It was Sunday morning in Austin, and David Mulugheta was winding through the city from his house, headed to pick up one of his highest-profile clients for their second day together at South by Southwest. The client, Jalen Ramsey, was waiting in the lobby of his hotel. Dolphins GM Chris Grier, on the other side of the negotiation, was at home in South Florida, and Grier’s coach, Mike McDaniel, was on a floatie with buddies for his 40th birthday weekend.
The trade that was about to go down, as Mulugheta dialed up Ramsey to tell him—not wanting to wait until he saw him in person, with how fast news travels these days—was a very 2023 transaction in that it was done, more or less, by everyone remotely.
And that was hardly the only new-age element to the deal.
