#386 - Trent & Tyler Leon - Co-Founders @ Tilden Capital

Chris Powers: We're now on episode 386. Y'all were episode 89. So, I just wanted to start by saying if we hadn't done that episode, I don't know where this podcast would be. So, we're going to break the ice with just an icebreaker. Who is the best golfer, you two or Taylor? We have to get it on the record, who's the best Leon golfer? 

Tyler Leon: Well, we got to go with Taylor. She's made the most money. 

Trent Leon: Taylor's the best golfer. 

Chris Powers: You agree? 

Trent Leon: She was incredible. 

Chris Powers: Would Art agree? 

Trent Leon: Everyone would, you have to agree. 

Chris Powers: But Art pretty much thought y'all were all great. He instilled a lot of confidence in y'all. 

Tyler Leon: But she played on LPGA for five years. And we didn't play on LPGA as long. 

Trent Leon: Yeah, she had great sponsors. She'd still be out there if she wanted to be. 

Chris Powers: She's good at having kids now. 

Trent Leon: She’s a great mom... She's going to have her fifth at 38. 

Chris Powers: Married a stud, Brandon, who I'm playing tomorrow with in the member guests. Kicked for Georgia. Kicked for the Seahawks. A lot of athletes. 

Trent Leon: A lot of athletes. 

Chris Powers: So, for those listening, we're going to talk about oil and gas, but we're going to talk about athletics to start. Tell me about growing up in Dallas. Like, when did golf become a thing? As far back as you can remember. 

Trent Leon: We bounced around a lot, but it was when we were in, for me, it was when we were in Houston. 

Chris Powers: You were in Houston before Dallas? 

Trent Leon: Yep. And our dad was a member of Braeburn and I kind of remember going out there as a seven-year-old, but not really knowing what I was doing. But yeah, like the Mentos they had by the shack at the driving range and all three of us would be out there and our dad would probably be hitting more balls than us, but that's like my first memories. 

Chris Powers: Tyler? 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, mine's exactly the same, at Braeburn. That's when we really- he started dropping us off a bunch, playing golf, and we got to swim at the pool, kind of like every- probably a lot of kids growing up. 

Chris Powers: Did y'all like it or did he- it was like you didn't have a choice or y'all took to it at seven? 

Tyler Leon: We didn't always like do- it wasn't like an everyday deal. It was kind of like weekends because we played other sports, and I don't really remember it feeling forced. It was just like, hey, we're going out. I'm going to play golf with my buds. Y'all go hit on the range. There was like one or two other kids we played with. And then, it was a lot more laid back thing in elementary school. 

Chris Powers: But when did it become like a thing? Like when it was like, all right, we're golfers or we're going to start doing this? 

Trent Leon: Moving into Dallas.

Chris Powers: Which was how old were y'all? 

Trent Leon: I was nine. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah. I was 11. 

Chris Powers: And were y’all good friends as kids?

Tyler Leon: We're probably better friends now. 

Chris Powers: We'll talk. We have a story or two. But y'all were good- But when y'all played golf as kids, were y'all competitors more than you were friends? Or was it like the Trent and Tyler show even as kids? 

Trent Leon: We were different ages. We would always be next to each other on the golf course because the kids are all moving together like a school of fish on a golf course. And you're just trying to have fun. I mean, I'm a little brother. I want to beat my big brother. Like, I mean, and I think that kind of changed in college. We were on the same team. For me, that changed in college. It was like, I never wanted Tyler to play bad. I just wanted to play better. I never wanted Tyler to finish second unless I won. If it wasn't me, I wanted him to win. And so, I think that kind of changed for me in maybe late high school, college, but I think it's more like maturity. 

Tyler Leon: I totally agree. 

Chris Powers: And you always wanted to beat Trent because you're the big brother. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah. You want to beat your brother for sure. But the key point, and I think other people see it with us now, is like we never like want the other one to do bad. That's not like- it's never even a thought. So that's how we've- I would say we've kind of always been like that. 

Chris Powers: Is that because of Art or that's just because of how it was?

Trent Leon: I mean, our dad's an identical twin. His best friend was his brother. Tyler and I are really close. They were probably closer. So, I don't know how you- I couldn't imagine how I could be any closer to Tyler already. But I think our dad raised us as if we were twins. I have twins. I try to raise my kids the way my dad raised us because we have such a good relationship. It's easier said than done, but I think our dad probably had a lot to do with it. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, he had a good thing always. Like if you got in fights or whatever, he'd let you fight it out. But he's like, okay, you guys are going to hug at the end of it. 

Trent Leon: Never punched each other in the face. 

Tyler Leon: So, like he had a couple of rules that are good that help you like never like make the fracture go too bad. Like hey, you're going to fight but get over it.

Chris Powers: Okay, you just said y’all never fought. There’s a story... 

Tyler Leon: No, we fought. We just never punched each other in the face.

Chris Powers: Okay, well, maybe not punch with fists, but we need to get to the bottom of this. There's a story about Art needing to get the wedding ring on his finger sawed off. Do you remember this? 

Trent Leon: Correct, yes. 

Chris Powers: So why would he have to get this wedding ring sawed off? 

Tyler Leon: Trent's going to have a better memory because he was... 

Chris Powers: And Taylor has a good memory too. So, I can fill in the gaps... I just know the way she looked at it. 

Trent Leon: This is the exact story. We would go play golf on the weekends as a family of five. By... 

Chris Powers: Mom, dad, Taylor, Trent, and Tyler. 

Trent Leon: That's right. And at no point as a 12 year old kid, we're 11 to 13, none of us ever played good the same day. You're all playing- Someone's playing good. Someone's playing bad. My dad would make us keep the score. Our sister would start getting upset on like the fifth hole that she's not keeping her score because she made an eight. And that happens to me probably the seventh or eighth hole. I don’t want to keep my score. We’re not keeping score. Everyone wants to fight. My mom’s wanting just to go in. Art's kind of getting a little short. We're on the 12th green and I'm twirling my putter around, like whatever, and it catches Tyler's ankle. Like he drops his knees. I don't think he cried. I'm sure he wanted to cry. Maybe he did. I think we all would want to cry. I mean, it smoked his ankle. At this point, my dad has had it with me and probably everyone else on the golf course. And he looks at me and he does this deal with his lip when he gets pissed off. And I saw it and I just started- he started walking over to me with his putter. I'm like, oh shit. I start running towards the golf carts down this hill, and he's running after me, and he falls. And when he falls, he lands on his finger and dislocates his ring finger. And so, we get in, he's wearing a white shirt. We get in towards the pro shop at Gleneagles where there's a thousand members. People are hitting at Saturday afternoon. And in my mind, it was like 20 people. It's like, rough sport, huh, Art? And he just wants to kill me, just trying to get me in the car so he can spank me. That's how I remember this story. 

Chris Powers: And so, it had to get cut off. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, it had to get cut off.

Chris Powers: But you weren't chasing him down trying to hit him in the head with your putter?

Trent Leon: No, I hit him on the green. 

Tyler Leon: Our dad was trying to hit him in the head with his putter. 

Chris Powers: Oh, okay. There it is. 

Trent Leon: That's what he was trying to do. 

Chris Powers: All right, so you leave Houston and you get to Dallas, and you guys joined Gleneagles. And there was a young group at Gleneagles that was pretty good golfers that y'all got plugged in with immediately. Were you already good at golf prior to getting to Gleneagles or was Gleneagles when it started to kind of take shape? 

Tyler Leon: I think we were probably nothing special, could hit the ball, could go play nine holes by ourselves at the time, or maybe 18 when we got there, but weren't like world beaters by any stretch of the imagination. 

Trent Leon: We were winning local stuff. Right? NTPGAs and stuff. 

Tyler Leon: Well, that's when we started playing it. We were in the STPGA before. 

Trent Leon: Yeah, we were not winning those. 

Tyler Leon: I personally remember being nine years old in Laredo, shooting 65 in nine holes. I don't think I was a world beater. I was kind of like, why am I playing golf? Anyways, so we did that, moved to Dallas. That's when we really started playing a lot more because we didn't- we stopped playing baseball cause you had to do- it was select in Dallas at that time. And dad's like, we're not doing that. So we're going to play golf. And so, we had a lot more time in the spring when you play a lot and in the summer. And so, we started playing at NTPGAs. And the wildly enough, a couple of the best players in the DFW area were a guy named Andrew Dresser, Matt Rosenfeld, and Jeff Bell. And Matt Rosenfeld at the time was already considered like the next Tiger Woods. I mean, he had won Junior Worlds and all this stuff. And they were at Gleneagles. And so, we played with them. And so, we started playing in NTPGAs and they kind of kicked our butts at the start. But we just did it every day and finally kind of caught up. We were able to compete with them over time. 

