U.S. Minor League Baseball player retires at age 22 to pursue his passion for technology and business by forming BlockTerra Capital LLC, a hedge fund that operates solely for professional athlete clientele.
The fund was officially launched in March 2018, but the founder Tyler Adkinson had already formed relationships of 30 clients. One of them is Joe Kelly, a top MLB pitcher.
American professional athletes have a history of making headlines because of poor wealth management, or by having to take their agents to court because of distrust or deceptive practices. Tyler maintains a level of trust as a retired professional athlete that the average investment professional does not have.
Perfect Opportunity
This was not a spur of the moment decision for Tyler. His life long interest in technology, university education in business and communication skills while in the L.A. Dodgers developmental system allowed him to quickly realize his entrepreneurial potential.
“Technology has fascinated me as long as I could imagine. I was waiting in line for the release of the first iPad. I was in middle school. I sold candy to pay for it. I feel like cryptocurrency is the pinnacle of technological advancement.”
Ultimately, sustaining an injury led to the downtime to cement his decision to put everything together. He played through a bone spur in the summer of 2017. While recovering from surgery, he re-prioritized his life.
To really push things forward, his career as a minor league baseball player lost stability with a change in laws on March 23, 2018. A full salary would no longer be paid if players did not commit a 40-hour work week to baseball. So, Tyler chose a new future.
He sees BlockTerra as much more than a business, but rather representing a youth movement. “The developers are all millennials or younger generations. They’re all tech-savvy. The people creating and driving this space are us.”