Tough Draw Tuesday: Who’s in Your Corner?

Many meaningful accomplishments may look individual from a distance.

An athlete gets a buckle. A filmmaker gets a credit. A business owner gets the name on the company’s door. The person standing on the stage is the person everyone sees.

But the visible moment rarely tells the whole story.

Behind it, there is almost always someone else. A spouse who believed before there was much proof. A parent who drove the miles. A friend who challenged an idea. A mentor who made an introduction. A collaborator whose ability made the work better. A brand that took a chance. A teammate whose experience changed the way the whole thing moved forward.

The more Tough Draw grows, the more I realize how little of anything meaningful was ever built alone.

Long before Tough Draw had athletes to represent, films to produce, podcasts to record, brands to work alongside, or any real certainty about what it might eventually become, there was my wife, Lindsay.

She has been there from Day 1.

Through every version of Tough Draw, every good season, and every difficult one, Lindsay has been the person beside me while I chased something I believed could become meaningful. She has celebrated the wins, weathered the disappointments, and continually given me the freedom and encouragement to keep pursuing a vision that, especially in the early years, required considerably more faith than it provided evidence.

But saying she has simply “supported” Tough Draw does not really tell the story.

A majority of the imagery that has helped define this brand over the years came through Lindsay’s camera. She has helped run Tough Draw Talks, managed social media, created graphics and marketing materials, worked behind the scenes on LANE: Life | Legend | Legacy, and had a hand in virtually every kind of project Tough Draw has taken on, whether her name appeared in the credits or not.

She has also done all of that while being a wife and mom first.

As our family has grown and Tough Draw has grown alongside it, her day-to-day involvement has naturally changed. The responsibilities of raising a family do not disappear because there is another deadline, production, rodeo, or idea I want to chase.

Yet there is not a chapter of Tough Draw’s story where Lindsay’s fingerprints are not somewhere on it.

When building something, it is easy to talk about what I  am trying to accomplish.

The longer Tough Draw exists, the harder it becomes to look back at anything meaningful we have accomplished and find very many places where I  is actually the right word.

It is almost always we.

The People Behind the Work

As Tough Draw has grown, there are simply more things happening every day than one person can, or should, try to carry.

Growth has meant finding people who understand what we are building, bring experience I do not have, and care enough about the work to make it better.

Kaycie Timm has become an important part of that evolution, bringing a communications background, a deep understanding of the Western industry, and the ability to look at ideas through both story and strategy.

That has mattered for Tough Draw.

Across Tough Draw Sports, brand partnerships, marketing strategy, written content, social media, photo, and video work, Kaycie has helped bring more structure and clarity to ideas that often begin as instincts. She helps make sure what we are trying to say actually connects with the people we are trying to reach.

Tough Draw Tuesday itself is a good example.

The initial thought and voice may start with me, but having someone willing to challenge the structure, ask whether we are actually saying what we think we are saying, and help shape that thought into something stronger has improved these stories.

Being in someone’s corner does not always mean agreeing with them. Sometimes it means caring enough about the work to challenge it.

Relationships That Build the Company

Kaycie’s role represents part of what the day-to-day team around Tough Draw has grown into, but some of the most important relationships within this company have been built over years of doing life and business together.

Mike McGarvey is one of the best examples.

When Tough Draw Sports began taking shape, Mike became an integral part of building that side of the company with me. What started as a professional relationship grew into a lifelong friendship built around trust, mutual respect, and a shared belief in what we can do for the athletes who allow us into their careers.

Mike also brought something to the table that could not simply be learned along the way.

More than 25 years working across professional sports, including Major League Baseball and the National Football League, along with his current work in athlete brand opportunities, gave him a perspective on athletes, representation, and the business surrounding sports that complemented my experience in rodeo, production, storytelling, and the Western industry.

That combination became an important part of how we approached Tough Draw Sports.

When an athlete chooses to work with us, the goal has never been to simply put another name on a roster. We are being invited into that athlete’s team. Their family may be part of it. Their traveling partners, coaches, sponsors, and other people they trust may also be part of it.

Our responsibility is to come alongside that team and determine where our relationships, experience, and abilities can help.

Over the years, Mike and I have had the privilege of doing that together. We have celebrated wins with athletes, worked through difficult conversations, navigated opportunities, and tried to be another steady voice in their corner as careers and circumstances changed.

Somewhere along the way, while trying to build a company centered around relationships, one of the relationships that helped build the company became a lifelong friendship itself.

Klyne Kidwill is another version of that for me.

Our friendship is accompanied by a shared passion for creativity and storytelling, but he also brings business acumen and perspective that complement the way I naturally approach ideas. The best creative relationships are not necessarily built around two people who think exactly alike. They are often built around enough shared purpose and trust to challenge each other when they do not.

Tanner Griggs represents another strong supporter in our corner.

Tanner and I originally knew one another through our college film days, only to reconnect professionally years later. His work in technology and animation has opened creative possibilities for Tough Draw that simply are not part of my own skill set.

That has reinforced another lesson over the years.

Building the right team is not about surrounding myself with people who can do everything I already know how to do. Growth often happens when someone comes alongside the work who sees something I do not, knows something I do not, or can execute something I could not accomplish nearly as well on my own.

People, Projects, and Seasons

That lesson reaches all the way back to the beginning.

Before Tough Draw was a company, it was a screenplay.

The original Tough Draw film began in a college classroom in 2008 and grew into something I became determined to make. That pursuit eventually sent me deeper into the Western sports world, but even an idea that began as something intensely personal quickly required other people.