Chris Powers: Is that how you remember it? 

Trent Leon: Yeah, I think a big reason we got as good as we did as quick as we did was because of Gleneagles. I think if we were at any different club in Dallas, I think Rosenfeld, Dresser, Bell, all of us would say the same thing. I mean, five of us all went on full rides to D1 schools. 

Chris Powers: Is there like a moment that you remember that you were like, all right, and you don't have to brag on yourself, but you're like, all right, we're pretty good at this? Like, we're clearly starting to separate ourselves from the pack. Was that just after getting to Dallas still young or was that like late middle school? Like was there a day that you're like, all right, we kind of got this thing? 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, for me it was later. I would say kind of like 7th, 8th grade. I remember winning the Texas State junior whatever, junior tournament, which was like the biggest tournament in the state at the time. And in 7th or 8th grade, I won that, and I was like damn, I mean, I can play, shot under par scores. And I think at that moment, I was like, okay, I can really do something here. 

Trent Leon: I was winning more local stuff, but Tyler being a little older, I was kind of older for the age group I was playing in, I guess, and I was winning. But I played well at a tournament MCI Heritage when I was 12 or 13, and the only reason I got- I was just there with Tyler because they're like your third alternate. So I got up there. Well, I had the lead with like a few holes to play against a bunch of 18 year olds, and I didn't win. I kind of choked. But that was like my first big like playing against guys from other states. And I was like, oh, I guess I am good enough to do this. 

Chris Powers: All right, Matt Rosenfeld, if you're listening to this, did you or did you not crash a golf cart into the lake at Gleneagles and try walking with your golf bags back like nothing ever happened? 

Trent Leon: Well, the best part of the story is it was only 80% his fault, as he said. 

Chris Powers: Who's the other 20%? 

Tyler Leon: It was me because I was riding in the passenger seat eating my hot dog. He said I should have been paying attention. And it's also my fault as well why we drove in the lake.

Trent Leon: He was really big on that. 

Tyler Leon: It was really funny. And yes, we did try to leave the cart and act like it would never happen. But the mistake we made, and to all kids listening, do not leave your scorecard with your names on it if you leave a cart in the water. 

Chris Powers: It wasn't us. There's a golf cart... 

Tyler Leon: It was the 16th hole, and the there's two lakes, and there's a bend where you kind of have to turn so you don't drive in the lake. Head down, Rosenfeld's looking at something, they went straight into it. 

Trent Leon: Did you get suspended for a week or something? 

Tyler Leon: Probably. I can't remember the length of it, but yeah, we got suspended. I remember they're like, y'all drove it in there? No, it wasn't us. Is this not your name? Matt Roosevelt and Tyler Leon? 

Trent Leon: And they stole the golf cart because they were 13 year old.... 

Chris Powers: We’re sorry, Gleneagles. To this day. 

Tyler Leon: Hey, I'm still sorry. 

Chris Powers: To this day, we're still sorry. All right. So, middle school, you're good. You start winning tournaments. You're a few years back. You're getting better. What was the decision to go to IMG? Was that because y'all were good at golf, you wanted to accelerate it or was there a different reason to go to IMG?

Trent Leon: You’ve got to ask our dad, but I kind of remember Tyler and Taylor kind of being collateral damage. I wasn't doing great at school. I was kind of getting in trouble. My dad was talking about sending me to like Harlingen Military Academy or NMMI in Roswell. 

Chris Powers: I remember I got a NMMI threat at one point. 

Trent Leon: Yeah, so he talked about Culver, and then he saw how much it costs. You're going to Harlingen. But luckily, I was playing good at golf and I was really liking it. And so, we had a- there was a buddy, Ty Tryon, I think Ty's a coach now, but he got his PGA tour card. Ty got it when he's like 16 or 17. Ty was a really good golfer playing AJGAs against us. And he just started going to IMG, and his dad, Bill, told our dad about it. So, our dad flew down, looked at it, came back and was like, you're going there next year. In like two months, you're going to Florida. And so that was kind of it. 

Chris Powers: Were you happy about that? 

Tyler Leon: I was not happy about it. 

Chris Powers: You were not. Because you're wrestling, weren't you? 

Tyler Leon: I had no interest. I was like, I'm good. Life's good. Golf's fun, but like I'm not like obsessed. 

Chris Powers: I was good, but I'm not obsessed. 

Tyler Leon: I was good playing other sports. I was good at other sports. And I was like, I don't really see why I need to move down here. But I tell you what, the greatest thing he ever did, and he probably- I actually told him this other day, I said the moving part, golf, I got better there because I was more focused and could only do that. But he gave us a book called Who Moved My Cheese. And it's all about change and accepting change and understanding change is going to happen. You can't just keep doing the same things and expect better results. And it's a phenomenal book. And of course, we drove to Florida, which was like 18 hours. So, at first like, I'm not reading this effing book. And then I'm getting pretty bored because it's pre iPads and all that, and I'm like, I can only play the sign game so many times or be pissed. So, I start reading the book. And I'll be damned, I read the book, and I kind of open up my mind. And I was like, all right, maybe that book makes sense. I'll give it a try. So, and a lot of those things I read in the book have stuck with me since. 

Chris Powers: Who Moved the Cheese. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, Who Moved the Cheese, something like that.

Chris Powers: Johnny, drop it in the link. Okay. So you read the book on the way and you get there. You're a little more excited. Did you land there and like you're already enrolled, hit the golf course immediately as soon as you got there or...?

Trent Leon: Pretty much, like the next day.

Chris Powers: And you were more excited to get there? 

Trent Leon: Well, my options were Harlingen Military Academy... all boys school. But I really liked lacrosse and I liked wrestling. I liked playing team sports. I liked all that stuff. But I thought I wanted to be a professional golfer at like 10 years old. Tyler wasn't there. So, yeah, I was cool with it, and I wasn't doing well at school. I heard the school was easier at IMG. That sounded great. So yeah, I mean, I was excited. 

Chris Powers: Who are some of the players you played with there that would be people would remember today? 

Trent Leon: Casey Wittenberg was... Ty Trion, Casey, Christo [?] was a world beater... I think he's doing really well. He's in Atlanta. Or in Jupiter. 

Tyler Leon: He's in Jupiter now. 

Trent Leon: He's in Jupiter. Sean O'Hare was there. Drew, David Gossett came back a lot. He was there before us. But like really, Jonathan Moore, he won a national championship with us at Oklahoma State. JC Deacon, he's now the head coach of Florida. He was a good college player. But like Peter Uihlein is kind of the best probably that went there, that came out. And then I think Gorillo went there for a couple years, but that was way after us. 

Chris Powers: Do you still stay in touch with IMG kind of like as alumni or it's not like a big deal once you move on? 

Trent Leon: I have not been there since the day pretty much like I graduated. Now Tyler's gone back.

Tyler Leon: Yeah, I've taken the kids to a couple of camps over the summers. But there's no one to like really stay in touch with. Most of the- I think almost every instructor, but one has rotated out. I did say hi to the guy that's down there now. But it's all new faces. 

Chris Powers: Is it better today, is it improved?

Tyler Leon: It's a good question. I mean, I saw some of the stuff they're doing with the boys. My daughter's doing tennis, the boys are doing golf. It's hard to say if it's improved because it's just like a week long camp. I think it seems like it's really good. And IMG is transformed now where basketball and football are, they're big into. When we were there, the sports were tennis and golf and the national, the under 20 soccer team was there for the national team. So that was the main focus. That shifted now to these, all these different sports. But I think it's still, you would get a lot better, but it's not as important as it probably once was because the instruction was so much better than what you can probably get now. 

Chris Powers: And you basically- Go ahead. 

Trent Leon: Well, when we first got there, there was 50 of us on golf, or maybe 60. And 20 of us were really good. And I think now there's a couple hundred. And so, we had eight to a group, and there's kind of two better groups. But all the instructors were kind of- but I don't know what number would probably be better, but you get 200 kids, and maybe, I don't know, five or ten of them are really good, and you got 190 of them that are, I'm not saying they're bad, but maybe they're not going to play D1 golf. So it's just, it's probably not as an environment that we were in back then.

