Shot ($$).
On Friday, a five-star recruit in the Class of 2023 signed an agreement with a school’s NIL collective that could pay him more than $8 million by the end of his junior year of college, The Athletic has learned. He’ll be paid $350,000 almost immediately, followed by monthly payouts escalating to more than $2 million per year once he begins his college career, in exchange for making public appearances and taking part in social media promotions and other NIL activities “on behalf of (the collective) or a third party.”
“The NCAA is toothless because the NIL is different in every state and there’s no oversight,” an ACC recruiting coordinator told On3. “The Power 5 conferences wanted autonomy, and they got it. They need to put rules in place. We were waiting for somebody to test the waters and do something big like this with NIL and collectives. We knew it was coming. But I never expected somebody to dive head-first in like this.
“I’m already longing for the days when you had to beat schools that were handing out cars to kids.”
In other words, we know what they are; we’re just haggling over the fee. And just when I think we’ve about reached the limit on stupid money in college sports, too.
I’m really looking forward to the day when Jimmy Sexton takes on his first recruit as a client.
So we don’t need the NCAA anymore right? I mean piss on em anyways. Unless it protects the women and all the terrible shit that has gone on, but I’m not smart enough to know these things.
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This WILL end well for some of the boys. For the sport we watch now? Not so much.
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“I never expected somebody to dive head-first in like this.” Of all the stupid things people have said, this is definitely one of them.
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It was so fucking painfully obvious yet most denied the reality that there was no other destination but here. The only thing that surprises me is the speed. I thought it would take a couple of cycles to get to really stupid. Turns out it took less than 1.
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Ozzy Man says destination fucked.
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Ozzy Man is funny as hell
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dive head-first in like this is putting lightly, dive in check book first is the only way to go now…#$$$$$NOWSANITYLATER…
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Any idea who the unnamed player is? The story I read suggests it is Texas and Arch Manning. I wouldn’t think he’d do that because money shouldn’t be that important to him.
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Nicholaus Iamaleava to UT is the rumor.
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So UT as in Tennessee and not Texas?
https://247sports.com/player/nicholaus-iamaleava-46101236/
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Also FWIW his twitter profile lists him as a “professional athlete” https://twitter.com/nico_iamaleava8?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
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Not what I envisioned.
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Yep, like who knew?
Who was out here warning you every single day that this is exactly where we’d land with NIL?
Who dammit?!?!!
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“Happy happy joy joy happy happy joy joy. I don’t think you’re happy enough. I’ll teach you to be happy. I’ll teach your grandmother to suck eggs. I told you I’d shoot, but you didn’t believe me. Why didn’t you believe me?”
Stinky Wizzleteats, of course. That’s who.
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We gotta get outta here before he releases the marmosets on us…
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Today in “Elvis is dead and I don’t feel so good myself.”
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Interesting if you read the article. No payment is contingent on the player actually signing with the school in question to avoid the NCAA’s rules or state law. The Athletic was allowed to read the contract in exchange for player and collective anonymity.
I would love to see said athlete sign somewhere else as a result.
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Yeah that will be the really funny thing. When Masterminds like Saban or Kirby tell a silent commit to torpedo a rival collective’s funds by taking the money, then signing with a rival.
“Nolan Smith is available for autographs at the Auburn Guthrie’s this weekend!”
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The old tale was that when Eric Dickerson showed up at SMU with a new Trans Am, everyone assumed that SMU had provided it. The rumor was that TAMU had provided it and then Dickerson flipped at the last minute. What was TAMU supposed to do? Ask for it back? Don’t know if that’s true or just an urban legend here in Texas, but I love the sound of it.
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Great RB’s and Trans Am’s, they go every where together….
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yeah, but iirc the contract allows thd collective to demand the money back plus 10%. My guess is that if the kid signs with Kentucky thd collective will use some other reason to declare a default. the athlete is supposed to do promotions for the collective and its clients. I will bet the collective won’t want another team’s qb and UT boosters won’t want another team’s qb endorsing so the collective will claim a default and want its money back.
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Yeah, it’s about over.
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Good for the players. They are finally getting theirs.
The losers: The coaches (have to share the same cash pool with more people); The schools (same as above); and us fans who like to pretend this enterprise still has the slightest thing to do with the schools and places we love.
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So, as a fan of the sport, you’re happy? You’re sad?
