Loved this episode and was stoked on the guy 'til the part where he called out Kelly directly on air. What an incredibly shitty, jockish, and unprofessional thing to do-- Kelly's current employer and role in the show means he is going to have zero ability to really respond in that situation. Clements knew, and took the opportunity to steamroll Kelly and add to his narrative as the skater's defender.
And then the part where Kelly is describing the actual situation (spoiler: skater with agent is poached by shoe company X with large sums of money from a smaller, skater-run brand with a TM that supported the skater when nobody gave a shit and had a years worth of shoes/vids lined up for him) and Clements is just going "yeah bro that sucks!!! but that's what I'm paid to do" and "bro, you had a good eye with him" (subtext: we appreciate the small brands' ability to farm talent until they're ready for big shoe money, the big boys will take it from here).
In the end, you can see by his own admission that Clements has pretty much been on the forefront of developing the formula for big money in skateboarding for 10-15 years, with taking on the Nike sponsorship to doing these huge contests (e.g. Kimberley Diamond Cup), and now with his apparently ruthless contract negotiations. Your opinion on that, and him, I guess is a matter of perspective ("the homies finally getting hooked up" vs. "nike and adidas are buying the entire industry with basketball money").
Topic: Ryan Clements | The Nine Club With Chris Roberts - Episode 51 (Read 12661 times)