Chris Powers: And you like go to school for a few hours and then you play golf all day. 

Trent Leon: You'd go workout 6:30 to 7:30 days three days a week. This is at 13 years old, 12 years old. You get to school, or maybe it's 6 to 7. School started at 7:30. You're out at 11:30 and golf one to whenever you wanted to stop. So, it's like college. It's all block scheduling. 

Chris Powers: But did you play other high schools? Like how did high school golf work for y'all?

Tyler Leon: So you don't have to, but we were asked. And so, the school you go to is like a local private school in the Bradenton area. It's called Saint Stephens or you could go to Bradenton High School.

Trent Leon: Yeah, there’s two of them. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, at the time. Now they have their own high school at IMG, but at the time we went, you kind of have those two options. And so we went, I'd say half the population or 60% of the population of those schools were regular kids that had no affiliation with IMG. And then the others were people who were at IMG. And so, when golf season came around, we really had no- We were not planning on playing for the high school team. They'd ask you, but we're playing all these national tournaments and doing that. Well, they had a great coach, a guy named Michael Valle. He kind of reached out. I remember him reaching out to me, and he was a 10 year MLB baseball player. 

Trent Leon: Spanky, they called him. 

Tyler Leon: His nickname was Spanky. He played for the Pirates with Barry Bonds and all these guys and just a really cool guy. And he's like, look, I'm not- I'm just going to ask you guys play in the important tournaments. Like you do your deal, I get it. And let's just go have fun doing that. I was like, yeah, we'll do that. So that's what we did. We would basically just play a couple of regular seasons so we could qualify for the postseason and we would go play those. And so we did compete against the local high schools.

Trent Leon: Yeah, we went state. We did that one year. We went state. I think you were a state champion wrestler in Texas, and in the same year you were state champion golfer in Florida. 

Tyler Leon: Well, I was a state champion golfer in Texas and a state champion wrestler in Texas. And then I won the state championship in golf in Florida. I don't know what year, it was junior or senior, something like that. And we won the state title as a team as well. 

Chris Powers: All right. When did college offers start coming in? Like now these days, kids are getting college offers in like sixth grade. When did they start? Or when did you know, okay, we could probably play D1 golf? And does that happen freshman year or sophomore year? Was it different for both of you all? 

Tyler Leon: It might have been earlier for him. I mean, I think mine was sophomore year letters started coming in.

Chris Powers: From who?

Tyler Leon: Like a lot. I think my very first letter was actually from Alabama. 

Chris Powers: Really? And they were good at the time? 

Tyler Leon: They were not as good at the time. He had watched me play some stuff like eighth grade, ninth grade and kind of liked what he saw. But then the offers just started piling in from sophomore to junior year. 

Trent Leon: Yeah. I was freshman, sophomore, but you get them... 

Chris Powers: How do they work? 

Trent Leon: Like, well, everyone's different. Like, Harvard sent me a letter. I remember talking to them, and like have you seen my GPA? 

Chris Powers: You're about to go to NMMI last year. 

Trent Leon: But you get letters from all these guys and everyone does it different. Like you'll get a handwritten one from the coach, which a lot of them are, I don't know if they do that for everyone or how they decide that. But A&M, I remember theirs was pretty exhausting. They'd send you something every Monday and it'd be about one of their traditions. So, like the dog and fish camp, and like I know all this stuff about A&M just from like the recruiting letter. I'm like I’m never going to this place.

Chris Powers: Yeah, no offense Garry.

Trent Leon: Yeah, no offense, Garry. But they're all different, and they're not allowed to talk to you, so they’re just sending these letters. And I'm jumping ahead here, but you go to these AJGAs in the summer and the coaches come out and watch, and you can kind of tell who wants you. Like I think the Arkansas and then the Arizona coach watched me like every round I played for three years. But Mike Holder's bit, who's the Oklahoma State legend, AD, Tyler got to play for him, he recruited me, coached for everyone, he won nine national championships, like completely changed college golf. He would come up and watch you play, and he can't talk to you. So, you'd be warming up and he'd grab your bag, and he’d start going through all your clubs, didn't care where he put them back in. And then he would stand so close to you, legs spread, arms crossed. You would think you'd hit him. Like if you're hitting a- starting with a sandwich, and you pulled your driver out and he didn't move, you'd hit him in the nose with your driver. That's how close he'd stand. He wanted to see how you'd do feeling uncomfortable, but he was kind of- the coaches were coming out to watch us. 

Chris Powers: So, how'd you make your- because you had to make the first decision. So, what was it between? 

Tyler Leon: So, at that time, I was playing really well. I was one of the top players in the country and getting recruited by a lot of programs and fortunately, which is great. And I guess IMG was paying off because I was able to go where I kind of wanted to go. And so I was in between. I'd settled in my mind with Texas, Georgia Tech, Wake Forest and Oklahoma State. And I liked the coaches. I'd kind of got to meet them. That's how I narrowed it down. They were also all top programs. And I kind of thought initially that I wanted to go to Texas or Georgia Tech because they were- Texas was a great school and grew up in Texas, sounded interesting. I didn't really know much about Oklahoma State except their golf history, and Georgia Tech was really good at the time. 

Chris Powers: Is that like Bryce Mulder era? 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, he was there. They were really good. And so I was like, well, that sounds kind of cool. And so, I went to all the trips. And man, when I went to Oklahoma state, I was like, it's a no brainer. And Casey Wittenberg and I really wanted to go to the same college. At the time, he was the number one player in the country. I was probably top 10 or something like that. And we had gone to recruiting trips together, and man, we both went to the Oklahoma State one and were like it's a no brainer because you get up there. First of all, at that time, they were able to come pick us up on a plane and take us out there. It was amazing. So that part is a kid, you're like wow. And we also fly these to every tournament. I'm like that's cool. And then you go to Carson Creek, which is this golf course they have there that’s only- it was really built for the golf program. It's owned by the golf team, not the university. It was unique. And you just see the wall of like one national championship after another, All Americans on tour. And it's like, at that moment in my life, I thought there was- I for sure knew I was going to be on the PGA tour. There's no doubt. So, this is where I'm going. And I loved the small town feel of Stillwater. We grew up going to a ranch as kids. So, like that felt really comfortable. And it was just a no brainer and said I'm going here. And so that was how my process went. And that's how I chose it. 

Chris Powers: Was it weird for you when he was out of the house and gone? 

Trent Leon: Well, I got bridged in eighth grade. I hadn't hit puberty yet. 

Chris Powers: Didn't your dad think you wouldn't hit puberty? 

Trent Leon: In all honesty, at this point my grades had gotten better because I wasn’t at St. Mark's in Dallas, which is a hard school. But I just hadn't hit puberty yet. My dad's like, you're not going to high school without hitting puberty. I was like, God. So, I'm praying for puberty every night. It didn't come. But I get held back. So, I was- Tyler ended up going from one to two years ahead of me, and then I bounced back with my sister in the same classes as me. My sister and all of us are great friends, and Taylor and I had a lot of fun together. But what was really tough was my senior year. I mean, I'm 19 years old in high school and my buddies are all at UT. You were hanging out with my buddies at TCU that I grew up with and y’all were going on spring break trips, and I'm like stuck in Bradenton, Florida, like retirement capital of the world. And Tyler's playing college golf... It was just like, I was definitely jealous, but at the same time, my sister and I and mom and dad, I mean, I got to spend a ton of time with my sister, which was awesome. We played a lot of golf together. So, it was great. I worked my butt off because I saw how good he was playing his freshman year. So, it wasn't weird, but I was jealous. 

Chris Powers: What colleges were you in between? 

Trent Leon: Georgia, Texas, Oklahoma State. I considered Arizona for a while, but those were probably the top three. My dad really didn't want me to go to UT because I had so many friends down there from Dallas. So, I kind of agreed with him. So, I ended up in Georgia and Oklahoma State. 

Chris Powers: What's your recollection of why you chose Oklahoma State? 

Trent Leon: So, Georgia just beat y'all, and then they were like top- it was Oklahoma State and Georgia. 

Tyler Leon: They were the best two programs. 

Chris Powers: Who was on the Oklahoma State team and who was on the Georgia team at this era? 