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I’ll just say I’m very, very, very relieved we finally got our NC last season
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Last I heard coaches’ salaries aren’t going down, schools aren’t losing contributors for season tickets (at least at UGA), and facilities aren’t falling into disrepair.
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Man I really hate NIL.
There needs to be some rules. Even the pro sports have a salary cap. If we are going to be paying players now then I don’t think laying down hard and fast rules is irrational. Right now it’s just who can hand over the larger bags of cash gets the recruits. For NIL proponents, is this what you wanted???
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You can’t have a salary cap without at least a limited antitrust exemption and a collective bargaining agreement.
As for your question, I don’t think it really matters what we wanted. It’s what the NCAA wanted that mattered. The waiter has now presented the check for that.
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Agreed and you can’t have a salary cap or a CBA without a recognized labor-management relationship
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Just a question, Biggen. What do you hate? I hated that AJ Green and Todd Gurley got suspended for practically nothing and those suspensions ruined 2 seasons as a result (thanks, Greg). I have no problem with Jordan Davis showing up on Morgan & Morgan billboards all over Atlanta. I have no problem with Davis and Nolan Smith showing up on Georgia dairy spots on social media.
The problem is the hard and fast rules will not stand up to judicial scrutiny under the Alston decision.
We’ll see if this works out for the players and the schools involved, but I don’t see Kirby and UGA sitting on the sideline while others do this. I tend to think the results from the combine and the draft results in late April are going to end up being just as (if not more) important than an NIL deal.
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I’m fine with all the situations you describe above. Those guys earned a reputation as good players. It’s the signing of NIL contracts with HS recruits where I am in “Wait and see” mode – feels slimy, but I may just be conditioned to feel that way. My feeling is just that this is enticement, which is still breaking a rule.
Now maybe this recruit has been solid with his commitment already and intends to enroll at this school and has been for years. He’s just getting his stuff ironed out early (Which is actually smart). There just isn’t really any way to know the difference. If they are serious about stopping enticement, some rules or timing restrictions need to be installed. It just will need to come from the schools/conferences, because the NCAA wont touch it.
I do wonder if the conferences will align eventually to make rules against collectives using donations for funding NIL deals. If people are donating to collectives, maybe less money gets to the school? If we have private businesses coordinating part of recruiting, will coaching salaries go down?
Very interesting time to be a college football fan.
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I’ll admit I think this is slimy and dumb. When coaches don’t deliver, these guys are going to find out really quickly that these collectives were a really bad idea.
When UGA comes to ask for a donation to a collective, I’ll be saying, “Go pound sand.”
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yeah, but iirc the contract allows thd collective to demand the money back plus 10%. My guess is that if the kid signs with Kentucky thd collective will use some other reason to declare a default. the athlete is supposed to do promotions for the collective and its clients. I will bet the collective won’t want another team’s qb and UT boosters won’t want another team’s qb endorsing so the collective will claim a default and want its money back.
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What I want is for Stetson Bennett to be able to participate in the endorsement market with the same restrictions that Kirby Smart and Nick Saban have, meaning that he can get what the market determines. If $8 million for the name, image and likness rights is too much then the market can take care of that.
I recall Governor Kemp’s 2018 ads supposedly blowing up regulations in his backyard. It is inconsistent to be against regulations on the market except for college athletes.
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I agree that the current path doesn’t end well and I don’t see anyone wanting to slow it down. The NCAA doesn’t want to recognize players as employees. Also, the NCAA doesn’t want to and/or is unable to regulate the NIL current rules. IF liability is a big reason the NCAA doesn’t want to recognize players, NIL is a convenient way for NCAA member schools to have “independent contractors” without the employee-employer dynamic.
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The NCAA wouldn’t be their employer.
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True, at most schools it would be the Athletic Association. Would it be more appropriate to say that AAs don’t want to be player employers, therefore the schools don’t want it, ergo the NCAA doesn’t want it?
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I find peace in that at least the Dawgs again before all of this BS sticks a fork in the heart of my love for the game.
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Amen to that. Glad we finally got a championship before this.
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The kid may still be a minor, thus the confidentiality. Wouldn’t mind being his trustee or conservator.
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I smell a Haslam.
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Thank Gawd we are the reigning National Champion. Bitchez.
College football as we know it is cratering. With the upfront money comes all kinds of negative consequences. Grab the popcorn and enjoy the carnage.
