XBAR - I'm telling you that if you are a commercial operation of any size (truckload of calves or more), have your pastures stocked correctly, and are raising the right kind of cattle (meaning not crap) that you (1) should not be selling your calves off the cow at 500 lbs and (2) those calves should never see a sale barn. If you can do all of that, prices in north central Texas are much better than you think which makes the $1500 recip deal not worth the trouble.
I don't remember what age calves this guy was talking about, but you put your "money" - meaning feed - into a fall calving herd in our region from the months of mid Nov through mid March. Once you spend that money, you are leaving free gain on the table if you wean commercial calves that young instead of keeping them on the cow through June or so when your additional expense is very minimal. You would be weaning 650 lb calves instead of 500 lbers. There is a whole world of cattle buyers out there that doesn't involve a sale barn.
If you are having embryo babies for someone, they aren't content with a minimal input operation. As far as I'm concerned, if I own/lease the land, own the cows, and have the money and time to feed them, letting someone with embryos worth a few hundred dollars each is letting someone else's tail wag my dog. Don't undervalue your collective assets.