Riley and Madison McKibbin: Filling the storytelling void in beach volleyball

Riley and Madison McKibbin: Filling the storytelling void in beach volleyball

Madison and Riley McKibbin can still remember -- with much amusement, as memories go – one of their first disasters as producers of beach volleyball videos on their eponymous YouTube channel. Not that it seemed like a disaster at the time – they rarely do. Riley probably thought it was a stroke of genius when the wind had muffled up the sound of one of those early videos, and rather than redo it, he simply recorded a voiceover, trying to match his cadence on screen.

“You can really tell,” Madison said on SANDCAST: Beach volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter. “It’s like an old, bad movie, like they’re speaking English words and it’s Japanese.”

“There were some bad decisions that were made for sure,” Riley added, laughing.

That’s the beautiful thing about being first in an industry with a large fanbase and what was at the time, and still sort of it, an almost entirely untouched gold mine of digital media: Even when bad decisions were made, they didn’t seem bad at the time. They seemed innovative, because the crux of their content was innovative, something that had never really been done before.

When the McKibbins were initially tinkering with the notion of retiring from indoor volleyball, which they played professionally overseas – Madison finished in Greece, Riley in Italy – and switching to beach, they did what anybody in this current generation would do: They searched YouTube.

They found what nobody in any future generation will now find: Little to nothing. Nothing that was great, anyway. There were some out there. But Riley, now 31 and coming off a career-best AVP season, knew he had found a hole. Why he knew that he and Madison thought they could be the answers to that problem is still a mystery to them. Riley had no prior experience editing film. Madison had little, though he did have a camera. An early issue there was that Riley couldn’t even turn the thing on.

In spite of that, Riley said, “we somehow thought we could fill that void.”

They have. And they have done it to such a spectacular degree because the foundation of virtually every video posted on The McKibbin Brothers YouTube channel has remained the same, whether it’s a hilarious voiceover edit, a tutorial on jumpserving, or a supremely well-done vlog: They’re telling stories that ought to be told.

“The thing is,” Madison says in their video following filming the 2020 AVP Media Day, “all these people aren’t just beach volleyball players. They have these passions outside of beach volleyball, which are so differentiating, so spread out all over the place, which makes them them, sometimes these volleyball questions – they get asked every single Media Day.”

They do things different. They don’t ask Alix Klineman what it’s like to transition from indoor to beach. They get her rolling on cooking, and food, to the point that Klineman, one of the more reticent individuals on Tour, actually asked the McKibbins to let her talk more.

“Actually, I have one more,” she said. “I can really just keep going.”

Nobody had ever gotten that story, because nobody had ever bothered. The McKibbins saw the void there. They were unqualified to fill that void. They didn’t care. They filled it anyway.

“It’s been a long learning process and during that learning process we’ve discovered different avenues we could take it,” Riley said. “So it moved just from doing beach volleyball tutorials to workout videos to some blogs to some mini documentary kind of videos. It’s been a pretty crazy, great learning experience.”

They’ve discovered the videos that are most fulfilling to them. The slow-motion replays of matches throughout the season are entertaining, and there is some benefit there, but there isn’t character building. No storytelling. There isn’t the reward of stringing together a narrative, drawing new fans into this sport, as a Formula One docuseries called “Drive to Survive” did for them.

“That’s something me and Riley realized about our content recently,” Madison said. “The ones we’ve been super excited for, you can see it. The ones where we’re like ‘meh’ you can tell as a viewer.”

“It’s almost like YouTube knows how much energy and how excited we are about the videos that we’re making,” Riley said. “When we’re super excited about a project, the views show it. When we’re throwing up filler content to hit that Wednesday quota, YouTube knows: ‘Nope, we’re punishing you. You only put in 75 percent effort’ and we’re like ‘Dammit!’”

They’re back to their metaphorical drawing boards. They couldn’t elaborate on the specificity of future projects, because they don't know the exact direction of them just yet. There are vague ideas, visions – something big out there. They just don’t know precisely what it is.

“Our main goal is to start innovating again,” Riley said. “I think one of the reasons we had such great success in the very beginning was because we spent a lot of time writing and trying to make the content at least somewhat entertaining.”

They’ve accomplished that much. They’ve filled one void, and they’ll surely find more as their abilities evolve and the perimeters of their limits as storytellers and creators expand.

There isn’t a team in beach volleyball better suited to do it.

Episoder(500)

SANDCAST Mailbag: Who are the new beach volleyball partnerships for 2022?

SANDCAST Mailbag: Who are the new beach volleyball partnerships for 2022?