Trent Leon: Yeah, Georgia was like Kiz, Kizner, Chris Kirk, Brendon Todd, then Harman just- Brian Harman and I were good friends in junior golf. So Brian was kind of pushing me to go up there as well. And he just committed. And at Oklahoma State, it was, what, Norrin, you, Pablo. 

Tyler Leon: Pablo Martin, Casey, well, Casey Wentberger just turned pro. I guess Jonathan Moore came the year before. 

Trent Leon: Yeah, Jay Moore came the year before, which Jay Moore, we all went to IMG together, Tyler and I, Jay Moore and Casey. And so, if Tyler would have gone to LSU, I think all four of us would have gone to LSU or wherever Tyler went, we were probably all going to end up going. So, I called Tyler, and well, I think in my mind, I was kind of leaning towards Georgia. I had a really- I had a lot of fun on my recruiting trip. The coach, Coach Hack’s a great guy, just like a fun guy to be around. Holder's like a military dictator type thing. I was a little nervous we would clash. And so, I wake up one morning, I'm reading Golf Week, which was this big magazine that’d come out every week, and they did a big deal on college. And it says Taylor Leon commits to Georgia. And I was like, what? My parents hadn't told me. She committed like a month before. They didn't want to tell me about it. I was like, well, eventually I'm going to find out. And so, I'm like, God. So, I bring it up and like, why? And so, they didn't want to tell me, but Taylor definitely needed to get away from me because I wouldn't let her have a boyfriend, a life, like I just- our little sister. But I'm still like kind of leaning towards Georgia a week after this. So, I call, I'm like, I'm going to sleep on it. So, I called Tyler, and I just tell him like, I think I'm going to go to Georgia. And Tyler didn't say a word my entire recruiting process. And the first time he ever said anything is after told him I think I'm going to go to Georgia. And he's like, man, I've been real quiet about this. You're coming here, come to Oklahoma State, we're going to win a national championship, we're going to get on the PGA Tour, you're going to be an All-American, you're living with me, you're coming here. So, I called the coach the next morning and told him I was going to Oklahoma State. That all sounds good to me. 

Chris Powers: All right, we're going to talk about Oklahoma State for a bit, but before we do that, I think everybody that knows y'all knows it's unique – three kids, three D1 golfers. I know it's a KD and an Art thing, but Art was very into golf. What would you say was like the overarching parenting strategy or thing that came to where you have a family that's kind of all top of their game in their respective deals? 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, I mean, I think it's he was really passionate about the game. He wanted to go all the time to play golf himself, and then he saw talent in us, and he wanted to nourish that and try to blossom it. And that's what he did. And so, he saw ability. And so, he took us out there and he tried to get us the best coaches that he could and get us in the best competition. And he had a real passion for it, which was- anyone who knows our dad, he's a super positive guy and kind of thinks you can do anything. 

Chris Powers: The most positive. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah. And he's always been like that. And it wasn't always with golf. It's with everything. He's just like, dream big and go do it. And in his mind, he thought that's- what could be greater than having my three kids be professional athletes? Like that would be awesome. I wish I had these opportunities growing up a poor kid in Memphis, and I love sports, and I didn't really have those opportunities. And so, he did that with us. And I just think it was an everyday drive, and it wasn't like, look, he pushed us, but not like some of these horror stories you hear. He pushed us in a really healthy way of like here's how you are great at anything and you put forth the effort. And so anyways, I think he was a huge factor or he was a giant factor. 

Trent Leon: Yeah, like I still don't sit on the couch on Saturday and Sunday mornings. And our dad just didn't let us sit around. And so, if we weren’t going to play golf, we'd have to go get a job. And that wasn’t even a consideration by the time we got to 13. I mean, we all wanted to play golf. But he just... like as a little kid, I thought I could run through a wall if my dad told me I could. He just built it up. Like in wrestling, I don't think I was that good of a wrestler, but before I got on the mat, he’d be like pumping me up like I could go beat whoever just won the Olympic gold. And he kind of probably thought I could have.  I don’t know. He made me think I could.

Chris Powers: I'm pretty sure after an amateur event we recently played in, like he said something like basically like I think you could still be on tour. And I'm not saying you couldn't or you could, but he 100% says it in a way of like you could be on tour. 

Trent Leon: He's texting me during the Masters. He's like, if you would have won that mid-am, you could win this damn tournament. Dad, I hit a 280. There's no way. 

Chris Powers: I asked Taylor, she said, nobody believed in their kids as much... as our dad did, it was a confidence like I can't describe. She said, he was always helping us, always giving us advice. Like literally after every shot, every practice ball, do this, do that, and we would look at him and be like, dad, we got it, I got it, and he would look at us and say, Taylor, Tyler, Trent, you ain't got shit, and then we would just put our head back down and keep hitting balls. But Art's a legend and obviously just remarkable and you just don't hear that story very often, three kids all being really, really good. 

Trent Leon: Yeah, he was pretty selfless, gave up a lot for golf. I think it's a testament to having a positive attitude. 

Chris Powers: He's got a positive attitude. And his brother. I didn't meet all his brothers. Larry? Most positive guy on the freaking plane. 

Trent Leon: They all are. It's crazy. 

Chris Powers: I'm like, get mad about something. Here, come hang out with me for a day. All right. So, you're both at OSU. We don't have to spend the whole time there. What was- let's just talk about the ’06 championship season and then the season that got away. I don't know if you were still there yet, the year that y'all won stroke play by like 18 and then lost to Georgia in the finals. 

Trent Leon: Well, he had won at [?] Valley. They should have won. They underperformed. 

Chris Powers: What happened there? 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, we were the number one team by like a landslide in ’05. I think we won every tournament. 

Chris Powers: That was your first year or second year? 

Tyler Leon: Second. And we were so much better than everyone. And I think we maybe lost three times during the regular season, just kind of won everything. And for whatever reason, just we all played like crap at the Nationals, and I don't even blame it up to nerves or whatever, like you just played bad at the wrong time. And so that was a pretty big letdown. And so, it was cool to go back in ’06 and play. We were playing really well once again, and it was awesome to do it. I was a junior, Trent was a freshman, and it was really cool to do it with your brother and go win, and it was an incredible feeling. I mean, one story I've got to share, after knowing we should have won my sophomore year, like really, like I've never felt nerves like that ever again, the final morning waking up. Did we have a lead or a couple back? I can't remember. 

Trent Leon: It was us, Wake and Florida, but we're all like jammed in there. 

Tyler Leon: Anyways, we're jammed in there. And it was cool because another guy we played with on the team, Jonathan Moore won individually, Pablo Martín got there. Well, Pablo Martín was a freak of all freaks. He was better than anyone in the country. He had already won a European tournament at 19. 

Trent Leon: Didn't finish out of the top five all year. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, just unreal. And it was cool to like rehash notes with him on the way home. All of us had the same thing. None of us could sleep before the final round. It was like your heart was beating out your chest when you woke up that morning. I still have never felt that in a golf tournament and played in really big stuff later in life. And we kind of hashed notes later on, like they still hadn't either. It was really cool that it meant that much to all of us. And we wound up in Bend, Oregon, and it was awesome. 

Chris Powers: And who'd you beat in the finals? Oh, was it match play at the time? It was still stroke... And you were a couple back going into the final day. 

Trent Leon: This sounds terrible. I don't even remember. 

Chris Powers: Yeah, okay. But it was close enough. You weren't like running away with it. 

Trent Leon: No, we were not. I remember with nine holes, we might have had like a one-shot lead or something and there's par five and... Maybe it's the 12th or 13th hole, but at the time, I would have to like driver, three wood, like wedge or if I had driver four iron, I’d have a seven iron in. But there's water left, [?] right. And I mean, all of us talked about that hole after. I think we played that whole one under as a team. I bet no one else was even close to par. But on Florida was Billy Horschel was on that team and Matt Every, both four time first team All Americans. 

Tyler Leon: They had some VJ tour winners. 

Trent Leon: Yeah, that's some other studs. I can’t remember. But then Wake Forest had Web Simpson and a couple other guys that were All Americans. But we beat some good teams. It was fun. 

Chris Powers: And when you got... did you play the- you obviously were top five as a freshman? 

Trent Leon: Yeah, I played every tournament in college. I missed one. I went down to Austin for a weekend and came back Monday and did not play very well. And I paid the price. 

Chris Powers: Wait, real quick, in ’05, did you lose in like a nail biter? Did you guys just not even come close? 

