9 years in the NFL taught me 5 rules about money that business school never could

NFL LESSONS

I spent 9 years in the NFL as a linebacker.

Giants. Lions. Cardinals.

144 games. Thousands of reps. Millions of dollars earned.

But the most valuable thing I took away had nothing to do with football.

It was how to think under pressure.

The NFL gives you a decision-making framework that translates directly to investing. Most people never see the connection. Let me show you.

Lesson 1: Know Your Assignment

In football, every player has an assignment on every play.

Linebacker in a Cover 2 defense? Your job is the flat zone. Not the deep third. Not the middle. The flat.

Abandon your assignment to make a big play and someone else's zone opens up. That is where the quarterback throws. Touchdown.

The investing parallel: know where you sit in the capital stack.

First-position debt? Your assignment is principal protection and consistent yield. Common equity? Your assignment is maximum upside — but you absorb all downside first.

Do not be first-position debt chasing equity returns. Do not be common equity expecting debt-like protection. Know your assignment and stay in your zone.

The mistake I see constantly: investors chase "12% returns" without asking where they actually sit. They think they are getting protected yield. Turns out they are common equity — last in line. When the deal goes sideways, they are shocked they lost money.

They never knew their assignment.

At 42 Solutions, I underwrite every loan with this in mind. I am first-position debt. My job is principal protection. I do not chase equity upside. I stay in my lane.

58+ loans. Zero principal loss. That is assignment discipline.

Lesson 2: Preparation Beats Talent

The best players I played with were not always the most athletic. They were the most prepared.

They studied film. They knew tendencies. They anticipated plays before they happened.

Preparation beats talent when talent does not prepare.

The investing parallel: due diligence beats gut feel.

I do not fund loans based on intuition. I use the same four-question framework on every single deal:

• Character — Who is this borrower? What is their track record?

• Capacity — Can they actually execute this project?

• Capital — Do they have reserves if something goes wrong?

• Collateral — Is the property worth what we think it is?

No shortcuts. No "this one feels right."

Film study is due diligence. And I have seen too many people invest based on a relationship without doing the work. A good pitch deck is not due diligence. A trusted referral is not due diligence. Hope is not a strategy.

If the four C's do not check out, I do not fund the loan. Period.

Lesson 3: One Blown Play Loses the Game

You can play a perfect game for 59 minutes. One blown coverage in the final minute and it is over.

All the good plays stop mattering.

The investing parallel: one catastrophic loss erases years of gains.

Ten percent annually for nine years turns $100K into $236K. One bad bet in year ten that cuts your capital in half puts you back at $118K. You just erased seven years of compounding.

That is the blown coverage.

This is why I prioritize capital preservation over maximum return. I would rather earn 10% with near-zero chance of loss than chase 15% with real downside risk.

Buffett's Rule 1: Do not lose money. Rule 2: Do not forget Rule 1.

The investors I have watched blow up their portfolios all followed the same pattern. Years of disciplined, consistent gains — then one high-risk swing on an unproven operator, over-levered real estate, or a speculative deal that felt different. It was not.

Do not blow the coverage.

Lesson 4: Discipline Beats Emotion

The NFL is chaos. 80,000 people screaming. Clock running down. Bodies flying.

The players who succeed stay disciplined. They execute the play call. They do not freelance.

The investing parallel: stick to your system when everyone else is panicking or chasing.

2020: COVID hits. Markets tank. Everyone pulls capital. I kept lending — conservative LTV, proven borrowers, first position.

2021 to 2022: Market rips. Everyone chases equity returns, levers up, takes big swings. I stayed in first position. Same LTV. Same discipline.

2023 to 2024: Rates spike. Deals slow. People get desperate. If a deal did not meet the standard, I passed.

58+ loans. Four-plus years. Zero principal loss.

Not because I am smarter. Because I stayed disciplined when it was tempting to freelance.

The investors I see struggle most are the ones who change strategy based on what is hot. Market up? They want equity. Market down? They want cash. Someone made 20% in crypto? They want in.

That is reacting, not executing. It does not work in football and it does not work in investing.

Find your system. Stay in it.

Lesson 5: Control What You Can

In the NFL, you can have the best linebacker on the field. If the defensive line does not hold their blocks, he gets exposed. It is a team game and you cannot control every variable.

The investing parallel is the same.

I cannot control whether the Phoenix market goes up or down. I cannot control interest rates. I cannot control whether a borrower's contractor flakes mid-project.

But I can control where I sit in the capital stack, my loan-to-value ratio, the borrowers I choose to work with, and how I underwrite every deal.

I focus there. I trust the system to handle the rest.

The mistake I see constantly: investors try to control everything. They want to time the market, predict the rate environment, guarantee the outcome. You cannot. But you can control your position, your underwriting, and

your risk management.

That is enough.

The Playbook

Nine years in the NFL taught me five things about capital allocation:

1. Know your assignment — know where you sit in the capital stack

2. Preparation beats talent — due diligence beats gut feel

3. One blown play loses the game — never take catastrophic risks

4. Discipline beats emotion — stick to your system

5. Control what you can — position, underwriting, LTV

This is not theory. This is what I lived for nearly a decade at the highest level of professional football. And it is the exact framework I use to run 42 Solutions today.

58+ loans. Zero principal loss. It is not luck.

If you want to talk through how these principles apply to your own portfolio — lending, equity, funds, or anything else — reply to this post. I will walk you through how it works in practice.