NIL Newsletter #148 | Title IX & NIL, Collective Disparities, NFL Draft & NIL, + ICYMI
Welcome to the NIL Newsletter by Optimum Sports Consulting - providing valuable, actionable NIL resources for student athletes, administrators, agents and other sport professionals.
Recapping NIL This Week:
NCAA President Baker Comments on Collectives + Title IX
New NCAA President Charlie Baker discussed possible issues regarding the affiliation of NIL Collectives with universities.
Because a majority of NCAA D1 universities are public and receive public funding, Title IX prohibits discrimination based on sex in those institutions—typically, this issue is implicated in athletic department spending and student-athlete scholarships.
President Baker believes that this prohibition can, and will, be extended to include collectives who are “affiliated” with universities who receive public funding.
“The Office for Civil Rights would say, right now, that if a a collective is affiliated — and there will be a discussion on what that means — then they need to be spending as much money on women’s sports as they spend on a men’s sports and as much money on on women athletes as they spent on men athletes,” Baker said.
Baker goes on to say that this issue in particular is one he hopes Congress focuses on for any future federal NIL regulation.
More on his comments is available HERE.
Survey of Collectives Shows Current Gap in Spending
On3 conducted a voluntary survey of over 60 collectives nationally in order to determine the number and proportion of female student-athletes supported.
Of the more than 60 groups solicited, only 23 returned responses.
Key Figures from surveyed collectives:
17 — average number of female athletes with deals per collective
23% — percentage of female student-athletes per collective
74 — most female athletes signed by one collective (Oklahoma-focused Crimson and Cream)
87% — highest percentage of female student-athletes (Creighton-focused Heart Mind Soul)
Although, on average, collectives would be out of compliance with Title IX, a number of collectives are already expanding to encompass a greater variety of sports and larger number of female student-athletes.
There are also female-specific collectives, such as the Lady Vol Boost Her Club at Tennessee, and the Who Rocks the House Collective at Utah.
Additional information is available HERE.
Experts Believe NIL Thinned Out NFL QB Draft Class
Jim Nagy, director of the Senior Bowl, initially believed that the 2023 NFL Draft would have too many late-round quarterbacks for its own good, hurting individual’s draft chances.
Instead, 20 senior quarterbacks decided to return to their schools or enter the transfer portal in the months leading up to this most recent NFL draft.
The most surprising was Bo Nix, who began his career at Auburn before transferring to Oregon for what most believed would be his last year.
Nagy projected Nix to be a second- or third-round pick, and in total, 11 projected draft picks returned to their schools or transferred.
One returning quarterback transferred to a new program, where he understood that he would make at least $1 Million dollars through the school’s collective.
One collective, according to unconfirmed reports, is building a quarterback fund of $200,000 to $500,000 — “essentially slotting a free-agent quarterback position and delegating funds for whenever that happens.”
Whether this year was an anomaly or the sign of a continued trend is unknown, but collegiate returns in the NIL era appear far more common than before.
More info is available HERE.
ICYMI Ticker
Dinkytown Athletics was announced as the official NIL collective of Minnesota Athletics. LINK
UCONN MBB Head Coach Dan Hurley on NIL: “I don’t want to lose a player because of [NIL], but I also don’t want it to be that a player comes here because they heard about our NIL.” LINK
Temple AD Arthur Johnson desires more alumni support on NIL: ““We have to embrace it, but we have to be OK with change. And it’s part of the new world. Ideally, for me, it would be used for retention more than recruitment. ... [But] we need support in the worst way.” LINK
The Florida Victorious collective announced it would match every donation it receives in May up to $2 Million. LINK
Texas QB Arch Manning (Yes, that Manning) doesn’t have any NIL deals, despite having a top 5 NIL valuation. The family’s stance is that Arch can’t have any NIL deals until he becomes a starter. LINK
Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt vetoed Oklahoma’s new NIL bill, along with 23 other bills, as he remains firm on tax cuts and educational reform as his primary priorities. LINK
The Michigan-focused Champions Circle collective launched with an endorsement from Head Coach Jim Harbaugh, and plans to support all 29 athletic programs. LINK