I keep hearing that ND is lagging in NIL money. Do we have facts to back that up, or is it just an assumption because of who BD is? I don’t doubt this assumption, but was curious if we have any actual inside info from either ND or recruits.
The best that I can describe it is that Texas A&M was ahead of the curve relative to everyone last year, but Texas also had some pretty bold initiatives. Most others didn't start having anyone step up with NIL "contracts" until this year, and didn't start throwing around promises until the end of last cycle. Now a handful of schools are mirroring their model but with more or less cash depending on the institution. Almost everyone has some sort of "collective."
ISD reported that there are some prominent former players and alums who are going to be the face of a sports marketing group // collective that is in the works. They said that there will be one that is focused on taking care of current players and one that is focused on prospective players, and that the one focused on taking care of current players is further along.
What I continue to hear is that ND's admin is the main thing holding back NIL money from flowing // the public announcement of one of these collectives. They do not want to do anything // approve deals that could be considered pay-to-play. ND seems to already be doing a decent job of putting infrastructure in place to take care of guys that are enrolled, because that's a lot easier to do without operating in a gray area. With regard to prospective athletes, it seems that they are being over cautious to establish that any money they get is from a "legitimate business interest" which becomes doubly difficult if the group offering the money were to be a Notre Dame based "collective" or "sports marketing" group. So I'm more skeptical about ND ever being able to do what Tennessee did for Nico, but I'm reasonably confident that they're going to establish a solid NIL program for current members of the team... which is pretty much the spirit and intent of how NIL was supposed to function.