How Ryan Reynolds is using web3 storytelling in soccer 🧠

It's Friday here on the West Coast, which means it's time for another Decentra Daily opinion article!

Estimated reading time: 5 mins

In this edition:

• How a Ryan Reynolds soccer TV show uses web3 storytelling tactics

As documentaries go, it's def more of a 4-3-3 than a 5-4-1   ...Soccer fans, does that make any sense? 🤷‍♀️

Following us on Twitter yet? Why the heck not, friend?

Welcome to Wrexham - a show with a web3 mindset

Have you seen Welcome to Wrexham?

The FX series follows actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney as they buy a small, community-focused Welsh soccer club, Wrexham AFC.

It’s a weird mix of real-life Ted Lasso & social commentary doc – and it’s better than both of those things!

The show is entertaining, heartfelt, and genuinely informative about the less glamorous side of UK football culture.

• It’s been nominated for two critics choice awards 🏆

• +90% on Rotten Tomatoes and scheduled for a 2nd season 👍

And the wider project of improving Wrexham AFC is on track

• The team came 2nd in their league last season ⚽️

• FA Cup games live on international TV (UK ITV & US ESPN) 📺

• Huge sponsors and club infrastructure well-beyond their current status 📈

How did two actors with zero sports management experience pull off something like this? By storytelling like a web3 project, of course!

IRL storytelling

Rich actors are always investing in Tequila, questionable apps, and sports teams – and it’s not unusual for foreign investors to drop big money on UK soccer.

But Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney didn’t get involved with some high-profile franchise. Instead, they paid $2.5 million for Wrexham AFC, a tiny community-owned club in a league that only just qualifies as professional sport. Why?

Here, I’ll hand over to @JoePompliano, who wrote a great thread on this question:

As Joe says, this purchase wasn't about financial advisors and emotionless investing.

It was about using creative storytelling skills to bootstrap a project the two actors really seem to care about.

Rob and Ryan "storified" their investment. By turning the task of improving a football club into a compelling story, they were able to attract funding that wouldn’t have otherwise been available, and engagement from people who wouldn't have otherwise been interested.

💵

• Joe estimates that Wrexham AFC made around $3m from the documentary deal

• The team gained sponsorship from huge brands like TikTok and Expedia

📲

• Season ticket sales nearly tripled

• Wrexham AFC's Twitter followers increased 364%, Instagram followers are up 670%, and the team's new TikTok channel quickly grew to 459k followers (stats from @JoePompliano)

• Wrexham even became the first non-league team to be playable in a FIFA video game

Storifying goes deeper than money and engagement

When you run your business like a story, progress becomes a narrative arc.

People get emotionally, as well as financially, invested. The community begins to push the story forward – and the project grows alongside it.

Soon, success means more than just profits: it's about being part of a satisfying narrative.

And the allure of a good story can be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

As the story of Welcome to Wrexham plays out, the club begins to attract managers, staff, and players from higher leagues and more successful teams.

Sure, the boosted paychecks help to bring in extra talent.

But when the "famous" striker (by Wrexham standards) Paul Mullin joins the team, it feels like he's partly there to make Wrexham AFC's story more compelling.

In other words, by turning their project into a story, Ryan & Rob gained the interest of talented people with the ability to write the next chapter.

Better story = project growth

Welcome to Wrexham also shows that storifying isn’t a gimmick

The idea of turning people's lives and livelihoods into a story can strike some people as patronizing – that it's trivializing real people and issues for engagement.

Welcome to Wrexham says, not so!

Because the docuseries has a sincere vibe, it's able to explore the lives of players, families, and the wider community without coming off as shallow or haughty.

It reflects on the mixed fortunes that come when a sports team gets funding – how big plans disrupt staff and can signal the end for aging players.

It covers fans battling cancer, going through divorce, and dealing with life's daily struggles.

Players face breakups, pregnancy issues, and sub-par housing situations.

The show even covers how the club and town wrestle with the ongoing question of how they feel about Rob and Ryan's involvement in their lives.

You might think including this content would harm the project. But it's the opposite – the story is way better because of that honesty.

(Remember: better story = project growth)

Shout out to @WAGMIUnited

I can't write this newsletter without mentioning WAGMI United – the web3 group that bought another small UK football club, Crawley Town FC.

Crawley sits in the league above Wrexham, and WAGMI (which stands for We're All Gonna Make It, if you're not familiar with the degen slang) is using many of the same web3 strategies to realize their aim of taking "the smallest club in English Football to the Premier League."

With community governance protocols and internet-wide marketing, they're giving more people the opportunity to become Crawley fans – and giving more Crawley fans the chance to become a real part of the team's story.