{"id":54637,"date":"2024-06-04T21:38:49","date_gmt":"2024-06-05T02:38:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/?p=54637"},"modified":"2024-06-04T21:38:49","modified_gmt":"2024-06-05T02:38:49","slug":"new-alabama-qb-commit-keelon-russell-shares-thoughts-on-nil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/new-alabama-qb-commit-keelon-russell-shares-thoughts-on-nil\/","title":{"rendered":"New Alabama QB commit Keelon Russell shares thoughts on NIL"},"content":{"rendered":"

Four-star quarterback and top-100 recruit\u00a0Keelon Russell<\/a><\/strong> has been locked in with\u00a0SMU<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0since September.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday afternoon, the longtime Mustangs pledge flipped his commitment to Alabama<\/strong><\/a>. The move comes after he took his official visit to Tuscaloosa over the weekend. Florida<\/strong><\/a> and Ole Miss<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0were slated to land visits, but those have since been called<\/a> off. <\/p>\n

The 6-foot-3, 182-pound quarterback completed over 74% of his pass attempts for 3,267 yards and 35 touchdowns to just three interceptions in 2023 at\u00a0Duncanville<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0(Texas). Russell\u2019s commitment gives Alabama its first quarterback commitment of the Kalen DeBoer<\/a><\/strong> era. <\/p>\n

The No. 8 quarterback in the 2025 class, according to the\u00a0On3 Industry Ranking<\/a>, Russell spoke with On3 at last week\u2019s On3 Elite Series<\/strong><\/a> in Nashville about his views on NIL. He repeatedly said he could earn whatever money he wanted off the field from what he accomplished off the field. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m an honest believer that money is a thing as we go through this process, but the money that is talked about getting when you\u2019re on campus is the front-end money,\u201d the quarterback said. \u201cI\u2019m a firm believer that you\u2019re going to get millions of dollars on the backend. I believe you may start off at $400,000 one year and you may end up at $800,000. It doesn\u2019t really concern me because you got processes \u2013 the thing for me is getting to the next level.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe NFL is where I want to be. I know the NFL is going to give the right amount for me. It doesn\u2019t matter where I\u2019m at.\u201d<\/p>\n

Keelon Russell worried about Heisman, not NIL dollars<\/h2>\n

On3 offered<\/a> an anonymous survey to 41 blue-chip recruits at the On3 Elite Series to gain a better understanding of the NIL marketplace, with 36 opting-in. We granted them anonymity so they could be honest in their answers, delivering insights on what top prospects are looking for in their recruitments when it comes to NIL.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Of the 36 athletes surveyed, 33 listed the amount of money they wanted. The majority of desired\u00a0financial packages<\/a>\u00a0ranged from $200,000 to $600,000 per year, with the median at $400,000. The lowest recorded NIL offer wanted was $33,000.\u00a0More than 20 of the athletes asked to fill out the survey were rated as five-star recruits.<\/p>\n

Notably, 22 recruits provided details for the amount of money they desired and their largest NIL package to date. In a surprising outcome, 12 said they were content with taking less money than their largest NIL offer, which is 54% percent of the pool who answered both questions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Keelon Russell shares that philosophy. <\/p>\n

\u201cI really don\u2019t care,\u201d he said when asked about NIL. \u201cIf someone is offering $200,000 less than previous schools, I really wouldn\u2019t care because I\u2019m going to become the best I can be, and I\u2019m going to up the prices regardless. I\u2019m a firm believer that I\u2019m going to be a future Heisman winner. You got all these brand deals, dude, you can go into a school and flip $300,000 into $2 million.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dream NIL deal<\/h2>\n

Now committed to Alabama, Keelon Russell\u2019s top job will be to help recruit the rest of the Crimson Tide\u2019s 2025 class. While he can\u2019t profit off NIL yet because he\u2019s a high schooler in Texas, the quarterback has nearly 20,000 social media followers. <\/p>\n

He\u2019s already started to think about what his dream NIL brand would be. Russell said he\u2019d like to model at some point, similar to what former USC quarterback Caleb Williams accomplished in NIL. <\/p>\n

\u201cGucci, Louis Vuitton, Balenciaga,\u201d Russell said with a laugh. \u201cEven if I just got to throw on a pair of socks.\u201d<\/p>\n

The post New Alabama QB commit Keelon Russell shares thoughts on NIL<\/a> appeared first on On3<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Four-star quarterback and top-100 recruit\u00a0Keelon Russell has been locked in with\u00a0SMU\u00a0since September. On Tuesday afternoon,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54637"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54637\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54675,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54637\/revisions\/54675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}