REVISITED: Jackson Olson — From Instacart to the Savannah Bananas

0:00Instagram teen accounts have automatic protections for what teens see and who can contact them. Plus, time management tools. And Instagram will continue adding built-in safety features to help create age-appropriate experiences. Learn more about teen accounts and Instagram's ongoing work to protect teens online at Instagram.com slash teen accounts. Before we get started, I wanted to let you in on a little secret. What you're about to hear is only part of the conversation. Every week, we keep talking over on Patreon where you'll find exclusive bonus episodes behind the scenes footage after I show conversations with my guests and personal stories from my life that I don't share anywhere else. If you love misunderstood, Patreon is where you'll get the full experience. Just head on over to patreon.com slash misunderstood with Rachel Yucatel or click the link in the

1:00show notes. I'd love to have you join us. This is the story of how I became the third basement for the most fun team in sports. I was playing in the Cape Codley, which is the most prestigious college-based ball league. The diving backs offered me a contract. Before I go, my next year of college I get not drafted but basically signed. I talked to my coach, talked to my dad, and they were like, go back for your senior year and get drafted. And then COVID happened. And MLB draft, instead of picking 1,500 players in the draft, they picked 150. And to my baseball career, I am completely done. So I started delivering groceries. No way you were doing TikTok videos of your deliveries. And it's sharp reach out to me. They're like, hey, we want to pay you to do the Super Bowl at that. What made me leave that job is I was in the middle of a delivery one day and I've got a message from MLB. It was a direct message. Jackson, we want you to go to every MLB stadium and rank every MLB stadium. So I was at my 21st stadium on the field recording video. I had this itch. I'm like, this is fun, but I missed baseball so much. I missed playing so much. Later that night, I was in my hotel, and I saw not one, not two, but three banana TikToks. How did you get a hold of them?

2:03Yeah, so I made a TikTok. So Jesse, Cole reached out directly? Yep, he DM me and was like, Jackson would love to work with you in any way. Can you explain what banana ball is? It's theater on a baseball field. But we're also playing a real game. We're doing crazy walk-ups. We're singing songs. We're doing dances. We're throwing the ball between our legs. This is a two hour time limit. If the game's tied at the end of the game, we have a showdown where it's like picture versus hitters. It's like very WWE style. Band catches the foul balls and out. Have you ever been playing and something goes terribly wrong? Oh my gosh, yes. Welcome back to Misunderstood. I'm Rachel, you could tell. My guest today is Jackson Olsen, the third baseman for the Savannah bananas. A name you've probably heard a lot lately. But unless you've been to a game, you might not fully understand what makes this team so special. Jackson has had an incredible journey in baseball, playing at collegiate level before joining the bananas, a team that has taken the sports world by storm with their unique blend of high energy entertainment, unconventional rules, and non-stop fan engagement. The bananas are more than just a

3:05baseball team. They're a phenomenon, selling out stadiums across the country and redefining what it means to experience America's pastime. I had the pleasure of sitting down with Jackson and hearing all about how he got start into TikTok and how he combined his love for being creative with playing baseball. So what's it really like to be part of the most talked about team in baseball? Jackson is here to give us an insider's look at life as a banana from the behind-the-scenes antics to the pressure of playing a game that's as much about showmanship as it is about skill. Whether you're a baseball fan or just love a great story, you're going to love this conversation with Jackson Olson. Let's get into it. Jackson, I'm so excited that you're here with me. I've heard nothing but Savannah bananas for the last couple of months. And it's like such an honor to have you here and ask you all the questions everyone wants to know. So thank you for joining me on NIST understood. Yeah, thank you for having me. I also love the name NIST understood. It's really cool. Thank you. I really appreciate that. So I want to start with who you are as a person because

4:06so many people are focused on the team as a whole but as an individual I want to know you. So can you tell me a little bit about your upbringing and when your love for baseball started? Yeah, I mean my love for baseball started immediately. My brother and dad both played. I was the bad boy for my brother's team growing up. So automatically you're just going into the baseball world. A bunch of 18, 17, 18 year old, 19 year olds swearing and just like probably not the best scenario for me to be in when I was five years old. But it made me love the game and that's kind of all part of the game. And yeah, so that's when it started. And obviously love baseball my entire life. So I had to continue to get through high school, continue to get through college. Luckily I was able to get a scholarship to the University of Hartford. Played shortstop three years there and then COVID hit. This is all the spark notes of this story. But COVID hit. And I was like, you know what? I've always wanted to play baseball down south. I was playing. I was shoveling snow on our field at Hartford every December and I'm like, I want to go to the south.