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Just think of it as a clever form of wealth redistribution. Wealthy alums get to funnel the proceeds of a decade of increasing asset prices into their hobby and Black students athletes get a piece of an ever growing pie.
What’s not to love.
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It brings to mind a song:
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I really love to see stupid greedy bastards get their comeuppance. I love that the little guys who work for a livin are going to get a piece of the pie. I despise the entire education establishment as a group of small minded Esaus, having sold their virtuous birthright to buy kowtowing elite licking porridge. I’m glad that UGA got the last somewhat untarnished trophy. We’ll see if I can stomach what college football becomes, I suspect I can…
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At least this will bring more parity to… the teams that already have the most to spend.
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Believe me the states that have hamstrung their schools will be repealing their rules ASAP. If every school has a “Collective” and it is now in the recruiting business, the schools will be losing millions of the dollars that would have been going into the AA. Not only that but the people whose names are on new buildings might just be the only school donors left. If I can be a collective donor and get to pick a player spokesperson, or just get good seats at the stadium, which are no longer deductible, I’ll help my business a lot more with the spokesperson. Now UGA just has to figure out if this is going to help any other sport but football.
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College football had a good run.
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I don’t believe the number of 8 million dollar agreement. Until somebody shows me the contract and the first payment of $350,000, I think it’s all baloney. And a contract doesn’t even mean the kid is actually paid. Finally, how do you make a deal like that when a team has 22 first stringers.
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When you look at it objectively and with an elementary ability to see the current world with a modicum of reality, who could have possibly NOT seen this coming. THIS is the world we live in. Money rules. With zero guidelines or enforcement, money rules absolutely! This is only the beginning, it will really hit the fan before we know it. I remember the angst of some over booing of the coaching staff being misconstrued by the players as being directed toward them. Justifiably unfair, these are kids who are unpaid to play. Is it now going to be acceptable to boo an 18 year old millionaire who is not playing up to his salary? Just one of many wonderful questions to ponder now that we’re in a pay to play era. I’m so happy we got a title before it truly becomes NFL Jr. Just my probably not worth two cents.
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That’s not even the crazy part. The contract doesn’t even mandate he sign with a particular school!
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I think a good lawyer could get around that pretty easy. If the kid signs a collective contract with Tennessee for example, it could have a clause stating the the kid will have to be available to be in Knoxville for appearances every Saturday in September, October and November. That would be impossible if the kid then flipped to UGA.
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Not with his NetJets lease 🤣
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This is what you wanted, right, Senator?
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Being somewhat lucid on a Saturday night is a rarity for me, Chop… But I don’t think it’s a surprise to anyone this is where it headed. That said, I’m pretty sure Blutarsky and I are in the same camp that the NCAA could have headed it off to everyone’s benefit by not being so collectively tone deaf/stupid/stubborn/greedy/myopic/self-righteous/Icouldkeepgoingbutyougetmypoint by actually doing something proactive and setting some NIL compensation standards BEFORE the courts nutted them. Serves the fuckers right, but I really hate what it has done and will do to “Amateur” university level competition in all sports.
Fucking Idiots.
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While I understand the sentiment, I am not sure what mechanism the NCAA could have used for setting and enforcement of NIL compensation standards. I think there is a perception that if the NCAA would have just allowed a little, it wouldn’t have led to the current situation. I think it may have slowed it but how can an organization that couldn’t stop “under the table payments” be able to stop allowed legal methods of paying players under the umbrella of NIL.
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I think it would be more accurate to say that the host steadfastly avoided concerning himself with this eventuality. Acknowledging or defending this end would have run counter to the argument that NCAA bad in all things. You can’t argue that there is no justification, moral or practical, for the ncaa to have, or enforce, the ban AND also point to a possible justification for the ban now can you?
The ONLY thing the NCAA had to fall back on were the politicians to give them an anti-trust exemption which was never happening in this political environment. Instead the politicians gave us just the opposite in the form of state to state NLI legislation.
The turn from everything will be ok in the NLI world, to the ncaa could have avoided all this is consistent with the ncaa bad in all things argument but not much else.
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chop, all I’ve wanted was for the NCAA to quit rigging the market. I would be perfectly happy with any form of a fairly negotiated framework that both sides had the opportunity to fashion.
