An insider tidbit on where Michigan is headed with NIL money
And a tidbit follow up:
https://twitter.com/DFF_Blizzard/status/1479547458527113225
Apparently Michigan is all-in now, intending to rival the schools that have gone all-in already with NIL.
p.s. this may have already been posted. but I couldn't find it on the board.
January 8th, 2022 at 3:24 AM ^
It was already posted a year ago when everyone said just wait until we unload the money cannon. Ill believe it when I see it. That is meant as no snark to you OP i just cant believe we sat on our hands this long. Every top 20 program has money. This is about coordination, planning, and utilizing resources. When Harbaugh came on the market we had a $9 million check written within 48 hours. Dont stop now. You got the best NFL coach that was out there go buy him the best free agents.
January 8th, 2022 at 3:43 AM ^
Maybe the Orange Bowl was the painful lesson needed to get off of our hands.
January 8th, 2022 at 12:28 PM ^
Hopefully the combo of the Orange Bowl and seeing A&M land the No. 1 recruiting class with NIL money did the trick.
January 8th, 2022 at 7:10 AM ^
There’s no doubt that we aren’t on the leading edge of NIL but we are absolutely doing well. Our backup QB and our 1B running back can’t stop giving money away. Cade has a deal with TB12. Jace Howard, as much as it makes my stomach turn, signed with Barstool.
On the other hand, this is where Courtney Morgan’s departure hurts us the most, IMO. His experience in the business side of things must have been extremely attractive to recruits. Gotta find a way to replace that
January 8th, 2022 at 8:14 AM ^
Sure, various players are making some money. But there doesn't seem to be the coordinated effort between boosters, businesses, and the AD like others have shown. They sure as hell had a head start, though, and Michigan is in serious catch-up mode. The UT OL is getting $50K each to be on the roster. ATM has a payroll for 2022 recruits in the $20-25M range.
That is a league Michigan doesn't even know exists, yet.
January 8th, 2022 at 12:10 PM ^
And this ^^^^ is why our Head Coach, who loves to compete, loves winning and hates losing is earnestly seeking to apply his world class skills on a more level playing field.
It would seem our administrators are struggling with the whole "leaders and best" concept. I wonder how they missed that part of their education.
January 8th, 2022 at 12:16 PM ^
But, but, Michigan Money Cannon!!!
/s
January 8th, 2022 at 10:48 AM ^
Barstool signs any athlete who applies and all Barstool does is send them free merchandise so that they can promote Barstool. I am now realizing that probably makes your stomach turn even more. My apologies.
January 8th, 2022 at 11:28 AM ^
"doing well"??? They will not let players use the Block M fergodsakes!!! That is not doing well. Why is there not a department for NIL to help players??? We have administrative departments for sooooo many things, but not this???
Doing well does not mean what you think it means!!!
January 8th, 2022 at 11:58 AM ^
The Block M is the holiest of holies. It is what the mouse is to Disney and the blue oval is to Ford. UM is hopefully studying usage of the M, maybe profit sharing arrangements, and any potential PR pitfalls.
All of it screams opportunity to me though and I’m hoping it won’t be squandered.
January 8th, 2022 at 12:13 PM ^
Preserving the logo isn't just an issue here. In all sports, unless you pay the team/league, the ad can't use the team or league logo. The school owns the logo, just like the athlete own's his/her NIL. You have to pay to use it.
And there are plenty of advertisers out there that you wouldn't necessarily want to see a block "M" showing up in their ads.
January 8th, 2022 at 3:45 PM ^
So you are telling me that all the other schools are also not letting their players use the school logo or wear their jersey with the logo??? Really, come on I HIGHLY doubt that. As much as I hate to say it about the school I went to and love, but for certain issues they need to dislodge their heads out of their collective asses.
January 8th, 2022 at 12:19 PM ^
If only we had a world renowned business school or high profile alumni business leaders to utilize.
January 8th, 2022 at 1:16 PM ^
Good comments, of course, B. But where Michigan seems to be lagging is having a coordinated system to have NIL resources available for recruits. That is, when recruit X visits, part of the information is the NIL package they will receive when they enroll. Teams like Texas A&M clearly already have this in place, and their system is running.
