Wudup doe! #DaRundown Sports proudly present “Money Manziel (Official Johnny Manziel NFL Draft Theme Song)” by CL The Main Event. This song is made on purpose to depict the alter-ego of the former Texas A&M quarterback, Heisman Trophy winner, and NFL draft prospect Johnny Manziel, Money Manziel. You know the side that everyone is scared to embrace at his position. This song is taking the mindset of Manziel saying everything he wish he could say but because of the scrutiny that lurks, he can’t. No fear #DaRunudown Sports Podcast is here for you Johnny. No need to thank us. A retweet would be nice though.

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Background information

 

As someone who doesn’t have the life experience or “football acumen”  of some of these GM’s and people who work with them, I’m in the belief that if you are talented then everything else should be marginalized. Colin Cowherd often sites Steve Jobs as one of those examples of greatness that took off. It didn’t wait for him to finish school. The NBA used to let the most talented high school players enter the league. Now they are required to do one year in college. This is better known as the “one and done rule”.The topic of the rule is a heavily debated subject in many circles. If you have genius level skill and/or talent, you should be able to put it to work for you.

 

I’m 24 years old and have been looking for work that matched talent and credentials. I will be graduating from Chattahoochee Technical College my AAS in Marketing Management very soon and specialize in content marketing such as blogs, social media, and podcasting. Being so close to graduating , I’m looking for a job in his chosen field of expertise.  Going through the job posts I found a common trend. These companies require you to have a lot experience usually anywhere from 3-7 years to go along with a bachelor’s degree. This not to say those are not good ways to measure the readiness of a candidate but what about vision? Lets do the math. 4 years for a bachelor degree + 5 years medium required experience = 9 years of work to be qualified to be a content marketer on a high level.  Even in a best case scenario you, pick up an internship or job freshman year in the right field. Your still looking at 5 years before you would be considered to contribute to an established firms.

 

There are employment opportunities my resume already qualify me for that are close enough to marketing they can slide in the experience column. This is where I start to feel like Johnny Manziel. I can get the job by acing the interview every time. (I will be less than modest and say that I would rate my job interviewing skills above average.) When it gets time for the process  to begin the job I get red flagged for something in my background. If Johnny Football happens in 2004 instead of 2013 you wouldn’t know half the stuff you know about him now and the perception that he was risk for being at parties…while in college probably wouldn’t exist. Let’s just say if I had stayed in a different state out west back in the day I’d probably be on my Plies tip with “Plenty Money”.

This how I feel “OK. Let me get this straight, so you just told you think I could have all the talent in the world, you think I stood out the most among my competition, yet because of something happened with me and nobody got hurt?  ”

 

These job descriptions never mention anything about vision. Forward thinking sounds more like will you take lots of recommendations if we don’t buy in. How about finding the guy that’s already built a fan base from his basement with no budget. Qualifications are great but I say the  jump shot  or in this case rocket arm of intellect is vision. What good is all this gathered intelligence and time spent developing professionally if you can’t spot a trend and exploit? What about the guy in school , working night shift, making trash bags,  in the backwoods of Georgia, and like that the light bulb goes off. Maybe it’s because of the position I am in, but I think that more companies should look to acquire talent by scouting. Does body of work not count? With all the available platforms there should be a way to find standout talent. If you sing you can sign up for “The Voice” or “American Idol”. Both are TV products built on finding upper echelon talent. Musicians have some lengthy rapsheets but keep making music that prints money.

It seems to work for professional sports organizations. The New York Giants found Victor Cruz under a rock and he becomes a salsa dancing, Chunky Soup eating, contributor for a Super Bowl team. Do you want qualified talent or transcendent talent? For a metaphor, we will take the 2012 NBA Draft.  Sometimes qualified get you Damian Lillard, senior. Other times qualified gets you Draymond Green, senior # (Shoutout Saginaw, MI, Go Trojans, MSU, SVSU, and Vargas Taco Bread). Transcendent gets you Anthony Davis. He was the #1 pick before he stepped on UK’s campus or played a minute for John Calipari.

 

However you look at it, when the Johnny Football autograph scandal went down it started to bring the paying college athletes discussion to the forefront. Putting this in my own words the question that related to me at the time was if I’m hot now, why can’t I make money off what I do, while I’m hot? (Using hot as in as when you do things right consecutively i.e. Stephen Curry.) Regardless of whether or not Manziel was ready after his freshman year, his talent should be enough for him to qualify for the NFL. For that matter Jadaveon Clowney should have been after that Michigan hit. It’s no secret that I ride with the folks that believe the NCAA has a broken system (See”: Picking a “Billion Dollar Bracket”, NCAA wins every year)   In closing, I drew inspiration from the parallel that run between our live and turn it into the Johnny Manziel song, Money Manziel. It’s more than a theme song for him but for anyone who has talent and no matter what they do they can’t shake a past. I will be waiting on a day when my work is my resume.