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Start your free trial today. Everybody needs money. That's why they call it money. From Cool Global Headquarters, this is Motley Cool Money.
It's a Motley Cool Money Radio show. I'm Chris Allen joining me in studio this week for Million Dollar Portfolio, Jason Moser, from Motley Cool Income Investor, James Early, and from Motley Cool Deep Value, Ron Gross. Good to see you as always, gentlemen. Hey, Chris.
You got the latest headlines from Wall Street. Just in time for opening day, we will dig into the business of baseball, and as always, we'll give you an inside look at the stocks on our radar. But we begin this week with the Big Macrow. The jobs report from March showed an additional 215,000 jobs.
Unemployment rate ticked up slightly to 5% Ron. What'd you think of the report? I liked it. And don't be too harsh on that unemployment rate.
Wasn't it? There's a good reason it's place, Ron. There's actually a good reason for it. The labor participation rate actually ticked up to 63%.
It's the highest level since March 2014. We've had a problem with the labor force participation rate for quite a bit of time now. We're actually seeing people return to the labor force in this latest report. So that plays with the math of the unemployment rate.
So it's for a good reason that we saw that tick up. We also saw a tick up in the U-6 rate, which we often talk about as the wider unemployment rate, which is at 9.8%. Wages also another sticking point we constantly talk about showing an increase of about 2.3% annualized. It's an increase.
It's still not where we need it to be. Well, not to belittle all this analysis. I mean, Ron knows you're doing so. But the question is, what's the real story?
Is it a minor tweak in some of these rates? Or is it what the Fed is going to do with this information? I think the markets are going to watch the Fed. It seems like everyone has given up on the chance of an April rate increase.
But now everyone seems to fully believe in a June increase. Yeah, well, even December, I think we're at the 70% likelihood of an increase for the December. It comes a little bit less than that in June. But you are correct.
Where did we go from here? Well, the thing is we kind of become sort of a give and take economy, right? I mean, employment is starting to improve a little bit. We see the auto numbers for the Big Three.
While they did okay, they missed analyst expectations as far as a number of vehicles sold. And when you have a situation where finance is obviously very cheap, then you start to wonder, is the consumer really? Employment can be fine, but if wages aren't really increasing, well, then that can be a problem as well. Spending doesn't really pick up.
So you kind of wonder it's a little bit of a give and take. And I think that Janet Yellen has been pretty clear that she's going to sort of take baby steps here and pushing interest rates up as we go along. So I don't think we can expect any rash actions here anytime soon. One interesting article I saw raised a red flag.
It said there remains weakness in the temporary job market three months in a row. It's been very weak. That often is an early indicator of weakness in the permanent market because the hope is temporary turns into permanent. And so if there's weakness there, it could be a red flag to watch in the coming months.
But heading into the summer isn't the summer one of the parts of the year where typically temporary employment ticks up? We'll have to keep an eye on it so far, you know, last three months very week. Let's get to some of the company news of the week. Lenar is America's second largest home builder.
First quarter profits came in higher than expected and shares up this week. Looked like a pretty good report on the surface of James. You know, Chris, I keep reading all these articles about millennials, how they're a little tyrants in the workforce and they're difficult to manage, but I got to give them credit. They're gainfully employed in their buying houses.
And this was a big driver here. First time home buyers were kind of 30% of Lenar's customers, which is a big number, average selling price up 12% year over year. The issue was basically low supply. I mean, demand was good, but it was also low supply.
In other words, we finally absorbed all the foreclosed homes. And now these young people are out there buying homes again. I don't think it's a bubble in the making, but it's just an issue of the cycles evening out now. And mortgage rates, which were historically low for quite some time, had ticked up a bit, but they're back down to be, you know, it's a three-point-a-five-time to buy home and you get that night's deduction as well.
So it'd be interesting to see we just talked about the Fed and rising interest rates as those tick up. What does that do to the first-time home buyers? Do you get the sense that Lenar and some of the other home builders are maybe making business decisions based on money? What happened in 2008-2009?
Are they being a little bit more cautious, at least in terms of their forecasting? Chris, whatever they're doing, it's working. The S&P is up 100 and something percent since 2009. The low point early 2009, Lenar stock is up 600%.