5:10I want to see what it's all about. So I transferred to Stetson, played a year there. But before that, I was playing in the Cape Cod League, which is the most prestigious college baseball league. And was playing really well. And the diving backs, Arizona diving backs came up to me one day. They were talking me for a little while and they were like, hey, like we think that you could be a good fit for organization, blah, blah. And then they offered me a contract to basically forego my next year of college, like not going back next year college. And get not drafted, but basically signed. And I was like, whoa, like, okay, obviously I'm going to say yes to that. I want to play professional baseball. It's been my goal. It's every kid's dream to put on a major league baseball hat. And talk to my coach, talk to my dad and they were like, go back. There was a really small offer. It was like $5,000, which seemed to like a lot to me at the time. Really, I'm really thinking of things was not at all, which I'd find out later. My dad, my coach at Hartford was like, go back for your senior year, get drafted. These teams will have more invested in you if you have a really good senior year and you play

6:11really well. These teams will want you even more. And they'll give me more money and they'll have, but basically more invested in you. So, all right, cool. And then COVID happened. And MLB draft, instead of picking 1,500 players in the draft, they picked 150. So it really went down like a significant amount. And I was unfortunately not in the top 150 best players. I was probably like 500 to a thousand. I don't know what I would have been. But the draft got cut short because of the less teams, less money teams have because of COVID. And then it was like, all right, I'm done. Like this is my end of my baseball career. I am completely done. So I started delivering groceries because I didn't want to get a job yet because I was too immature to get a job in the real world. So I was like, let me just deliver groceries and like document my time because I had started a TikTok channel before that. And I was like, let me just like make videos of no one is no one's doing this in the entire world. Like, wait, no way you were doing TikTok videos of your deliveries.

7:12Yes, I have like literally, if you go back to Nullsit Instacart, you will literally find probably a hundred or hundreds of videos to meet delivering groceries. The funny part about that is that Instacart reached out to me. And I don't even know this was a real thing. This is like my first brand deal. They're like, hey, we want to like pay you to do the Super Bowl ad where you're in full football gear running through the store like grabbing Doritos, grabbing Mountain Dew, putting it in your cart. And they paid me more for that than I made my entire time delivering groceries actually. So it was a whole circle moment of my entire life. So yeah. That is so cool. Oh my god. So all right, hold on. I have so many questions. So as a young kid, first of all, so you were good enough obviously, but so you really wanted to be a baseball player. That was it. That's all I wanted. And was there a plan B like, were you going to be an accountant? I mean, what what else was there for you if there was a plan B was to be a professional uh Instacart driver. That was really what I literally had nothing else. I mean, I remember my

8:14mom texted me this like a month ago and it was a memory popped up on her phone that we both went to New York City. He's asked if I'm gonna get what's in New York City and I interviewed for a job in New York. I don't even know what job it was. I don't know what company it was. I got a LinkedIn message and this guy was like, hey, you should apply for our job. And I was like, all right, New York City, my brother works there. My sister has worked there. I like, that'd be so cool to live there. And I got out. I walked out of the interview. My mom was like, how did it go? And I was like, it went great. But what am I doing here? I'm not supposed to be in a suit. I'm not supposed to be wearing a suit right now. I'm 21 years old. I have my rest of my life to work like this. I was like, there's something and that was the moment where it clicked. And I'm like, I have to do something else. And that's when the InstaCart started. That's when TikTok started going crazy and like, basically my whole journey started. Okay, wait, I'm gonna side step for a second because I get a lot of InstaCart orders. I have a 12-year-old. The InstaCart people are always at our house. I'm just curious how that works. Are you always like sitting in your car waiting near a place to get a delivery? Like, how does it work? Yes. So, I mean, this is a crazy story. So I was delivering

9:17in Connecticut. And yes, you sit in your car, you wait for the order, you get the, you get the $70 Costco order and you're like, let's go. And it takes you like an hour and a half to find everything. You finally find it. But anyway, I moved to New York City. And you're getting like a $4 tip, right? Yeah. But you're like, if you, I played it right and I was playing at Smartware, I was making like probably $400 a day during InstaCart deliveries. And it was over COVID. So it was also like, and after COVID a little bit. So everybody was ordering groceries. But then I moved to New York City with my ex girlfriend, not well, girlfriend at the time, now ex girlfriend. And we were both InstaCarting. We were both like riding city bikes. We're putting groceries, hoping that no one stole our city bike. We literally park our city bikes outside of the store. Go in, hopeful, hoping not like tracking the bike to make sure like if I'm in the back of the store and I can't see it, I'm like tracking the bike to make sure no one stole it. Walked outside, put the groceries on the handles, parked the bike again to bring it up 100 stories where these rich people were living in New York penthouses, giving good tips though. But yeah, that's that's as much as all.

