptcy.

Right, and being foolish isn't close to what Koehler did... wouldn't want to be him.

The whole thing was an incredible mess.

Lots of blame to go around. In the end, it looks like Stoops and the estate of Toby Keith will just have to eat the $800K they put up as a loan. They should have known better as well and even the personal guarantees will only force the parties to file BK, so they won't recover any money and the guarantors have to live with a bankruptcy.

I blame Lincoln Riley.

I blame Lincoln Riley.

This is always the answer, regardless of the question.

This is always the answer, regardless of the question.

The GOAT of scapegoats, the B*tch of the west, the King of Points Allowed, Emperor of “Mecca”, the Lord of the close, the small in the B1G.

Regarding Berry Tramel's bankruptcy to escape his personal guarantee on the Sellout loan, his BK application shows he made almost $200K in the two years prior to leaving the Oklahoman.

$200K! I had no idea anyone at that paper made anywhere near that, and I'm sure it's the reason the Oklahoman has been systematically replacing their experienced reporters with kids just out of college or from small-town papers.

I doubt Tramel makes nowhere near that amount at the Tulsa World. I suspect Jenni Carlson also took a big pay cut to come back to the Oklahoman.

Did it say he made that all at the Oklahoman? Because he has been a regular for a while on The Sports Animal that he probably makes money doing.

Did it say he made that all at the Oklahoman? Because he has been a regular for a while on The Sports Animal that he probably makes money doing.

That's a good point. No, just listed his total income not by source.

But it begs the question: What the heck was he thinking?? He was pulling down $200K/year as a local journalist and decided to throw all that away and take a flier on this crazy startup where nothing was guaranteed, then he signed a personal guarantee on a huge loan.

He's darn lucky the World hired him but he's still going to end up bankrupt.

Jenni Carlson didn't sign a guarantee but had a great, stable job in a field that literally thousands would have killed for, and she also threw it away for this craziness. I don't know for sure but she had to have taken a big paycut to come back, and she was very lucky to get that.

When I hear about people like that especially at his age leaving jobs like that I think more about the benefits they are losing probably more than the pay. Especially health care. Jobs like that probably had benefits beyond just health care too. I worked a union job for 26 years that had some of the best benefits you could imagine. And as a retiree from that employer I still have many of those benefits. When I see what some people have to pay for just health care insurance today and the high premiums, deductibles, and out of pockets I sometimes think employer benefit packages can be more important or as important as wage compensation especially when it comes to losing them and having to get them in the private sector. He is 63 and close to Medicare eligible but even with that you usually need a supplement. It just seemed like a pretty big risk to be taking at that age to voluntarily walk away from such a long term employment.

He made $200k/year and is broke? Making that much for a decade and doesn't have a few hundred grand saved up....

A fool and his money are easily parted

historical bag fumble to leave that kind of money doing that kind of job

It is sad to me that people today are so eager to judge and publicly ridicule a person they do not know and a situation they have no context for and for which they do not know the real details. They know nothing of the motivations or intentions of the person. They seem happy for his loss. Why do so many people seem happy about the ruin of a good man? Tearing down is much easier than building up.

It is sad to me that people today are so eager to judge and publicly ridicule a person they do not know and a situation they have no context for and for which they do not know the real details. They know nothing of the motivations or intentions of the person. They seem happy for his loss. Why do so many people seem happy about the ruin of a good man? Tearing down is much easier than building up.

My thoughts as well. Berry is a good guy. I wrote him several emails over the years and he answered every one of them. I don't know how many other sports writers would do that.

^

This was a highly visible enterprise with people who highly promoted themselves. They took out billboards, for goodness sake.

Tramel went to the press directly to talk about this in detail, where he called the main parties 'crooks' and attempted to put all the blame squarely on them. All the filings are public information. All involved continue to seek the spotlight as a part of their work.

It's news, and lots of people are interested. I don't see anyone ridiculing.

^

This was a highly visible enterprise with people who highly promoted themselves. They took out billboards, for goodness sake.

Tramel went to the press directly to talk about this in detail, where he called the main parties 'crooks' and attempted to put all the blame squarely on them. All the filings are public information. All involved continue to seek the spotlight as a part of their work.

It's news, and lots of people are interested. I don't see anyone ridiculing.

Tramel was called a fool just a couple of posts earlier.

If he's been making that kind of money all these years this whole thing makes even less sense. On the low should have several hundred thousand put away & if he's been a high earner like that for much of his career could easily be well into 7 figures stashed. At any rate personally guaranteeing anything just makes no sense. We are all about one stupid mistake or accident away from losing everything.

I think Tramel left the Oklahoman before he was going to have to take a massive pay cut. And they might have been considering RIFing him outright. He is a star over age 60 in 2 rapidly declining industries, with no good way forward in either. He took a chance and it didn’t work out. He’s going to be okay. His kids are grown. He is still a name who can get free access to the sporting events and media rooms. Someone will usually pick up the check at lunch and dinner. He can do stringer work and start his own Substack if the Tulsa World gig plays out. Hopefully he has shielded his assets enough to keep them after the BK.