Tyler Leon: No, we finished like sixth place. It was like crazy how bad we did. 

Chris Powers: And who was on the ’06 team? 

Tyler Leon:’06 was Trent and I, Jonathan Moore, Pablo Martín, and Zach Robinson who's actually a Fort Worth native as well, lives in Oklahoma City now. 

Chris Powers: Okay. And did you ever sniff another national championship before you left? Because you graduated ’07, you graduated ’09. Tell us about the Georgia heartbreak. 

Trent Leon: Well, the year before Georgia, my junior year, we came in third, I'm pretty sure. Yeah, we came in third. And I mean, we had the lead and UCLA ended up coming in- Ricky and I made some big scores coming in on the second round. We had a pretty big lead, and I think I finished like triple double and Ricky finished maybe double double. Anyways we kind of gave that one away, got away from us. But yeah, so my senior year, Rickie Fowler, Kevin Tway, Morgan Hoffman, Peter Uihlein, and me, and I think I played three guy. Morgan was a stud. Morgan probably would have gotten Player of the Year if Rickie didn't. So, we win stroke play. This is the first year they moved it to match play. The reason they moved it to match play is Mike Holder, the Oklahoma State AD, wanted it to be match play and had been pushing it forever. So, it was on- it's kind of our own fault, but we played Georgia first match. Hudson Swofford signed for one high, so we shouldn't even have played him, but we ended up getting- they’re the A team, we were the first team. And on the Georgia team, Brian Harman, Russell Henley, Harris English, Hudson Swafford and a walker cupper named Adam Mitchell. So, Adam and I are the only two that didn't play on the PGA Tour. It's pretty stacked. I thought I was playing some pretty good golf. I lose four and three to Russell Henley. He just wore me out. I thought I could keep up with him. By about the sixth, seventh hole, I was like... I looked at my dad, I don't know if I got enough juice for this guy. But I think Harmon, he beat Rickie like maybe the last three holes doing one up. He really sacked up. We lost, I think A&M won. We beat A&M that year at their home course by like 40 something shots and then beat them in the Big 12 by 50 something shots. And they ended up winning the tournament. 

Chris Powers: And that was your last college golf tournament? 

Trent Leon: I went and played the Palmer Cup the next week. And then I was just in such a hurry. God forbid I wait around for trying to make a Walker Cup team. I was in such a hurry to play the Hooters tour to turn pro. 

Chris Powers: Really?

Trent Leon: Yeah. 

Chris Powers: And were you on the Hooters tour yet? 

Tyler Leon: I was, yeah, I was playing...

Chris Powers: It was Hooters. Hooters turned into what? Korn Ferry? ...Hooters, Nationwide. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah. The way pro golf works, there's basically many tours, like the Hooters Tour, Adam's tour, Gateway tour. And so that's kind of like you put up your own cash pot in a way with a little sponsor dollars there to juice the pot. And then there's Nationwide, Korn, I guess it's called Korn Ferry now, we used to call it Nationwide was the tour owned by the PGA right below the PGA tour and a way to graduate onto the PGA tour. And that's kind of- and then there's the PGA, and that's kind of what it looks like on the pro landscape. And so my career, I was a mix of the Hooters Tour and Korn Ferry and I played for four years as a pro. 

Chris Powers: Didn't you Monday into the Houston PGA event? 

Tyler Leon: I did, yeah. 

Chris Powers: That was one of your last events, right?

Tyler Leon: Yeah, it was actually- it was a really cool thing. It was my greatest accomplishment, I guess you'd say, outside winning lower level pro tournaments or having status on the Korn Ferry. I Monday'd into the shell Houston Open. And it's also one of the reasons why I quit, which is... I just... I guess an interesting way to say it is you see how good they are day to day. Phil Mickelson was close to my locker, and I got to chat up with him a little bit and see him play, played in a group in front of me. And I just- it was fascinating to me. I was just like, man, there's some really good players and names you kind of forget over time. And I'm in these Monday qualifiers. I'm like, damn, this guy Chris Riley was in the Ryder Cup six years before. How is he at a Monday qualifier with me? And I just saw how good you have to be all the time. And the fascinating thing was, I remember I was traveling and I would buy this Forbes magazines and kind of read, something to read. And I remember it was like Forbes 400 and the 400 guys worth a billion dollars. 

Chris Powers: There's no golfers on that.

Tyler Leon: First of all, there's no golfers. Second of all, I'm reading the Forbes 400. I'm like, okay, if you're the 400th best golfer, you're worth like $70,000. And you're like really good. You shoot under par all the time. You can qualify into the Shell Houston Open. You can have status on the Nationwide. It's hard. And I was like, it was an aha moment. It's like, okay, man, you can keep grinding this out. You'll probably be a journeyman, at best you'll have some status on tour and you'll have some status. You go back and forth. Or you can go try to be the 400 best at something and you'll do better. 

Chris Powers: Was it like a sad ending? Like, was it sad to come to the decision that like a golf career is coming to an end, or was it actually pretty logical, like this is the obvious thing I should...? 

Tyler Leon: It's like light bulb moments people have in their lives. It was not sad. I never had to look back one time and be like, man, I wish I tried harder. I think a lot of the sadness comes from a lot of that. It's like, I wish I'd done this or that. It's like, no, I mean, I really, I poured everything into it. I didn’t have a plan B. I thought this was it. And I worked hard at it every day and was thorough about it. And it felt great. I was like, damn, you gave it your best. This is the reality. And let's go try to be great at something else. 

Chris Powers: So, you finished that tournament. Did you make the decision like that next week that- like how many more tournaments did you play? 

Tyler Leon: That next Monday, I got into Mexico City. 

Chris Powers: Which was PGA or? 

Tyler Leon: It was a Korn Ferry or, yeah, Korn Ferry event. And because I had status on the Korn Ferry, so they’re like, hey, you're in Mexico City next week. And I was like, damn, I don't want to go. That was my first thought when I got the call. It was the first time I said, I don't want to go, because of all these things colliding. And I was like, you need to do something else. If that's your feeling at this stage, you need to do something else. 

Trent Leon: Mine’s similar. I mean, you find out pretty quick how many good golfers there are when you get out of college. Like being the best in college, I mean, it's not easy, but it's a lot easier than being the best golfer from 18 years old to 50 years old in the entire world. But you don't realize that until you get thrown out there. I got my ass kicked pretty good on the Hooters Tour with guys who played in like D3 colleges and stuff. I'm like, I kind of was going through some chip yips. And I was just like... but I got through, got to final stage in European Tour School a couple of times, played on the Challenge tour. I never played great, I had some top tens, but got to go to Kenya, India, all over Europe.

Chris Powers: Djibouti. 

Trent Leon: Did Djibouti. So, played with a lot of good players, but it was- When Tyler quit, I was shocked. And then at the same time, though, I'm traveling around. I mean, I call my dad, we played in Essex, and I think Tommy Fleetwood shot 63. And I played good and I shot 69. And that's kind of one of the best rounds I had in a while. It was really tough conditions. And then like Brendan Gray shot like 65. I'm in like 16th, 20th place or something, tied with another 20 guys at 69. And I call our dad, and I'm like... How’d you play? Well, I played really good. But the cuts going to be- I'm going to shoot 200 tomorrow and miss the cut. And I just was like, I could not have shot 63 or 65. I mean, maybe I could have shot 68. But at that moment, I was kind of- he was six months removed, maybe a year. And I just kind of was like, and honestly, you and I were rooming together... You were making money in real estate. I'm losing money in golf every week, and it sucked. I didn't feel good about myself. Missed four cuts in a row and 30 grand. And so, seeing you doing well and our buddy Streeter was doing really well and at NTR metals... they're buying me dinner. I'm like, God, I need to get a job. So anyways, I was more like just looking around. I'm like, what the hell am I doing? And so, I quit the next day. And I don't really look back at anything. And I still don't, and I didn't have any regrets about it. It was a great time in my life. A lot of fun. I love all the guys I met out there and try to stay in touch with them. 

Chris Powers: And now we're resurrecting what's going to be a storied amateur career. And we'll talk about that in episode 689. All right. So, I thought that would be cool to kind of just set the stage. I think golf's obviously a big part of your life. So, you get out, we don't have to go through step by step. Now, let's just kind of talk about oil and gas, which you've been in. Anybody listening to this, you can go back to episode 89 if you want to hear early on in the story. I kind of just want to pick up with kind of what's going on. It's been honestly like four and a half years since we recorded the first one. And I'll say a little bit of a joke, but oil’s hovering around 65 right now. Trump, we love him, but he's brought that price down. 