10:23The way our InstaCart people making their money on the tips are they making it, you get a certain percentage that InstaCart gives you. Yeah, there's a percentage InstaCart gives you, but then you also make money. If someone tips you big like that's your most of your money is going to come from. No, okay. Yeah, I had some horror stories though. My first time InstaCarting in New York City, I was riding a city bike. And I don't know if you've seen you've written on every street in New York City, but there's two streets that have a really a pretty steep incline that like Manhattan does not have inclines, but there are a couple where it's like, okay, so I was riding my bike not thinking about this and I was riding down and my brakes like weren't working as well. I was like an older bike, I guess. And I had I had nine bags on both sides. Like I'm I'm holding them and also holding the handles and then holding them and holding the handles. Yeah, truck flies by me and I stopped the bike and I literally see it in slow motion to this day. All of the groceries except for like two of the bags flew out onto the street. I'm really I the whole next like five days. I'm looking on take a top to make sure no one got the video me doing this. And I found it too. This is starting

11:25into like an InstaCart podcast. I know. Forget the baseball. This is like an important part of like my journey of why I am here because I was like, I'm going through all this adversity. I found old bags and I was like putting everything in and finally got to the people. They took my tip down from like $25 to $2 because the watermelon and like the milk cart was like dented in all this but anyway. Wow. Okay. So what made you leave that job? What made me leave that job is I was in the middle of a delivery one day and I got a message from MLB. It was a direct message because we had followed each other. I made some videos for them. And this is in the early days of like social media still. And you had this thing called the creator class. They wanted me to create videos for them along with nine other creators. And I was like, all right, this is literally my segue into what I want to do for the rest of my life. Like I'm going to take advantage of this. I made a video applying for it because I do apply for it. And they picked me. And then yeah, we had to make 12 videos for the creator class. But whatever you wanted to be, if you're at a standing meeting at Hotdog,

12:29it was just promoting MLB in any way. And I think I made like 65 videos because I was like, if I'm going to like, there's nine of us. I almost see it as like a competition. Like I want to be the best one out of all of mine of us. Right. Get the most views, the most engagement, all the stuff. So that there's another opportunity next year, because this is not going to go on forever. They'll pick me if they're going to, if they're deciding between one person, they're going to take me. And that ended up happening. And they reached out in their log. Jackson, we want you to go to every MLB stadium. This company called Game Time Ticketing App. Rank every MLB stadium. And I'm like, all right, this is it. Like this is this is the greatest job ever. Yeah, this is my next step. But I still knew that it was like once the 30th stadium was over, then what? Like, so I kept working hard and working hard. And I started to get brand deals like direct TV reached out. Don't be reached out. All these companies were reaching out. And I was trying to go in this following. And so I was at my 21st stadium. And I was basically on the field recording videos at Target Field to the twins, Minnesota twins. And I'm like, I have this itch. I'm like,

13:33this is fun. But I miss baseball so much. I miss playing so much. And funny enough, like my entire life has been this weird, like full circle moment and think like these, all these sidelined signs and like all these signs happening around me. And I went back to my hotel scrolling on TikTok. And I'd see the bananas a couple of times, but not like a million. Three videos back to back to back from the bananas. And I was seeing like, I was seeing MLB videos like different plays and home runs guys were hitting. But then I had never seen bananas. And then I saw three back to back to back bananas TikTok. And I'm like, this is what I what I was thinking about earlier about playing baseball. Like, this is theater mixed with like, I love the greatest showman. Like, makes with the greatest showman mixed with baseball mixed with TikTok. Like, I have to make I have to shoot my shot with this team. And so I made a TikTok. And now I'm here. So. And so wait, so were they hiring? Were they like, how did you get a hold of them? Yeah. So I made a TikTok. And I basically the talk was and you could find it. It's on my, my, like, my pinned videos or whatever

14:34on a Savannah bananas. Okay. And you're finally okay with not playing baseball anymore. And I like threw my glove down through my batting gloves down. And I looked to my right and the text above says, but then you see this Savannah bananas TikTok. And it makes you want to play again. And I showed like a bunch of videos guys like doing crazy stuff. And just happened like they reached out, owner reached out. They're directly with social media reached out. And yeah. So Jesse Cole reached out directly. Yep. He DM me and was on wax and would love to work with you in any way. Let's figure something out. Wow. So originally did you think it would be as a creator or were you like, wait a minute, I can actually get on this team. No, it was, it was originally as a creator. Like, hey, you can come down. We have this summer series. We're going to play six games in August. We're trying out this new format of like having six games, whatever. I don't know exactly like what the whole plan was. All I knew was that I was going to go make content, film some videos and get out. And then I was on the phone with Jesse. And I'm like, hey, Jesse, like, I don't know if you know this. You probably don't even really think it's going on. But I played

15:35basically while I played in the Cape Codley. I got an offer from a professional team like all the stuff. And he was like, no, no, like I know, I've seen a couple of your things, whatever. And then yeah, it turned into me making content to me going there and actually playing their base for them. Oh my God. Okay. So now what year was this that this all started? 2022. Okay. So basically their first year, right? Because they kind of started with this whole new brand in 2022. Yeah. Early in 2022, 2021, but they had the first tour when they went on tour and actually went out of Savannah and played seven cities. Earlier that year in 2022. And then the summer series was in August. So it was very, it was kind of at the start of like, banana balls. Yes, it's Angus Maximus. This partner has one part of a pound of hot sushi cooked to honor Angus beef. It's more fish than a quarter pounder. The burger is closed. And for only 599, even regular juice can afford it. Like that guy. Give me that big old burger. Yeah.

