Sunny Ray sits down with Tim Frost, a former professional basketball player turned crypto entrepreneur, to trace his unconventional path into Web3. Frost recounts leaving a decade-long basketball career, including a coaching opportunity with the San Antonio Spurs under Gregg Popovich, to pursue something entirely new. He describes entering crypto in 2014 through trading and eventually running social media for an altcoin, then co-founding Blockverify, an early blockchain supply chain company he built years before the Ethereum mainnet launched. The conversation moves through his evolving views on bitcoin as a speculative store of value versus a medium of exchange, and his shift toward believing DeFi is the next sustainable frontier of crypto. Frost explains how a chance pandemic connection with a future co-founder pulled him deep into DeFi research, ultimately leading to Yield, a fintech aimed at giving mainstream users simplified, secure access to decentralized finance yields without requiring them to interact directly with protocols like Curve, Balancer, or Uniswap. He shares early traction numbers and plans for stablecoin, ether, and bitcoin funds.
A former pro basketball player explains how he pivoted into crypto and built Yield, a fintech simplifying access to DeFi.
How did we first meet, and what were you working on back then?
We met at Boost VC in Silicon Valley, I think around 2015 or 2016. I was part of the founding team at a blockchain company called Blockverify, an anti-counterfeit supply chain project. It was good but challenging, we were building before Ethereum mainnet even launched, so the technology and market understanding were very early stage.
What did your younger days look like, are you more technical or business-minded?
I come from a non-technical background, I studied business and economics in university. Actually I took an unconventional path, I was a professional basketball player for 10 years and played all over the world. After that I wanted a dramatic shift away from sports entirely, and that's when I started dabbling in crypto in 2014.
Was there a catalyst event that made you leave basketball for crypto, like an injury?
It was more of a personal challenge. My whole life was destined toward coaching after playing, and I actually landed an entry-level job with the San Antonio Spurs under Gregg Popovich, considered one of the best jobs you could get. But I realized I just didn't want anything to do with the sport anymore and needed something completely different.
Did playing professional sports translate into skills useful for entrepreneurship?
Definitely. People who played competitive sports tend to thrive in business because the only way to survive or thrive is perseverance and hard work, working through issues. There are a hundred walls you have to knock down, same as climbing the ranks as an athlete. My success in business is directly tied to the character built through being an athlete.
What is your current philosophy on blockchain versus bitcoin as money?
My philosophy has evolved a lot. I now believe the killer app of blockchain and crypto is money, it's probably always been that. I'm open to people building in every direction, but overall I think bitcoin functions more as a speculative asset and store of value than something people actually spend, similar to digital gold.
What was your Ethereum and DeFi 'aha moment'?
I had largely dismissed Ethereum after the ICO market imploded. About a year ago I was on some DeFi panels through my work on the banking side and started paying attention. My co-founder, who ended up living ten minutes from me during COVID, was fully into DeFi, and we spent all day every day going deep until it clicked that Ethereum was becoming what it promised to be.
What exactly is Yield, and who is it built for?
Yield is a UX layer on top of DeFi. People who understand protocols can go directly to Curve, Balancer, or Uniswap themselves. Our clients are the ones who just want to hand over crypto or fiat and get access without managing the complexity and risk, more like a Coinbase or Binance type of user base entering this new world.
Is Yield centered around a specific protocol like a DEX?
Our primary strategy right now is built around Curve, and our first fund is a stablecoin fund. We're also launching an ether fund and a bitcoin fund in the coming weeks. We launched last Friday and already have about 8,000 users onboard, dealing with the typical early-stage growing pains.
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