So it's effective, whatever their strategy has been. Last week, Marriott was going to buy Starwood Hotels for $13.6 billion in cash and stock. Earlier this week, on-bank insurance from China came in with a higher bid, only to drop that bid altogether just a few days later. What in the world is going on?
This dance has been happening back and forth for a few months now, and it really did look like on-bank had the winning bid, and then they just dumped it. Yeah, this is turning to quite the soap opera. I think honestly that Starwood is probably happy that this is working out the way it did. So we look at Starwood and they go, okay, well, management certainly has a responsibility to consider every offer on the table, and it would seem on the surface that accepting the highest bid makes the most sense.
It would be the most responsible thing to do, but maybe not if you look at this from a longer-term perspective. And so I think it makes more sense for Starwood to be a part of Marriott as opposed to a part of the Enbong Consortium, because there wasn't really a hotel specialty dynamic to that relationship, whereas obviously that is just what Marriott does. I do think this really also is a testament. It shows the value in knowing where you stand in the negotiation process.
I mean, it's one thing if you're Radio Shack and you're trying to liquidate assets, it's an entirely different thing if you're Starwood. And you know you have this really valuable portfolio of brands in a growing and global industry that's creating a little bit of a bidding war here, but only I think it's going to work out okay. It's going to force Marriott to pay, I think, about a billion dollars more than they initially offered from the very beginning, but it looks like Marriott management is very excited to get this thing moving forward. And it's just an issue of the Chinese government, right?
I mean, they would have taken the bid. Had the government not put the gabash on the bottom. I think it ultimately came down to the fact that it was going to be more red tape involved than they really wanted to deal with, something in regard to the American ownership of a Chinese-based company. It could not exceed a certain percentage.
And on buying is notorious for having a very tough to understand ownership. They're the Pac-Man's of 2016 buying everything they can say. And Marriott shares fell when this news broke. And I'm wondering if at least some investors look at this and think, you know what, we don't want Marriott buying Starwood at this price.
They're going to pay too much for it. I could see that if Marriott came back with another deal. I mean, we look at Marriott and Starwood both down for the week after everything is said and done. Starwood that's more understandable because honestly the stock fell because this higher bid is going to be thrown to the side.
But I think again, we have to look at this from a little bit of a longer term perspective. I understand that these are two very good operators in a very relevant industry where scale really matters. They're going to be able to take advantage of a lot of cost efficiencies. And I think the shareholders of Marriott will be lined this all works out here over the long haul.
The Burger Wars are heating up. McDonald's CEO Steve Easterbrook said the company plans to add 1,300 new restaurants in China. This news came on the same day that McDonald's got a new competitor, Chipotle, filed to trademark the name Better Burger. What could go wrong?
What could possibly go wrong? Starwood McDonald's though. This is a big expansion that they're looking to make in China. Really big and they've struggled in China.
They're actually closing 90 restaurants in China. 2014, they had some supply issues and supplies of chicken and burgers were not available and they're still trying to regain the trust of the Chinese consumer who are actually pretty wary about some fast food concepts. So they have an upper battle there. But as you said, it's a very big expansion.
They'll franchise them, which typically in China people get nervous about because you want to have some control. It'd be interesting to see how it works out with them giving up the control to the franchise or. But it's a huge market as we know. It does make sense.
It's all going to be in the execution. I remember there's going to be more competition in the market too, as Yumbrands splits off their Chinese operations. And while Yumbrands has Pizza Hut and KFC in China, Taco Bell doesn't really have a presence at all, but they are going to change that now how Taco Bell has received amongst the Chinese population. Yeah, it's not hot there.
Pizza Hut is a luxury restaurant in China. It's got fancy wines, like steaks. It's just like a hot date. Bit of a similar dynamic when we were living in Cairo, Egypt too.
Pizza Hut and KFC to a lesser degree, but certainly Pizza Hut. I'm a little torn on the Chipotle news because on the one hand, diversifying as they have with Shophouse and Picoos, and L. Kelly, and now presumably a burger chain diversifying makes sense to me. On the other hand, I looked at the troubles they've had over the last six months and I think, you know what, given that today, they've only opened about a dozen shop house restaurants.
They've had that concept for years, but they've only expanded to about 12 or 13. There's only about three pizza area localis. So they're clearly taking a very slow approach with this. Yeah, I don't think that would be any different here with the burger concept.