16:38He holds Angus Maximus. Only 599 is cold senior. A bill for a limited time of participating restaurants tax on included. Not valid for use within a combo or in combination with any other offer discount. So all right. At this point, do you think a lot of people knew of banana ball or was this kind of contained within Savannah? No, I think a lot of people knew at this point, because like I was going to games, um, majorly games, and people were like, oh, like either they were rare, not jerseied. And I'm like, well, like bananas or they were like, hey, Jackson, you've got to go to a banana's game. Like you would love it. Like you wouldn't love making content. They're like added to your MLB should add it to your state. Someone told me that MLB should add it to my stadium tour. And I'm like, what? And they were like racing stadium like the bananas like feel that I'm like, what, what even is there this? And so it was pretty big at that point. Okay. So now for people that are listening that have no idea what we're talking about, can you explain what banana ball is? Yes. At the core is, I mean, when I really think about banana ball, I think about Broadway, mixed with baseball, mixed with theater, like it's, it's theater on a baseball field, but we're

17:42also playing a real game. So everybody always likes to compare us to the globe charters. Like, hey, you are the globe charters of baseball. And that's amazing to be related to such an amazing like league, not league, but I guess T sports team like more charters. You know, we're going to have a league. But the main difference is that we're playing competitive competitive games. We have more teams. We have four teams now, which is really cool. And every game goes down. I mean, a lot of the games go down to the very, very end. And that's why people are staying the entire game. Like, they want to see who wins. Like, it's, it's a different game or playing. We're having a lot of fun. We're doing crazy walkups. We're singing songs. We're doing dances. We're throwing the ball between our legs and bouncing the ball between our backs. But like at the core of it, like, we're still playing, we're still playing. We're still playing to win. Like, everybody wants to win the game at the end of the day. So it's not, it's not a staged game per side. The game itself is live. But all the other things are staged. The songs and the, okay, so it's okay. I have so many questions.

18:45First of all, who are these people that are on the teams, these teams? Are they people that wanted to be major baseball league people? Are they people that have big singing careers? Like, how do you, how are you good at both? Like, that seems like a lot of stuff going on. And also, sorry, it doesn't, you're not just a typical baseball player. You're like catching things in different ways. And you see my most better and more flexible. Yeah, you obviously have to be very flexible. I mean, mentally and physically. Like, that, I would say it's been more flexible mentally, for sure, because you're going from, I mean, they're recruiting guys that either have a background in dance or background. And like, they have a good TikTok account or they have a good social media. But at the core of it, like, number one, you have to be a really good person. You have to be a good person. That is literally the number one most important thing for anyone going into this organization. They've gotten rid of a lot of people that are really good baseball players, but not great people. And so that's number one. But also, I mean, you have to be a good baseball player. Like, a lot of people think they look at the bananas and they're like, oh, they're just like having fun out there. And like throwing balls between their legs, but like, no, like, they're our centerfielder. And now,

19:47a lot of our outfielders, but our centerfielder, DR Meadows, started it. He does a backflip. And in the middle of his backflip, he catches a fly ball and lands it every single time. And so they're looking for people that can do stuff outside of the box, but like, it is the most impressive thing when you see it, when people come to a game for the first time, when they've seen on social media, and us singing and dancing. And they see that there are shortstop Ryan Cox bouncing a ball between his back on a real ground ball. The runner is running as fast as he can. We have a lot of fast guys. Downs is it between his back catches it. Downs is it between his legs like a basketball player. And throws the guy out at the first base. It is the most incredible thing I'm never going to say that we're better than Major League Baseball players. We're better than like, I'm, that's, there's, I don't care about, we don't care about that comparison. It just basically we want people to acknowledge like how difficult it is to actually pull this stuff off. Right. Well, but I read that, where my notes say that like 33 of the former players have made it into the Major League Baseball, they've been drafted. Is that right? Yes. So that came from our, when the banana started as a

20:49summer league, called summer league. So like the kept like I was talking about, like the bananas played in the coastal plains league. And that basically got out of the league to start banana ball. But yeah, they've been during that league. They were still, they were still singing and dancing. Like they were still, they had bananas. Yeah, like dancing with the stars like bananas version. Yeah, dancing with the bananas, I think it was called, but yeah, well, they were still, they were scouts watching these guys trying to draft them, but they were also dancing. They were doing a, hey, baby dance. They were like engaging with fans in the crowd. And yeah, so very cool. Okay. So you don't know who's going to win the games. The games are not staged. No, the party animal is one more games than us. The other team we play. I know there's two more. They won more games than us in 2023. It came down to the last game. And people think that that's scripted. You guys were tied until the last game. Obviously, it's scripted, but it really, if you ask anyone in the entire organization, you would think there would be a whistleblower, but like that it literally was not staged at all. And yet we won the

