Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to correct a reference in the interview. The interviewee misspoke and referred to Barbra Streisand when he meant journalist Barbara Walters.

Jabari Young, a senior writer and editor at Forbes, came to SMU on Tuesday, March 3, to speak at the William J. O’Neil Series in Business Journalism alongside Forbes assistant managing editor Ali Jackson-Jolley.

Young curates the Forbes BLK 50 list, covering the wealthiest, most successful Black business owners, entrepreneurs and investors. He frequently covers sports business beats, recently producing features on NBA legends Derrick Rose, Chris Paul and Jimmy Butler.

Before the lecture, he spoke with The DC’s Sports Editor, Tyler Welch, about his career in journalism, starting as a sports beat writer in college and then for the San Antonio Spurs all the way to his senior writing role at Forbes Media.

Tyler Welch: When it comes to covering sports business, where do you say you find your best stories? Would you say it’s more about following the money, or is it more about the people and the connections you find?

Jabari Young: Neither. I follow my own curiosity. As a journalist, I feel like the minute you lose your curiosity, your effectiveness probably goes down. I followed my own curiosity. Obviously, the numbers and people help make that valid. I’m like, ‘Damn, I was curious about it, I’m glad I was right.’ But I usually follow my own curiosity in hopes that, that will lead me into a great story. A lot of times it has, sometimes it hasn’t, but it’s your own curiosity that [you’re] gonna rely on… because the numbers might not tell the story. It might not be right. And then the people could be boring. Right? And so, I just follow my own curiosity and let the storytelling happen that way.

Welch: What’s a story you’ve written recently where you did follow your curiosity and it ended up being a really big story or something that kind of surprised you with what you found?

Young: You know, the list, the fourth BLK list. I found out things that I didn’t know about, but I was more so excited that the public didn’t know a lot of these people. I have known of them because I follow business, and it’s my job. But that list was able to put a lot of people [the public] probably didn’t know about on the map and introduce a lot of people to these individuals, like the guy who bought Walgreens [Stefan Kaluzny]. So that list was good for me. It was a win-win. I learned something, and I’m sure the public learned something. And we revealed two new billionaires, one returning on that list, so in a way, it’s its own breaking news, right? You’re putting on information the public didn’t know.

Welch: When it comes to making a story that’s a list or a ranking style of article, how are you intentional when it comes to making sure you’re creating a story?

Young: By looking at what’s already out there and trying not to go and regurgitate that. For example, the list that we came out with, Forbes put out a summer list in 2008, the wealthiest Black Americans. That piece of IP, I don’t think people remember that that existed. That takes some searching. I had to go back to 2008 to find that, right? How many people are doing that? And so that right there…. you can go back and look at the list and say, ‘All right, how can we revamp this and make it fresh and make it where the storytelling is unique?’ And we’re in this very interesting society. I call it the microwave society. Where people want things instantaneously, and because of that, they tend to forget things very fast, too, because they’re already off to the next thing. So there are always ways where you can go back.

Welch: What was your intention or original idea behind [the BLK List]? And how would you say that your focus and what you’ve tried to make it become over the next couple of years has evolved?

Young: Forbes are known for their lists. And so, okay, where do I start? Flashing back to the original IP, [the] 2008 Black wealth list… I found the infrastructure of what it could be, and now I could just go knock down the walls and all that stuff. The base is still here, because of that list, and I can use this base, and build a bridge to [the] 2024 list. And that’s what I did, and so you notice people crossed over from that list. Oprah [Winfrey], Bob Johnson, Michael Jordan and that was 2024. Power, wealth, impact. And that list was more so an introduction, right? Giving you a whole bunch of sectors, nonprofit, CEOs, corporations. You[‘ve] got entertainers, you’re regular individuals who are making [an] impact, building wealth, doing great business. But then it came time to revamp that and kind of make it more Forbesian, right? Because Forbes is not really covering nonprofits like that. We count money. That’s what we worry about. So how do you make it more Forbesian? Upgrade. Go back. Start from the tower you built from that infrastructure of 2008, 202[4]… now let’s take it and let’s build the rest of the mansion.

I think now we’ve landed on a theme, the “Money Masters.” It’s Forbesian. You see the money. It’s private equity, venture capital. We have our sectors which we’re covering. We have the people who are on it. Every year, you may not see a new batch of names come on it, no. We’re going to use the ones we have, and now we can see if they’re going up and down. Then we could put arrows next to their name. Hey, last year he had this amount as an asset manager. Now this year, he has that. It’s going down. And if the next year he’s on that list, it goes down again, maybe the third time the list comes out, that person doesn’t belong on a list because he’s clearly downgrading. That person– they’re scaling them. So, I feel like there’s a variety of things that we can do, keeping the core theme, keeping the people. But it took two iterations to get to this one.

Welch: Do you think next year and in future years of this list, it will remain that sort of theme of private equity and wealth management?