What we’ve got now is the obvious result of an organization that refused to see what was coming and get out in front of it. Now, after getting body slammed by the SCOTUS, the NCAA is literally afraid to look the wrong way at NIL compensation.
I can’t say what we’ve got is exactly what I wanted, but I can say it’s better than what we had when the NCAA was acting as an illegal cartel.
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An “illegal cartel” whose terms were happily accepted by thousands of athletes over decades of time.
Now, what we’ve got is a frenzied scramble into vast godless territories from which college football will never return.
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“Happily”? Gee, you’d think those grateful wretches would turn down these new opportunities, then.
Those terms were happily accepted by millions of fans over decades of time who didn’t want to see the sausage being made.
BTW, what’s with the scare quotes around illegal cartel? SCOTUS not definitive enough for you?
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Those terms were happily accepted by millions of fans over decades of time who didn’t want to see the sausage being made. I tend to think we are rapidly approaching the time when NIL will also fall into the “not wanting to see the sausage being made” category.
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That was the problem. The alternative presented to the “illegal cartel” in the form of NLI deregulation wasn’t a better destination. I tried to advocate for a workable solution but I was repeatedly told that was unnecessary because all would be fine in the land of NLI in spite of the obvious.
An across the board stipend is the answer…. Was then. Is now.
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How is an across the board stipend a workable solution without a limited antitrust exemption and a CBA?
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I’m no expert, but if the ncaa allowed each conference to set an across the board stipend that was based in some reality (tied to a percentage of tv revenue as an example) and each conference could compete to be more attractive to the next for prospective student athletes and the ncaa explained to the courts what today looks like back then, I’d think it would have a chance to pass scrutiny. But again, I’m no expert.
Even if failing in court tho the politicians would see how small a carve out is required and may have given it to the ncaa then OR, failing that, may be willing to give it to them now after seeing the clusterfuck that is unregulated NLI. If all failed the NCAA would still have credibility with someone rather than no one. Couldn’t hurt.
What we couldn’t do, in my view, was deregulate NLI and pretend that the result would be superior to status quo.
(I would also advocate raising admissions standards closer to that of the rest of the student body as the disconnect contributes to viewing players as entertainers (employees) rather than students. No reason a lot of these guys can’t go juco and put pressure on public high schools to do their damn jobs.)
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I’m not sure I understand what you’re suggesting, so I’ll ask instead of arguing. 😉
When you say “if the ncaa allowed each conference to set an across the board stipend that was based in some reality”, they already do that, as long as it’s somehow tied to academics. The courts have blessed that and even imposed a financial limit on the payment amount. Are you suggesting that schools engage in straightforward pay to play now? I haven’t heard that’s a bridge they’re willing to cross.
Further, are you suggesting this as an outright replacement for NIL compensation, or simply as a means of making NIL compensation less attractive to college athletes? Nothing wrong at all with the latter, but if the former is the case, you’ve just thrown the NCAA right back into the antitrust fire, assuming no antitrust exemption/CBA, that is.
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I would call it a “revenue sharing” plan. It recognizes that student athletes generate a ton of revenue AND that getting a degree while participating in sports requires a great deal more time and effort than the regular student body, in general. It also treats each scholarship athlete the same no matter the sport or position.
In short, my plan eliminates inequities, real and perceived. It incentivizes a conference to offer as much as possible to prospective athletes. It permits enforcement of direct pay to play arrangements between prospect and booster. It isn’t NFL-lite. Its a new arrangement between schools and student athletes that involves $ which is not that much different that nutritionists, fancy locker rooms and decked out weight rooms.
I’m not suggesting any administrator has proposed or endorsed this plan. I made it up and as such have only seen it here….repeatedly, and as you’ve made clear, ignored. I am, in spite of that, arguing my plan’s superiority to either the prior or current status quo.
As far as its legality, as I said, I’m no expert. I do find it more defensible in court and a more salable plan to Congress than “we’re the ncaa and we’d like a law that lets us do whatever we want.”
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I wasn’t questioning your label or that you believed in your plan. “… a new arrangement between schools and student athletes” suggests some sort of an agreement between the sides and with that I am wholeheartedly on board. But we are a long way from the NCAA and the schools embracing such an approach.
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I don’t know who “the other side” will ever be though. If one existed my plan would probably easily lead since most athletes would be content with a guaranteed check over the whims of the marketplace.
Who would make up “the other side?”
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The NCAA would have to recognize a players organization.
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