Tyler Leon: Do we love him?

Chris Powers: Maybe we're Kamala guys. But I just wanted to start with kind of, how are you thinking about the oil and gas industry like today specific? You can take that however you want, but what's going on today? You're obviously a lot more educated on it than even you were four and a half years ago. What's good to know? 

Trent Leon: Well, I mean, I think, yeah, I mean, I guess really got- we started our business, this business in 2014. So, it's been 11 years, had different administrations, all different types of pricing and different catastrophes happen in the market and that sort of thing. And so, looking at it now, yeah, sure, do I wish oil was higher than 65 and operators were dropping rigs right now? You bet. It's better when things are hot. But the great thing, the positive thing with Trump and for an oil and gas guy, a lot of people think it's always pricing, but commodity prices are a big part, but it changes all the time anyways. The nice thing with him involved is, hey, we're not trying to end the business in five years. So, when the Biden administration was in, investors, the capital behind public stock markets and private equity groups and all that, they were starting to hang at zero 10 years out on the curves for oil and gas investments. So, if they're looking at an investment, you basically need a double in four years, cause they're putting a zero in 10 years. And it just really, it made so many people leave the industry as investors, which is tough. Because ours is a capital-intensive industry that needs new capital all the time. And so, with even lower prices, the great thing is investors are coming back to our space and realize it's around for a lot longer than 10 years. And I think that's a truth everyone is seeing. I'd love to give a shout out to Kelcy Warren and his commercial he did during the Super Bowl. I mean, I thought it was fantastic to really paint that picture. And he did a phenomenal job that I think a lot of the world doesn't know. And the US does it better than anyone on the clean part of oil and gas. I mean, the rules and regulations in place, it couldn't be done any better. And so, yeah, it's a great time to be in our industry. There's still a lot of tailwinds behind us. 

Chris Powers: Awesome. You got anything? 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, I mean, when we started, it was like shale revolution, cowboys, everyone loved the oil and gas guys. We're saving America to you get a couple of Democrats in office back to back, and all of a sudden, we're villains and they want us to pump more to lower prices, but then they want us to end our business. And it was just a confusing message. But they made everyone not like us. And then now like Kelcy Warren's ad on the Super Bowl was great. Landman, I've had more people- 

Chris Powers: It's such a great show. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah. Great or not, it's good pub for us. And I have friends from all over the country, like Oregon, and we have different beliefs and whatever, but they're texting me loving the show. And just at least getting a snippet, if you believe it or not or whatever, like someone talking good about our industry, like that hadn't happened in a long time. 

Chris Powers: I think it's- I mean, and Aubrey did it with Chesspeak, there used to be billboards all over, when he was fracking in the Barnett. I think the biggest whiff that the oil and gas hadn't figured out, and maybe they are now through the media, is like just having good marketing for the industry. It just hasn't really existed for a while. What about the Permian specifically? As a bit of an outsider that knows a little bit, I would read, oh, they're running out of inventory. All the tier one's gone. There's people that say it's 10 to 12 years out and it's done. Is there the truth to that?

Tyler Leon: I mean, I think... inventory, we were actually talking about this earlier, tier one inventory is probably shorter dated, let's call it five to seven years, but that's tier one. That doesn't mean there's not more oil. And so, there's tier two and there's tier three, which maybe it needs a little bit higher prices to work. But there's still the resource there. And then beyond that, like our industry has always done, is it's always found a way to kind of find new hydrocarbons, maybe in large oil fields or there's a new play that rises. And so, there's still plenty to be done in our industry. And I think it'll come from technology enhancements as much as anything. 

Trent Leon: Yeah. I mean, inventory, there's going to be less inventory in [?] today, find new resource or not. I mean, it's a depleting asset. So, every time you drill a well, there's less inventory. But tier one is getting drilled out at very quick paces. And that's in every basin. People were all hot on Oklahoma the last six months, but now we're sitting here at $60 oil. A lot of Oklahoma probably doesn't work. 

Chris Powers: And how do you define tier one, cheap cost to produce the most oil possible? 

Trent Leon: Highest margin barrels... So you make money at 30 bucks, $35, that's tier one inventory. 

Chris Powers: Okay. So, a new play that, or maybe it's not new. It's new to- I haven't heard it as much, but they found the Barnett in the Permian. Okay. So, has that always been known? Like, it's almost like we just figured this thing out. There's the Barnett shale. It's the new thing, but it's like, with geology haven't we known that that's the case for a long, long time? Like how do these things kind of come up by surprise that you could have probably seen on a map for a long time?

Tyler Leon: Well, they need more inventory so now they're going to test it. 

Chris Powers: So, they knew about it but they're just not testing it? 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, and with new frack designs, it's working. It's getting easier to drill and they understand it. It's not easy to drill compared to like going to drill the [?] a shallower zone. You don't get- you're not going to lose many wells drilling a horizontal one. 

Chris Powers: But as a mineral or non-op buyer, you can't underwrite the Barnett as being part of the pay stack until somebody's proven that it's part of the pay stack? 

Trent Leon: That's right. 

Chris Powers: So then it just becomes like a bonus. 

Trent Leon: Two years ago, we were not even thinking about it... not putting in our debt. Now we can add value to it and we can pay those mineral owners more. 

Chris Powers: And you don't have to answer this. I don't know if it's- it’s probably not a secret. Like, is there another one of those in the Permian that's like in two years, this bench will now be being underwritten? Is there another hidden bench out there that's known but not being talked about? 

Tyler Leon: I don’t know if we know what that hidden bench is, but there's other formations, like the Woodford as well is being brought up with the Barnett right now.

Chris Powers: In the Permian?

Tyler Leon: In the Permian; that's another deeper zone. 

Chris Powers: Coming out of that's typically talked about in Oklahoma. So now it's being talked about in the Permian?

Tyler Leon: Correct, in the Permian as well.

Trent Leon: There's shallower zones. I mean, there's resource. 

Chris Powers: Do you underwrite those resources?

Trent Leon: No. 

Chris Powers: So, it's all just bonus if you own something that that ends up being a thing?

Trent Leon: That's right, yeah. And we'll underwrite whatever we can underwrite, because in the Permian, it's as competitive as it gets. But the great thing about being in the Permian is like there's resource at 6,000 feet down to 15,000 feet. Now, maybe it doesn't work today, but will it work in 30 years? And if oil is at one hundred bucks, it works. 

Chris Powers: So, this is a perfect segue into kind of risk reward. If we went back not even four and a half years ago, but when you all first started, fair to say that when you all first started buying in Eddie and Lee, people were like confused at some of the stuff that y'all might be buying or how could they be buying this stuff? 

Trent Leon: For sure. We've historically been called, we pay too much. 

Chris Powers: All right, you said it, not me. And then time goes by and you ended up making 10X or 15X on that stuff. Has the same philosophy of risk reward just continued? Like, is it the same kind of thought process that you took back then when you were, quote unquote, overpaying? Like how do you continue to look at things? Or have people caught up to you more in the way y'all have thought about it from 10 years ago when you were a little more, like you would be considered more outliers back then? 

Trent Leon: I think so. I mean, I think people have. I mean, there's more players, the rocks more delineated. And so, we're all kind of looking at the same thing. Earlier on, like when we first were buying in 14, people were like, there's one zone in the Delaware basin. There's one zone. You can't pay for more than one zone. And we're like, well, there's more than one zone. 

Tyler Leon: Sure. Maybe it hasn't been drilled widely enough to believe there's more than one zone, but we were like, well, we're happy to pay for four. One thing we've always done different, and maybe it's not always the right answer, is we don't get that tied up on IRR and we're more NOIC guys. And then you've got to risk reward, what is really the NOIC, the inventory you're looking at? Is it very delineated and you know it completely? Or is it like some of these extra benches we're talking about today, earlier on when they're not even really proven. And so, I think it- per example is like let's just say you're looking at something and it's in this tier one area with a lot of zones, maybe you say, okay, I'll buy it down to 13% IRR. Because I'm actually underwriting 5, but I see 7 possibly, but I'm willing to lean in because there's a decent chance of an option value here. Whereas if maybe I go to the edge and I'm not- I don't really see a great option value, so I'm not going to buy it down to 13. I'll buy it at an 18. That's how we've kind of always viewed it. And we talked about this the other day. I think golf was a- and probably everyone can talk about this in sports they played or jobs they had. Like golf is a great example of risk reward. Should I go for this par five with the three iron in my hand over water, island green, or shall I lay up, or there's no trouble and I got a six iron. Yeah, I should go for it. And it's weird. I see a lot of similarities to the risk reward decisions you had to make in golf and business. 

