Will Johnson signs 'historic' NIL deal
On3 Consensus five-star cornerback and Michigan Wolverine signee Will Johnson has inked a multi-year NIL deal with AFB Hospitality Group.
https://www.on3.com/news/5-star-michigan-recruit-will-johnson-signs-historic-nil-deal/
Good for him!
Hopefully this puts to rest the "Michigan doesn't do NIL deals well" narrative.
I highly doubt this deal is anything close to what you are seeing at some of the bigger programs.
Based on what?
Honestly, based on how Michigan has done things on nil.
March 29th, 2022 at 10:50 AM ^
How have we "done things"?
Not enough to reel in guys who want lots of money and are 5 stars. thats the most blunt way to say it. We want 5 stars who want lots of money.
March 28th, 2022 at 10:31 PM ^
I was not aware that Michigan was one of the "smaller" programs.
Based on the fact that he signed a deal to promote two restaurants, that's it. How big could it possibly be?
March 29th, 2022 at 10:20 AM ^
You do understand that NIL is being used to pay players to play for their school... The deal of what they do for the money or the type of company paying them doesn't really mean much.
March 29th, 2022 at 12:21 PM ^
Actually, it does, at least to a certain extent. NIL has rules and guidelines in place, and deals have to be deemed as reasonable, both in terms of market value and in regard to what the player agrees to do in exchange. Further, all NIL deals have to be passed through compliance. There are legally binding components in play with NIL, not just NCAA rulebooks.
It's still pretty wild west stuff at this point, but there are more strictures to it than people think. Throwing egregiously large sums of money at a player with little in return will raise some big red flags.
NIL is simply a beard to pay players. Any rules for NIL are a sham used to justify the notion that the players are not being paid directly.
M will, of course, follow the meaningless NCAA rules scrupulously. Some schools will use NIL to pay players and circumvent the sham NCAA rules.
I fall emphatically on the side of paying the players out in the open.
Who is enforcing these rules and guidelines? The NCAA? Because I doubt they enforce anything given their track record of ambivalence and getting their ass kicked in court. If they tried to say a certain deal wasn't "reasonable" and it goes to court and they lose, which they likely would, then they lose all semblance of having control. You can't really prove a contract is unreasonable if both sides are happy about the contract. As long as it's not illegal, no court is going to care about the NCAA's opinion. If some TAMU booster thinks his million dollar payment to a star QB for an IG post is "reasonable", what court is going to overturn that? You are worth what the market says you're worth.
"Bigger Programs" lol
If it's thinly concealed make-work efforts to hand out the traditional 200,000 simoleon payments, then I imagine you're right. And it's also true--and worth noting by those who think that Michigan could, if it got organized compete--that we will probably never match those schools grift for grift. One reason some of us have looked with more skepticism on these developments. . .
March 29th, 2022 at 10:48 AM ^
Man, don't you know that we are ten years behind all our peers on NIL - even though it's only been in existence since last summer!
There were a couple NIL tidbits I found interesting from the Bussin' With The Boys interviews.
1. Harbaugh basically said he supports NIL but is not going to be enticing players to come to school here based on X and Y promised deals. AKA - we won't see Michigan go the Texas A&M route.
2. Zak Zinter and Trevor Keegan basically said they had no (or very few) NIL deals. They did say they released a children's book through the MDEN which is pretty cool.
3. Corum has had much more success and made over 6 figures last year.
This is good information. It's too bad that program-relevant items like this cannot be disseminated here since the media company it comes from is verboten according to the rules of the board.
Seth covered this a while back. I think Barstool stuff is okay if it's actual news. Their issue was with the early Barstool days where everything was rumors or sexist jokes. But Barstool is too big to not allow some of their interview/news stuff to be posted. Bussin' with the Boys being a prime example of relevant content that you can post here.
You assert many things without evidence. I see no MGoBoard statements from Seth that Barstool stuff is fine to be posted if it's actual news. The Moderator Action Sticky continues to list Barstool on the banned list, with no qualifications or exceptions.
There was a thread on the relevant Bussin' with the Boys episode which was removed just one week ago. Moderator rob f commented on it in the sticky. Unless there has been a change in the last 7 days, anything from the site is against the rules. To the extent newsy items will be allowed, it is clearly on an exception basis which is a long ways away from "okay if it's actual news."
Jesus. Who are you, Horatio Caine? He left a comment in a thread a couple of weeks ago that featured a Barstool link. The person who created the post even mentioned the Barstool ban but since it was relevant news Seth said it was fine and gave context to the Barstool stance. Do you want me to go back and find it or can you handle that on your own?
Here's your evidence you lawyerin' hardo.
https://mgoblog.com/mgoboard/are-bans-certain-writers-and-publications-becoming-counterproductive-site
I'll ignore the insults.
Thank you for the link, though I wish you could have sent me directly to the relevant comment instead of making me read through over a hundred mostly irrelevant ones.
Again, your relationship with truth is tenuous, since you say that thread features a barstool link, when there are actually no links that I see, only random references. The "feature" of the thread is Ranier Sabin and the Freep, not barstool.
Seth's comment does indicate that he's open to allowing certain barstool-sourced news items to stay on the board, however that was a somewhat off-handed remark a month ago. I put more stock in the rules as written still on the Mod action sticky, and as they were enforced within the last week, which I pointed to above.
Unless Seth changes his rules in the Sticky and/or FAQ, one can only conclude Barstool content is still expressly and universally banned.