This episode of SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter, marks FOUR YEARS of the podcast! What began as an off-the-wall idea at a breakfast meeting at the Ocean Diner in Hermosa Beach has become my biggest storytelling passion, and, strangely, one of the points of Bourne’s beach volleyball career for which the Olympian and Manhattan Beach Open champ is now most well-known. It's been an incredible ride, and we have you, the listeners, to thank for that. Seriously, we love you. Above all, that has always been, and will continue to be, our main goal with SANDCAST: Give the beach volleyball fans the beach volleyball stories and content they want. For our four-year anniversary, then, what better way to celebrate than by answering questions from the fans who keep this show moving? On this episode, we answer: - Who are the new beach volleyball partnerships heading into the 2022 season?  - How epic is the Myrtle Beach Open? - What is up with Konstantin Semenov's body language? - Will the new World Tour format pull more players from the AVP? - What's one rule we would change in beach volleyball? And many, many more! ENJOY! *** We now have SANDCAST MERCHANDISE!! Rock the gear of your favorite podcast today! https://www.sandcastmerch.com/ This episode, as always, is brought to you by Wilson Volleyball, makers of the absolute best balls in the game, hands down. You can get a 20-percent discount using our code, SANDCAST-20! https://www.wilson.com/en-us/volleyball Check out our book, Volleyball for Milkshakes, written by SANDCAST hosts Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter: https://www.amazon.com/Volleyball-Milkshakes-Travis-Mewhirter/dp/B089781SHB  Be sure to check out some of the coolest beach volleyball gear in the country at Vollis Beach! Recently partnered with LuLu Lemon, Vollis is offering high quality, good looking apparel, and you can get it at a discount using Travisfans to get 15 percent off! https://www.vollisgear.com/ SHOOTS!

20 Okt 20211h 20min

Riley McKibbin: The rise to one of beach volleyball‘s most important voices

Riley McKibbin: The rise to one of beach volleyball‘s most important voices

This episode of SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter, features, for the first time, Riley McKibbin on his own. You guys, of course, know Riley McKibbin: He's the elder of the Beard Bros and the editor of the viral and wildly popular McKibbin YouTube channel, which is providing so, so, so much good for the beach volleyball world.  On this episode, we discuss: - The direction of the YouTube channel, and how it is more geared towards storytelling than tutorials - A new four-man event being put on by the McKibbins and SharpeVision - Riley's rise through the volleyball world, from benchwarmer to a setter on the U.S. National Team And, as always, much, much more.  ENJOY! *** We now have SANDCAST MERCHANDISE!! Rock the gear of your favorite podcast today! https://www.sandcastmerch.com/ This episode, as always, is brought to you by Wilson Volleyball, makers of the absolute best balls in the game, hands down. You can get a 20-percent discount using our code, SANDCAST-20! https://www.wilson.com/en-us/volleyball Check out our book, Volleyball for Milkshakes, written by SANDCAST hosts Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter: https://www.amazon.com/Volleyball-Milkshakes-Travis-Mewhirter/dp/B089781SHB  Be sure to check out some of the coolest beach volleyball gear in the country at Vollis Beach! Recently partnered with LuLu Lemon, Vollis is offering high quality, good looking apparel, and you can get it at a discount using Travisfans to get 15 percent off! https://www.vollisgear.com/ SHOOTS!

13 Okt 20211h 26min

Jake Gibb has one last tournament before becoming the full-time soccer dad

Jake Gibb has one last tournament before becoming the full-time soccer dad

This episode of SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter, is a re-run episode that we recorded back in August of 2018 with Jake Gibb. When we initially recorded this episode, Gibb was one day removed from the Manhattan Beach Open finals, where he and Taylor Crabb lost to Phil Dalhausser and Nick Lucena.  We figured now would be a great time to run it back, given that Gibb is in his final tournament of his storied career, competing at the World Tour Finals.  On this episode, Gibb discusses: - How ignorance perhaps paved the way to him becoming one of the best American blockers of all-time - The growth of his partnership with Taylor Crabb. This in particular is fun to look back upon, as Crabb was just beginning to come into his own in 2018 and is now one of the best defenders in the world.  - His growth curve as a professional beach volleyball player, and the importance of a growth mindset - Two young Norwegian kids named Anders Mol and Christian Sorum And, as always, much, much more: ENJOY! *** We now have SANDCAST MERCHANDISE!! Rock the gear of your favorite podcast today! https://www.sandcastvolleyball.com/merchandise/ This episode, as always, is brought to you by Wilson Volleyball, makers of the absolute best balls in the game, hands down. You can get a 20-percent discount using our code, SANDCAST-20! https://www.wilson.com/en-us/volleyball Check out our book, Volleyball for Milkshakes, written by SANDCAST hosts Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter: https://www.amazon.com/Volleyball-Milkshakes-Travis-Mewhirter/dp/B089781SHB  Be sure to check out some of the coolest beach volleyball gear in the country at Vollis Beach! Recently partnered with LuLu Lemon, Vollis is offering high quality, good looking apparel, and you can get it at a discount using Travisfans to get 15 percent off! https://www.vollisgear.com/ SHOOTS!