Michigan may not like the system, but they need it to remain competitive, or else they will fall behind teams they are currently above in recruiting.
It's free agency. Time to roll in the mud or bow out of contention.
January 8th, 2022 at 11:37 AM ^
The booster structure in place at places like A&M was already there because of the way they paid players before NIL. Nobody has what they had set up day one unless it was already happening under the table
January 8th, 2022 at 12:31 PM ^
Now, if we can just do away with admission standards we'll be a real football school.
/s
January 8th, 2022 at 1:13 PM ^
Cardale Jones and every buckeye agrees with this....
January 8th, 2022 at 3:24 AM ^
I would like Coach Harbaugh to stay, and for the university to do every permissible thing it can to give itself a competitive advantage on the recruiting trail.
January 8th, 2022 at 5:52 AM ^
I would settle for evening the playing field.
January 8th, 2022 at 12:00 PM ^
I would settle for not handicapping our athletic programs out of some misguided noble vision of what a student athlete should be.
January 8th, 2022 at 4:16 AM ^
NIL is the ultimate tool we can use to get over our recruiting disadvantages compared to the Georgias and Alabamas. The only school that can match our passion and rich fan base is maybe Texas and Texas A&M.
There is nobody else.
January 8th, 2022 at 4:31 AM ^
The only school that can match our passion and rich fan base is maybe Texas and Texas A&M
I bet there are substantial and meaningful differences between the Michigan and TA&M fanbases as to what they think a worthwhile expenditure of their own money is.
January 8th, 2022 at 5:28 AM ^
True, but a national title level Michigan brings off the field prestige benefits that could make it a good investment in the minds of affluent Michigan alumni.
And Michigan has been much more prestigious for a longer time than tamu, so that would also make up the difference. We just need a few leaders to well, lead the charge
Maybe one day mgoblog can become like texags. That site is amazing, I spend way more time there as a tamu grad student, even though my heart is still with Michigan undergrad
January 8th, 2022 at 8:27 AM ^
I've never visited that site, and I bet the vast majority here have not, either. Can you explain the differences? Do they have a UFR and high level content like FFFF and Neck Sharpies? Do they cover other sports more in depth? Are the writers better, or more connected? What makes that site "amazing" such that MGoBlog should strive to be more like it?
January 8th, 2022 at 11:48 AM ^
Check out their message boards for one. The design, layout, functionality, speed, everything is much better. They have a ton of paying customers, a team of writers, rent out a building in downtown college station etc.
I'm not shitting on mogoblog, I love Brian, and I really do hope MgoBlog reaches its potential one day.
January 8th, 2022 at 8:48 AM ^
And Michigan has been much more prestigious for a longer time than tamu
Not I the eyes of A&M grads. And trust me, there are plenty, enough not to make a noticeable difference, of affluent grads from there to ensure the right amount of prestige.
January 8th, 2022 at 1:21 PM ^
Correct. Early pay of A&M grads is less than UM but mid career and late pay is higher, primarily because of engineers employed in oil and gas and a growing Texas economy. It's a high value school: lowish tuition, good STEM education, high pay. Plenty of affluent grads with a great regional network effect.
January 8th, 2022 at 5:29 AM ^
(double post)
January 8th, 2022 at 8:38 AM ^
If you don't play the NIL game you become Fordham or Army football.
January 8th, 2022 at 9:28 AM ^
The Fordham Rams are still great. It's the pictures that got small.
January 8th, 2022 at 1:37 PM ^
Right because not playing the NIL game didn't get us a BIG Championship a #3 national ranking and a top 10 recruiting class.
Buy a clue.
January 8th, 2022 at 3:48 PM ^
So you're implying we have to win a conference championship and finish top 5 to get a top 10 recruiting class? That isn't going to happen every year.
TAMU didn't win a conference championship or finish top 5 to get their top recruiting class. A good NIL program can smooth that over for the years you don't get those kinds of finishes, which in turn improves the odds of getting those finishes.