Chris Powers: That's why I'm not great at oil and gas. I'm always laying up short... Going back real quick to just industry and talking about those benches, like Trump's come in hot, like drill, baby, drill, obviously pricing's going down. So, you're hearing rigs are getting laid down right now. Like is this actually going to be a drill baby, drill four years? Or has there been anything like government wise where they're going to subsidize oil and gas producers to keep producing? Or is that more just narrative drill, baby, drill, but it's not actually going to happen? 

Tyler Leon: I mean, like Fed lands, it got really hard with the Biden administration. And the majority of what we do in New Mexico is Fed lands buying overrides. We're not doing the Permian. But it's near impossible to go start a really small company and go drill in New Mexico without having a handful of regulatory people. And so, when you look at your G&A and what you got to do, it wants people to be in Texas. Now, there's a ton of resource in New Mexico, but that's not the case in other fed lands where maybe there's just one zone. You can't make sense of having all these people on your team to go drill something. And maybe the Powder River where you can only drill for three months because of a prairie chicken and it takes you two years to get a permit and the winter's like always there. So that's probably why the Powder River's... it is true. No, that's true. 

Chris Powers: Wait, explain what that is for anybody listening to this. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, and I'm not an operator... so somebody else can explain it a lot better. But there's the prairie chickens and they mate, but they will not mate if there's a drilling rig noise or there's too much noise. 

Chris Powers: And a prairie chicken is literally just a certain bird. 

Tyler Leon: It is a beautiful bird. You can hunt them. Like if you don't know what it is, Google it. It's a really good looking bird. 

Chris Powers: And we can't drill oil and gas because we don't want to kill the prairie birds. 

Trent Leon: And so, a lot of the times you can drill up there is when the weather's really poor. 

Tyler Leon: We've never seen a prairie chicken. I don't know if it has talons... Wilson said in Wedding Crashers. But it’s a larger bird. 

Chris Powers: You throw a famous, you throw a pretty famous Halloween party and I might be a prairie chicken this year. I'll do that for the Halloween party and bring a prairie chick. 

Trent Leon: But I think regulatory stuff can lay down. The problem is it doesn't matter what Trump says. If oil’s at 60 bucks, you can't make money. People aren't going to put money into, they're not going to invest in it. 

Chris Powers: And right now, the trend line is rigged down. 

Trent Leon: That's- if you kind of read all these recent quarterly reports, everyone's dropping a rig or half a rig or something. 

Chris Powers: So, it's not like they're all going down, it's just not as much. 

Tyler Leon: It’s not as much.

Chris Powers: Isn't that also been a trend line, though, just in the fact that most of these EMP companies have to produce cashflow and operate a profitable business now? That's been going on for a while. 

Trent Leon: It's been going on for a while. I mean, forever, there was no such thing ever talked about free cashflow yield five years ago, or even maybe I can't remember when the cutoff was, three to five years ago. That wasn't even a conversation. It was reserves and growing reserves. And so that created- which was an unhealthy way to go forever, especially in shale. It brought on too much debt, and it was the wrong motivation. And so, yeah, now where it is, hey, let's look at this like an operating business. We've got to create free cashflow. We've got a depreciating asset, and we've got to run it like a real business. And that's been healthy for our industry. But with that, we still are a depreciating asset and you've got to continue to drill, or you're going to run out of product. And that then will put prices higher. One thing I think is interesting to bring up that people don’t- someone from Oregon, they don't really- there's no effect to layoffs in oil and gas. It's a huge industry with a lot of jobs. And so like, they're not laying down rigs because they're pissed they're not making enough money. No, they're not making enough money to where they don't have to take on- they got to start taking on debt to operate because the margins are too tight. Which the market will- the public market will slam you for doing stuff like that. So, they have to drop rigs to be prudent with the balance sheet. But the problem here is, that no one talks about, like why does 60 bucks not work? Well, the cost of everything has gone up. And one of the key ones, forget the tariffs and all that... and everything. People. I mean, look what inflation has been like in the US for the last several years. People cost more. So what? You say, well, forget them. We should just fire them so I can have a cheap price of the pump. That's not right to say. But most of America doesn't have oil and gas production. So, they don't think that's- they don't even quantify that when they complain. 

Chris Powers: Okay. And again, I know you all aren't AI tech guys, but like, is AI going to play a part on the drilling rig and make it cheaper to where you're not going to actually need as many people? Like when I watch a well getting drilled, like you need roughnecks doing all this kind of stuff. Is there any part of the process that's going to get cheaper that you've even heard about? 

Trent Leon: I'm sure like efficiency is gained in AI, maybe that'll- but like I don't know enough. 

Chris Powers: You're not sitting here right now seeing some major thing? 

Trent Leon: We're not on the right side of the business. You could ask John or Cody if they got a robot out there breaking pipe or something.

Chris Powers: You just own the mineral, you don't care. As a mineral owner, you don’t care how much the well costs. 

Trent Leon: Well, we do. We do.

Chris Powers: As a mineral owner, you don’t.

Trent Leon: Yes, we do. Because we're buying them. Now, if I inherited them, never had to pay for them, sure. It's like Lucky Sperm Club. But we're paying people for them. If it costs more to drill that well, they're going to drill less of them. 

Chris Powers: I got you... On non-op, it does impact you a lot more. 

Trent Leon: We do non-op as well and take leasehold and all that. But we try to be in the best rock that we can buy in to where those guys can drill through pretty much almost any cycle. 

Chris Powers: Yeah. Has the industry changed at all from a standpoint of like you're tighter with the operators, so you have better line of sight of like this is going to get drilled?

Trent Leon: The best rock gets drilled. And so we've never been- some guys in our industry try to partner with operators to get drilling, a drill schedule. But then, you're giving them- I mean, you're giving up a lot of the candy and there's not- there's only so much great rock. And so, what we try to do is just buy in the best rock, and that stuff's gotten drilled, and it's always exceeded our timing. If we thought it was going to drill in seven, maybe it got drilled in three. 

Chris Powers: Okay, y'all- we've talked about this in the past. Y'all, from my perspective, get a lot done with a relatively lean team. How big's the total team? 

Tyler Leon: 13. 

Chris Powers: Not including third-party landmen?

Tyler Leon: Correct, yeah. 

Chris Powers: And how many, if you had landmen out in the field? 

Tyler Leon: We don't have a ton and they're really not sourcing deals. They're doing more of like the curative work once we're buying something or research expense trying to find new ownership. 

Chris Powers: And y'all have bought how many billions of dollars worth of deals at this point? 

Tyler Leon: We think it's about, we got to double check, but around 1.2 billion. 

Chris Powers: Okay. Was it by design that you only had 13 people, or looking back you're like this is just kind of how we did it? You typically hear a team's doing this much volume. They seem to be much larger. 

Tyler Leon: Well, I mean, I think a lot of it is we work with other- Pegasus has been a long time partner of ours, but we still cover a decent amount of our G&A. And so, we're just sensitive to G&A burn. It matters to our pocket. And so, we try, we ourselves are very involved on a daily basis and we ask a lot of ourselves, and so we do the same with other people. And just, you talk to people and you hear stories, you read books, and you live it. And I'm a big fan of a small team and guys trying to do a lot with a little. I just think the conversations are easier. You're more nimble. You can get a lot done. Now, obviously you reach points where you got to bring more people on, but we've always tried to just really fill the cup with everything you can do before you kind of bring someone else on. 

Trent Leon: It's a really big decision for us to bring someone on. 

Chris Powers: Really? Like how does that even- like how does that even conversation begin to start? You're like, we're just overloaded or we- like how do you even think about it? 

Trent Leon: Yeah. So, for a long time, we leaned on Pegasus for a lot of the technical work. 

Tyler Leon: We still do in the Permian. They've got great geologists, great engineers. 

Chris Powers: Shout out to Pegasus, George Young, George Rogers. We love you. 