I think what will happen is they'll open up one store, they'll test it for probably about a year trying to figure out what they can do to differentiate themselves. Because like you said, the burger market is a very big one, it's very saturated. So if you're going to be successful, I think you have to do two things. You have to put yourself in markets where the demand is probably there, and then you have to do something a little bit different.
The thing about burgers, they tend to be breed fairly loyal followings. I mean, for everybody that likes five guys, you have another contingency that'll say, no, I think burger joint is better, or elevation burger. It's something else that we've never even heard of. So I think there's plenty of room to play in this market, just like there is in the pizza market.
It's just figuring out what they can do to differentiate themselves because we know that the model there works fine. Agreed. The model works fine. I just think the burger market is just too saturated.
There's just too many burger joints out there. It's the new cupcake. Every place was a cupcake place a few years ago, and then they all closed down. You were a burger aficionado yourself?
I'm not. I like a burger. I like it. I like it.
I like it. He's clearly anti-cupcake. Yeah. There's too many choices.
I can't imagine they'll differentiate themselves in any major way from all the other choices out there. So hey, go slow, take a measured approach, test it, but I don't see it being a big deal. And I would say to investors in Chipotle today, take solace in knowing that they will take it slowly, and if it doesn't work, they will bag it. I mean, this is not going to be something where they're rolling out.
50 burger joints a year now in the hopes of overtaking this market. Up next, we'll give you an inside look at the stocks on our radar. Stay right here. This is Motley Fool Money.
As always, people in the program may have interested in the stocks they talk about in the Motley Fool, and they have formal recommendations for or against. So, no buyer saw stocks based solely on what you hear. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money, Chris Hill here in studio with Jason Moser, James Early and Ron Gross. Son Edison bills itself as the largest global renewable energy development company, and it is getting smaller by the day.
Shares down more than 60% this week, James. There's a lot going on, and on top of all of that, the US Justice Department came knocking on their door with a subpoena. Chris, I had 50 cents in my pocket today, and I debated between buying some chips from the vending machine or a share of Son Edison. This is just a classic example of a company that stuffed way too much in its mouth and then couldn't digest it, spit some out and whatever else happened.
So, these guys hide debt, they're getting sued after a failed acquisition. DOJ investigation, CFO resigned. Everything is bad about this company. It's just an obvious example.
You don't have an unlimited runway in renewable energy. No matter how field good of a thing you're doing, you have to control yourself, and they didn't. So, the fact that the stock has dropped from the mid-30s to 50 cents a share in six months. You don't look at that and think, ooh, maybe I'll take a flyer.
Ron, I gotta ask Ron. It does seem like a Ron. I would like to do a validation analysis or a balance sheet analysis or just take a quick look at tangible book value. Where are we in relation to the stock price?
You know much more about this than I do. They're already entering debtor in possession financing. Isn't that? That's your inequity, older.
You're probably gonna get wiped out. I didn't realize we were at that point. You know, Einhorn owns 7% himself in Greenlight owns 4%. How's that working?
Apparently not very well. McCormick's first quarter profits rose 32%. The spice maker also raised guidance for the full fiscal year. They're getting it done, Jason.
They are. The surprise here is that we're not surprised. It's just more of the same from this company. They've done a wonderful job through the years of grooming and developing this brand that has just owned an entire aisle in virtually every grocery store you set foot in.
I don't see that changing. They've just done a tremendous job in building that brand over time. Consumers buy it almost without even thinking about it anymore. I know I certainly do.
I think I'd be willing to bet that probably every homeowner has at least one McCormick product in their pantry somewhere. Just a very funny quote from the call. You wonder why they're doing so well. Well, here's the money quote right here.
Management says quote, consumer demand for flavor is strong and on the rise. Because I mean, who doesn't love flavor? We all love a little flavor. And a big driver for this company continues to be what they call the comprehensive continuous improvement program, which is just clever.
Whoever made that slogan got paid way too much. I'm telling you that. It's code for we're constantly focusing on how to cut costs and be as efficient as possible. You look at the top line growth versus the bottom line growth of this company.
It's working because they remain a grow. They remain very, very profitable. And I think that's continuing. I just got to say, every time I see McCormick, I feel like an idiot because years ago, this was an income investor recommendation.