21:50tour last year. So now this is kind of like the, all right, who's going to win the third tour? Right. So you guys start your season this coming weekend. What's new and different? Are there any new teams? Are there any new rules? What should we expect? Yep. New team, the Texas tailgators. So they are the new team. They're not based in Texas yet. They're still in Savannah. So like all of us are all together. Do you guys all practice your moves together? Yeah. And I think that's what makes, and we were in the same, we're in different locker rooms in Savannah. But when we go on the road and we play in these 17 Major League stadiums, four NFL stadiums, we're all sharing the same locker room. Okay. So you better be, that's why like you better be a good person. If you're going to come into this organization, that's a big reason. Like we don't want anyone that's like a headache or a cancer in the locker room. But yes, we have one new team, a lot of new like choreography that we had to learn this preseason, new trick plays, everybody's doing new tricks. It's kind of like just evolving what we've already done. We know

22:52it's been successful. We know we, the bananas have been successful, but it's like you have to evolve and you have to do new things or else those people that came last year and then you're before, like they're going to come again. Like they're going to see us again in Mesa. There's going to be a lot of people that have already seen us play that are going to that game. They're going to come there like, all right, is this going to be the same as I saw last year? And it's not. So it's going to be really cool. Okay. So give me an idea of like what happens during preseason? Like what is a week in the life for you guys learning dances or you guys practicing playing or you working out? Tell me what it's like. All of the above. We were learning, I mean we have long, we just had snow and sabbat unfortunately. So that knocked out about three days of very important rehearsal time. So yesterday we had a long day of re-learning these dances, doing a music video and like the dances, like we're baseball players. Like dancing is very, very difficult for us. Some of us, some guys are really good, but like me personally, I've had to learn a lot in the last year and a half about the way my body moves and not looking like a statue out there.

23:53But yeah, so a lot of dancing, a lot of creating content to you and like just being with the guys again is so cool because we all get to make content together and really practicing these trick plays and working on our hitting and fielding and everything all the above. So it's way more than I ever had to do in college mentally and physically. Right. All right. So I know there's a bunch of rules and for people listening that might not understand the difference between a regular baseball game and one of yours, can you explain some of the rules that stand out that make you guys banana ball and what you are? Yeah. So two-hour time limit. What does that mean? It doesn't go to nine innings. It goes to nine innings unless they're almost it hits two hours. And if we play the first three innings and it's two hours long, like the game's over. Like we're only playing the two hours. Okay. It's a really cool thing. There's a showdown, tie-breaker at the end of the game. If the game's tied at the end of the game, we have a showdown where it's like pitcher versus hitters. It's like very WWE style. Like it's literally a showdown. Like it's really cool.

24:55We have fan catches a foul ball. It's an out. So if it's a foul ball, I'll get it out. I catch it. It's an out. How often does that happen? A lot. Do people bring their people bring their gloves? Everyone. Everyone brings their gloves. It's really cool. And you get brought down in the field. If you catch one, we had a game end two years ago. A game end in a fan caught foul ball. And we literally lost our minds. It was so fun. Well, that's so fun. Yeah. So those are the most exciting ones. I think that really made banana ball what it is. I had a question on one. How can a batter steal first based? So if there's a pass ball, pitcher throws it and it goes past the catcher, you can just go to for if you can steal first base. But the catcher can still throw you out. We they can do that in major league baseball too though. Can't they? Or no? Not on some so only on if it's a third third strike and the catcher drops it, you can go on. But you can if it's as like first pitch of your at bat and he throws it behind, you can go to for we had it happen today in our scour engine. It's it's excited. Oh my god. This is Angus Maximus. This partner has one pound of hot sushi cooked to honor Angus speed.

26:02It's more fish than a quarter pounder. The battle is closed. And for only 599, even regular foods can afford it. Like that guy. Give me that big old burger. Yeah. The whole Angus Maximus only 599 is whole senior. A bill for a limited time of participating restaurants tax on included not valid for use within a combo or in combination with any other offer or discount. So how do you guys plan for your acrobatic stuff or the things that you're catching if you can't plan how somebody's hitting a ball to you? Yeah, I mean you have to have a lot in your arsenal. I think I've got a lot of different. So my main things that throw the ball to me in my legs and behind my back. So I have three I've two biggest three different throws for three different ground balls to hit to me. And so like if a ball is hit like way to my right and I have to make a longer throw, I'll throw it between my legs like normal. I can't really do it on the camera but it would make sense to you. So I then if a ball is way to my left it's easier to throw behind my back because I behind the back throw you have to really make sure you're throwing it directly to him.