January 8th, 2022 at 10:30 AM ^
It doesn’t matter what the overall fanbase thinks though. Just what the guys with deep pockets think.
January 8th, 2022 at 11:32 AM ^
Exactly.
And my boss always says, "we're committed to ensuring each of our employees is fairly and competitively compensated..." Easy to say and also easy to then not do. I think if JH leaves, it speaks volumes to the commitment or lack of commitment the AD has to this.
January 8th, 2022 at 11:48 AM ^
As someone who grew up in Texas, I can definitely tell you a TAMU alum would donate to a NIL fund before paying the mortgage or kid's tuition. If bagging Walter Nolen meant a few downgrades from single family homes to 2-bedroom garden apartments, they're doing it.
January 8th, 2022 at 8:22 AM ^
You're probably right that we have the most number of fans willing and able to regularly donate 1k to win. Maybe the most fans making 100k in MCOL areas and maybe overall. Don covered that we probably don't have as many fans willing to put 50% of their nonessential spending into the team. Really though, none of the little guys matter because it is about the big fish, where Don, as I'm sure he also means, points out they're willing to spend what they're willing to spend but not throw money away despite how much they have. A person with 1 billion dollars donating 1% of their money is 10 million dollars. Invested, a person can easily spend 4% of their current money each year, forever, even without a job, and of course many of these people still have a job. Phil Knight is worth 60 billion dollars, so every year if he wants to he can spend about a quarter of a billion dollars, sustainably before accounting for things like his job, accounting frippery (real estate), and 'why does it have to be sustainable again, I'm 83 years old?' That means Phil Knight alone can match the first $500 of donations per person if every single one of our 500,000 alumni chipped in every year. Of course, Oregon has 200,000 alumni of their own.
Michigan has our billionaires but we're far from alone in that. Oregon, A&M, Texas, Nebraska, Michigan State with two prominent names, Stanford with at least one that cares about sports (they share one of ours!)...the list goes on even just in prominent and historically successful football schools (plus MSU). The Walton family, of Walmart fame, have 3 of the 15 richest people on the Forbes list and all went to Arkansas, which also has football-crazed 8.5 billion net worth Jerry Jones (more than Stephen Ross by google's inaccurate estimate) and a rich football history. MSU has one that played for Izzo and another that owns professional sports teams, and they are business rivals in the same industry with functionally unlimited personal money so the word is they're competing over donating the most to MSU sports..
We talked about this in threads before NIL went live. Old days were about getting an extra $5,000 from the local car dealer and 2-5 more of them to participate than your rival. Then you added a zero and maybe a Nevin Shapiro for Miami for a few years here and there. If the wild west continues all it takes for a team is one billionaire to drown that out in an instant. Hell, Harvard has a 55 billion dollar endowment and 400,000 alumni if they really wanted to change the landscape...
Further, as always, if both schools have great coaches and similar offers, are more kids moving from the small town in Florida they've always known to Gainesville or all the way up to Michigan?
January 8th, 2022 at 8:42 AM ^
This is a great post.
The fact is that MANY schools will be able to have a big enough money cannon to fund NILs.
The separator will be which schools are willing to be most organized, efficient, willing to push the envelope, etc., in their approach and integration of NILs as a recruiting tool.
January 8th, 2022 at 11:49 AM ^
We don't have to be better than every other school in NIL to compete. We just need to compete on an fairly even footing.
We don't need to get every player. We just need to be competitive enough to land some of those guys that we always wind up in the top 2 or 3 for, and then the bag man sweeps them away at the last moment.
January 8th, 2022 at 5:14 PM ^
We don't have to be better than every other school in NIL to compete
We just need to be doing a great job in the NIL and if we are close the kids will choose the MICHIGAN brand who hold it in respect IMO
January 8th, 2022 at 1:28 PM ^
Wow. Great post! That’s spot on.
13 years here and only 300+ points.
We need more “greatness.” Please post more!
January 8th, 2022 at 5:39 AM ^
January 8th, 2022 at 7:08 AM ^
Why is there an assumption that UM is not full in on this already?