It made good returns. And then I sold. It just got up, up, up. It's up 240% in 2009.
This is an example of finding a best of breed stock and just sticking with it. I'm over-gardless evaluation. Not just a good example of that. Shares of Lulu Lemon Athletic up 12% this week after fourth quarter profits came in higher than expected.
Nice end of the fiscal year, Ron. Yeah, they had a good year. This is a company that has had a checkered past on a number of fronts from product to management. But things are going well now.
So the holiday season was very strong. Same for sales up 5% if you exclude currency with profit up 6%. Guidance was actually a little bit weak, but the stocks seemed to shrug that off and was strong. They went online sales to go to a quarter of revenue by 2020.
That's from about 20% now. So the company is executing well and expanding its kind of product offerings as well. All right. Let's get to the stocks on our radar.
I'm going to go ahead and talk about the next week. We'll bring in our man Steve Brodo and from the other side of the glass to hit you with a question. Jason Moser, you're up first. What are you looking at?
Sure. It's an NDP holding we have today, Boston Beer, ticker S.A.M. and I was reading this week a conference called the Meeting of the Malls. I just love that name.
But Dick Youngling, Jim Cook and Ken Grossman, the founders of Youngling Brewery, Boston Beer and Sierra Nevada, we're talking a lot about the saturation of the craft market today. And I think a lot of people aren't really taking a long enough view here in that a lot of these breweries are very small. They are not built to last. And the venture capital is investing a lot of money.
And those funds have finite lives. Well, at some point they're going to be wanting to realize returns on those investments. Boston Beer has a very good competitive advantage, not only the brand but the distribution and production facilities it has today, not to mention a very smart leader and Jim Cook. So I think this is a business we plan on holding on for a long time in NDP.
Steve, question about Boston Beer? Do you have a favorite bad beer? Boston Beer is a good one. You have a favorite bad one.
You're talking about just your regular old kind of a mass brew? You bet. You know, I was in the golf business a lifetime ago and Greenville, South Carolina, it was all about the Silver Bullet. It's so cool.
James, what are you looking at? I'm going with a stock called Omni-Com. This is an income investor recommendation. And this is a stock that I just tried hard to get people to love.
It's just tough because it's sort of like, steak at a seafood restaurant. It's a dividend stock, but it's an advertising company. It's a company that the TV show called Mad Men was based on has great margin. Great profits.
40 something percent return on equity. I'm looking at the numbers right now. 2.4 percent yield isn't huge. The stock is up 10 percent this year.
I think it's an overlooked dividend stock just because it's in a weird industry. And the term? OMC. Steve?
How would I begin to make sense of the advertising industry and what makes a good business in that space? It's cyclical, obviously talent is what's useful, but this company has a bunch of different agencies so they can serve competing businesses. Normally, if you're a coconut Pepsi, we wouldn't go to the same agency because of conflict of interest. But if one parent company has many different sub-agencies and they can do that, Omni-Com does.
That's part of their business model. Ron Gross, what are you looking at? Steve, I've got to go back to Perielos, which I know you know well, P-E-R-Y. They are quietly becoming a stronger business under the radar as they execute on their strategic plan.
They report fourth quarter results next week. Stock's currently trading on a P-E of 10. It looks very undervalued. Steve?
How does Perielos get away from being the TJ Maxx brand that we have come to love? I don't know if they need to necessarily get away from it. They just need to get the right merchandise at the right price points into the stores. And then if they stick to their bread and butter, then sales will grow in profits along with them.
What do you like, Steve? I'm going with Omni-Com. Is that it? James?
It is, Steve. Thank you so much. I'm in. Thanks for being here.
Thank you, Chris. ESPN's Tony Coronizer says he is quite simply one of the best sports writers in America. Barry's Verluga is next. This is my full money.
Welcome back to Motley Full Money. I'm Chris Hill. Opening day is this weekend. So to talk through the business of baseball and more, we turn to Barry's Verluga.
He's the national baseball writer for The Washington Post, author of the fabulous book, The Grind, Inside Baseball's Endless Season. He joins me now from across the Potomac River in Washington, D. Barry, thanks for coming back on the show. Chris, thanks for having me.