6 Okt 202144min

Rising Canadian defender Jake MacNeil‘s life on the road is only beginning

Rising Canadian defender Jake MacNeil‘s life on the road is only beginning

This episode of SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter, features Mewhirter's good friend and standout Canadian defender Jake MacNeil. The two have been on the road together for nearly two months this season, and are currently filming a movie in Bulgaria.  Our chat is a wide-ranging one, discussing: - MacNeil's experience as a training partner at the Tokyo Olympic Games - A wild season in which he and Will Hoey were on the road non-stop since May - The difference between teams a the one-star level and the five-star level - What the next few years are looking like in the Canadian federation And, as always, much more.  ENJOY! *** We now have SANDCAST MERCHANDISE!! Rock the gear of your favorite podcast today! https://www.sandcastvolleyball.com/merchandise/ This episode, as always, is brought to you by Wilson Volleyball, makers of the absolute best balls in the game, hands down. You can get a 20-percent discount using our code, SANDCAST-20! https://www.wilson.com/en-us/volleyball Check out our book, Volleyball for Milkshakes, written by SANDCAST hosts Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter: https://www.amazon.com/Volleyball-Milkshakes-Travis-Mewhirter/dp/B089781SHB  Be sure to check out some of the coolest beach volleyball gear in the country at Vollis Beach! Recently partnered with LuLu Lemon, Vollis is offering high quality, good looking apparel, and you can get it at a discount using Travisfans to get 15 percent off! https://www.vollisgear.com/ SHOOTS!

29 Sep 202148min

Yariv Lerner is bringing beach volleyball back to the big screen

Yariv Lerner is bringing beach volleyball back to the big screen

This episode of SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter, is AWESOME. This episode features Yariv Lerner, the CEO of Nu Boyana Film Studios, one of the largest film studios in Europe.  Why are we having a CEO of a film studio on the podcast? Because Lerner is producing a movie, Qualifying, depicting the grinding journey of the qualifier beach volleyball player, shooting it at Sofia Beach in Sofia, Bulgaria. Now, for the first time since Sideout, beach volleyball will be back on the big screen, and for the first time ever, it's going to be done right.  On this episode, we discuss: - How this movie came to be, and how a script written 20 years ago by Tom Black was revived to become a bona fide movie - How Lerner became so passionate about beach volleyball, beginning on the coasts of South Africa to Santa Monica - Lerner's legendary house in Santa Monica, which roofed players such as Billy Allen, Nick Lucena, John Mayer, Kevin Wong, and Adam Roberts, among others - The cast, plot, and projected release date of Qualifying And, as always, so much more.  ENJOY! *** We now have SANDCAST MERCHANDISE!! Rock the gear of your favorite podcast today! https://www.sandcastvolleyball.com/merchandise/ This episode, as always, is brought to you by Wilson Volleyball, makers of the absolute best balls in the game, hands down. You can get a 20-percent discount using our code, SANDCAST-20! https://www.wilson.com/en-us/volleyball Check out our book, Volleyball for Milkshakes, written by SANDCAST hosts Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter: https://www.amazon.com/Volleyball-Milkshakes-Travis-Mewhirter/dp/B089781SHB  Be sure to check out some of the coolest beach volleyball gear in the country at Vollis Beach! Recently partnered with LuLu Lemon, Vollis is offering high quality, good looking apparel, and you can get it at a discount using Travisfans to get 15 percent off! https://www.vollisgear.com/ SHOOTS!