Just because there have been no public announcements, like some other places, does not mean big bucks are not being spent by donors - who may wish to remain anonymous.
McNamara got the money for OL gifts, and other players with the announced charitable donations, from someone.
January 8th, 2022 at 7:37 AM ^
I think that as a part of this arms race, you need to be transparent with how much you are loading in the cannon. This lets every recruit know how serious you are.
Donors don’t have to be identified, but Michigan needs to demonstrate that they will be savvy and relentless with how serious they are taking NIL
January 8th, 2022 at 10:03 AM ^
They don't need to be transparent with the public. They just need to be transparent with the recruits.
January 8th, 2022 at 8:04 AM ^
The one thing I assume as a Michigan fan is that the school is never going to be out front in seeing how far the rules can be stretched. No RR reference intended.
As far as NIL goes, I'm not surprised to hear little from the AD about their program. I would never assume that means they're disorganized or don't care about utilizing it. Rather, they have an unusually large segment of the fanbase that is stuck in the past, ready to object to anything that strays from the tradition of the football program or the school. I could make an RR reference here.
The important thing is developing an NIL program that they can sell to recruits, current players and donors. They can do that without a media campaign touting their efforts. My only fear is that the administration reflects the fanbase too much and the AD feels pressure from them too.
January 8th, 2022 at 8:18 AM ^
"Just because there have been no public announcements, like some other places, does not mean big bucks are not being spent by donors"
Donors/booster getting in on the NIL game is far short of Michigan being "full in on this already."
The fact that some Michigan players do currently have NIL deals is also no indication the Michigan's NIL approach is on the level that can win recruiting battles with the truely "all-in" schools.
Texas A&M has a $25-$30 million dollar NIL slush fund. Meanwhile, Michigan's starting QB got enough money to buy his OL winter coats...
And the ultimate proof that Michigan has a merely adequate, but not truly top-level, NIL game...is that Texas A&M is about to pull 8 top 50 recruits, while Michigan is getting 1 top 50 guy.
January 8th, 2022 at 10:26 AM ^
Of the 7 top 50 recruits A&M has on 247, 4 are from Texas, 1 from Tennessee, 1 from Arizona and 1 from Philadelphia.
Geography is still going to be play a role in recruiting. If UM does go full in on NIL to compete with the top recruiting schools, UM isn"t going to start pulling a lot of kids out of the south. UM will hopefully be able to win the battle for the midwest kids they want and pull a kid or two out of the south.
Using your reasoning, the good news is OSU probably hasn't gone full in on with NIL either because they only have 2 top recruits - and guess what OSU's 2 top 50 recruits are both from Ohio.
January 8th, 2022 at 11:13 AM ^
OSU pulls guys out of the SEC footprint. They have done well in Texas and California.
Lot of factors go into that. But it does prove that it is possible to pull top 100 difference makers to a Midwest name brand program.
On OSU’s current class…. Is it a sign that they are going to fall a bit behind the top 3 average recruiting level? They still have a monster class and several top 100 guys. But are they going to be just a bit less successful with top 50 the further Meyer is in the rear view mirror? Maybe. Too soon to tell.
January 8th, 2022 at 1:01 PM ^
A program that touts The Team 3X and adamantly believes in mixing the athletes into the on-campus student experience is not a likely leader with heavy compensation to student-athletes. Plus, the AD is widely, and deservedly, considered rule-following, traditional, conservative and stubborn. Add to the mix a couple of average or even below average recruiting classes to UM standards (no slight to the guys in the classes, but not a “fluke” like TAMU or collection of 5* where funds are really spent). And a school with major boosters and some who really like credit for funding athletics.
It all points to a cautious approach - and I am just guessing a reluctancy to leave the old ideals of college athletics.
January 8th, 2022 at 7:10 AM ^
The day we start doing what Texas A&M did, I'm done as a fan.
45 years down the drain as a die hard fan.
And the sad thing is none of this (NIL) had to happen...
Oh well, maybe I can find something else to be passionate about.