Major League Baseball is a $9 billion industry. And at least on the surface, it looks like there's good money being made by the players and the teams and the networks. When you look at the business of baseball, does it look healthy or do you have questions about its health? I really don't.
I mean, I think that there's a popular narrative. And actually, now I think the revenues are up to $9.5 billion pushing forward all the time. I think there's kind of a popular narrative. We get to the World Series every year.
And if it's the Royals are in it and there's kind of small market teams and it's not the Yankees and the Red Sox and the postseason all the time, that these national TV ratings are not key kang and oh, they're the lowest for that and the all-star game ratings aren't what they used to be. It's not the mid-summer classic that ever kind of marked their summer around. But it really can take on the kind of vibe of a dying sport. And of course, they've got to be aware of their demographics and aware of what's largely an aging fan base and try to figure out ways to get younger people playing the game and engage in the game and kind of trying to wake up and figure out what the score was last night and be really involved.
But if you look at it as 30 individual businesses, these businesses are really doing quite well. A lot of the money comes in through the local television contracts. But that business is booming. The Royals are a great example.
They're attendance skyrocketed last year. Attendance across the majors was almost 75 million people last year. It's the seven-highest, seventh-most attendance of any year in major league history and all of those years have come since 2005. So this is a year in which a new collective bargaining agreement expires or a new one will be negotiated because the current one expires at the end of the 2016 season.
And I think the general sense, and you can never bank on anything in one of these labor negotiations, but the general sense is that both sides know they've got a pretty good thing going and the players are making lots of money. The owners are making money. And there's not sort of a line in the sand. We're at a tipping point.
We need a salary cap or we need more than a luxury tax. There's really kind of a, there are going to be some sticking points. But I think in general, the attitude is we've got something to go here. Let's keep it going.
We are, however, starting to see standoffs between television networks and the cable providers, on the national level yet, but we have seen it in cities like Houston and LA and now New York City where Comcast has blocked out the channel that here's the Yankee games. And it does seem like if things are at the moment good between the owners and the players, maybe behind the scenes, things are getting a little chippy in terms of the television deals. And I think that's what we're going to see. You know, a lot of these rights fees were signed or these deals for these huge rights fees were signed in an arrow before we had the idea that, oh yeah, we are going to watch games on our phone and we do want it to travel with us.
And the days of bundling ESPN and other sports properties into these huge cable television packages and charging a couple hundred dollars a month for your service at home, it seems like the consumer is kind of running out of patience with that. And it will be really interesting to see, as we go forward in so many things, from the Olympics to baseball to the NCAA basketball tournament are fueled by these giant TV contracts. You know, if that model is sustainable anymore, as viewers have its change, as the networks become less popular or less, you know, viewers become less dependent on them because they can get content from so many different ways. I think that's kind of a very large picture view of not just Major League Baseball and their TV issues, but sports TV issues as a whole.
One of the biggest stories of the preseason had less to do with baseball and more to do with international politics with President Obama going down to Cuba and taking in a game. What do you think the president's move towards normalization of relations with Cuba means for the business of Major League Baseball? Well, I think it's interesting on a couple of levels. One, it's clear that baseball is going to be at the front and center of any sort of diplomatic negotiations between the two countries.
It's something that has a deep history with both countries and it's really, you know, in a lot ways more interesting and sexy or something to put out in front of a diplomatic negotiation than say, you know, sugar cane trade or something like that. So I think there was a lot of pomp and circumstance around Obama not only going to Havana and going to Cuba, but to sitting in that stadium for nine innings between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Cuba national team. But if you talk to scouts and executives around Major League Baseball, even if relations with Cuba are normalized and we're a long way from that, you know, actually happening, can the impact on the Major League over the next year, two years, five years doesn't seem like it's going to be that great. Most of the talent, most of the top level talent, Yasie Puyig and Jose Breo and Jose Fernandez have been, you know, a success, but it's they have already defected and they're already here and there are in fact more than 100 other players over the last several years who have defected and done the very harrowing journey and, you know, had to take a raft or whatever to get to the United States and be scouted.
A lot of them won't even make it to the majors. Some of them won't be signed. And what's left behind in Cuba is an aging national team, a less than thinned out talent base. It would be good for the Cuban player to have normalized relations and it would be great to have a safer path and a more normal way to get into the American baseball system.