27:04Between the legs you can still see the ball. Do you have a lot? Did you learn this skill with the bananas or you knew how to do this already? With the bananas. I mean over the last two years once I came in first practice, scouts are doing trick plays and you kind of learn from everybody else around you that's doing them. So do you I mean do you think scouts are still looking at you guys at all because you guys are kind of a different player and and still are very you know playing all the time you play a full seat them. Yeah I mean I don't think any scouts are looking at the bananas. Like yeah I want I want this guy like he's like a dancer not that but we I mean we have a lot of guys that have played baseball professionally so we had a guy on the party animals drafted in the first round he was a first round draft thick and I was playing with the party animals it's like I don't know I think of it as like a tailored fifth type thing like it's end game like bananas like if you want to play for this team like you better be all in and I'm pretty sure you majorly scout is not going to look at a guy and be like yeah even if you hit 35 home runs like you're still a

28:05subaid of banana right now like when they were a column summer league team of course but I think guys come here and they really want to like lean in completely to being this and doing this and saying that no one not saying that a lot of guys are not talented enough but like I don't know it's the most fun thing in the entire world and it's very rewarding too. Well I love that I mean are you guys getting paid well enough that this can be your only job or do you have to deliver groceries on the side luckily do not have to deliver groceries anymore I mean yeah we get paid well and then on the side I mean I've worked with two main companies Gator and Reebok on year deals so that's really cool I've worked with a bunch of companies capital to one like like a lot of a lot that are associated with sports with major league baseball with that type of thing like booking.com I've gotten to do a lot of cool opportunities a lot of us have now so we basically have a lot of us have a dual incomes now with bananas and social media brand deals. Let me ask you question about that what do you think because NIL is such a big deal now when you are in college like what

29:08do you think about the whole NIL thing? Yeah I mean I was making merchandise in college probably illegally I mean I don't care now like sue me NCI what are you gonna do like I was making merchandise and it had my name or my initials J.O on it and I was like all right that's fine like anyone could be J.O but it had like don't be afraid to be you or on the front of it and that's like in my Instagram bio so they can track it back to me if they really wanted to but I was sneaky with the I don't know but I think it's really cool they a lot of these schools deserve their athletes deserve to be paid so. And what is the end you said endgame what is the endgame for all of you guys as players I know right now you're having so much fun you're getting paid you're making good living so this like fills your time and your purpose in your life but where do you see yourself in five years? Is this the type of job that you can keep playing or like you'll have to retire from the bananas and then you know be a coach like what's the next step for after this? Yeah I don't know I mean personally I've always looked at acting as something that I want to get into I mean I'm making

30:12TikToks every day and not that I'm like acting acting and speaking in them but I have a lot of us have gotten this ability to like basically basically act in a certain way and I don't know if I wanted to record it or anything like that but yeah I think acting is certainly a thing that I could get into maybe hosting too and yeah are you worried about the TikTok band thing? Um not really I mean I was leaning into like the humor of it a little bit but you were like really worried about it so if it completely goes away let's say will you just move it to Instagram and do more of your stuff there I mean I know you're prevalent on Instagram anyway yeah Instagram Snapchat YouTube I've gotten a good following on both of those two so I'll I'll just move to those because there's nothing you can do if it can't spam like there's only you can only go forward and move forward so okay I love that you have a great attitude about everything what do you tell our listeners about one of your most favorite moments that you can remember or

31:14like a favorite rule that you know you were saying the guy caught the ball at the end to end the game like what's one of your most favorite days favorite memory um this is like an ingrained one now where like I think of it like you know when someone asks you a question and like you know immediately like what it's gonna be like this is been my for two years now um so obviously we're very fans first the our the name of the company is called fans first entertainment that's the onbrella company of the bananas part animals fire fighter tailgators um so at the end of the game we always sign autographs and we'll be out there taking pictures for two hours hour two hours after the game and two years ago we really didn't have any like security or anything like that so we were staying out there for a long time until the last I was staying out there until the last fan was gone every single night we don't do that we can't really do that anymore with the amount of fans are playing in front of the amount of fans that are there um but I was very at the very end and there was three people left in my line to get an autograph a woman walks by me she kind of like touched me on the shoulder she was like you must be so tired of this aren't you and like set it and the three

32:16people were three kids were standing right there and as she said that I looked and I was like okay first girl has a sign and it says Jackson will you please make a tick-tock with me and I made a video a long video about this a year ago and so I saw that second kid is covered in his entire body in autographs is his entire body the party in Olsmanana's all signed it and the last girl had a racially that said Jackson on it and so she said that and like walked by and as she was walking by she was probably 20 feet away and I was like no not really like not tired of it like I see these three kids and like they are the most exciting this is 11 o'clock probably on a Sunday they school the next day right and I'm like no like I will never get tired of this like if anyone gets tired of this they're insane it does get tiring mentally and physically but like tired of it tired of it never so that's the coolest one oh I love that um you know you you said something at the beginning that you said you love the name misunderstood do you have such a great um persona and you have such good like vibes you know but is there something that you feel in your