Trent Leon: Incredible partners. It's been a great partnership. And so, we still- like we were in there yesterday talking about geology and new areas we might want to buy in. And so, what we've done for a while is we have our own engineer. We got a geologist we do a bunch of contract work with. And we’re trying to do a lot of that on the front end. So, when people want answers on price, send us a deal or we're talking to a mineral owner, we can give them an answer, Tyler and I, in 20 minutes, or we can have our engineer run it, and in an hour, we can do it. We backstop a lot of deals. But we wouldn't do that if we didn't have the tech, like the technical guys in our office. So, eight years ago, we were buying stuff, the margins were so high. Now the margins are so thin, if we make a bad mistake, I mean, we could- it’d be a difference of making a couple million bucks or losing a couple million bucks. 

Chris Powers: And you don't re-trade? 

Trent Leon: We never re-trade. We've never retraded on a deal. 

Chris Powers: So you'll just eat it? 

Trent Leon: Yeah. We ate a couple. 

Chris Powers: Have you eaten some crow before? 

Tyler Leon: We have. 

Trent Leon: Nothing like buying a deal... And $20 during COVID after you told him it was at 65.

Chris Powers: Or the title’s not there. So, if you wanted to hire somebody though, the conversation would start by we're just too overloaded or we're hiring someone to go do this specific thing that we can't do anymore and we want to be able to do it? 

Trent Leon: Like right now, like our engineer’s getting- there's not enough time in a day for him. He needs someone to help him. He needs a tech. So, we've been talking about it. He's doing as good as he can do, and he’s doing a great job, and he just needs some help. And it’s slowing down our deal flow. So we need to hire this person. So we’re going to do it, but we’ve been waiting, we’ve been talking about it for two months. But like with our buyers, and Tyler can speak to it as well, but we have really good buyers and they're bought in, they like being there. We're there for them. If they call us at midnight and need something and I’m up, I’m responding. If not, I’m responding as soon as I wake up. And so those guys do a lot and they’re really good. Now, if I bring on another four of them, it's not going to double the amount of deals. Maybe we get an extra 15% of deals, and that's not worth having another four people in the office. 

Chris Powers: Are there things that you do even today that the typical business book would say y'all should have, like I'm talking about you two, you guys should have delegated this by this point, I can't believe you're still doing this thing? 

Tyler Leon: For sure, there's definitely people. I mean, we still price a lot of units individually across the basin ourselves for hours a day. And people are like, why would you do that? But- 

Chris Powers: And what's your answer? 

Tyler Leon: Well, to Trent and I, it's really important. I mean, then that way we're really in tune with the market and the pricing, and so then we have quicker feedback, and instead of like, well, do I trust the guy I delegated to, is it correct? And we've tried delegating more of that, but it's also something we need to be involved in, in our mind. Right or wrong, that's something that helps us. And so, I think it also helps us see opportunity in the market quicker, instead of waiting on responses from other people and then seeing it maybe two months too late. So, I think that's something, a perfect example of where like the business books tell you to delegate, but maybe you need to be in the weeds. 

Chris Powers: You can answer this, you don't have to. One of the, I would say, the Tilden specialties is just like big families, big deals. Is that just the simple fact of being able to build great relationships over long periods of time? Like most people that try and go to Eddie and Lee in that New Mexico area that wanted to work on the big stuff, the Leon brothers kind of already had their foot in the door. They've kind of been there. Was that just happened by happenchance, and it's just like we're nice and we went and met all these people and we're really nice to them? Or maybe it's not just about that. Like is there a thought behind how to get bigger families to do bigger things? Because we're heading into a world where like $80 trillion worth of farmland and ranches and minerals is going to transfer in the next 15 years. Y'all seem to have figured this out in dealing with large families. Maybe it's like what you did or... 

Trent Leon: I mean, we've just- I mean, we've been buying minerals in New Mexico since 2015 and in the Delaware Permian. And so, it's time, yeah. Like, if I came in two years ago, I don't- So I think a lot of it's relationship based, it's trust. I'm not- I don't like blow smoke up their ass. I'm like, it's a great asset. We’re buying it to make money, but I can pay it to you now. 

Chris Powers: We're not buying this to lose. 

Trent Leon: Maybe we will, but the purpose here is so we can make money. But I tell our guys, you want to build your network as big as it can be. I tell our buyers, when you call these people, you don't need to just call them and make the offer and then try to- just try to talk to them. There's nothing wrong with having a buddy in Roswell, New Mexico, that might never sell you his minerals. Maybe his cousin or aunt or friend or somebody and he recommends them in eight years or whatever. Just build that network and don't be so consumed about what happens today and just watch and see what happens. 

Tyler Leon: Yeah. I'll give a shout out to our dad. I mean, he really, he was in real estate his whole life, tenant rep for the most part. So, relationships were big. And he always told us two things. He's like, look, big deals take the same amount of time as little deals. So, work on big deals. And relationships matter and you've got to know as many people and be as good to at many people and good things come around. And he really hammered both those home for years. And I didn't even know what he was talking about at 14 years old or 16 or whatever. I'm like, I'm playing pro golf. What are you talking about? But now it's manifested... Yeah, now it's manifested and it's a reality. 

Trent Leon: But what you're looking for is you want to make the last offer. Like we're not getting stuff for 30% under market here, getting it cheaper than anyone else. But what I want is if Chris Powers’ mineral company offers this person I've been talking to for five years $30,000 an acre, I want him to call me and say, Trent, if you beat this, I'll sell it to you. And here's what Chris Powers offered me. And we get a lot of that. And so, we'll tell them right then and there, we'll do it. Or you should, you know what, I can't get there. You should go with Chris Powers. 

Chris Powers: Do you think it's from golf, just how you're wired that you just continue to kind of stay focused on the same thing? We're going to joke about it a little bit. You maybe have a little more shiny object syndrome, but when you talk to Trent, you're like, I don't know why we would stop buying minerals. We're just like really good at it. I can’t figure out why we would do something else. Is that just how you're raised and how your mind works? Because the more successful you get, it's easy to get pulled. I mean, we're not going to talk about the EV charging station venture that we almost went on. But then when I'm like, what kind of deals do you do? You're like, we just take our excess money and we put it in the S&P 500. That is like the whole strategy. Did you think through this one or is this just like it just seems simple and we just kind of keep it simple? 

Tyler Leon: Yeah, I mean, I'll say a couple of things about it. Like I have definitely said, hey, let's look at other ideas. I'm pretty curious and want to see other things. And I read a lot and it makes me think of these other ideas. But looking back, we've done pretty crappy in outside investments outside what we know. And Trent’s been really good about being diligent of like, hey, look, we're good at this. If you want to have fun at something, go on vacation. Let's just keep making money. And it's a great point. And I kind of sat there and thought about it for a second. I was like, yeah, that is actually a great point. And I do think, triangulating that to sports or golf, like you do a repetitive thing a lot, and really the more you do it, the better you get and the more success you have a lot of times. And so, I think those things colliding have led us to be like, let's just keep it simple stupid and just continue to be great at what you're at. 

Chris Powers: All right, so if we just wrapped it up and said if we sat back here in four more years, will it look a lot like the last four years or is there anything interesting, again kind of staying within the focus in the lane? Is it new plays? Is it new things? Like what will the next four years look like? 

Trent Leon: Tyler, we have a- we're land driven. So, we have- 

Chris Powers: That means you won't operate or might not. 

Trent Leon: So, we have a drilling deal we really like. We put together 20,000 acres of leasehold in Eagle Ford and it was just Tyler and I and William Malloy. Those are the three investors. And if you’re not in oil and gas, 20,000 acres, it's quite a bit in the shale play. So, we got that sold, and now we're looking at a drilling deal. We are interested in operating if we like the asset enough and think we can really turn a dollar into three to five dollars. And so, we've talked about partnering with an operating team or building out our own. So, I wouldn't be shocked if we're here in four years and we have a small operating team that we can go drill some Eagle Ford units or this bigger drilling deal that we like. I think that would be the only... So, I could see us doing that, but we will never stop buying minerals. I will be buying minerals when I'm 70 years old. Now, hopefully they're oil and gas minerals. Maybe it's whatever they're putting in batteries. 

Chris Powers: Yeah, we're going to go catch a- we'll go be catching asteroids and drilling those asteroids with Elon for all the minerals... All right. This was great. Thank you for joining me today. 

Trent Leon: You bet. Thanks, Chris.