But from a baseball perspective, if relations are normalized, you're not going to look at, you know, 15 or 20, not the upweeks coming over in the first two years, they'll be much thinner talent than that. You're listening to Monica Money talking with Barry Zverluga from The Washington Post. Last time you were on the show, one of the things we talked about was how the NFL is able to bring in casual fans in a way that's harder for baseball to do as we get set to kick off the 2016 season. What is a storyline that you're watching that you think casual baseball fans might find pretty compelling?
Well, I think, you know, I think every even casual fan understand what history and frustration and kind of frustration that can define a city or define a region's attitude to a certain degree that grew up in New England and of course that references a Red Sox, the pre 2004 Red Sox because for generations, all New England had known as disappointment and frustration. And so that turns into the Chicago Cubs this year who haven't won World Series since 1908 and are 108 years removed from that and very living Cubs fans don't know that euphoria. So it's a very on the field kind of storyline but I think it's one that draws in people who aren't day to day baseball fans because the Cubs have a very good team. You could argue they have the best organization in baseball right now and if they're around in October, those national TV ratings we were talking about that kind of flag annually, made a lot of people will be tuning in because, you know, Chicago would be kind of a different city if the Cubs ended up winning World Series.
One of the things you wrote on Twitter recently was I just made playoff predictions that did not include the St. Louis Cardinals. I may not sleep well for six months. I'm curious about what your predictions are but first, why do you think baseball success is so hard to predict?
Sports Illustrated came out with their annual issue where they're previewing the season and part of them picking the winner included an admission on the part of Sports Illustrated, a venerable publication that in the last 20 years they've been correct precisely once. Well, I think a couple of reasons. One, when you're predicting success and I don't think it's hard to predict success over the course of 162 games season, there are variables of course, variables in performance and almost more importantly variables in health. But, you know, the truth comes out over 162 games and it's hard to hide from the truth.
It's hard to play above your level by such a significant factor that turning an 80 game winner into a 100 game winner just simply doesn't happen in the way that an NFL team who's probably a 7-9 team end up winning three extra games and whatever circumstances and all of sudden can win 10 games and be a division champion. So, I think it's a little bit easier and I've failed at this many times but I think it's a little bit easier to predict success over the regular season. But now that the playoffs are expanded and they're not just expanded to three division champions and a wildcard team but they now have two wildcard teams and playing that single game elimination game to start October. That tournament is really, really difficult to pick.
The safest go Giants have won three World Series since 2010 and going into each of those postseason, no scout or executive would have said you've got to watch the Giants. They're the clear favorite here. So, you know, talk to the 116 wins Seattle Mariners of several years ago who lost in the first round. You know, the Cardinals have had the Cardinals 100 games last year and have the best record in baseball and the Cubs beat them in four games in the division series.
Once you get to October, it's best to not make predictions but to sit back and enjoy it because you really have no idea what's going to happen. Who'd you pick? I picked the Astros. I picked the Astros because I really feel like they're on the rise.
They have the reigning American League's Iron Award winner in Dallas. Pico, who had a breakout year last year but I also think they have a much deeper rotation than they had last year and they get, you talk about something like a draw in fans who might not be traditional fans. They have one of the best young players in the game and they're short to not Carlos Correa who play a full season this year and he certainly looks like the player that not only can you build a franchise around and build a lineup around and build a team around. And really you can build a fan base around because he's charismatic and funny and fun and he plays with Flair and they have a really good organization.
They have a very good Major League team. One of the Astros. Our producer Matt Greer is a proud native of Houston and you've made him very, very happy. Coming up more with Barry's Verluca including a round by Sellahold.
Stay right here. This is Motley Fool Money. There's nothing like the beat from the Chiefs. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money.
I'm Chris Hill talking with Washington Post writer Barry's Verluca. Before we wrap up, looking ahead to the summer, you mentioned the Olympics. You're heading to Rio? Indeed.
I covered the Olympics before. You're in Athens in 2004, Beijing, London. So you're an old pro at this. What do you like to cover?
If your editor comes to you and says you get your pick, what is the Summer Olympics sport that is the most fun for you to be at? Well, I'm a little biased in this because as you said, my first Olympics was in 04 and that was Michael Phelps's first Olympics. And we actually had a reporter assigned for the full year just to cover Phelps. And I was kind of younger person, the low person on the totem pole and I got swimming but everything but Phelps.
