Nestled among Seattle’s skyscrapers, Amazon headquarters would seem to be light years away from the Seahawks’ place of business. CenturyLink Field is surrounded by freeways and industry. A mile north, 2121 Blanchard Street overlooks giant glass biospheres. But seated among the venture capitalists fashionably attired in expensive suits and tech whizzes dressed down in geek chic at Amazon HQ on a Tuesday last month were a handful of investors who had made their first millions on the field.
This meeting, dubbed “Smart Play: Connecting Startups and Sports,” was a joint event run by the NFLPA and Amazon Launchpad, an online marketplace for select startups. And the meeting was all about getting reps. Standing on the line of scrimmage and betting on business ventures have a lot in common. Both are high-risk—one to your body, the other to your bank balance. Both promise huge rewards—a multimillion dollar contract and chance to win a Super Bowl, or an even bigger bank balance and the chance to change the world. And getting good at either requires a little bit of luck, and a whole lot of hard work.
“Like anything else, the more you do it, the more reps you get at it, the more efficient you can get it done,” says Marques Colston, who spent a decade playing receiver for the Saints, picking up a Super Bowl ring in 2010, before retiring in 2015. Colston has invested in sports and health technology startups, including Lexaria, a biotech company specializing in cannabinoid products, and Sport Testing, a company that develops athletic assessment technologies.