March 30th, 2022 at 12:19 PM ^
Do you ever read your comments and realize how pedantic you sound? I'm sorry you had to scroll so much to find out you were wrong. I'm sorry I didn't remember every detail of a thread from a month ago. I'm sorry you don't like that Seth's comment doesn't jive exactly with the board rules that you clutch so closely to your chest. Lighten up man. I just pointed out that Seth said he doesn't care that much about Barstool if it's newsworthy and you go make whole thing about it. Just lighten up man, it's a Michigan message board.
Hope for more of that for him and other players.
What do you think an NIL deal with Hooters in Taylor, MI is worth?
Lifetime wings and a pair of orange booty shorts.
What more could you want?
The shirt. I want the shirt.
WHOOOOAAAA NILLLLL-EEEE!
God help us all if anything ever happens to this man!
I hope he is enjoying retirement
March 28th, 2022 at 11:34 PM ^
^^^ Nicely done, I log in just to catch up on Keith Jackson accolades.
I'm all for the student-athletes getting paid and this appears to be great news for Michigan recruiting, but I still wish the Athletic Department had a way to spread the wealth to the kids in the non-revenue sports, too---or am I missing something in the big picture?
It's money for an individual's name, image, and likeness though -- not for a team or sport.
I worded that poorly, a better way to ask/restate my question is to ask if the AD is adequately coordinating with local NIL endorsement/business opportunities for everyone; in other words, "spread the wealth" by giving all athletes opportunities, large and small.
While I believe there's a sizable # of student-athletes to whom earning a bit of spending money is low priority (or no priority at all), I also believe there to be numerous young men & women of Michigan (especially in sports that don't award full-time scholies) who do deserve opportunities to reap some above-board benefits.
March 28th, 2022 at 10:49 PM ^
I'm not educated enough on NIL rules rob f so it tough to have an opinion for me here.
So, if I were company "A" and wanted to throw a butt load of money at just one recruit/player and company "B" wanted to spread it out, can the AD say "no" you have to spread it out as we say?
That would be very difficult for me, as a company fronting the capital, to do any type of ROI. A tennis ball supplier would have very difficult goals as say a restaurant needing a local celebrity endorsement.
Not disagreeing with you, just trying to understand how it works.
March 28th, 2022 at 10:50 PM ^
pretty sure they all have that opportunity, but if athletes aren't in a high profile sport, they aren't likely to attract much attention.
I did read somewhere that one of the top expected NIL winners is supposed to be a Womens gymnast out of LSU. So the opportunity is there for the taking.
March 29th, 2022 at 12:30 PM ^
The LSU gymnast and the sisters who play basketball all got big deals right off the bat.
women athletes have appeal for NIL as they can have large social media followings making them ideal for posting endorsements. Isn’t it Joey Velasquez on the FB teal whose gf has millions of Tik Tok followers?
March 28th, 2022 at 10:52 PM ^
What would be the benefit for a company to give students like that some money? It’s not like there is an unlimited pot of gold. The Michigan degree is the benefit for those student athletes that outweighs other universities.
I absolutely agree that everyone should be able to reap the benefits of NIL, but the fact of the matter is that a member of the men's golf team, or the women's field hockey team, is not in a position to be courted for these opportunities like members of the football or basketball team will be.
Most of the sports on Michigan's campus are not high profile sports (as in, do people within the Michigan student body, much less within the city of Ann Arbor or the state as a whole, know who the members of the team even are?), and in most cases they are non-revenue sports. So the demand to put members of those teams on advertisements or include them as part of a company's brand just isn't there like it would be to pull in Will Johnson, Blake Corum, McCarthy, Dickinson, etc.
Is it fair? No, it isn't. But unfortunately that's just the way it is. I hope Michigan hires some folks for its NIL program who are creative and savvy enough to find ways to generate opportunities for the folks on non-revenue sports teams, but by their very nature, those opportunities are going to be much harder to come by. In a fair world they wouldn't be, but you have to find a way to create demand for them.
The NIL law passed in Georgia did exactly what you are asking: allowed the schools to pool the NIL endorsement money, so that the wealth would be spread among all athletes, instead of being concentrated among the select few: the stars in certain sports.
The law was widely (and in my opinion, unfairly) criticized and as far as I know, the pooling arrangement was not adopted by any major university in the state. Based on the reaction to that, I would be surprised if any school put any significant effort into getting deals for the 80% (assuming it's a Pareto distribution) of athletes that would not generate business interest on their own.
March 29th, 2022 at 11:12 PM ^
Sounds like flat-out Commonism. Wadn' gonna fly in Georgia.
Our little league team held a car wash at the Pizza Hut to raise money to go to state(humble brag), maybe they could look at something like that?
Kudos.
Nvm.
March 28th, 2022 at 11:23 PM ^
It's not Michigan-specific, but that's the idea behind Team Fan Club, right? That was plugged on the MGoPodcast back in October or November, IIRC.
March 28th, 2022 at 11:37 PM ^
NIL is the best thing that could happen to non-revenue sport athletes because during college is probably the time they are most likely to be able to make money of their image or likeness. Some of the biggest winners have been womens basketball players, volleyball players, etc.
A certain high profile Sparty alum, pays a $500/mo stipend to EVERY football player on the roster, walk-ons included (happen to know one of said walk-ons who is receiving this). I think this an example of what you are talking about, and where Michigan definitely needs to play catch-up.
Feel free to start paying the players a stipend then.