So I kind of picked the other storylines there and Americans are always strong in swimming and swimming. Swimmers are, for the most part, pretty bright analytical thinkers. They're fun to interview. They're pretty thoughtful.
So I've kind of gotten sucked in by swimming. I then did cover Phelps in his eight goals at Beijing. And I just like the characters. I'm going to be, so I'll be at the trials in Omaha in June and into July.
And then, so that's kind of a, it might sound niche-y. It's kind of a personal preference. I kind of like know the storylines there and I think it's fun. I also think one great thing about covering the Olympics is whenever you're done with kind of whatever your beat assignment is for those two and a half weeks, you know, the swim may be the last eight days, you're going to stumble into some story you have no idea about and you don't have any idea what these athletes have been through and who they are and how they got there and what comes out in their performance and telling those stories whether they're about, you know, judo or rowing or whatever.
It doesn't really matter the sport. The fun part about being at the Olympics is packing up at the end of it and being like, wow, I never saw that coming and that was super, super fun. All right, we will wrap up with a round of buy, seller hold. This is baseball's most valuable team with an estimated value of nearly three and a half billion dollars.
Buy, seller hold, the New York Yankees. There's no brand in sports and it just being at their spring complex and watching fans walk around this kind of, you know, place at the side of a highway in Tampa and just soak in history. That can't be replicated. So, so I buy there.
This spectator event first appeared on national television in October of 1981, so it's a bit long in the tooth. Buy, sell, or hold the wave. Oh, sell hard. Sell now and sell yesterday.
I mean, it's that you talk about if you want to live like five things that are the definition of tired, there's a challenge you to come up with a list that doesn't include the wave. He's a superstar whose career has been tainted by his use of illegal performance enhancing drugs. Buy, seller hold Alex Rodriguez being elected to the baseball Hall of Fame. I sell it not necessarily because I believe that he shouldn't be there.
I think we are into the greatest of gray areas on how these guys should be treated and I think it's naive to think that there isn't somebody who's already been elected or who will be elected who relied heavily on performance enhancing drugs and just weren't either stupid enough to get caught or were just incredibly lucky not to get caught. But I think the record shows the recent record whether it be with Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens and Mark McGuire or whoever that guys who are known users of PEDs have very little chance with this elective to get into the Hall of Fame. So, I'll sell on ARUD. And finally, it's been associated with the game since 1908 when it was immortalized in song.
Buy, seller hold, cracker jack. I told it, definitely. Really? I'll buy it.
Unless you're a dentist, who doesn't like cracker jack? Well, it happened in 1908. I mean, that was the Cubs World Series here, right? So, something's got to turn around for one of those.
Yeah, I like cracker jack and I even like the little prizes so I'm fine with buying that. The grind inside baseball's endless season is out in paperback now. It is available everywhere. It's the perfect book for any baseball fan to pick up a copy.
Barry's for Luga. Thanks so much for being here. Pretty much. I really appreciate it.
Pretty much. I really appreciate it. I really appreciate it. Before we wrap up this week, Steve Broido, I got to bring you in here, man.
You are a proud son of Chicago. A lot of people, including our guest this week, predicting a pretty nice year for your Chicago Cubs. You've got to be excited about this. Of course.
Everyone loves the Cubbies. Everyone? Everybody. Now, as I understand Chicago, there are people who are Cubs fans.
White Sox fans. White Sox fans. And never the twin shell meat. Or racks.
Did you grow up a Cubs fan? I really didn't like baseball very much. But if I had to pick one, it would have been the Cubs. Fair enough.
Fair enough. By the way, something crossed my desk this week. You know about Comic Con? Yes.
The big event out in California? I do. Can I interest you in brunch Con? Because apparently in August, in Los Angeles, there's going to be a brunch convention.
I think that sounds very interesting to me indeed. A brunch convention. Is it like tasting? Or is it just a?
There's going to be all kinds of tastings. There's going to be something called the hangover lounge. I'm excited about this. I think it sounds good.
We should pack up the pool and we'll be able to take a trip. Alright. That's going to do it for this week's edition of Motley Fool Money. Our engineer is Steve Bruno.
Our producer is Mac Greer. I'm Chris Hill. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next week.