Kristen Horn and Sam Birdsong became important parts of developing the Tough Draw screenplay. Through those early relationships came connections with Chad Gundersen and Chris Juen.

Years later, some of those relationships circled back in ways none of us could have mapped at the beginning.

When the opportunity came to make LANE: Life | Legend | Legacy, Chad, Chris, Kristen, and the team at Out of Order Studios became instrumental in bringing the film to life.

Professional relationships became genuine friendships, and a project carrying enormous personal meaning became another reminder that no matter how strongly one person believes in a story, filmmaking is inherently a team sport.

The audience sees the finished film.

They rarely see all the people standing outside the frame.

The same is true of most things worth building.

Tough Draw has also been around long enough now that not everyone who helped shape it is still part of the day-to-day. That is part of building anything over time. Some people remain for years. Some contribute something important to a particular project or season and eventually head in another direction. Someone may disappear from the daily work and unexpectedly reappear years later.

The relationship may change, but the lesson or impact does not disappear with it.

There are things to learn from what worked and things to learn from what did not. Different people sharpen ideas, introduce new perspectives, and help bring clarity to what is being built. Those lessons carry forward and, hopefully, make the next chapter stronger.

When Someone Opens a Door

Teams are not always made up of people on a payroll or names appearing together on a website.

Sometimes being in someone’s corner simply means opening a door.

Kim Brian brought Tough Draw into opportunities in the music world that expanded where our storytelling could go. People such as Andy Craven have created opportunities, made introductions, and believed enough in what we were doing to invite us into another room.

Brands have done the same.

Lane Frost Brand, CINCH, Cavender’s, and American Hat are among the brands that have trusted and worked alongside Tough Draw through different chapters of the company’s history. Every relationship has looked different, but underneath each one was a moment when someone decided to take a chance, trust the work, and say yes.

That matters.

I have written previously about being grateful for “the people who believed before there was proof.” The longer I do this, the more weight that idea carries because belief also creates responsibility.

When someone opens a door, the responsibility is to do something worthwhile once the opportunity is there.

Becoming Part of the Team

Looking back at all of those relationships, it is hard not to see how much they eventually shaped what Tough Draw itself became.

The people who have come alongside us have shown us firsthand what having someone in your corner can mean. In turn, more and more of what we do has become about trying to provide some version of that for somebody else.

That mission is readily apparent in Tough Draw Sports.

Mike and I have talked often about what it means when an athlete trusts us enough to work with them. We are not replacing the family, friends, coaches, traveling partners, or others who helped get them there. We are simply being invited to become another part of that team and, hopefully, bring something valuable to their corner.

The same lesson has shown up repeatedly in the stories we have told through Tough Draw Tuesday.

Trey Benton III made sure his father and wife received credit when he reflected on his career. His dad hauled him wherever he wanted to go and never hesitated to have him entered up, while his wife, Reba, stood beside him through injuries, comebacks, good seasons, and difficult ones.

Carlee Otero repeatedly points to her husband, Michael, and the role he plays in keeping horses, business, and life on the road moving.

Jacob Lees is building a career while he and his family enter a new chapter with a baby.

TJ Gray’s story carries its own reminder of the family and people who helped shape him long before the world saw the competitor whose name appeared in the standings.

The standings show the individual. The story usually reveals the team.

That extends beyond Tough Draw Sports.

Production means a business or brand trusts us with its story and asks us to help tell it. Marketing means coming alongside a company, understanding what makes it different, and helping communicate that to other people. Tough Draw Talks gives someone a microphone, asks questions, and tries to create enough room for them to tell us who they really are.

Film asks people to trust us with stories that sometimes mean considerably more than a piece of content ever could.

The more Tough Draw has grown, the more its different pieces have ultimately become different ways of standing in somebody else’s corner.

Maybe that shouldn't be surprising.

Who’s in Your Corner?

Part of getting older, both in life and in business, is becoming better at recognizing the people who helped carry the weight of each season.

Some were there from the beginning. Some stepped in for a specific project, conversation, introduction, or opportunity. Some remain close to the day-to-day work, while others left behind a lesson, relationship, or piece of belief that still matters years later.

Tough Draw looks considerably different today than it did when Lindsay and I first started down this road. There are more pieces to the company, bigger projects, more people around our table, and more people trusting us to sit at theirs. There are people who are deeply involved in what we’re building today, along with countless others whose fingerprints remain on different parts of the journey that brought us here.

But through every version of it, I’ve been fortunate to know there was someone in my corner before any of those other things existed.

Lindsay stood beside me when there wasn’t much evidence to suggest where any of this was going, and she is still there today.

Maybe that is part of why being in somebody else’s corner has become such an important part of what Tough Draw does.

Very few meaningful things are built alone.

And maybe building the right team is not simply about finding people who can help us get where we are going. Maybe it is about building relationships with people who make wherever we are going worth getting to.

Continue the Conversation

Every athlete, business, family, and dream has people behind it who rarely receive the same recognition as the person out front. Tough Draw is no different, and we are incredibly grateful for the people who have believed, contributed, challenged, opened doors, and stood beside us through every season of the journey.

Who has been in your corner when it mattered most, and whose corner are you standing in today?

We’d love to hear those stories.

Every Tuesday, Tough Draw shares stories, conversations, and observations from across the Western community, exploring the people, brands, businesses, and relationships that continue shaping its future