Does NIL = Wins, Air Max Day & NIL Compliance Mailbag | NIL Blitz: Mar. 25 - Mar. 31

Knew you'd be back - thanks for checking out the Blitz. Today's lineup is a healthy mix of commercial and collective plus NIL activations from the pinnacle of college basketball to the small college scene in the NAIA.

Come get your fill!

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1. LISTEN: "How March Madness became a 'Tryout for NIL' ??
2. $weet $ixteen ??
3. Division Street on Your Feet ??
4. Do NIL Earnings Correlate to Wins? ??
5. NIL Compliance Mailbag ??

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1. LISTEN: "How March Madness became a 'Tryout for NIL' ??

If you're a regular here you know I don't want this to become a regurgitation of miscellaneous news (which I hope it hasn't been in your experience!) - but this week I can't help but amplify this short pod from Front Office Sports featuring Blake Lawrence .

Here is my "political debate fact checking" style review of the episode...

?? Dartmouth Men's Basketball Unionization

"Key phrase is athlete empowerment. Anyone that works to serve athletes just knows that they need to have a platform and a stage to share their thoughts, opinions, wants and wishes... the end result, again, is years away."

• Three weeks back, the team voted 13-2 in favor of joining SEIU Local 560. Expected, Dartmouth declared they would not recognize the union. Many believe this case could snowball as far as the Supreme Court. More context on why they want be a union here.

?? Collective Bargaining

"I believe that collective bargaining benefits the school and conferences in sports media entities way more than it benefits student-athletes."

• In a professional model, though star athlete salaries might make college coaches earnings look like chump change. The restrictions in place, however, are much more restrictive than the current "unrestricted free agency" that many akin the college realm to be today. More on that here.

?? The General NIL Environment

"Lunch money versus living money. Lunch money comes through everyday NIL activities that athletes are doing appearance for a couple hundred bucks here and there - and then there's the living money side of it where athletes are earning tens of thousands of dollars a month."

• Lunch money is relative - are you on the McDonald's dollar menu or are you getting prime rib? It all varies by athlete. This same concept applies across leagues, too. Here is a breakdown of what lunch money and living money looks like from Power 5 to Division 3.

Short podcast but tons of great snippets in here - give it a listen here.

2. $weet $ixteen ??

We received the following inquiry last week from David Fahrenthold at the New York Times regarding the men's basketball front: do you have any updated figures on athlete earnings from collectives?

We sure do, thanks for asking!

• At top schools, the average men’s basketball player with a collective contract is paid $63,450, and the average women’s player $10,610
• The average starter at a big-time football program now takes in about $147,295 a year
• This year, Opendorse expects to process over $130 million in payments for athletes, with just over 80 percent coming through collectives

*NOTE: in MBB alone, there has been a 71% growth in earnings from the fall. As noted last week, the market is experiencing record highs that are expected to continue well into the summer.

The NYT folks spun the article into an interactive highlight of the various way the men's Sweet 16 teams pulled in their earnings which you can check out here.

(For fans of small college hoops, a quick stat for you is that MBB earnings account for 19% of all activities at the D3 level, the largest share of any sport.)

(For fans of women's buckets, there's no question the big news is Epsilon's deal which was offered nationwide.)

Shoutout to Brant Haupt and the Data team for always being ready to answer these requests. Public NIL figures can be spottier than airplane wifi, so it is comforting to know we can draw from a consistent database of 150K+ real transactions.

3. Division Street on Your Feet ??

Jumping on to celebrate NIKE's Air Max Day, Oregon's NIL Collective Division Street co-released exclusive Air Max 1 “University Of Oregon” through GOAT starting on March 26. Selling for $220, the funds are aimed to support the Collective's efforts.

As if you couldn't expect the details would be pristine, according to SneakerNews, even the QR code on the box leads to the Ducks Of A Feather website, a Division Street sub-label that produces apparel and accessories by Oregon student-athletes.

Not every Collective has a Phil Knight in their corner, but it's hard to ignore this as one of the most unique fundraising efforts to date. Looking forward to hearing the impact of it.

4. Do NIL Earnings Correlate to Wins? ??

This is the million-dollar question skeptical fans and donors are asking, right? Does all this NIL activity actually help chalk up W's?

If you're asking University of Providence women's basketball head coach, Bill Himmelberg, he'll tell you yes. The Argonauts are coming off of their most successful season yet which falls in line with their buy-in to the new NIL game. "NIL certainly made a difference in recruiting," Himmelberg said.

But this is an NAIA school in the middle of Montana we're talking about - did Phil Knight take a grad class out there and we don't know about it? Where is the NIL funding coming from?

According to 406 MT Sports, "Himmelberg’s resources as owner/operator of McDonald’s in Great Falls" allow the Argos to be compensated on a semester basis for promotional work for the restaurant. It is estimated that "six Providence players work 10 to 15 hours per week in his McDonald’s franchises, a job that earns them up to $3,500 per year".

So this side gig at McDonald's is supposed to be the difference maker for their program? Again, if you ask coach he would say a resounding yes. “I’m talking to three girls right now [in recruiting] I couldn’t talk to if we didn’t have NIL money.”

In last summer's Opendorse annual report, women's basketball showed a moderate correlation (0.587) between winning percentage and average NIL compensation at the NCAA Division I level. Knowing that resources can vary even more greatly at a small college level, I wouldn't be surprised if the correlation is even stronger in the Argos' case.

5. NIL Compliance Mailbag ??

The people's segment - the NIL Compliance Mailbag is back again this month! Here are three doozies from the past thirty days...

Q: Can an athlete post while on the road for the tournament?

A: Yes. I hope you've seen the plethora of examples by now, including gems like Jack Gohlke's deal with TurboTax coming to you live from his hotel hallway. However, this might not be as straightforward as you think.

The NCAA's October '22 guidance prohibits NIL activities from taking place while student-athletes are on call for required athletically related activities (e.g., practice, pre- and postgame activities, celebrations on the court, press conferences). Was Gohlke's video recorded under RARA? Depending on how strictly you interpret NCAA Bylaw 17, which defines RARA to include "(h) Travel to and from away-from-home competition", then one may consider time in the hotel to be "on-call". Comes down to the compliance officer's decision.

But I will add, as we're now approaching the end of our third tournament, I can only think of one example of an institution persuading a student-athlete to wait on executing their NIL deal while on the road. For the most part, compliance officers have viewed that period in the hotel to be personal time, not falling under RARA. Food for thought that all go into the stew which is navigating NIL during March.

Q: Can a conference share NIL-related content on their channels?

A: Yes; however, the will be calculated if/when doing so. When you consider promotions from the USOPC, they include athletes from a variety of sports. Pro leagues do the same. Having a governing body seemingly favor one team over another doesn't help their optics. So while no rules currently prohibit a conference from leveraging its media assets to promote student-athlete NIL, it would like take the right, equitable opportunity to find favor.

Q: Under NCAA guidance, if a coach's spouse is a minority owner in a business, can that business donate to a collective?

A: Yes; spouse questions are fun. Per usual, the October '22 guidance is the north star when it comes to involvement of institutional staff and it does not describe any prohibitions on spouses.

Additionally, we are aware of several other spouse connections to collectives (e.g., one institution's MMR rep's spouse operates their collective). This background combined with the fact that the individual is only a minority shareholder in the business provides a fair amount of separation.

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Last Wednesday marked the 1,000th day of the NIL era. Phew.

I debated posting a list of one thousand NIL stories for one thousand days... but I don't have time for that (and you don't have the attention for it). Maybe for the 2,000th day ??♂

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