33:20life that that has been misunderstood or you you can you feel empathy for people who have been misunderstood yeah I mean I think I was always misunderstood as this hard-nosed baseball player who I never had a great I never like I didn't always have a great attitude like I had problems in college throwing my gloves throwing my helmet like getting upset like being this like if I don't succeed I will never be good at anything in my entire life and so it's misunderstood and now I'm able to like get past that and like half people actually understand through social media through the bananas that I'm actually like hopefully a good person hopefully I've inspired people to do better things with their life too so yeah misunderstood early on but then kind of changed it in my own way to make sure that people understood like who I really was do you think that you feel more misunderstood now though because you found your purpose and like you feel so happy in what you're doing and you're not trying to figure out where you need to be or what you need to be doing and you're

34:21like happy in the moment yeah yeah I think and also like it's not always easy so people do always think like all right this is the most positive if getting the entire world like he's always being happy and positive and never like being mean or like we're responding in nasty comments or anything like that but like it does wear on you like I tired a lot I'm tired a lot and like I'm putting on this smiley face a lot because I love it and it's fun there's some days when you jump to the field and you're like who like that was a tough last two days I got four hours five hours of sleep self-inflicted like not that they're making us get four or five hours sleep no no I'm not going to still love the like everything going on in my mind but yeah so basically I've misunderstood because I'm just I'm just a human being no I get that I love that you said that I know a lot of people that follow you will want to know about your personal life now like how do you balance the two what are you doing in your personal life or do you not have time for a personal life yeah I mean if people people are gonna want to know everything that's going on I live a pretty

35:25private lifestyle outside I mean of bananas and everything I'm just chilling most of the time I'm not going out partying I'm usually never going out I don't see a need for it right now in my life I'm just kind of like preparing for the next day planning everything out but yeah people do want to know what's going on I mean people want to know if I'm dating if I'm like doing this or doing this or like if I'm gonna play with the bananas forever like I get messages comments all that stuff and I'll respond to some of them if they're positive but when they're trying to like get into my life I'm just like no I'm not not at that point yet where I can just release everything in my entire life to everyone sure no but I think more I mean I totally get that but like I wonder you know I'm sure people wonder if all your best friends are the people on the team or like after you leave the team are you with the totally different group I love that you said you're not going out because that shows me like you're really focused on what you're doing and you don't really care it's not like you have FOMO about what's going on in some nightclub you're a young kid and some people think that that's what you need to be doing I would think that you don't need to be

36:30doing that because you're above that like you have a lot of shit going on you don't need to be doing any of that stuff so I think that's great that you figured that out on your own yeah up a pack today angel soft definitely and like like my best friends on the field best friends in real life like I have really got matching tattoos with two of them like at the same time and it's actually of our so it says 3 2 2 4 we do a dance every third innings second matter second pitch and then so like that's an automatic every game and then it says dsc which basically means do something cool or buying fortnight together every night like it's it's a very close knit bond

37:35with a couple guys so I love that it's your family proud of you yes they are proud of me I think they always have been but there was obviously some times where they were maybe worried about what I was doing like in start driving at that point but I think they understood there was a longer term goal that I had that I was not gonna just like settle for anything we had a lot of deep conversations and long talks about it like what's next like what is next there's got to be something that's next right like all my former teammates were getting jobs and they were landing these jobs and posting on LinkedIn like like I am so thankful and grateful to blah blah blah I am a computer like I'm not going to be a computer for the rest of my life like I'm not doing that and I saw that and I'm like is that what I want to do I just got done playing college baseball being cool like I'm not going to type out a computer not anything wrong with that but I was going to do something else that I have in front of me I don't know what it is yet but I'm thankful that I believe in myself right but don't you think there's something to be said for the fact that you're you are and were a hustler like you didn't just like say to your parents can you pay my rent you went out and

38:39you tried instacarding which is like hard I mean physically emotionally like it's a lot of work to to make money and it sounds like you were making good money I mean everything that can go wrong and it just shows that like you were trying and you know how to be kind of at the at the bottom and work your way up I think that says a lot about your character though you know yeah yeah and then I obviously like I didn't put this at this and there but I moved to California on my dad and I drove in this $8,000 car that I bought with I don't know what money but I got it and I moved to California because I was like I need to do something crazy this is after ML or in between MLB critical loss in between going to the stadiums and I need I need I'm gonna live in Connecticut my entire life if I don't do this right now so I moved to California um was struggling pretty pretty good out there um didn't have a lot of money didn't know didn't have any friends didn't know anyone finally met someone who I was um got to be roommates with and he was an actor so he got

39:40like he had that passion and I had that passion to like so we were kind of like pushing each other in different way different ways right uh yeah so it was really cool to have that and then um yeah that's when I started going on that MLB tour finally moved to Savannah like broke my lease in California moved to Savannah um between in starting and moving to California by myself like it was I was hustling a lot I mean not to the point where I was like that getting on the side of the street but I was I was hustling no but hustling to get it done to pay your bills I get that I respect um your parents come to all your games not all of them um a decent amount though as many as they can my mom was retiring this year um so that'll be really cool we'll should be able to come to more after that I was actually I for Christmas I got them a trip to anywhere they wanted to go like to watch the bananas um like flight hotel all that stuff and I asked my mom I was like we're like when do you think you can take off work and I said it like not realizing right away but she was like I'm gonna be retiring like you I could go I can go for 20 I could follow you guys on tour I could be a