22 Sep 20211h 5min

April Ross and Alix Klineman, and the micro changes that led to an Olympic gold medal

April Ross and Alix Klineman, and the micro changes that led to an Olympic gold medal

This episode of SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter, features Tokyo Olympic GOLD MEDALISTS April Ross and Alix Klineman, as well as the lovable and wonderful and fantastic guest host, Chris Geeter McGee.  What an absolute treat this episode is. Over a few glasses of wine, Ross and Klineman discuss: - How they didn't consider themselves favorites heading into Tokyo  - Their experience at the Olympic Games, and how Klineman felt oddly calm during the entire experience - Ross' decision to go with Klineman, and how it was only Jen Kessy who agreed that Klineman was the best option - Whether or not they intend to play Paris together And so, so much more. ENJOY! *** We now have SANDCAST MERCHANDISE!! Rock the gear of your favorite podcast today! https://www.sandcastvolleyball.com/merchandise/ This episode, as always, is brought to you by Wilson Volleyball, makers of the absolute best balls in the game, hands down. You can get a 20-percent discount using our code, SANDCAST-20! https://www.wilson.com/en-us/volleyball Check out our book, Volleyball for Milkshakes, written by SANDCAST hosts Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter: https://www.amazon.com/Volleyball-Milkshakes-Travis-Mewhirter/dp/B089781SHB  Be sure to check out some of the coolest beach volleyball gear in the country at Vollis Beach! Recently partnered with LuLu Lemon, Vollis is offering high quality, good looking apparel, and you can get it at a discount using Travisfans to get 15 percent off! https://www.vollisgear.com/ SHOOTS!

15 Sep 20211h 47min

At 24 years old, TJ DeFalco might be the young guy, but he‘s no rookie

At 24 years old, TJ DeFalco might be the young guy, but he‘s no rookie

Welcome back to SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter. On this episode, we brought in yet another Olympian – and a rookie who is not a real rookie on the beach, TJ DeFalco. DeFalco competed in his first Olympics in Tokyo, making a name for himself with an absurd ability to hit the back row quick set, then got the coolest of calls: Nick Lucena wanted to play the Manhattan Beach Open with him. And so it was that DeFalco played his first AVP since 2016. On this episode we discuss: How it felt for TJ to get back on the beach after nearly five years off it His first Olympic experience in Tokyo How Reid Priddy forever altered the trajectory of his career How eight words and a phone call from Matt Fuerbringer got him to partner with Nick Lucena   And, as always, much, much more.   ENJOY!   We now have SANDCAST MERCHANDISE!! Rock the gear of your favorite podcast today! https://www.sandcastvolleyball.com/merchandise/ This episode, as always, is brought to you by Wilson Volleyball, makers of the absolute best balls in the game, hands down. You can get a 20-percent discount using our code, SANDCAST-20! https://www.wilson.com/en-us/volleyball Check out our book, Volleyball for Milkshakes, written by SANDCAST hosts Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter: https://www.amazon.com/Volleyball-Milkshakes-Travis-Mewhirter/dp/B089781SHB  Be sure to check out some of the coolest beach volleyball gear in the country at Vollis Beach! Recently partnered with LuLu Lemon, Vollis is offering high quality, good looking apparel, and you can get it at a discount using Travisfans to get 15 percent off! https://www.vollisgear.com/

8 Sep 202146min

Tri Bourne and Trevor Crabb, Manhattan Champs, going somewhere they‘ve never gone before

Tri Bourne and Trevor Crabb, Manhattan Champs, going somewhere they‘ve never gone before

This episode of SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter, features the most recent winners of the AVP Manhattan Beach Open: Tri Bourne and Trevor Crabb.  Bourne and Crabb made a huge comeback to beat Chaim Schalk and Theo Brunner in the semifinals before beating Casey Patterson and Chase Budinger in the finals. It marked Crabb's second Manhattan Beach Open win and Bourne's first.  On this episode, we discuss: - How it feels for Bourne to alas win the Manhattan Open after two losses in the finals - How the second win was just as sweet for Trevor Crabb, who won his first with Reid Priddy in 2019 - The mental focus Bourne found in the semifinals, when he and Crabb went down 16-12 to up 19-16.  - Trevor now being 2-0 when he guarantees victory And so, so much more.  ENJOY! *** We now have SANDCAST MERCHANDISE!! Rock the gear of your favorite podcast today! https://www.sandcastvolleyball.com/merchandise/ This episode, as always, is brought to you by Wilson Volleyball, makers of the absolute best balls in the game, hands down. You can get a 20-percent discount using our code, SANDCAST-20! https://www.wilson.com/en-us/volleyball Check out our book, Volleyball for Milkshakes, written by SANDCAST hosts Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter: https://www.amazon.com/Volleyball-Milkshakes-Travis-Mewhirter/dp/B089781SHB  Be sure to check out some of the coolest beach volleyball gear in the country at Vollis Beach! Recently partnered with LuLu Lemon, Vollis is offering high quality, good looking apparel, and you can get it at a discount using Travisfans to get 15 percent off! https://www.vollisgear.com/   SHOOTS!

1 Sep 202157min

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