Young: And maybe even add another layer. Maybe you say, ‘Okay, private equity, private credit is going through hell right now.’ But maybe we say, ‘Okay, now we want to bring in some hedge fund managers…’ You can re-theme it that way, or you can go younger. It says, Forbes BLK List, “Money Masters: The Next Generation.” You’re only allowed to make this list if you’re under 35. So now we’ve got different classes of people, but it’s the same theme. There are a whole bunch of ways that you can go. Similar to when Apple made the computer and they made it, and they did it over again and they realized, ‘Damn, there’s a whole bunch of other layers we could do this.’ Let’s see if we can scale it down with the music. iPod. Let’s see if we can make a personal computer. iPhone. Now, let’s see if we can make it a little display. iPad. They went through so many different iterations of the Macintosh to lead to what we use today, right? No different, I use that philosophy, that analogy to build the BLK List.

Welch: I saw the video of you interviewing Derek Rose. One of the questions you asked that stood out to me was when you just asked him about his 2026 playlist, the music that he’s listening to. What is your intention when you’re asking those more unique, unanticipated questions like that?

Young: To break the ice and to get them to understand that you come here and we want to talk about board and business. A lot of these guys, athletes, entertainers, they’re very good at knowing about their business, but they’re not in it. So I can’t come and ask Derek about all the numbers and this, that and the other. He’s not in it like that yet. He was playing in the NBA his whole life… they don’t have time for much else during the season. So, trying to come there and ask them a whole bunch of hardcore business questions, how would that go? Would it favor me? Would it not? Yeah, maybe it would, but let me sprinkle in some of this human being stuff.

Welch: That interview itself was about 45 minutes long on YouTube. But then you cut it down into an article on Forbes that was much shorter than what you had for the whole interview. How do you go about picking which pieces you think would be the most interesting for a shorter article?

Young: Barbara Walters, one of the best to ever do it, would always still call around to colleagues and the people and say, ‘Hey, I’ve got such and such coming up. What would you ask them?’ I was like, ‘Damn, that is a great way to get out of your own way.’ Because I’m studying the person. I know I have a list of things, but I’m trying to relate. I want the person that’s not here to be watching us. So maybe I should call that person on the outside, and ‘Hey, what would you ask?’ And I take those lines of questions and I apply it to, you know, whatever that is.

So that article was written up. It’s nothing major in it, but it was just another presentation, entry point for the person who may not go right to YouTube or the Enterprise Zone and know that we did that Derrick Rose interview, who might not see the algorithm and see the clip pop up. Let me just create an article version of that. And that’s why, at the bottom, you see it says ‘Capital Gains: watch the interview,’ so you can learn more about this, right? Because I don’t know how long people have to digest a 45-minute review. But if I can create a 600-word story to lead them into it? ‘Damn, I didn’t know Derek was doing that. He lost out on Chick-fil-A?’ And so that’s what that is…. That’s a perfect way to get somebody in.

Welch: Derrick Rose, huge NBA player, but honestly not one of the biggest people you’ve interviewed, either. When you’re interviewing billionaires and high-profile guests like that, what are some other things you do to make sure that they’re giving you the best possible interview you can get?

Young: The most important thing you can do is listen to them. As a journalist, we want to get to the next question, get to that point, get to the one we really want to ask, right? But you gotta listen to them. Listen to what they’re telling you, listen closely, because that could lead to a follow-up. Always have that ‘Why?’ in the back, right there, ready to pull it out. It’s like a gun– ‘Why?!’ Because that ‘why’ breaks things down. It takes you deeper. But you can only ask that ‘why’ if you’re listening.

Welch: Looking back at your earlier experiences, whether it was in San Antonio or even back when you were at school, what do you say are some of the things that you took away from being a sports beat reporter that you still use in your career today?

Young: To not ever forget about the human element [of] things. Now, what is the human element of things? I remember a time where I was covering [the] Spurs, and I had known a former player. His name was Mark Jackson, and he went to Temple, played for the [Philadelphia 76ers], and he was an analyst. I was a production assistant back when Mark was in the newsroom, he remembered me. But I relied on him. And so, Tim Duncan was going through a divorce at the time. And I’m like, ‘He’s playing horrible.’ And I said, I wonder if I ask him, ‘Hey, Tim, you know, is the divorce impacting you, or you play it all?’ That’s a very tricky thing. You’re asking someone about their personal life, and it’s Tim Duncan… do I ask the question or not? And so I called up Mark, and I said, ‘Mark… I’m thinking I’ll ask this question. You played in the NBA, you know this dude, if I ask this question, is that fair?’ He said, ‘Jabari, Tim’s gonna look at you. Study your face and never talk to you.’ I said, ‘Damn, seriously?’ [Jackson said] ‘Yeah, man, because you’re crossing that boundary, and for some guys, he might answer, but for [Duncan], he’s strict.’ I’m glad I listened to him because it was those moments that I’ve learned the human element of things. Maybe he is playing bad because he’s getting a divorce. But guess what? That ain’t any of my damn business. I can’t go there.