40:42groupie oh gosh all right uh explain how people can get tickets to this because it seems very difficult very difficult there's an interest list um there's wait so you cannot so just to convert you cannot buy a ticket you have to be on a list or something right you you can buy a ticket it's unfortunately there are a lot of the tickets not a lot but if someone decides they want to go to a game like two days before they'll go to the third party party site and pay a lot of money the best way to get on it is going through the interest list or um buying me something really nice and then maybe I'll get you ticket uh okay so that means DM Jackson and offer yeah I get you to get now I'm getting but um yeah to interest list a lot of people want to come a lot of people want to come to games luckily we're playing in front of a lot more people this year there's a lot more tickets to console a lot more tickets to be bought well but like I went online to get a ticket and it said that all the tickets were done and you had to be on like a wait list for an interest list or whatever yeah so basically I mean these tickets sell out really fast so like for Mesa like

41:47that game is sold out completely like every seat is full um yeah so it's it's tough that's amazing though yeah and obviously I mean you think of like people always like the Yogi Barra like it's so crowded no one goes there like that's like the famous school I was thinking about and it's like right well we're we're gonna be we're gonna fill two million seats this year so it's like when people are complaining about not no one being able to get tickets I'm like well two million people are getting tickets so that's a well I would say that's a lot of people are getting tickets that's how I kind of like like to think about it and rationalize in my head but and last year did you guys travel to all these same places that you're traveling this year or do you have a lot of new places new places um we're playing in three minor league parks we're playing in 17 age league stadiums and four and a four football stadiums so that's not scheduled it's it's crazy oh my gosh okay and lastly I just want to know have you ever been playing and something goes terribly wrong oh my gosh yes my first game uh on the 2023 tour very first probably first inning too

42:51we wanted to do a skit where I was going to light a ball on fire and so the uh picture was gonna hold the ball up and he was gonna have all this soapy substance on his hand that was flammable and I was gonna click the lighter have it go off uh stuck accidentally stuck the lighter into the fluid so it was wet so it couldn't light so I'm sitting there with 8,000 people in West Palm Beach watching my every move watching everything on the field like this is the first game is so exciting like I'm the third baseman for the bananas let's go and it didn't light and I stood there for like it felt like an eternity it's probably seven seconds and then Kyle I pressure was like just go he was like the most like depressing thing he was like just go back to their base oh no we ended up doing it and actually making it happen uh the next inning and it got an ESPN it went viral it got probably 10 million views um yeah that was pretty embarrassing right um what advice would you give to any young athlete it's looking to combine their athleticism with social media you've done such a good job with that yeah I think I mean this is advice I'd

43:53give to my younger self if I wanted to like it would basically be don't put so much pressure on yourself to get to that next level and like that's the only thing that you want to accomplish in life because like that was the only thing I wanted to accomplish I was like all right I want to be division one baseball player pro baseball player and that was it um just don't worry don't worry about the negative negativity the haters that are like oh you're gonna play for the bananas now like you're gonna do musical theater like all this um yeah just focus on yourself and what you love to do and uh yeah if you like theater if you like dancing if you like singing like do it now because it actually turns out being pretty cool when you're older you don't realize it at the time you don't think like singers are cool when you're 12 years old playing baseball at football but like now you think about it and you're like whoa like I wish I played in an instrument growing up right I wish I tried more things did the gymnastics like did all this stuff um yes to try new things um okay Savannah banana is your season starts February 2nd did I get that right um very first February 1st uh and goes until October people should go where to find out how they can get ticket

44:59bananas website is probably the best way um which is why is it Savannah banana but calm yep yep okay and uh and if they're interested in following you and knowing more about you how can they find you uh Jackson also an underscore on everything and then yeah basically that Jackson you are so cute and fun and hopefully I will see you at one of your games I can't wait to see how you guys do the season good luck to you and thank you for joining us awesome thank you so much if you've enjoyed today's episode don't let it end here our patreon community has become one of my favorite parts of misunderstood it's where I can become more personal answer your questions share what's really happening behind the scenes and continue conversations that simply don't fit into the public podcast whether you want bonus episodes exclusive behind the scenes access my Palm Beach Life Series monthly giveaways or even a one-on-one conversation with me there's a membership tier that's perfect for you I truly love to welcome you into our insider club just visit

46:04patreon.com slash misunderstood with Rachel Yukitel or click the link in the show notes yes is Angus Maximus this partner has one part of a pound of hot sushi cooked to honor Angus speech it's more face-to-the-quarter pounder the battle is closed and for only 599 even regular dudes can afford it like that guy you get that big old burger yeah he holds Angus Maximus only 599 is cold senior available for a limited time of participating restaurants tax on included not valid for use within a combo or in combination with any other offer or discount