It is sad to me that people today are so eager to judge and publicly ridicule a person they do not know and a situation they have no context for and for which they do not know the real details. They know nothing of the motivations or intentions of the person. They seem happy for his loss. Why do so many people seem happy about the ruin of a good man? Tearing down is much easier than building up.

Now think about what he does for a living

Now think about what he does for a living

False equivalency. Tramel does his homework. He knows a magnitude more about the subjects of his columns than you know about him.
Furthermore, do you think it's a columnist job just to write puff pieces and never be critical?

Now think about what he does for a living

Not sure what your innuendo is. He reports on sports.

If you want to know who he is and what his values are, that might be more important and I'm sure a disappointment to those gossipers thinking he's a bad person or stupid.

He made $200k/year and is broke? Making that much for a decade and doesn't have a few hundred grand saved up....

He made $200k/year and is looking to avoid a large creditor by filing bankruptcy and probably plowed all of his money into exempt assets before filing.

Not the same as broke.

Not sure what your innuendo is. He reports on sports.

If you want to know who he is and what his values are, that might be more important and I'm sure a disappointment to those gossipers thinking he's a bad person or stupid.



False equivalency. Tramel does his homework. He knows a magnitude more about the subjects of his columns than you know about him.
Furthermore, do you think it's a columnist job just to write puff pieces and never be critical?

I'm not implying either of these, and barely follow sports media--much less him--as is.

Unless he has a background in being a professional athlete or if he talks about sports business and was in the front office of a professional sports team then I'm saying he's in a position to exactly to be "so eager to judge and publicly ridicule a person they do not know and a situation they have (little or) no context and for which they do not know the real details"

More speaking to sports media in general than him as a person. If he has either/both of those backgrounds, I stand corrected.

I'm not implying either of these, and barely follow sports media--much less him--as is.

Unless he has a background in being a professional athlete or if he talks about sports business and was in the front office of a professional sports team then I'm saying he's in a position to exactly to be "so eager to judge and publicly ridicule a person they do not know and a situation they have (little or) no context and for which they do not know the real details"

More speaking to sports media in general than him as a person. If he has either/both of those backgrounds, I stand corrected.
I don't think you understand anything about journalism or are just awfully cynical. And no, you don’t have to be an athlete to be a good journalist. That’s just silly reasoning.

Unless he has a background in being a professional athlete or if he talks about sports business and was in the front office of a professional sports team then I'm saying he's in a position to exactly to be "so eager to judge and publicly ridicule a person they do not know and a situation they have (little or) no context and for which they do not know the real details"

By your way of thinking only pro athletes or front office people (or former pros/FO people) should be able to write opinion columns? Like Rover said, I don't think you know how journalism works.

Broke is an exaggeration... I’m not a bankruptcy expert but I wouldn’t think you could move all your money to exempt assets without it being fraud.

If he's been making that kind of money all these years this whole thing makes even less sense. On the low should have several hundred thousand put away & if he's been a high earner like that for much of his career could easily be well into 7 figures stashed. At any rate personally guaranteeing anything just makes no sense. We are all about one stupid mistake or accident away from losing everything.I've been a banker most of my life and am a commercial banker now.

I would estimate that 90% of the commercial loans that I have approved over the years have required a personal guarantee. It's a requirement at most banks and for most commercial clients. Your comment and the other comments on this thread stating that personally guaranteeing a loan "makes no sense" are simply misinformed.

I've been a banker most of my life and am a commercial banker now.

I would estimate that 90% of the commercial loans that I have approved over the years have required a personal guarantee. It's a requirement at most banks and for most commercial clients. Your comment and the other comments on this thread stating that personally guaranteeing a loan "makes no sense" are simply misinformed.

I took it that he meant personally guaranteeing made no sense for Tramel. If so, then I agree. Bad business decision for Berry.

I took it that he meant personally guaranteeing made no sense for Tramel. If so, then I agree. Bad business decision for Berry.In retrospect, sure, but that's being a Monday Morning Quarterback. He would have only personally guaranteed if he had an ownership stake, and I'm sure his personal guarantee was required as a term of his employment.

If this thing had been a home run (although there was probably little chance of that), there would be little or no criticism of his decision.

In retrospect, sure, but that's being a Monday Morning Quarterback. He would have only personally guaranteed if he had an ownership stake, and I'm sure his personal guarantee was required as a term of his employment.

If this thing had been a home run (although there was probably little chance of that), there would be little or no criticism of his decision.

Like I said, bad business decision by Berry.

I took it that he meant personally guaranteeing made no sense for Tramel. If so, then I agree. Bad business decision for Berry.

People love to second guess without having any real context or facts. Being judgmental has become a national pastime. Oh, it's red and big... it has to be a firetruck. LOL