Quick Slants with Uva: Some thoughts on NIL

1- NIL isn’t the main problem

Recently, the NCAA approved a proposed settlement that includes a revenue sharing model between schools and their players.

As I’ve said many times before, I’m all for student-athletes being able to get paid, and they legally can now. But without contracts, or the old rule of having to sit-out a year when you transfer as an undergrad, this won’t change anything. If anything, it’s only going to muddy the waters even more. NIL, alone, hasn’t been the problem. It’s NIL combined with loose transfer portal rules.

If schools are now going to be legally allowed to pay student-athletes then the next step should be implementing contracts by said universities to protect themselves. Perhaps the best thing that could come from this settlement is that it creates more dialogue as to why contracts at the college level should be considered.

2- NIL transparency

This is something that I’ve talked about in the past but it’s worth mentioning again. Especially with what we’re talking about today.

How much is a player truly making? This is a fair question that I’ve seen a lot on both TIF and on social media when it comes to how NIL money is being used.

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There’s a couple problems with being publicly transparent. The first, it shows other programs how much your deals are with your own players. The second, it can quickly divide a locker room.

What a lot of these college players are failing to realize is that NIL isn’t the same as cap space in the NFL. When Juice Wells left, I was told from sources that multiple South Carolina players reached out to the Gamecocks’ collectives wanting more money. It doesn’t work that way. And the reason I share that is because it’s an example of how uneducated a lot of these players and families are about how this all works.

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Currently what you have are some players telling other players how much they’re making in the locker room. In a lot of cases, that I’ve been told, they’re not making anywhere close to what they’re telling their teammates. That’s also happening throughout college football with a lot of these NIL deals. The majority of these players aren’t making nearly as much as what many think they are.

While this would open up a world of chaos, not only internally but externally as well, a part of me would like to still see it happen. In some way. What exactly that looks like, I still don’t have an answer.

3- NIL at the high school level

Earlier this week, the Florida High School Athletic Association voted to permit NIL deals for student-athletes. While Florida becomes the 31st state to approve NIL at the high school level, plus Washington D.C., they, unlike most other states, have an open enrollment policy. I’m not here to talk about the issues that could cause but instead just my overall thoughts on having NIL at the high school level.

Like college student-athletes, I’m all for anyone in this country being able to make money off their name, image, and likeness. In the big picture of all of this, this won’t impact many high school student-athletes. I mean really. Are you gonna all of sudden go to Marty’s Auto Shop because some 17-year-old high school quarterback who has been driving for a year tells you to do so? I don’t understand why a business would that but what do I know. Again, the majority of this law won’t impact the masses when we’re talking about these high school student-athletes.

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What worries me though is the impact it could have on players who’ll have people getting into their ears telling them what they should do. We already see it at the collegiate level and how it’s impacting guys who are in some cases 20 and over. What type of challenges could it create at the high school level when a kid’s brain is even less developed but they have perhaps the same amount of people telling them what they need to do?

For the states that have an open enrollment policy, this could essentially create bidding wars like we’re seeing with the transfer portal, with some players. It also distracts the player from keeping the main thing the main thing, especially during a time where he should be focused on just football and school.

I’m still wrapping my head around the whole thing and I’m sure I’ll have more pros and cons to add but these are just a few that have come to mind so far.

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